Portal:Politics/Selected article/2007, week 20

The rule of law is the principle that governmental authority is legitimately exercised only in accordance with written, publicly disclosed laws adopted and enforced in accordance with established procedure. The principle is intended to be a safeguard against arbitrary governance. Samuel Rutherford was one of the first modern authors to give the principle theoretical foundations, in Lex, Rex (1644), and later Montesquieu in The Spirit of the Laws (1748).

In continental European legal thinking, rule of law is associated with a Rechtsstaat. According to Anglo-American thinking, hallmarks of adherence to the rule of law commonly include a clear separation of powers, legal certainty, the principle of legitimate expectation and equality of all before the law.

The concept is not uncontroversial, and it has been said that "the phrase 'the Rule of Law' has become meaningless thanks to ideological abuse and general over-use".