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Conflict of laws
Preliminary matters
Characterisation  · Incidental question
Renvoi  · Choice of law
Conflict of laws in the U.S.
Public policy  · Hague Conference
Definitional elements
State  · Jurisdiction  · Procedure
Forum non conveniens  · Lex causae
Lex fori  · Forum shopping
Lis alibi pendens
Connecting factors
Domicile  · Lex domicilii
Habitual residence
Nationality  · Lex patriae
Lex loci arbitri  · Lex situs
Lex loci contractus
Lex loci delicti commissi  · Lex loci actus
Lex loci solutionis  · Proper law
Lex loci celebrationis
Choice of law clause  · Dépeçage
Forum selection clause
Substantive legal areas
Status  · Capacity  · Contract  · Tort
Marriage  · Nullity  · Divorce
Get divorce  · Talaq divorce
Property  · Succession
Trusts
Enforcement
Enforcement of foreign judgments
Mareva injunctions  · Anti-suit injunctions

A person's status is a set of social conditions or relationships created and vested in an individual by an act of law rather than by the consensual acts of the parties, and it is in rem, i.e. these conditions must be recognised by the world. It is the qualities of universality and permanence that distinguish status from consensual relationships such as employment and agency. Hence, a person's status and its attributes are set by the law of the domicile if born in a common law state, or by the law of nationality if born in a civil law state and this status and its attendant capacities should be recognised wherever the person may later travel.

In early laws, an outlaw was a person who, by judicial process, was deprived of all normal rights as a human being unless and until a court reversed itself through an affirmative act of inlawry. This was a form of civil death. Similarly, a slave was a chattel or possession, and had no legal personality except that, in the U.S., some of the Free States did allow limited legal personality. Legal personality could be surrendered voluntarily by becoming a monk or by travelling, e.g. the first provisions of the French Civil Code deny civil rights to foreigners. As an aspect of the social contract between a state and the citizens who owe it allegiance, most developed legal systems contain positive provisions defining each individual's legal identity and its attributes. All matters of social rank or caste are examples of personal status, the modern extremes of which would be nobility and the 200 million dalits, the untouchables of India.

Full age or minority are in many laws treated as aspects of personal status. The same thing is true of the loss of capacity by reason of insanity or other mental illness. This is of critical importance if a person wishes to enter into a marriage or a contract having travelled to a state where the age of minority is different or the form of marriage is apparently not consistent with the laws of the "home" state.

Fictitious persons or legal entities may be created by law through the act of incorporation and these corporations are quite separate from the natural persons who may be involved. The holders of some public offices are vested with the office, its terms are fixed by law, and every person within the state must recognise the existence of the office and its rights and duties, e.g. an archbishop or a corporation may represent a business association with its own purposes and capacities. It would be commercially inconvenient if the status of the entity changed depending on the laws of the place where commercial transactions were effected. For example, general partnerships have a separate legal personality in some states but not in others.

In all nations, marriage creates a family relationship which is of sufficient interest to the State that it usually controls the circumstances in which the relationship may be terminated. The mutual rights and duties owed by the spouses are in rem and each person's status as a husband or wife binds the world no matter where the spouses may go (except where local public policy is invoked). Under normal circumstances, marriage exists until either one of the parties dies or until it is ended by legal process through nullity or divorce.

The emotional ties between parents and their children come into being through the natural blood relationship but the law attaches a series of right and duties to all involved to recognise the social and economic importance of maintaining population growth. This includes questions of legitimacy. A legitimate child is born to parents who are married; the child is illegitimate if the relationship is not recognised by the law, but usually has the opportunity to change status if the parents subsequently marry. A relationship similar to that of natural parent and child may be created through adoption.

A relationship of care and obedience exists between a minor child or other person incapable of caring for him or herself, and the person who actually cares for him or her, and this is broadly similar to incidents attaching to parent and child, often beingrecognised in the status of legal guardian and ward. Guardianship may be created by the law in any case where the ward is incapable of caring for him or herself.