METHODOLOGICAL FOUNDATIONS FOR THE STUDY OF THE CRIMINALIZATION OF SOCIALLY DANGEROUS ACTS: COMPETITION OF APPROACHES TO LEGAL UNDERSTANDING

Abstract

The article is devoted to the study of the problems of competing approaches to legal understanding in the context of determining the methodological foundations of the study of the criminalization of socially dangerous acts. It is noted that a modern researcher can choose one or another approach for himself, based on his own understanding of the ontology of law and the nature of its research, however, it is important to outline the epistemological paradigm that is the basis of a specific research conducted, which, in turn, will provide an opportunity to critically evaluate it process and results. The reason for the transformation of epistemological approaches was social dynamics, that is, the development of phenomena of material and immaterial culture, social progress. It was determined that essentialism still provides an effective toolkit for the study of law, since we consider it as a certain normative system (a set of ideas, beliefs) that exists outside the consciousness of a specific individual, and therefore is, in this sense, an objective phenomenon that known by the subject. It is emphasized that the theory of criminalization as a system of reliable knowledge about relevant phenomena / phenomena of legal reality should be formed based on a set of ideas and hypotheses that serve to solve a number of identified problems. The level of abstraction of the material that will make up this system of knowledge fully corresponds to the properties of the theory. It is concluded that the socio-naturalistic concept is an example of a classical understanding of law, since there is a certain phenomenon (natural law) which, as a result of cognition, is reflected in the mind of the legislator. When determining criminalization as a subject of research, it is worth using an essential criterion in the form of criminality/non-criminality of a specific act of a specific person. If, as a result of a change in a subordinate regulatory legal act, while the text of the criminal law remains unchanged, a certain act becomes a crime, it should be considered as criminalization and appropriate methods should be used to study this phenomenon.