promulgation is the formal proclamation or declaration that a new legal or administrative norm is issued after its final approval, while ordering compliance and enforcement, giving it mandatory force. In turn, publication is the act of giving public knowledge of the content of the law, or another legal norm, to citizens.[1]​[2]​.

Currently, in most legal systems, the conceptual distinction is made between "promulgation" and "publication." However, in the past such terms were considered synonymous.

Enactment, as Baudry Lacantinerie maintained, is the "birth certificate" of the law, since it gives it certain, authentic existence and invests it with coercive force.

The promulgation of the law is a power of the heads of state: kings, presidents, etc. and of legislative bodies when overcoming a veto.

Publication is the means used to make known the text of the law or other legal norm (such as a regulation or judicial ruling with erga omnes effects), usually by inserting it in an official newspaper.

In some situations, particularly in Latin America, when the approved norm requires confidentiality, because it refers to issues of national defense or intelligence work, an offprint of restricted or reserved circulation is published from the official newspaper. In these cases we speak of "secret laws."