Statutory law or non-statutory law?

 

Roman system leans on laws, Anglo-Saxon system leans on cases.

 

I don't know that there is a clear distinction between common law and statutory law countries, though the difference between the legal attitudes is clear.

 

Statutory law exists in all the so-called 'common law' countries (which the way it is normally used nowadays would be better expressed as the 'Anglo-Saxon common law' countries, though there are and have been non-Anglo-Saxon common laws).

 

And there are 'common-law' precepts in most 'statutory law' countries, though they are frequently encapsulated in constitutions (as the French constitution protects the common law concept of the presumption of innocence).

 

It's more a question of chronology. Cultures develop case law first and then statutory law, which tends initially to consist of attempts to codify common law practices.

 

It's true that the increasing use of statute law is aimed at increasing legal certitude (awareness of what the law is) but that principle itself is a common law principle. It's also true that the convolutions that drafters of statutes are drive to in trying to anticipate all possibilities frequently succeed in increasing confusion, not decreasing it.

 

(Statutes are of course the only way of changing what the law is: the common law is permanent.)