Interaction of European and Russian Legal Consciousness

AuthorA. Tyrtyshny - S. Tomas
PositionRussian New University (Moscow, Russia) - Russian New University (Moscow, Russia)
Pages34-49
InTERaCTIon oF EuRoPEan and RuSSIan
LEGaL ConSCIouSnESS
ALEXEY TYRTYSHNY,
Russian New University (Moscow, Russia),
STANISLOVAS TOMAS,
Russian New University (Moscow, Russia)
This art icle provides a n overview o f certain i deologemes of Western (European) and
Russian legal consciousness – prominent works of Ivan Ilyin and Duncan Kennedy are
taken as examples. The article analyzes the tabula rasa principle and its place in legal
consciousness. We use legal scholarship, judicial practice and opinion polls to examine
the relationship between legal consciousness and the lack of trust in Russian courts, as
well as their ineciency from the point of view of public opinion. There are a number of
shocking cases of torture of innocent people by the Russian police. Why is this so? The
answer lies in the legal consciousness of police ocers and of judges. This is something
that has been inherited from the Soviet period. It is completely dierent from the Western
legal consciousness, one of the key features of which is denial of authority. The critical
legal studies branch of American legal realism almost denies the very existence of law,
and, perhaps for this reason, American culture is less open to abuses like torture. At the
same time, there is no possibility to shift legal consciousness immediately, the tabula
rasa principle does not work. The nal objective of the article is to provide a perspective
on the reform of higher legal education and its relation to legal consciousness and legal
anthropology. We propose that a greater part of the university curriculum is devoted to
legal anthropology.
Keywords: justice; legal culture; legal consciousness; theor y of state and law; practice
and jurisprudence; psychology of law; legal education.
Recommended citation: Alexey Tyrtyshny & Stanislovas Tomas, Inte raction of
European and Russian Legal Consciousness, 2(2) BRICS LJ (2015).
ALEXEY TY RTYSHNY, STANISLOVAS TOMAS 35
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. Russian and Western Legal Consciousness Narratives
3. Public Trust in Justice Administration
4. Anthropologization of Legal Education
5. Conclusion: Towards a Reform of Russian Legal Education
1. Introduction
The topic of legal consciousness is rather well developed in Russian scholarship in
the framework of law and state theory, especially scholarship from the pre-Soviet and
Soviet periods. In the pre-Soviet period, there were three branches of development
of Russian legal consciousness theory:
1) Ivan Ilyin’s ideas on ‘healthy legal consciousness;’1
2) Leon Petrażycki’s theory of psychological motivation in legal behavior2; and
3) Mikhail Reisner’s avant-garde theory of socialist legal consciousness.3
The key ideas of the socialist legal cons ciousness theor y were devel oped by
Reisner d uring the pre -Soviet period, and were com pleted in the works of Isaak
Farber,4 Valentin Sapun,5 Valery Zorkin,6 and others. Therefore, Russian scholarship
and practice at the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century was based on
a well-developed conception of legal consciousness, the key ideas of which were the
dependence of the content of popular legal consciousness on the dominant socialist
1 Ильин И.А. О сущности правосознания [Ilyin I.A. O sushchnosti pravosoznaniya [Ivan A. Ilyin, On the
Essence of Legal Consciousness]] 147–158 (Rarog 1993).
2 Петражицкий Л.И. Очерки философии права [Petrażycki L.I. Ocherki losoi prava [Leon I. Petrażycki,
Essays on the Philosophy of Law]] 234 (Tipograya Yu.N. Ehrlich 1900).
3 Рейснер М.А. Обществен ное благо и абсолютное государств о // Вестник права. 1902. Т. XXXII.
№ 9–10 [Reisner M.A. Obshchestvennoe blago i absolyutnoe gosudarstvo // Vestnik prava. T. XXXII. Nos.
9–10 [Mikhail A. Reisner, Public Good and Absolute State, 32(9–10) Law Review (1902)]].
4 Фарбер И.Е. Правосознание как форма общественного сознания [Farber I.E. Pravosoznanie kak forma
obshchestvennogo soznaniya [Isaak E. Farber, Legal Consciousness as a Form of Public Consciousness]]
198–200 (Yuridicheskaya literatura 1963).
5 Сапун В.А. Современное правопонимание и инструментальные свойс тва права // Зарубежный
опыт и отечественные традиции в российском праве [Sapun V.A. Sovremenno e pravoponimanie
i instrumental’nye svoistva prava // Zarubezhnyi opyt i otechestvennye traditsii v rossiiskom prave [Valentin
A. Sapun, Contemporary Legal Consciousness and Instrumental Features of Law, in Foreign Experience
and Homeland Traditions in Russian Law]] 56 (St. Petersburg State University Press 2004).
6 Зорькин В.Д. Кризис международного права: современный контекст // Российская газета. 2014.
20 июня [Zorkin V.D. Krizis mezhdunarodnogo prava: sovremennyi kontekst // Rossiiskaya gazeta. 2014.
20 iyunya [Valery D. Zorkin, Crisis of International Law: Contemporary Context, Russian Gazette, Jun. 20,
2014]].

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT