No 9 (2025)

The current increase in competition of international legal policy of States call for the paramount importance of interpretations of concepts used in the UN Charter – the core source of International Law which prevails other international treaties. In light of this political and legal background, this paper explores the notion of “teachings of the most highly qualified publicists of the various nations”. International legal doctrines of legal scholars, as enshrined in Article 38 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice, are used as “subsidiary means for the determination of rules of law”. This article reveals the international legal scope of this notion and of the term “the most highly qualified publicists”, as well as the practice of the ICJ in the application of the teachings of legal scholars. The authors also propose a definition of such legal teachings and criteria for qualifying a legal research as international legal teaching according to the ICJ Statute. It is described in the paper why this notion is not legally identical to the notion of “science of International Law”.

Based on the analysis of two additions introduced in 2020 to the Constitution of the Russian Federation, the article substantiates the conclusion about serious imperfections (it was not possible to find another word) of two links in the modern organizational and legal mechanism of justice. The first follows from the text of Part 3 of Art. 118 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, which lists the courts that make up the judicial system of the Russian Federation, and where there are no military courts, which can be explained by their attribution by three federal constitutional laws to courts of general jurisdiction. However, this text names arbitration courts, which, together, like the military courts, make up two autonomous multi-layer specialized judicial systems, closing into the corresponding judicial collegia of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation; they even have about the same number of judicial bodies – about a hundred. It turns out that Part 3 of Art. 118 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation “went” after the three named federal constitutional laws, but it should be the other way around: military courts should also be present in this constitutional innovation, after which and in accordance with which these federal constitutional laws are subject to adequate adjustment. The second follows from the texts of paragraph “e.3” of Art. 83 and paragraph “l” part 1 of Art. 102 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, according to which the Federation Council, on the proposal of the President of the Russian Federation, terminates the powers of the heads and judges of the Constitutional and Supreme Courts of the Russian Federation, as well as cassation and appeal courts in case of gross misconduct. It is concluded that this has destroyed the unity of the status of judges, since here comes the constitutional responsibility of judges, while for the same violation the rest of the judiciary comes disciplinary responsibility.

The article presents a description of three works by Professor I. M. Ragimov devoted to the philosophy of crime and punishment, the reflection of crime and punishment in world religions and the death penalty, comprehensively and fully representing the philosophical, legal and theological views of the scientist; in some cases, the development of the doctrine of the dichotomous link “crime – punishment” is shown, which allows us to emphasize the fundamentality and scientific novelty of the author’s research.

This article substantiates the idea of the formation of Municipal Procedural Law, designed to regulate the procedural support of the activities of local self-government entities. Currently, there are legal conditions for its allocation in the structure of Municipal Law of the Russian Federation. These include the established municipal procedural legal relations that form the subject of the sub-branch, the emergence of a significant number of municipal procedural norms that establish procedures that ensure the exercise of their powers by local governments, and the formation of municipal procedural legal institutions. The formation of this sub-sector will stimulate the development of the science of Municipal Law in terms of studying the importance of procedural norms for solving issues of direct livelihood of the population.

In legal studies, there has been a traditional approach that an employment contract is a special agreement between an employee and an employer, the conclusion and execution of which is regulated by Labor Law. In legal doctrine and judicial practice, this approach has gradually been abandoned, considering individual provisions (parts, conditions) and the employment contract as a whole, as well as labor-law payments as a transaction (civil, corporate, etc.). In some cases, employment contracts began to be qualified according to the norms of other branches of legislation (for example, civil, corporate and bankruptcy), including as mixed and unnamed contracts. It has become common practice to legally assess an employment contract or performance under it as an independent civil-law transaction. This paper examines this issue, assesses the degree of convergence of the norms of various branches of law in qualifying the provisions of an employment contract and (or) its execution. The limit of possible variable regulation of issues of concluding and executing an employment contract by individual branches of law is analyzed, as well as the grounds for challenging this contract. As a result of the study, the experience of judicial practice is summarized and new approaches to the interpretation of an employment contract as a private law transaction are proposed.

Despite the absence of a criminal procedure mechanism for the application of criminal insignificance, in law enforcement activities decisions are made to terminate criminal prosecution in connection with the insignificance of the act. In this regard, the issue of the procedure for applying Part 2 of Article 14 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation in criminal proceedings is relevant, which is what this article is devoted to. After analyzing the history of the formation of criminal insignificance in Russia and summarizing the current practice of recognizing acts as insignificant, the author comes to the conclusion that the legislator made an essential mistake, expressed in recognizing an insignificant act as not a crime. Having identified three mandatory stages that make up the content of proceedings on minor acts, such as: 1) the stage of criminal legal qualification of the act; 2) the stage of establishing the grounds for criminal insignificance; and 3) the stage of applying the consequences of insignificance, the author consistently analyzes the state of criminal and criminal procedure legislation and offers his vision of existing problems, justifying the need for amendments and additions to the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code.

