Moral Categories Research Articles

Влияние внутреннего убеждения суда на оценку доказательств: цивилизационный подход

Introduction. In criminal proceedings, the inner conviction of the court has a direct impact on the evaluation of evidence. In criminal proceedings, the process of proof is of key importance at all stages of the proceedings. Evidence in the Russian criminal process means any information, the sources of their reception, as well as the methods of their detection, collection, fixation, and verification, based on and in accordance with criminal procedure law, to establish the circumstances in issue. The main condition for making a legal and reasonable decision in a court case is to establish the event that occurred as it actually took place. Therefore, it is important to use the institution of the discretion of the court as the basis for resolving court cases. The author in the paper sets the goal of the study, which consists of substantiating the impact of the court’s inner conviction on the evaluation of evidence. Methods. The methodological framework consists of the methods of historicism, systematicity, and comparative law. Results. The author’s position, justified in the work, is based on knowledge of the criminal process. Conclusions. As a result of the study, it has been revealed that the inner conviction of the court is considered as a moral guarantee of the administration of justice, acting as a determinant in making decisions in accordance with conscience and moral categories. The process of proof is the main one in relation to the formation of the inner conviction of the court. The reason for this kind of subordination is related to the dependence of the proof process on the parties to the criminal case. The judge evaluates the evidence based on the level of legal culture and his or her inner beliefs.

Very sneaky crimes

Milan is an increasingly safe city. Despite this, the insecurity perceived by citizens is growing. Particularly in social housing districts, squatting is considered by institutions, public opinion, but also by most regular residents, as one of the principle causes of urban insecurity. Based on ethnographic research conducted in Milan between 2015 and 2017, this article proposes an anthropological analysis of policies, norms, practices, and narratives related to the governance of housing illegality, showing how these representations contribute to producing a stigmatized, morally connoted, and criminalized image of squatters. In broader terms, starting with the ethnographic case of squatting, the article explores the anthropopoietic dynamics of social class construction and the centrality of moral categories in the production of urban inequality.

Концепт божественной красоты в произведениях св. Василия Великого: семантическая функция и происхождение

At present, the place of beauty in Christian theology, in particular, in theology, is being actively discussed in Russia. At the moment, there is a lack of historical research devoted to the reconstruction of the moral and theological Beauty category in the Eastern Patristic. The article deals with the Divine Beauty concept in the works of St. Basil the Great. The issue has not yet been investigated. There are 15 fragments where Divine Beauty concept is used. In all cases it functions as part of the metaphor of the Divine Beauty optical perception and is merely one of its semantic components. Apart from Divine Beauty, other semantic components form out a metaphor, which describe not beauty itself but its influence on a subject contemplating. In particular, methafor describes anthropological organ of contempleting, feelings the subject is expierencing, etc. St. Basil does not assign a logical content to the Divine Beauty concept , but endows its meaning through interaction with other semantic components in the metaphor. The origin of the concept in St. Basil is considered. The conclusion is that the idea of the beauty of God and the main term (κάλλος) are taken in the Septuagint through the mediation of Origen. He finds a metaphor as a means of philosophical elaboreting the concept in the "Symposium"of Plato and also, probably, in "Ennaeades" I 6 and V 8 of Plotinus. St. Basil places the metaphor of the optical Divine Beauty perception in various theological contexts, which have no entirely correspondence to anyone of the previous authors. So, St. Basil seems to have borrowed from Origen Christological and moral-ascetic context of using the metaphor, but expands the using to protology and eschatology, which corresponds Plato. In the using of the Divine Beauty concept, St. Basil is to be considered not as a philosophical borrower, but rather as a creator, who shapes new synthesis on the basis of the previous thought.

Moral Categories in Russian Criminal Law

The paper studies the forms of interaction between criminal law and moral ethical prescriptions as two systems that regulate the behavior of subjects of public relations. The study made it possible to establish that at present there are five main forms of implementation of moral and ethical categories in the criminal law of the Russian Federation. First, the norms of morality are embodied through the institution of the principles of criminal law. Analyzing the principle of justice, the author describes in detail the relationship under study. Secondly, certain moral prescriptions have been transformed into criminal law prohibitions and are currently legitimized in the dispositions of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. Particular attention is given to the historical transformation of the moral and ethical norm into the norm of the criminal law. Thirdly, the criminal law directly protects public relations regarding public morality and morality, which is enshrined in Ch. 25 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. Fourth, the assessment of the morality (immorality) of the behavior of victims of individual crimes affects the classification of crimes and the imposition of punishment. The materials of investigative and judicial practice are considered, in which law enforcement agencies assessed the immoral behavior of crime victims. Fifthly, the relationship between moral and ethical standards and the system of criminal law is found in the fact that almost all existing criminal law prohibitions were socially and historically determined by the requirements of morality and ethics. At the same time, it was established that there are both purely moral criminal law prohibitions, such as prohibitions on appropriation of someone else’s property or deprivation of life, and criminal law prohibitions based on morality, but significantly modified in the course of social development (crimes in the field of economic activity, computer crimes and others).

