Guernsey

• Laws passed by the States of Deliberation (the island's parliament), with Royal Assent
• Norman customary law (Droit coutumier), which still supplies old rules on land and family
• English common law and equity, in many areas
• Decisions of the Royal Court and the Court of Appeal

• The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London, the final court
• The Guernsey Court of Appeal
• The Royal Court, led by the Bailiff with elected judges called Jurats, and the Magistrate's Court

A law degree and a bar exam in Guernsey law, then admission as an advocate by the Royal Court.

• Its judges include Jurats, local people elected to sit with the Bailiff.
• The law of land still draws on old Norman customs, kept in French.
• It makes its own laws on tax and company matters, and sets up financial services separately from the UK.

Jersey, Isle of Man, United Kingdom, France, Bermuda

The University of Ottawa’s JuriGlobe database lists Guernsey as: Customary. 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.

Andorra, Bhutan, Mongolia, Mozambique, Papua New Guinea.

• JuriGlobe: world legal systems (University of Ottawa)
• Guernsey Legal Resources

Sources last reviewed: October 2026.