Montenegro

• The Constitution of 2007, the highest law
• Codes and statutes, drawn on European models
• The European Convention on Human Rights, as a treaty
• Decisions of the Constitutional Court and the Supreme Court

• The Constitutional Court, which reviews laws and hears individual complaints
• The Supreme Court, and the Court of Appeal
• High courts and basic courts, and separate commercial and administrative courts

A law degree and a bar exam, then membership of the Montenegrin Bar Association.

• It has a separate Administrative Court, like other former Yugoslav countries.
• The Constitution says that ratified treaties and general rules of international law rank above national laws.
• A very small country has a full Constitutional Court that hears complaints from individuals.

Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, North Macedonia

The University of Ottawa’s JuriGlobe database lists Montenegro 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 Montenegro

Sources last reviewed: October 2026.