Legal Concept and Legal Term: Specificity of the Correlation and Definitions (Based on Russian Laws)

Abstract

The present research featured legal concepts and terms in legislative texts. The paper focuses on various approaches to legal concepts and terms, e.g. logical-hierarchical, definitional, structural-semantic, etc. The author proved that the concepts of legal term and legal concept are often synonymous. They have the same nominative function, verbal expression, modification procedure, and variability. In addition, both terms possess legislative definitions. As a result, a legislative text can be understood in broad and narrow sense. The study touched upon the following issues: (a) the institutional functions of legislative definitions (interpretative, differentiating, legal, system-forming); (b) the location of the definition within the legislative text; (c) the main methods for constructing a legislative definition (lists, descriptions, combinations) and defective legislative definitions. The paper describes reasons for the ambiguity of legal concepts (terms) and the variability of their legislative definitions. The research was based on the texts of Russian federal and regional laws, legal dictionaries, and judicial practice. The methods included discursive, categorical, and definitional approaches, as well as induction and deduction and contextual, component, comparative analyzes. The obtained results and conclusions may be used in legislative text studies, as well as by experts in legislative and judicial discourse.