WHAT IS THE ROLE OF LEGAL SCIENCE IN MODERN SOCIETY?

Зохидов Манучехр

студент 1 года обучения магистратуры Юридического института РУДН,

РФ, г. Москва

ABSTRACT

The article is devoted to the analysis of the status of legal science (jurisprudence) at the present stage. The author made an attempt to discourse about the problems that haunt legal science, their influence. Conclusion are offered, which, according to the author, can bring legal science to a new level.

Keywords: science; education; jurisprudence.

1. Probably, there is no need to prove the fact that legal science (as a kind of discipline that studies the social structure of the world) is facing new challenges and problems. Such challenges are due to the change in value, worldview paradigms and guidelines in society, an increasingly intense and clearly manifested change of humanistic discourse (the rise of a person and his dignity) to «dataism» (the rise of the value of information and big data technologies) and the general automation of the processes of human life. "Religion" called "humanism", which has been dominating infinitely for 75 years in most of our planet (and the first serious discussions about a person, his rights and dignity have more than 200 years of history), is clearly inferior to its position in relation to towards global informatization and algorithmization of many, previously seemed impossible, branches of human life, which sets new trends in the rethinking of such fundamental (at first glance) human rights, such as, for example, the right to privacy, privacy of correspondence and telephone conversations, the right to free moving and choosing a place of residence, etc. Without unnecessary exaggeration, we can say that the ideas of a free market economy, democracy, the doctrine of human rights - liberal institutions today with the help of the "light hand" of artificial intelligence technologies and Big Data are inflicted colossal damage. In fact, liberalism today is undergoing a thorough revision and revision, and is suffering a serious collapse. And he, after all, once arose, including on the pages of the works of lawyers, scientists, representatives of political and legal thought.

2. Within the framework of this article, we will try to outline only some of the contours of the problematic aspects of the state of legal science and, as a result, the impact on society, its institutions and legal practice. Among the many problems currently on the agenda of scientific activity, special attention should be paid to the issues related to the relationship between science (scientific activity) with politics (state) and capital (large corporations - legal entities); A "portrait" of a modern scientist and his "pressing problems"; the commercialization of science observed in Russian realities; the influence of science on legal practice and the formation of legal culture of legal practitioners.

3. It is known that, as a rule, science, unfortunately, has always been forced to follow the trends that were dictated by the political conjuncture. The latter was formed under the influence of the worldview of the top political leadership of the state, their ideas about what is fair for society and a person, and what is not, what is good and what is evil. If natural sciences by and large are not burdened with a political context (since today no leader of the state (whoever he is: a democrat, a conservative or a dictator) has no doubts that E = mc², that there is no "Iranian", "American" or "North Korean" atomic physics, which makes it possible to substantiate and create their own unique, "national" nuclear weapons, and the Universal Law of Gravity is "apolitical" and is absolutely indifferent to what political forces are in power in a particular temporal and spatial dimension), then about socially -humanitarian scientific disciplines do not have to say this. Natural sciences determine the objective and natural development of the world, demonstrate its natural side, while humanitarian - the social picture of the world. Unfortunately, history knows a lot of facts about how social science, including legal science, substantiated and created a theoretical foundation for the most terrible social (and not only) experiments of politicians and those in power over people. To no less extent, the share of the blame falls on legal science (since here it is enough to give an example of the lack of consensus among theorists in the understanding of what is the state and law, because everyone is trying to focus the attention of the "consumer" of information on one or another side of the definition that seems to him the most correct or beneficial). It was legal science, often formulating various theories, that contributed to the "legalization" of flagrant anti-human acts. Consequently, we have to say that science in one form or another "served" politics and politicians. This is definitely a negative phenomenon. Science should not be politically engaged, at least when it is clearly directed against public interests. Ideology is very close in its content to politics. Ideology also tries to "pull" science to its side, curb it and make it its helper, using it in its own interests. As practice shows, nothing good has ever come of it.

4. Capital is another important satellite of science. Recently, there has been a tendency that science is "done" not in academies of sciences, universities and departments of research institutes, but in scientific structures of large transnational corporations that invest colossal money in the development of scientific activities, primarily for their needs, forming scholarships programs, grants and funding their R&D (at least, we can definitely talk about the sciences researching IT, artificial intelligence, Big Data technologies, personality psychology, neurobiology, neurophysiology, cognitive linguistics, etc. Who knows what lies ahead for legal science, in 50 years and where will research centers "move"?). The "crossing" of science and capital, undoubtedly, gives good results. However, such results are aimed at generating more profit for the corporation. That is, on the basis of certain scientific conclusions, the corporation rebuilds or modifies the model of products or services provided. It should be noted that this circumstance also has a negative side, since scientific research will be carried out in those areas that are obviously commercially attractive, which in turn will inevitably lead to uneven development of scientific activities and ongoing research. In the context of the merger of legal science and business, it can be assumed that capital benefits, for example, by conducting scientific research and theoretical justifications for lowering tax rates for business or investment activities.