Obligation according to G. W. F. Hegel’ Doctrine

The article is devoted to the analysis of the nature of the category of obligation according to the doctrine of the German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel. The author emphasizes that using the two concepts "obligation" (Verpflichtung) and "duty" (Pflicht), G.V.F. Hegel believes that the first has a legal basis, while the second has a moral basis. The key difference between them is the presence of a certain mindset, that is, a subjective belief, setting. As for the categories "right" and "obligation", they eventually merge in the thinker and they are formally identified (who has no rights, has no obligations), condition and predict each other (although the scientist emphasizes their content difference). The factor of such value identification and fusion is mediation, that is, the presence of a certain external reality, thanks to which the right turns into an obligation, and the obligation into a right. In the relationship between the concepts of freedom and obligation, the role of the necessary condition for the existence of affirmative freedom is assigned to the obligation. After all, the obligation, in fact, is not a limitation of freedom, but only of its abstraction.
 At the same time, the obligation according to G. W. F. Hegel’ doctrine is closely intertwined with a number of ethical categories - good, conscience, virtue, etc. Good is the universal goal of the world and human activity in particular, and therefore it is the goal of setting and fulfilling obligations. Virtue is the state of a person for whom obligation has become a substantial attribute of his existence. Whereas conscience is a kind of "path" to understanding obligation and good.
 And finally, the philosopher is convinced that individuals have obligations towards the state to the same extent that they have rights. The internal strength of the state lies in the concept of the unity of obligation and right. The formula of the abstract universal obligation is reduced to the need to sacrifice oneself for the sake of preserving the individuality of the state. While maintaining the dominance of the whole (the state) over the part (the individual), the scientist, nevertheless, tries to show that the special interest of the individual should not be rejected, but also taken into account, to some extent adapted to the interests of the whole, collective, general. And it is possible in such a combination to achieve the dreamed good - both individual and social.

Ethical standards in the sphere of work: problems of law enforcement

An analysis of the current labor legislation leads to the conclusion that there is no obligation for the employee to comply with ethical standards in the course of work, and therefore this obligation is not the main one for the employee. In the scientific literature and law enforcement practice, there is an idea that if the duty to comply with ethical standards is imposed by federal laws or professional standards, then in this case we are talking about professional ethics. For the majority of employees, there are no such norms, which forces employers to develop local acts containing such requirements. Due to the lack of regulatory regulation, the main problem is the legality of bringing employees to disciplinary responsibility for violation of ethical standards, given that the nature of ethical categories is evaluative.

Investigation of Turkish and Turkmenistanian Students’ Approaches towards Environmental Ethics and Their Levels of Naturalistic Intelligence

The purpose of this study is to compare the attitudes of Turkmenistanian and Turkish university students towards environmental ethics approaches and their naturalistic intelligence (NI) field. In addition, it was investigated whether there is a gender difference in environmental ethics levels in both countries students’. Environmental Ethics Attitude Scale (EEAS) and Multiple Intelligence Areas Inventory were applied to the students. A total of 172 Turkish and 103 Turkmenistanian university students participated. A significant difference between the mean scores of Turkish and Turkmenistanian was observed in all four categories of environmental ethics [Anthropocentric, Ecocentric, Ecofeminism, Teocentric]. The analyses conducted to test gender differences showed that there was not a significant difference between male and female Turkmenistanian students’ EAA mean scores. Comparison of NI levels of students from both countries suggested that Turkish students’ NI levels were “developed” and Turkmenistanian students’ NI levels were “moderately developed”. The research findings were considered for both countries students’.

Jus Post Bellum and the Decision to Withdraw from Afghanistan

This article makes moral sense of the Western withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021. It does so by applying classical just war thinking. The classical bellum justum, it argues, can make a distinctive contribution toward evaluating the decision to leave Afghanistan, a decision that continues to be discussed controversially. The article points out that classical just war thinking did not introduce distinct moral categories beyond jus ad bellum, such as jus in bello or jus post bellum. Exactly because classical just war thinking was meant to apply to all phases of a war, the article goes on to argue, it provides important lessons for just war as a tool of statecraft that seeks to inform political decision-making. Applying the wisdom that is encapsulated in the classical bellum justum to the withdrawal decision in Afghanistan, the article, although it is critical of its execution, generally sides with the Biden administration's course of action.

