The
law of obligations is one branch of
private law under the
civil law legal system. It is the body of rules that organizes and regulates the rights and duties arising between individuals. The specific rights and duties are referred to as
obligations, and this area of law deals with their creation, effects, and extinction. An obligation is a legal bond (
vinculum iuris) by which one or more parties (obligants) are bound to act or refrain from acting. An obligation thus imposes on the
obligor a duty to perform, and simultaneously creates a corresponding right to demand performance by the
obligee to whom performance is to be tendered. Obligations may be
civil, which are enforceable by action in a court of law, or
natural, which imply moral duties but are unenforceable unless the obligor consents.