Guatemala

• The Constitution of 1985, the highest law
• Codes and statutes in the Spanish civil-law tradition
• Decisions of the Constitutional Court
• Customary law of the Maya and other Indigenous peoples, in local matters

• The Constitutional Court, a separate permanent court
• The Supreme Court of Justice, and courts of appeal
• First-instance courts and peace courts (juzgados de paz)

A law degree and a notarial title, and registration with the Bar Association (Colegio de Abogados y Notarios).

• Lawyers also qualify as notaries, who draw up legal documents with public authority.
• Indigenous authorities deal with some disputes under customary law.
• An international commission against impunity once worked with Guatemalan prosecutors.

Mexico, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Spain

The University of Ottawa’s JuriGlobe database lists Guatemala as: Civil law. It names the systems in order of importance.

The map colours a country by the first-named system, and shows both civil-law and common-law countries as “mixed”. It is a simplification, and real systems are rarely pure.

Albania, Algeria, Angola, Argentina, Armenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Belgium, Benin, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Bulgaria.

• JuriGlobe: world legal systems (University of Ottawa)
• Constitute Project: constitution of Guatemala

Sources last reviewed: October 2026.