Comparison

Read two legal systems against each other

Because every portal follows the same fifteen-section outline, the comparison is genuinely like-for-like rather than a collage of whatever each government happens to publish.

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Comparison of selected legal systems
Attribute	ParaguayReviewed	HaitiReviewed	UgandaReviewed	MadagascarReviewed
Legal family	Civil law	Civil law	Mixed (common law and customary law)	French civil law with customary law
System of government	Unitary presidential republic	Unitary semi-presidential republic	Unitary presidential republic	Semi-presidential republic
Constitution	Constitution of the Republic of Paraguay	Constitution de la République d'Haïti	Constitution of the Republic of Uganda	Constitution of the Fourth Republic
In force since	1992	1987	1995	2010
Capital	Asunción	Port-au-Prince	Kampala	Antananarivo
Official languages	Spanish, Guaraní	French, Haitian Creole	English, Swahili, Luganda	Malagasy, French
Currency	Paraguayan guaraní (PYG)	Haitian gourde (HTG)	Ugandan Shilling (UGX)	Malagasy ariary (MGA)
Population	6,900,000	11,600,000	48,600,000	30,300,000
Division of powers	Unitary with seventeen departments and the capital district, each with an elected governor and departmental board holding administrative and limited fiscal competence. Legislative power is national.	Unitary with constitutionally recognised decentralisation to 10 departments, arrondissements and communes, and to the communal section as the smallest territorial unit. In practice the elected local bodies are largely unfilled and replaced by appointed interim commissions.	Presidential system with a Prime Minister, a unicameral Parliament, and a judiciary in which the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal (sitting also as the Constitutional Court) and High Court form the superior courts.	Unitary with a decentralised structure of 23 regions and communes. Successive constitutions have promised fuller decentralisation, including provincial autonomy, which has not been implemented.
How law is made	Bills may start in either chamber and must pass both. The President may object in whole or part; Congress overcomes an objection by absolute majority in both chambers. Constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds vote of each chamber and ratification by referendum; wholesale reform requires a constituent assembly.	Under the 1987 Constitution bills pass both chambers and are promulgated by the President, who may return a text once for reconsideration. With Parliament not sitting, measures have been issued as executive decrees since 2020 — a practice widely criticised as lacking constitutional foundation, and a key reason to check the current status of any recent instrument before relying on it.	Bills receive three readings with committee scrutiny; certificates of financial implication are required for money bills. The President assents, returns the bill twice with recommendations, or it becomes law if passed a third time by two-thirds.	Bills originate with the government or members of either chamber, are examined in committee, and must pass both the National Assembly and the Senate; the Assembly prevails on disagreement. The Haute Cour Constitutionnelle may review a law before promulgation, and organic laws must be referred to it as a matter of course.
Legal profession	A law degree and registration of the title with the Supreme Court, which maintains the roll and exercises discipline. Bar membership is voluntary. Because both Spanish and Guaraní are official, courts must provide interpretation, and practitioners outside Asunción are commonly bilingual.	Advocates are admitted to one of the departmental bars (Ordre des avocats), most prominently the Port-au-Prince bar, after a law degree and a period of pupillage. Notaries hold a separate public office with exclusive competence over authentic acts including land transfers, which matters greatly given widespread informality in land title.	Fused; an LLB, the Law Development Centre post-graduate diploma and enrolment admit an advocate. The Uganda Law Society is the professional body.	Avocats admitted to the Ordre des avocats de Madagascar after a law degree and professional training, alongside notaires for authenticated instruments and huissiers for service and enforcement — the standard French division of functions.

A comparison table flattens nuance by design. Where a difference matters to a decision you are making, open both portals and read the section in full — the constitutional detail behind a one-line summary is often the part that governs the outcome.