Categorical thinking as a prerequisite for the formation of categories in law (using financial law as an example)

Abstract

Categorical thinking might be understood as logical generalization, which serves as a prerequisite for the existence of categories in law, including in the branch and research realm of financial law. Categorical thinking mediates the formation and substantive development of financial and legal categories. Functionally, categorical thinking not only contributes to the formation of categorical-conceptual series of financial law, but also contributes to the formation of financial legal order. At the same time, categorical thinking, while providing constructive “rigidity” of the categorical-conceptual network, is inert and can slow down the formation of new legal categories and notions in the context of rapidly changing social relations. Financial law categories such as “finance”, “financial activities of a government”, “financial system of a state”, “government credit”, “government debt”, “currency exchange regulation”, “currency exchange control”, “banking regulation”, “banking supervision” and others, are determined by financial legal norms, they structurally construct the public finance law as a law branch, reflecting the economic forms of funds flowing mediated by relations with constituent entities. Such categories are synthetic, absorbing all aspects of social relations — not only legal, but also political, economic, social, managerial, moral and ethical and others. At the same time, legal thinking produces financial and legal categories that are “analytical”, since they represent a mental concentration of purely legal features of the reflected social relations.

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