ДОБРОЧЕСНІСТЬ СУДДІ ЯК КРИТЕРІЙ ОЦІНЮВАННЯ РОБОТИ СУДІВ В УКРАЇНІ

The article analyzes the practice of European judicial systems regarding the application of such a criterion as integrity to a judge. The author also analyzes the theoretical achievements of scholars regarding the content of such moral and ethical categories which have entered the legal circulation and the national legal field as good faith and integrity. The choice and relevance of the topic is due to the criticism and unsatisfactory state of affairs in the context of numerous reforms in the field of justice in our country and the ambitious goals of achieving the European legal and judicial culture. The author establishes that a condition for judicial independence and administration of justice in compliance with the rule of law is the integrity of a judge. At the same time, it is determined that integrity is a legally established criterion for the qualification assessment of a judge by the High Qualification Commission of Judges of Ukraine with a view to determining the ability of a judge (candidate for the position of a judge) to administer justice in a relevant court. The article analyzes the Recommendation of the European Network of Councils for the Judiciary workshop on the evaluation of judges and provides the main provisions relating to judicial evaluation systems and, accordingly, courts in European judicial systems. In the course of the study of comparative analysis of the selection, evaluation and promotion of judges: current criteria and methodology used in the EU and beyond, the author establishes that integrity competence (ability to resist undue influence, adherence to professional ethics, etc.) is a typical criterion enshrined in the legislation of foreign countries. It is found that in countries that have recently undergone or are undergoing judicial reform, there is a tendency to establish very high and very detailed requirements (criteria) for the selection, evaluation and promotion of judges, but less attention is paid to the methodology for verifying these requirements, which prompts future research to focus on specific methodologies and tools that allow us to understand how decisions are made on whether a person meets these requirements, such as integrity. Based on the analysis of scientific approaches to the use of such moral and ethical categories as good faith and integrity in law, the author concludes that they fully reflect the tasks of the court in the administration of justice and are both a separate requirement (competence) and a guide for a judge in the performance of his or her duties. Key words: court independence, court performance evaluation, evaluation criteria, justice system reform, integrity, good faith.

ИДЕИ А.В. ЧАЯНОВА И "МОРАЛЬНАЯ ЭКОНОМИКА"

The article compares modern economic views based on the categories of morality and moral values, and forming a new “moral economy”, on the one hand, and the ideas of A.V. Chayanov on the criteria for evaluating labor, on the other.

Dignitatis Humanae and Human Rights in Philosophical and Legal Existence and in Contemporary Constitutionalism: Division and Reunification

The article analyzes the concept of “human dignity” in the context of philosophical and legal existence; scientific and philosophical identification of dignity as a polysemantic concept allows us to state its universal value and consider it as a universal legal and ethical category. The research work reveals the views of modern philosophers and lawyers on the nature and role of dignity in relation to human rights. The aim is to study the philosophical foundations and legal aspects of human dignity, to highlight the conceptual foundations of dialogue and the co-existence of human dignity and human rights in modern philosophical and legal discussions. The polysemy and polymorphism of human dignity is combined with a wealth of concepts of dignity, especially in modern constitutional jurisprudence and the practice of constitutionalism, and a unified theoretical basis for the relationship between individual dignity and human rights. The author used general and specific research methods, including methods of dialectics, inductive-deductive analysis, legal hermeneutics and legal engineering and a discursive approach, critical rationalism, and legal realism. Conclusions: dignity as a philosophical and legal category in modern discussions has several of the most important hypostases, reflecting the fundamental categorical meaning: a) the category of ethics and humanistic understanding of man; b) a legal category with a significant variety of legal forms of consolidation at the international, supranational and domestic levels, in the branches of legal regulation; c) a historically changeable category, affecting both the evolution of ethics and law, the legal status of individuals. The article proposes four approaches to the relationship between human rights and human dignity, which are based on four concepts of human dignity: 1) dignity as a gift and heritage; 2) dignity as a social achievement and social honor; 3) dignity as human capacity; 4) dignity as human potential.

