Moscow University Law Bulletin. 2024. 3.

theoretical and practical legal study of the problems of legal regulation and the practical implementation of the right of complaints of citizens and organizations against decisions, actions (inactions) of public authorities authorized to provide state and municipal services was carried out. The importance and place of the legal institution of state and municipal services in the system of Russian law is considered. The features of the right of complaint in the process of obtaining state and municipal services as a guarantee of legality in public administration are studied. The historical and legislative conditions for the introduction of the sub-institution of pre-trial appeal into the structure of the institute of state and municipal services are determined. The following problems of legal regulation of the procedure for filing and considering complaints from recipients of state and municipal services have been identified:(1) the need to form a conceptual apparatus for pre-trial appeal; (2) building its model within the framework of the more general administrative-legal institution of the right of complaint; (3) features of the protection and restoration of the rights and legitimate interests of recipients of state and municipal services; (4) the ratio of general and special norms in this area. 

Based on the results of a study of theoretical and legislative foundations, as well as materials from judicial practice on the consideration of public law disputes in the field of state and municipal services, proposals were made to improve the legal institution of the right of administrative complaint.

The author comments on the ruling of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation in case No. A45–19074/2021. There is a view that this ruling classified damages recovered in criminal proceedings in connection with a criminal offense as punitive damages. The author refutes this view, since it is unreasonable to believe that the Supreme Court had the goal of completely reformatting Chapter 59 of the Civil Code in the ruling of the Economic Chamber, and proves that the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation had the goal only of prohibiting the commercial court from resolving the issue of returning the amount paid under the sentence of the general court jurisdiction, that is, it resolved the issue of the competence of the courts. From this ruling, it is impossible to draw any far-reaching conclusions on substantive law. The position of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation on the issue of the competence of courts in the assignment of rights has been criticized, since it is based on an unreasonably broad interpretation of Art. 383 Civil Code. In this interpretation, one can only support the Court’s decision to determine courts’ jurisdiction over a substantive relationship based on the moment of its emergence and not on any further developments (such as claim’s assignment, succession, etc.).

The article presents the text of one of the few surviving monuments of Roman law — the Tabula Baetica, containing an agreement of fiducia with a creditor. The author has translated this document and conducted a detailed analysis of its content. Special attention is given to the analysis of the institution of mancipatio and to the controversial issues in civil law, such as the status of the Tabula Baetica: whether this document was a real contract or a model of security, as well as the question of the completeness or fragmentary nature of this legal monument. The study includes toponymic and archaeological analysis, discusses the features of individual provisions of the Tabula Baetica, including possible engraving errors in the document, and assesses its significance for modern legal science. The work considers various viewpoints of researchers, identifies and explains key legal aspects, emphasizing the importance of the Tabula Baetica for understanding the development of Roman law and its influence on modern legal systems. The author analyzes individual fragments of the text, relying on classical jurists and contemporary research, which allows for a deeper understanding of the context and application of this legal instrument.

In Part 4 of Article 1349 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, the liver of the results of intellectual activity that cannot be objects of patent rights is fixed (the list of non-patent objects). Some bioethical principles have been fixed in this legal norm, which is certainly necessary in the context of the rapid development of biotechnologies. But from the point of view of law enforcement, this norm seems to be incomplete and requires specification. Moreover, as indicated in the article, these provisions of Russian civil legislation are not a very successful compilation of the provisions of the European declaration. 

The article presents the results of a comparative analysis of international agreements and norms of foreign law, according to the results of which the author made proposals for a significant change in the legal structure of Part 4 of Article 1349 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation and its addition with relevant principles of bioethics, which it seems necessary to take into account in patent law in correspondence with the norms of special legislation. In addition, to increase the effectiveness and optimality of law enforcement practice, based on the results of a comparative analysis of concretized examples of patent prohibitions with the provisions of special laws in the field of health protection, legal algorithms for the application of these prohibitions, arising from their legal nature, were identified.

The concept of legal regulation of labor relations, in which a foreign organization acts on the employer’s side, has been awaiting its formation for a long time. The economic and legal conditions of economic life and business activity in Russia, as well as abroad, have long since changed dramatically. At the same time, national standards do not take into account the specifics of work in organizations with a cross-border nature of activity, and international standards are not distinguished by certainty. Such an economic and legal phenomenon as a transnational corporation has a certain impact on the vision of the situation and legal decisions. Traditional ideas about transnational corporations blur the difference between employers with a complex structure (employers with separate structural divisions) and integration groups of employers so far generally ignored by the legislator, limiting the circle of foreign employers only to those that have a commercial nature of activity. This approach is not acceptable for relations in the sphere of labor, the legal regulation of which must take into account the diversity of methods and forms of organizing the activities of economic entities, including activities of a cross-border nature. To avoid difficulties with legal qualifications, the concept of “transnational corporation” should be perceived in the scope and with the content that corresponds to the term denoting it.