5. Now the author would like to write a few words about the portrait of a modern Russian scientist. Is it even possible in legal science to invent / formulate something really important and useful for the human species (well, or at least for members of their "community" - fellow citizens)? Will the scientific papers be of any interest? Or is everything new - well forgotten old? Why am I, a young man, “going into science”? What drives me? These questions, it seems to me, should be asked by every person who sits down to conduct scientific research. You can deceive the people around you, various digital systems for controlling the originality of the text of the work - the notorious "Antiplagiat" (at least for now), but you cannot deceive yourself. A person must clearly understand what goals he pursues in the scientific field. Probably, after honest answers to such questions, and long meaningful reasoning, the number of "applicants" for scientific degrees and positions will decrease, which, in turn, in my opinion, will have a positive effect on the quality of the research...

6. Special attention should be paid to the issue of burdening a scientist with various kinds of bureaucratic red tape in higher educational institutions. One gets the impression that an associate professor or professor does not work at the university in order to share his knowledge with students, convey his thoughts and point of view to the public and colleagues, engage in research activities, but write reports, draw up formal documents on the disciplines taught and various tables with a lot of digits. Yes, statistics are good, but they shouldn't be central to the work of a scientist and teacher. The same situation arises with the obligation of a member of the teaching staff to publish systematically in "western" journals, for failure to comply with which may result in the termination of his work at the university. We wonder how often and with what degree of interest are articles by Russian scientists read and discussed in the West? Are such articles in demand "there"? And in general, what relation do Web of Science and Scopus have to Russian legal science? We do not quite understand educational policy, which is aimed at demonstrating and achieving quantitative rather than qualitative indicators...

7. Perhaps the most acute problem (at least for me) in legal science and in the organization of this sphere is the already well-established and, probably, irreversible process of its commercialization. Let us consider this problem on the example of a specific situation, which is clearly "striking" - the situation with the Institute of State and Law of the Russian Academy of Sciences (hereinafter - ISL RAS). This institution is one of the most influential and authoritative (if not the most authoritative) among scientific and educational organizations that are engaged in training highly qualified personnel. Being a researcher at the of the Russian Academy of Sciences is very prestigious, for many it is a criterion and indicator of achieving a certain high level of scientific competence of a scientist. Eminent scientists, masters and luminaries of legal science work and teach there: candidates and doctors of legal sciences, professors, corresponding members and academicians, honored workers of science and education, honored lawyers. It would seem that the works that are written in the "temple" of legal science should be available for general acquaintance (after all, we are talking about legal education in the most literal sense), since most of those people who write their articles and then publish in the publications of this leading organizations are those with whose work self-respecting lawyers (both theoreticians and practitioners, law students) should be familiar. However, the situation looks like this. ISL RAS has two authoritative and widely read publications: the journal "State and Law" and the journal "Trudy IGP RAN". The journal "State and Law" is very popular, has a very long history and has been published since 1927. But now the main thing (!): to get acquainted with the full versions of these journals (as well as with individual publications in them) is possible only with a paid subscription or purchase (including with electronic format of articles / journal). Thus, the minimum subscription price for the issue of the magazine "State and Law" (published monthly) is 792 rubles [1], and the issue "Proceedings of the IGP RAS" (published once every two months) you can purchase for 1432 rubles [2]. How can such a circumstance lend itself to explanation? You can still somehow understand the situation with the printed version of journals (because there are costs for a publishing house or printing house operating under the ISL), but in the age of technology development, computerization and the availability of the Internet, the Institute, which is a structural subdivision of the Russian Academy sciences and funded from the federal budget - it seems to me unacceptable! One involuntarily gets the feeling that you are not talking about an authoritative federal state scientific organization, but about a certain limited liability company, whose main goal is to maximize profit. It is noteworthy that the main page of the ILS RAS website on the Internet contains a capacious quote from L.N. Tolstoy: "The business of science is to serve people." In light of this situation, we just want to slightly modify the quote and write: "The business of science is to serve people, but for their money!"

8. At the same time, we are not talking about the high cost of scientific journals of other educational organizations (or those published at these institutions), as well as educational and scientific legal literature, presented in large quantities on the shelves of bookstores and in "online stores" of publishing houses (limited by volume format of scientific work). The author understands perfectly well that in a market economy, an entrepreneur (a group of entrepreneurs) sees his main goal in making a profit from his activities. But we are also convinced that books that popularize science, contain fundamental scientific views, contribute to the educational development of a person, should not be so overpriced! There should not be such a situation when a student with a basic state academic scholarship of 3000 rubles. (in the "central" university of the country) must think about how to acquire a textbook for his property for 1,500 rubles or a magazine issue for 800 rubles. One thing should be remembered: as soon as we begin to consider (or are already considering) the educational or scientific spheres as those spheres where one can make a profit, commercialize them, the situation with education and science will inexorably go to degradation and collapse.

9. These, in our opinion, systemic problems in legal science cannot but affect the quality of scientific research. In turn, the low level of research work negatively affects the formation of legal culture in society, slows down or even hinders this process. All this, as a consequence, has a negative impact on legal practice: in the areas of lawmaking, law enforcement and justice. And legal practice is that social institution that is designed to improve people's lives, to bring rationality, orderliness and justice into it, to satisfy the needs of society and an individual. In a situation where there is a very low level of legal culture among the population and civil servants, it is difficult to set (more precisely, to implement) global, comprehensive goals for the development of the state, society, creating conditions for the formation of a human personality and the disclosure of its potentials.

References:

1. Official web-site of Journal: http://gospravo-journal.ru/
2. Russian press / Joint catalog: https://www.pressa-rf.ru/cat/1/edition/e86119/