The Traitor at the Court: A Tale of Moral Categories from the House of Kurds

:This paper focuses on a particular moral category, “betrayal,” that has gained significant purchase on Kurdish public culture in Turkey. It examines the ways Kurds reconfigure the relationship between political conditions and personal guilt by using betrayal as an orienting framework expressive of this relationship. In this sense, this paper frames “betrayal” not as a label or an abstract idea, but a register of political engagement that allows Kurds to recognize the conditions as well as the ethics of their shared membership in a public. It argues that examining Kurds’ reflexive interactions about betrayal—how they debate, define, and describe it—reveals a great deal about the formative significance of moral categories to the work of negotiating group-life, a specific kind of intellectual work thus rendered salient. The goal of the paper is to point to some productive directions in the anthropological study of moral categories by foregrounding the co-indexical relations between these categories and the semiotic operations in which they gain public and ethical recognition.

Correlation between the religious and the secular by F. M. Dostoevsky (based on “Writer’s Diary” and letters)

The article analyzes Dostoevsky’s religious and philosophical views on the correlation between the religious and the secular. The article examines journalistic works and letters of the writer. The analysis has shown that Dostoevsky’s philosophical thought is christocentric, moreover the dispute about the relationship between the religious and the secular as well as the dispute about the correlation between the religious and the historical process itself are immersed by him in a theological Christian context. Dostoevsky denied and criticized the key concepts of political philosophy of the Modernity (“Enlightenment”, “Progress”) and filled them with Orthodox understanding. He viewed religion and the culture itself (including rational thinking) as a subsystem of Christianity considering any social relations as a derivative of religion and as part of religion, and not as autonomous spheres. He considered any secular ideals and norms as religious and moral categories, put them inside the religious discourse of Christianity. Thus he doubt on the ontological usefulness of the “secular” as a philosophical category.

The Сhildhood Сare and Еducation in the late 19th – early 20th Сenturies as an Integral Part of the Ukrainian Institute of Motherhood

Child’s personality development is still being a significant component of Ukrainian society. We should pay attention to the emotional, physical and intellectual development of children, which is vital for their future. In order to achieve an objectivity, this research is focused on the analyzing of ‘family phenomenon’, including religious, moral categories and historical facts. The purpose of the research is to investigate the impact of upbringing and education of children on the quality of family life in the future. To achieve the above-mentioned purpose, the following scientific methods were applied: historical, descriptive, distributional, the method of comparative analysis, and the method of typological analysis. The application of these scientific methods made it possible to demonstrate the weakness of parental upbringing, neglecting the emotional state of children, and the low level of education of the population. The scientific novelty of the research results consists in an effort to reñonsider the definition of parenting role from different angles, focusing not only on the positive aspects, but also exploring the negative ones. The study makes it possible to ascertain the inadequacy of family life and educational potential of Ukrainians in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In order to objectively reproduce historical reality, it is necessary to further scrutinize educational aspect so as to avoid idealization of Christian-moral moments and not to fall victim to traditional stereotypes.

Социокультурные предпосылки культа агрессии и деструктивных процессов в молодежной среде

The article analyses the socio-cultural preconditions of the cult of aggression and destructive processes in the modern youth environment. The authors point out that the ongoing global hybrid war of information is using the levers of mass culture for its own purposes. The Internet has become one of its main spokespeople and its main advantage - the high speed of spontaneous dissemination of information. In essence, it is about the purposeful formation of a new type of terrorist by the ideologists of terrorist organizations through the distortion of consciousness and worldview. Further the authors specify the marked chronological sequence of application to Russian youth of technologies of management of masses from 2014 to 2021. Such technologies have been organically incorporated into mass Internet culture, not least because of the new ideal of young people - the anti-hero who challenges the system and destroys their enemies exclusively by force. In society today there is a desire for individualism, for isolation. Instead of critical analysis, cliched thinking, born and bred by a crisis of ideals, dominates today. An example is the now booming genre of superhero cinema. Bright heroes in equally bright and grotesque costumes battle some alien evil, destroying half of their own world along the way. It's a dumbing down of sensuality, a domination of form over content, a cliched shell that hides a reverse morality of permissiveness. And this is one of the tenets of terrorist movements and destructive ideologies. In order to confirm these theses, the authors conducted criminological research aimed at identifying the causes of the distortion of the moral image of modern society and moral categories in mass culture. The relationship between the moral values of individuals and their impact on the crime situation in society was studied. The study was conducted among teachers and students of the College of Altai State University. The respondents were also teachers from the Department of Criminal Law and Criminology at the Law Institute and the Department of Social Philosophy, Ontology and Theory of Knowledge at the Institute of Mass Communication, Philosophy and Political Science. A total of 330 respondents, aged 18-25 (students), 30-45 (teachers) were randomly sampled. The results confirmed the authors' hypothesis that the cult of power propagated by the mass media provoked a spontaneous social contamination, which was met by a surge of violent acts of a terrorist nature. Hybrid confrontation between states and uncontrolled, and often encouraged, terrorist activities in the digital sphere have given rise to an aggressive ideal of the hero of our time. Combating this triad requires a solid ideological basis in the anti-terrorist sphere, created through the joint efforts of the state and civil society institutions. The authors declare no conflicts of interests.

