The Concept of “Judicial Doctrine” in Russian Jurisprudence (General Notes)

Abstract

The paper aims to address the totality of individual terms based on the generic concept of “doctrine”: “legal doctrine”, “scientific doctrine”, “judicial doctrine” the way they are interpreted in modern Russian legal science. Substantially and conceptually, the work anticipates an approach to another subject that is an integral part of the Russian judicial doctrine and the process of its formation, namely the application of the principles and norms of international law in the administration of justice. The paper focuses on some ambiguous interpretations of the understanding of the phenomena that are combined with each other due to the interweaving of the above concepts found in modern domestic and foreign literature, sometimes mixing their external and internal sides, proposed corresponding original solutions or paradoxical qualifications. Two extremes are emphasized in the course of revealing the essence of the analyzed concepts: either an almost arbitrary — mechanical — connection of all the elements present in one case or another into a kind of artificial “complex”, or a declination in favor of only one component as a central (or supporting) component while ignoring the others. Analyzing the legal doctrine as a concept the author differentiates between a category of science and judicial doctrine, and assumes that it is worth avoiding hyperbolization of differentiation between them. On the other hand, it would be fruitless to draw direct lines of their influence on each other. At the same time, when using the term “judicial doctrine”, it is impossible to abstract from the concept of “doctrine” in the general scientific sense. Their mutual intersection with each other, “penetration” into each other are objective. Formulating the conclusions on the problems of the concepts of legal, scientific and judicial doctrine, the author advocates greater caution in making proposals and, at the same time, greater criticism in assessing the already existing conclusions of legal theorists and practitioners.