PUBLIC LAW

Public law is a theory of law that governs the relationship between the state and the
individual, who is considered to be either a company or a citizen. Public law covers three sub-
divisions: Constitutional, administrative and criminal law.

Public Law
(relationship between the
state and its citizens)

Constitutional Administartive Criminal

(a) Public law. Public law is concerned with the relationship between the state and its
citizens. This comprises several specialist areas such as:

i) Constitutional law. Constitutional law covers the different branches of the state:
Executive, legislative and judiciary. It covers such matters as the position of the
Crown, the compositionand procedures of Parliament, the functioning of central and
local government, citizenship and the civil liberties of individual citizens.

(ii) Administrative law. There has been a dramatic increase in the activities of
government during the last hundred years. Schemes have been introduced to help
ensure a minimum standard of living for everybody. Government agencies are
involved, for example, in the provision of a state retirement pension, income support
and child benefit. A large number of disputes arise from the administration of these
schemes and a body of law, administrative law, has developed to deal with the
complaints of individuals against the decisions of the administering agency.

(iii) Criminal law. Certain kinds of wrong doing pose such a serious threat to the
good order of society that they are considered crimes against the whole community.
The criminal law makes such anti-social behaviour an offence against the state and
offenders are liable to punishment. The state accepts responsibility for the detection,
prosecution and punishment of offenders.
For example: Drawings of wiring system are stamped/signature by someone that not have a
PE (Professional Engineer) license. If this drawing are approval, so this projects can cause a
lot of damage or death. The person that cheating can be enter the jail under the crimanal law
(public law)

Summary:

1. Public law governs the individual, citizen or corporation, and the state, while private law
applies to individuals.

2. Public law deals with a greater scope, while private law deals with a more specific scope.

3. Public law deals more with issues that affect the general public or the state itself, whereas,
private law focuses more on issues affecting private individuals, or corporations.