Pictures, Quotations, and Distinctions: Fourteen Essays in Phenomenology, RobertSokolowski, Catholic University of America Press, 2022 (ISBN 978‐0‐8132‐3518‐9), xiv + 326 pp., pb $34.95

Pictures, Quotations, and Distinctions: Fourteen Essays in Phenomenology, RobertSokolowski, Catholic University of America Press, 2022 (ISBN 978‐0‐8132‐3518‐9), xiv + 326 pp., pb $34.95

On the issue of freedom of conscience

This article examines the problem of the legal relationship of the state to religion, religious organizations and believers on the basis of the theoretical results of domestic and foreign scientific research. An analysis of the formation and development of modern materials on the problem of freedom of conscience and religious organizations in the sociolegal literature is presented. Protestantism laid the foundation for the idea of freedom of conscience, i.e., the religious freedom of the individual in the context of human rights. Avtorami suggests an interpretation of the definition of “conscience” and “freedom of conscience” through the prism of religion as the right of believers and analyses the current Law of the Republic of Uzbekistan and the CIS “On freedom of conscience and religious organizations” in the context of state-religious organization relations. Conscience as an ethical category has a purely personal character, expressing the inner spiritual and psychological "I", a sovereign spiritual phenomenon from the political and legal spheres of civil relations. The authors identify the problematic points in the regulation of relations between the rights and freedoms of believers to religion and associations in the legal acts of the country.

Biblijski motivi u narodnim epskim pesmama o Nemanjićima

The topic of this paper is biblical motifs in epic poems about Nemanjic dynasty. The holy dynasty of Nemanjic, during which Serbia experienced a cultural, economic, territorial and social flourishing, left an indelible mark in the Serbian collective memory. Folk epic poems about the Nemanjić dynasty bear witness to the beauty, strength, and grandeur of Serbian medieval rulers, while not disregarding their flaws and weaknesses. Among these poems, special emphasis is placed on those that preserve the memory of the impressive endowments and righteous deeds of the Nemanjić. Folk epic poems interwoven with biblical motifs have shaped the popular perspective on the world. Through them, ethical categories such as good and evil, justice and injustice, conscience, shame, guilt, and yearning for freedom are understood. Many generations have become acquainted with the Bible through folk epic poems. The influence of the Bible on folk epic literature is so strong that it is impossible to understand and interpret this type of Serbian cultural heritage without knowing biblical motifs and symbols. The presence of biblical motifs in folk epic poems related to the Nemanjić dynasty signifies the intertwining of spiritual heritage and cultural expression. The convergence of biblical themes and the epic narrative tradition is a testament to the lasting resonance of these literary works in the hearts and minds of the Serbian people.

The Constitutional Category of “Beauty” in the Polish Legal Order

The subject of the article is a reference to beauty in the preamble to the Constitution of the Republic of Poland of 1997. First, the legislative history of the fragment of the introduction to the Constitution, which constitutes beauty as a universal value, has been presented. Then it has been interpreted, taking the position that the constitutional concept of beauty is not only an aesthetic category but also an ethical category. Finally, a study of jurisprudence and normative acts has allowed to define the scope of beauty operationalization as a constitutional value. Critical reference has been made to the state of affairs in which beauty, being an element of constitutional axiology, plays a barely noticeable role in the practice of creating and applying Polish law.

“Man is Soul, Body, and Narrator”: Olga Tokarczuk’s Narrative Strategy

The article is devoted to the prose of Olga Tokarczuk, one of the greatest Polish writers of the turn of the twenty-first century. The most important constant of Tokarczuk’s worldview is the category of corporeality/materiality. The logic of corporeality/materiality on different levels determines the organization of texts, generates connections across motives and a common semantic field. The narrative of corporeality/materiality, leveraged by means of the writer’s frequent use of empathetic narrative, acts as a special construct by means of which Tokarczuk explores the reality of the surrounding world, but also communicates with it (through the potential recipient of the text). The article analyses the specificity of Tokarczuk’s visualisation of body practices in her prose (representations of the body, interaction of bodies, interaction of the body with the environment) and significant elements of the narrative structure directly connected with corporeality/materiality: the system of characters, the specificity of comparisons, basic ideas, the role of boundaries as an aesthetic and ethical category, as well as an artistic tool, and the moral purpose of the narrative.