The article examines a number of doctrinal views on the subject of Administrative Law by authors who are considered to be the creators of the doctrine of Soviet Administrative Law. These authors’ views have been somewhat forgotten, and the goal of this article is to bring their theoretical ideas back into the scientific discourse. Based on the research conducted, the article provides a definition of the subject of Administrative Law and presents various perspectives on its system. Given the unique nature of Administrative Law, there may be different approaches to the structure of the academic course in this field of law.

Law as legislation consists of branches, which allows its norms to be applied in the socio-economic life of society. However, complex in composition and time-consuming in execution types of products manufactured for the needs of the state require the interaction of different arrays of legal norms, such as public and private, in terms of the method of regulating social relations. The article attempts to show, using the example of purchases under the state defense order, how the unity of state and legal regulation in a state contract under the state defense order is achieved. Public law and private law are considered not only as different in the method of influencing public relations, but also in interaction. At the same time, the fundamental categories of public law cannot be interpreted as civil law (private power).

A significant increase in the number of international documents that do not have legal force creates uncertainty in the regulation of international relations. Of particular interest in this regard are memoranda of understanding, which resemble contracts in form, but are not contracts, so there can be no legal liability for their violation. But the State’s political commitment does not absolve it of responsibility completely; memoranda are subject to the pacta sunt servanda principle. The concept of estoppel is applicable to their action. The importance of memoranda lies in the fact that they serve as a preparatory stage for the formation of a “hard” rule, as well as for the crystallization of opinio juris in the process of forming a customary rule.

The current trend of referring to traditional values in the Russian Federation determines the relevance of studying legal categories with a value aspect. Mentoring is one of them, because it is based on mutual assistance and mutual respect, creative work, teamwork, and generational continuity. The Labor Code of the Russian Federation regulated the legal status of a mentor only in 2025, but the application of the norm introduced into legislation in practice has already caused a number of problems. Based on the method of comparative analysis, the article examines the experience of legal regulation of the institute of mentoring in the EAEU member states, and suggests ways to improve the current labor legislation of the Russian Federation.

The Scandinavian identity is based on the similarity of the political systems of the Nordic countries and their common history, a universalistic model of social security, a desire to maintain gender equality and involve as many citizens as possible in labor force activities. Quite significant changes, undermining the foundations of the Scandinavian identity, began to occur at the end of the last century. The most serious challenge was the crisis of multiculturalism, determined by the expanding influx of migrants and the growing difficulties associated with their integration into the life of the host society. Multiculturalism is subject to forced modification. The emphasis is shifting from the idea of integration as a two-way process, within which ethnic Scandinavians and newcomers would gradually move towards each other, learning about each other’s culture and values, to the idea of assimilation, which implies the obligation of migrants to more effectively adapt to their new country and be included in its political and social life.

The author analyzes the content and effect of judicial decisions (acts) that may underlie the emergence of civil rights and obligations. The position is substantiated, according to which not only the court decision as an act on the merits of the dispute (according to the current norms of civil law), but also other court rulings can act as such grounds. The conclusions drawn by the author are that, firstly, it is necessary to distinguish among the acts of the court such decisions, as a result of which rights and obligations may arise, and as a result of which the persons participating in the case do not acquire rights and obligations. Among the acts that are the grounds for the emergence of rights and obligations, it is possible to distinguish acts whose content has a directly law-forming effect (decisions), and acts whose purpose is to approve agreements already drawn up by the parties in the case. Based on the analysis, it is proposed to amend sub-paragraph 3 of paragraph 1 of Article 8 of the Civil Procedure Code of the Russian Federation, stating it in a new version.

In the speeches of the participants of the Conference “Soviet and post-Soviet theory and Philosophy of Law: the problem of succession. On the 100^th anniversary of O. E. Leist’s birth” discussed issues related to the origin, development, composition, and methodology of the General theory of state and law. It was noted that O. E. Leist belongs to those classics of the Russian theory of law, whose work closed the Soviet period and opened a new, non-Marxist period. The participants’ reports suggested that the modern General theory of law is the heir to the pre-revolutionary and Soviet traditions, and that it continues to occupy an important place in Russian jurisprudence largely due to the authors of these eras.