Comparison

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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	MadagascarReviewed	UruguayReviewed	HaitiReviewed
Legal family	Civil law	French civil law with customary law	Civil law	Civil law
System of government	Unitary presidential republic	Semi-presidential republic	Unitary presidential republic	Unitary semi-presidential republic
Constitution	Constitution of the Republic of Paraguay	Constitution of the Fourth Republic	Constitution of the Oriental Republic of Uruguay	Constitution de la République d'Haïti
In force since	1992	2010	1967	1987
Capital	Asunción	Antananarivo	Montevideo	Port-au-Prince
Official languages	Spanish, Guaraní	Malagasy, French	Spanish	French, Haitian Creole
Currency	Paraguayan guaraní (PYG)	Malagasy ariary (MGA)	Uruguayan peso (UYU)	Haitian gourde (HTG)
Population	6,900,000	30,300,000	3,400,000	11,600,000
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 a decentralised structure of 23 regions and communes. Successive constitutions have promised fuller decentralisation, including provincial autonomy, which has not been implemented.	Unitary. Nineteen departments have elected intendentes and juntas with administrative and local taxing competence, and municipalities were added in 2010, but all legislative power belongs to the General Assembly.	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.
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.	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.	Bills pass both chambers; disagreement is resolved by the General Assembly sitting jointly. The executive may veto, overcome by three-fifths of the joint assembly. Distinctively, 25% of registered voters can force a referendum to repeal a statute within one year of promulgation, and 10% can initiate a constitutional plebiscite.	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.
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.	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 degree from the Universidad de la República or an accredited private faculty confers the title of abogado, with registration by the Supreme Court. Membership of the Colegio de Abogados del Uruguay is voluntary; the Supreme Court exercises discipline. Escribanos públicos are a separate profession with exclusive competence over conveyancing.	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.

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.