The Insignificance of the Act in Criminal Law and the Social Danger of the Individual

Abstract

The article is devoted to the issues of taking into account the social danger of the individual when differentiating minor acts and crimes. The subject of the work is the norms of law governing the institution of the insignificance of an act in criminal law, as well as law enforcement practice that develops in connection with the application of the norms on the insignificance of an act. In the course of the study, the author examines the evolution of Soviet and post-Soviet criminal legislation in terms of the norms governing the insignificance of the act, as well as the legal technique of their construction. Particular attention is paid to the study of heterogeneous law enforcement practice in the context of the issue of accounting for the identity of the perpetrator in the differentiation of minor acts and crimes. The research was conducted on the basis of universal dialectical, logical, formal-legal and historical-legal research methods.The scientific novelty of the research consists in the fact that the author presents a theoretical justification of the approach, according to which personality traits cannot influence the resolution of the issue of the insignificance of the act and suggests an original practical way to implement this approach in the form of legislative changes, which subsequently positively affect law enforcement practice and contributes to its uniformity. The main result of the study is a proposal to amend the current criminal legislation, in particular, it is recommended to amend Article 14 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and add Part 3, which will meaningfully consolidate the above approach and thus bring judicial practice to uniformity.