The principle of the welfare state presupposes the active participation of the executive branch in the fair distribution of resources, significantly changing the balance of power in the traditional system of separation of powers, creating an imbalance not in favor of the legislative branch and weakening the latter. In the field of social policy, Parliament is losing its role as one of the leading links in the system of separation of powers, ceding the role of de facto legislator to the government and turning into an administrative machine for plebiscite approval of government initiatives. The Government uses the institutions of legislative power both for the actual regulation of social policy, including the establishment of standards of social life, income, and social support measures, and to expand its own powers, turning into a de facto legislator in this area. The latter thesis is confirmed by the quantitative and qualitative indicators given in the article, for example, a high level of support for government social initiatives. The latter are adopted practically unchanged, and the control of the legislator is of a legal and technical nature. The result of lawmaking is not the law as a rule of conduct and the will of the legislature, but the law as an act of the government, that is, the law only in the formal sense. The removal of the legislator from an active role in social policy suggests a violation of the principle of separation of powers. One of the ways to restore balance is to transfer direct management of the social sphere to autonomous decentralized agencies while maintaining effective parliamentary control over them, including the legislative procedure for the establishment of such departments, their accountability to parliament, as well as the participation of parliament in the appointment of their senior management.

The purpose of this article is to identify the constitutional meaning of the rules establishing responsibility in the sphere of citizenship of the Russian Federation. In constitutional law, there are sanctions such as cancellation of the decision on granting citizenship, termination of citizenship, deprivation of citizenship. The Constitution of the Russian Federation prohibits deprivation of citizenship. Nevertheless, the current legal regulation allows for the application of constitutional sanctions that interrupt the political and legal connection with the Russian Federation. The Federal Law of 2023 “On Citizenship of the Russian Federation” provides for the institution of termination of citizenship, which involves the loss of a person’s legal connection with the state both voluntarily (renouncing citizenship of the Russian Federation of his own free will) and involuntarily — regardless of the person’s wishes. It seems that forcible termination of citizenship should be considered as one of the measures of the constitutional responsibility of an individual. The basis for this liability is the commission of a constitutional offense incompatible with the high status of a Russian citizen. The law provides for two groups of grounds for compulsory termination of citizenship: ex ante grounds — which occurred before the decision on admission to citizenship was made; ex post grounds — which occurred after the decision to grant citizenship was made.

In the penitentiary systems of states, scientific information about the personality of convicts is important. International standards specifically emphasize the need to obtain reliable data on the trends and characteristics of the prison population. Conducted in December 2022, the Ninth Special Census aims to replenish the available statistical data on the identity of convicts serving sentences of imprisonment and forced labor, as well as persons detained in pre-trial detention centers in Russia. The need to conduct a special census was based not only on the modern needs of improving penal policy, but also on the basis of respect for historical traditions. The practice of conducting special censuses was typical for the period of the existence of the USSR, and it continued in modern Russia. 

The article examines the genesis, development and current state of the practice of conducting special censuses of convicts, and reveals the historical, organizational and methodological features of their conduct. Emphasis is placed on the personality of scientists who made a significant contribution to the origin and development of this method of studying the personality of the offender. The general features and features of the Ninth Special Census of convicts and persons in custody are analyzed, and their theoretical justification is given. The parameters of the census and the forms of its implementation are also disclosed.

Forensic means of investigating the circumstances of a case involving objects of fine art are considered. Pre-criminal and criminal situations are distinguished. Illegal actions in the sphere of circulation of objects and works of art are investigated. Attention is focused on the crime provided for in Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, which may include objects and works of art. In this regard, the following concepts are analyzed: “misleading”, “deception”, “breach of trust”, “theft”. It is proven that conducting a comprehensive forensic art examination at the initial stage is necessary to establish the subject of the crime under Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. General scientific methods are used — comparison, juxtaposition; analysis, synthesis, analogy; logical methods: deduction, induction; empirical method — review of criminal legislation; forensic methods — structural-functional; building versions; private expert methods: art criticism and handwriting examination. Scientific novelty lies in: 1) clarification of the subject of the crime, according to Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, related to objects of art; 2) in the classification of objects of criminal attacks in order to clarify the circumstances of the commission of crimes related to objects of art; 3) in optimizing the forensic recommendation for the appointment of a comprehensive forensic art history examination, necessary to establish the authorship, authenticity or counterfeitness of objects of art in the group of crimes related to objects of art.

