Let's examine the position of civil law in the overall legal system. The legal system is roughly divided into public law and private law. Essentially, Civil Law is classified as private law. Let's look at Case 1. Y killed pedestrian X when driving drunk. What legal responsibility does Y have? Y here has three types of legal responsibility as outlined below: The first one is criminal responsibility. First of all, Y will have criminal responsibility. Y is charged with dangerous driving causing death or injury. Any person causing death as a result of driving a vehicle with impaired safety due to having consumed alcohol, shall be punished by imprisonment for not less than three years, but less than 10 years according to Article 185-3 of the Criminal Code in Taiwan. Secondly, we will have administrative responsibility. Driving under the influence of alcohol is prohibited under Article 35, Paragraph (1) of the Road Traffic Management and Penalty Act. In terms of administrative responsibility, the car driver Y, shall be fined NT$30,000 to NT$120,000 and the car shall be removed from the scene and detained by the authorities. The car driver license shall be revoked and be permanently prohibited from driving. Thirdly, in terms of civil liability, anybody who intentionally or negligently infringes on the rights of others shall be liable to compensate for any consequent damages, it's provided by Article 184 of the Civil Code. If an automobile in use has caused the damage to another, the driver shall be liable for the damage arising therefrom, unless he has exercised the reasonable care to prevent the damage, that's provided by Article 191-2 of the Civil Code. Among these three types of legal responsibility, criminal responsibility, and administrative responsibility have certain commonalities. Although criminal responsibility is imposed by courts, while administrative responsibility is imposed by an administrative agency, a state authority impose a crime penalty on an individual Y or renders disadvantages dispositions on the same in both types. The branch of law governing relationships between the state and individuals in this context is called public law. Its main focus involves the exercise of appropriate control over state power to ensure that the rights of individuals are not unjustly impaired. Typical representations of the public law include constitution, the administrative law, and Criminal Code, and the Code of Criminal Procedure. In contrast to criminal responsibility and administrative responsibility, civil liability involves relationship between individuals, for example, X and Y in this example, and the branch of law governing the relationships between individuals in this context It's called private law. Its main focus involves the coordination of interests between individuals consider to be on an equal standard. Typical representations of private law include the Civil Code and the Company Act. Next, let's examine the position of civil law within private law. In addition to civil law, private law includes the Consumer Protection Act, the Maritime Act, the Insurance Act, the Company Act, and the Personal Property Secured Transactions Act. It is often said that the Civil Law is general subset of private law. In other words, Civil Law involves general laws while fields such as corporate law is called special laws. In absolute terms, laws without restrictions relating to the domain of their applicability are referred to as general laws. While those with restricted domains of applicability are called special laws. In relative terms, general laws are those that incorporate and cover areas outside the domain of applicability of special laws, whereas the special laws incorporate only part of the domain of general laws. Classifications between general laws and special laws are relative. For example, the Civil Code is a general law regulating transactions, whereas the Company Act is a special law regulating commercial transactions. However, the latter is seen as a general law relative to the Financial Holding Company Act, which are special laws regulating financial institutions to consolidate the supervision of cross financial industry. In civil liability, which of the following applies to Case 1? Article 184 or Article 191-2 of the Civil Code? Based on the principle that special law prevails over general law. The provisions of special law apply when there are both special laws and general laws dealing with the same subject. Conversely, the provisions of general law apply only when those of special law do not exist. Traffic accidents involving automobiles and pedestrians are regulated by Article 184 and Article 191-2, and the latter is applied preferentially over the former. Conversely, in a case in which a person beats another to death, only Article 184 applies because no special law exist to be applied in this situation.
