Administrative law

Administrative law is a division of law governing the activities of executive branch agencies of government. Administrative law includes executive branch rulemaking (executive branch rules are generally referred to as "regulations"), adjudication, and the enforcement of laws. Administrative law is considered a branch of public law. Administrative law deals with the decision-making of administrative units of government that are part of the executive branch in such areas as international trade, manufacturing, the environment, taxation, broadcasting, immigration, and transport. Administrative law expanded greatly during the 20th century, as legislative bodies worldwide created more government agencies to regulate the social, economic and political spheres of human interaction. Civil law countries often have specialized administrative courts that review these decisions. In the last fifty years, administrative law, in many countries of the civil law tradition, has opened itself to the influence of rules posed by supranational legal orders, in which judicial principles have strong importance: it has led, for one, to changes in some traditional concepts of the administrative law model, as has happened with the public procurements or with judicial control of administrative activity and, for another, has built a supranational or international public administration, as in the environmental sector or with reference to education, for which, within the United Nations' system, it has been possible to assist to a further increase of administrative structure devoted to coordinate the States' activity in that sector.