Mexican Legal System

This reference guide to the laws and legal literature of Mexico has been designed carefully by a reference librarian for researchers who do not read or speak Spanish. This basic sourcebook provides answers to the questions that are asked most frequently: Which is the relevant code? Where can the text of the code be found? What secondary material is available? Which material is available in English? This up-to-date guide should be useful as a reference in college, university, law, government, and public libraries and in companies that do business with Mexico. It could also be used in courses dealing with Mexican law and business.

An introduction briefly describes Mexico's legal system and provides some historical background. Then the bibliography points to primary and secondary material of importance and is annotated partially. Entries are organized under forty-one subject categories with subdivisions pointing to the laws, the sources for the text of the laws, secondary materials from periodicals, and books and monographs. All Spanish titles are given first in Spanish and then in English. An appendix gives a directory of publishers. Author and subject indexes are included.

FRANCISCO A. AVALOS is Foreign Law and International Law Librarian, College of Law, University of Arizona. He also teaches courses on foreign international law librarianship at the Graduate Library School. He is the author, with Arturo L. Torres, of Latin American Legal Abbreviations: A Comprehensive Spanish/Portuguese Dictionary with English Translations (Greenwood Press, 1989).