The article critically analyzes the current reform of public broadcasting (öffentlich-rechtlicher Rundfunk) in Germany, which began in 2020 with the adoption of Interstate Media Treaty and reached its maximum intensity in 2024, when the Expert Council of the Broadcasting Commission of federal states proposed the first draft of changes providing for a systemic restructuring of the institute. Focusing on the proposals for the transformation of public broadcasting in 2024, they are being evaluated for compliance with the constitutional and legal guarantees of the German communication order, which the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany throughout the post-war period deduced from the communication rights enshrined in article 5 of the Basic Law of the Federal Republic of Germany. To achieve this, the project of the contemporary reform is compared with the current model of public broadcasting, formed by the positions of the court in constitutionalized ordinary legislation, and constitutional-legal consequences of its implementation are forecasted, incorporating socio-political context. Existing issues within German public broadcasting are not excluded from consideration. As a result of the analysis, it is stated that in the case of the implementation of this reform, the postwar communication order of Germany, established by the Western Allies and legalized in the constitution, constitutional justice positions and legislation, will undergo a serious transformation through the growth of three main trends: centralization of regulation and management of public broadcasting; depoliticization and de-parliamentarization of public broadcasting; the neutralization of constitutional and legal guarantees of the independence of public broadcasting, primarily related to financing and its internal organization. It is suggested that the proposed reform is potentially incompatible with the Basic Law of the Federal Republic of Germany.

The article highlights the most important milestones in the life and creative path of the largest legal historian, Oleg Ivanovich Chistyakov, from the Great Patriotic War to the end of his life. His contribution to the development of historical and legal science is noted, as the initiator, editor of the entire publication, as well as the author of the 9‑volume “Russian Legislation of the X–XX centuries”, for the publication of which in 1996, already in modern Russia, he, as the head of work, together with some members of the author’s team, was awarded the State Prize for the first time among legal historians the prize of the Russian Federation and awarded the title of “Laureate of the State Prize of the Russian Federation”. 

O. I. Chistyakov was the first president of the Russian Historical and Legal Society, established in 2000. He is the developer of the problems of the form of state unity, the author of the allocation of the state with autonomous entities as a special form, attributing Russia not to the federation, but specifically to this form of the state. The issues raised by the author in his works are not outdated and are relevant. O. I. Chistyakov’s scientific works, as well as educational literature prepared by him or a team of authors under his editorship, are still being published and are in demand.

The article discusses incorrect theoretical positions about the essence of criminology as a scientific discipline engaged in direct forensic activities in the investigation of crimes and that this activity is carried out by an investigator. The functional and other features of the activities of a forensic investigator are outlined.

The article examines the formation and activities of scientific schools of Moscow State University named after M. V. Lomonosov, the Law Faculty of Moscow State University on the example of the scientific school of the Department of Business Law. In a relatively short period of time, the department was able to create a team of like-minded people, the results of whose activities meet all the necessary requirements of a modern scientific school. The article examines the main areas of scientific research in the field of business law, the relationship of scientific research of the department with the areas of research in other branches of law: civil, civil procedure, labor (other private law disciplines), administrative, financial and other public law disciplines. Particular attention is paid to the mutual influence of economics and law, taking into account the subject of legal regulation. The scientific school of the Department of Business Law is closely connected with the educational process. The achievements and features of the educational process at the department are shown, the goals and objectives facing its staff in training modern lawyers with a fundamental education and a broad range of knowledge in the field of law are defined.

On April 16, 2024, the Kazan (Volga Region) Federal University hosted an International Round Table “International Labour Law: Genesis, Problems and Prospects of Development (to the 120th Anniversary of the First Labour Agreement and the 105th Anniversary of the ILO)”. The participants of the round table — representatives of the bodies of the Eurasian Economic Union, officials of state authorities of the subjects of the Russian Federation, representatives of state authorities of foreign countries and representatives of leading educational and scientific centers devoted their speeches to the history, current problems and future development of international labour law. This review presents the abstracts of the participants’ reports on many theoretical and practical issues of international legal regulation of labour.