Vol 10, No 1 (2023)

This article analyzes alternative legal constructions used to resolve tax situations and determines the limits of the admissibility of their use. It emphasizes that such legal constructions are lawmaking and enforcement. Moreover, the latter takes place in the course of both judicial and administrative law enforcement. These constructions are civil law. The authors highlight the fact that the subject of this article is not civil law institutions that determine tax law. We discuss civil law constructions in the system of tax situations, i.e., situations that arise from tax legal relations and require their resolution. In the context of the article, the lawmaking constructions are those that are established in the Tax Code of the Russian Federation. One example, in particular, is the civil law constructions of a surety and a bank guarantee, enshrined in Art. 74 and 74.1 of the Tax Code of the Russian Federation. Enforcement constructions, in particular, are civil law constructions of unjust enrichment and tort liability. As an alternative, these constructions for regulating tax situations are used in the Resolutions No. 9-P, dated March 24, 2017, and No. 39-P, dated December 8, 2017, of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation.

We pay particular attention to the analysis of the “tax clause” as a false alternative civil law construction initiated into the practice of the Federal Tax Service of Russia, and we determine the criteria for the limits of permissibility of using alternative legal constructions in the context of the subject of research.

This article considers the problem of expanding the competence of tax authorities in transferring VAT payments to the counterparty of the contract through tax clauses. It analyzes the judicial practice of applying tax clauses and identifies practical and theoretical problems of using tax clauses in contracts. Finally, it concludes with observations about the withdrawal of tax authorities operating beyond the legal limits of their competence.

This article concerns the points of growth of A.V. Polyakov's communicative theory of law in the conditions of a medial turn. The main purpose of the A.V. Polyakov theory was to integrate various types of legal understanding, reconciling the confrontation of natural law, positivism, and sociological theories of law. The semantic core of this theory is the concept of legal communication as an interaction between legal subjects who are aware of each other's rights and recognize them. The medial turn associated with total digitalization is becoming a new challenge for the communicative theory of law. The author analyzes its nodal moments, in which it is possible to expand the heuristic potential of the theory. The starting point of the analysis is the structure of communication, the treatment of which allows one to concretize, expand, and supplement the initial provisions of the theory of A.V. Polyakov. In the part of the theory related to the consideration of communicants, A.V. Polyakov introduces the intersubjective figure of the Other, thanks to which legal communication is focused on the counterparty. However, a different figurativeness of the Other is possible here, based on the typification of polysubject communication and the combinatorics of classical forms of communication in intermediate models. The examination of the communication channel reveals the possibility of calibrating A.V. Polyakov's chosen broad understanding of the text as any set of signs included in semiosis through a narrow understanding of the text as a form of communication based on M. McLuhan's idea of communication revolutions. In this case, the prospects for research on the role of media text in the legal communication of digital society open up. The message is the material basis for transporting the meaning of legal communication. It is possible to expand the theory by analyzing the processes of interference of meaning within a single message based on the methodology of N. Luhmann's autopoiesis. The effects of legal communication can be considered more panoramically when detailing the system of communication blocks of various natures, which is conceptualized on the basis of R. Dahrendorf's theory of social conflict. Structural analysis of communication is both a strategy for detailing its features and a methodological technique for expanding theory through new projects of methodological syntheses with social theories.

The article analyzes the changes that have occurred in public life and legal relations that have occurred during the period of rapid development and implementation of information and communication technologies. Based on the presented facts and observations, the necessity of normative regulation of social relations arising in the digital space between different users is substantiated. In addition, it is concluded that information security is becoming increasingly important in modern society, and it should be protected at the state level.

This article examines the issue of assessing the reliability of evidence in the verdict in the case of contradictions in facts examined in court. The procedure for eliminating contradictions in evidence, as noted in the article, is directly related to the substantiation of the court's conclusions in the verdict and, in general, to the peculiarities of judicial knowledge. The author addresses the problem of comparability of evidence in a criminal case and points out that in criminal proceedings there are situations of inconsistency of information in which individual contradictions in the evidence examined do not entail their mutual exclusion. It is noted that working with contradictions in the evidence shows the true ability of the law enforcer to think analytically.

In the system of Russian legislation, the issue of the application of measures of criminal procedural coercion to participants in criminal proceedings has been extremely relevant and debatable for many decades. Most measures of procedural coercion can be applied not only to adults but also to minors since they are often involved as various participants in criminal proceedings the same time, the issues of electing and applying to minors in particular other measures of procedural coercion, unlike adult participants in the process, are poorly worked out in the legislation, have shortcomings, and therefore require further study and improvement. The article discusses some issues of applying other measures of procedural coercion to minor participants in court proceedings, such as the obligation to appear, drive, and seizure of property. The author analyzes the features of such an application and also gives examples from investigative and judicial practice.

The research examines some aspects of the digitalization of law enforcement. The author selectively analyzes relevant regulatory framework and a number of domestic and foreign examples of the use of artificial intelligence in the activities of law enforcement agencies and the prosecutor's office. He notes the problems of introducing artificial intelligence into the work of law enforcement officers and identifies the most promising areas of activity, primarily analytical ones, for the use of digital assistants by prosecutors. Based on the results of the study, the author concludes that the proliferation of digital assistant programs which eliminate routine work and increase the effectiveness of supervision is inevitable, and he also predicts the emergence of digital prosecutors in the foreseeable future.