Formal relations are relations strictly and automatically following from formally established rules and norms.
Formally — officially, publicly, in writing. Formally, this is about the letter, as opposed to the spirit. About the dead, as opposed to the living.
Informal relations live by their own rules, sometimes without rules at all, at least they do not fit into the existing formally established rules and norms.
The informal is not only alive. It is also something that is out of order, without order, sometimes against order.
Informal relations are informal economic relations, and hazing in the army, and the relations of the closest people.
“Informal economic relations are the rules and norms of economic behavior that are not established by the laws that are formally in force in the country and differ from those described by them.” — from the dissertation of G.A. Yavlinsky, see →
Informal relationships in the team — relationships that are formed on the basis of personal attachments; ways of doing things other than formally recognized ways or procedures. Informal relationships are those where there is a personal moment.
Formal relations in a team is the name of social relations in which people turn off their personal and begin to be guided only by rules and conventions.
Personal relationships — relationships are always informal. They are informal not in the sense that they are relations without conventions and without rules, but in the fact that in addition to rules and conventions, in personal relationships there is always a personal moment: personal views, personal attitudes, personal emotions.