Russia in the 2020s: Constitutionalism and Legal Awareness in the Face of the Challenge of the COVID-19 Pandemic

In the article, the author, using a broad socio-legal material, highlights the question of the place of constitutionalism in modern Russian legal consciousness and the reaction of Russians, as its bearers, to the challenges and trends generated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which has affected all, without exception, aspects of our lives. Considering constitutionalism from the standpoint of the social science discourse of its study, the author raises questions of its essence, interpretation in the works of jurists, both domestic and foreign, conceptualizes it in relation to the mass consciousness of Russians. In turn, considering constitutionalism in the prism of its sociological dimension, in the legal consciousness of Russians, the author identifies and explores the following incarnations: Knowledge of the Constitution as the basic law and personal attitude to it; Attitude towards civil rights; Assessments of state-political institutions; Practice of implementation of constitutional provisions; Implementation of social behavior models guaranteed by the constitution. A separate issue in the article is the definition of the directions and essence of the transformations generated by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this direction, the author, summarizing the data of sociological studies conducted by such national centers as FOM, VTsIOM, the Institute of Sociology of the Federal Scientific Research Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, draws a complex model of transformations and draws a conclusion about the current state of Russian constitutionalism and the legal consciousness of Russians under the influence of the pandemic.

discourse, law, policy, constitution, constitutionalism, mass consciousness, legal awareness, pandemic