Haiti

Legal tradition

Haiti belongs to the civil law tradition. A French civil-law system: the Code civil of 1825 and Code de commerce of 1826 were modelled directly on the Napoleonic codes and much of that text remains in force, making Haitian private law among the least revised in the Americas. Both French and Haitian Creole are official, but statutes and judgments are predominantly in French, which is a practical access-to-justice barrier. The constitutional order is severely disrupted: there has been no sitting legislature since January 2020 and no elected President since the assassination of Jovenel Moïse in July 2021, with executive authority exercised by a Transitional Presidential Council established in April 2024.

How power is divided

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.

Where law comes from

Constitution and ratified treaties

Article 276-2 gives ratified treaties precedence over domestic law.

Napoleonic codes

Code civil 1825 and Code de commerce 1826, still largely in force.

Lois and décrets

Statutes where a legislature sits; decrees during the current transitional period.

Doctrine and French jurisprudence

Persuasive, given the shared codal ancestry.

The legal profession

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.