At its most basic level the rule of law is the concept that both the government and citizens know the law and obey it.
The law is coercive insofar as it delimits the range of alternatives otherwise open to the individual actor, whether the results of noncompliance are penal sanctions in the traditional sense, or the foreclosing of legal processes for redress to the noncomplying individual.
Editor’s Note: The concept of Rule of Law is that the state is governed, not by the ruler or the nominated representatives of the people but by the law. The Constitution of India intended for India to be a country governed by the rule of law. What is the responsibility of judges when their personal opinions are in conflict with the rule of law in the case before them? Rule of law, the mechanism, process, institution, practice, or norm that supports the equality of all citizens before the law, secures a nonarbitrary form of government, and more generally prevents the arbitrary use of power., and more generally prevents the arbitrary use of power. Please see professional advice from a lawyer if you have a legal issue. In logic, the law of non-contradiction ( LNC) (also known as the law of contradiction, principle of non-contradiction ( PNC ), or the principle of contradiction) states that contradictory propositions cannot both be true in the same sense at the same time, e. g. The concept of the rule of law is embedded in the Charter of the United Nations . The Rule of Law and Why It Matters Overview John Carey, professor of government at Dartmouth University, believes that next to free and fair elections, one of the most important defining characteristics of democracy is the rule of law. The Preamble of the Charter states as one of the aims of the UN “to establish conditions under which justice and respect for the obligations arising from treaties and other sources of … WJP Rule of Law Index The four universal principles are further developed in the following nine factors of the annual WJP Rule of Law Index . The single factor that will turn a vulnerable or destitute person into a victim of human trafficking is the basic absence of the Rule of Law. Governments that operate under the rule of law are different than, for example, the absolute monarchies that ruled over medieval Europe, where the king or queen were not always subject to the laws of the land. The latest edition of the Index relies on more than 130,000 household and 4,000 expert surveys to measure how the rule of law is experienced and perceived by the general public worldwide.