Jurisprudence is considered one of the most significant among the humanities . This is because without the legal aspect, the existence of society is impossible. The article considers the history and methodology of legal science, terms and its main problems.
The concept, the main features of legal science, its difference from the social sciences
The system of knowledge about the state and law that mankind has accumulated over its entire centuries-old history is what legal (or legal) science is. This includes knowledge of:
- modern states and legal systems;
- historical information about the state and law;
- history and methodology of legal science in the framework of theories, concepts, doctrines and ideologies.
The specificity of legal science lies in the fact that it is designed to serve the needs of society in legal regulation. From this follows its main difference from other humanities:
- legal science is accurate and specific;
- she does not tolerate the duality of judgment;
- all concepts and categories are clearly structured and logically interconnected.
The subject and structure of legal science
Like any other, legal science has the following structure:
- Subject.
- An object.
- Subject.
- Methodology and others (sometimes technical means, procedures are allocated).
The subject is a person, in relation to legal science - this is a legal scholar or research team. An essential condition here is that the subject has a certain level of necessary knowledge, legal culture and a desire to engage in scientific research.
The subject of this science is very wide - this is the entire base of legislation, as well as the process of law-making and law enforcement.
The subject of the history and methodology of legal science is the system of laws that determines the processes of the formation of the state and the development of law from the moment it has arisen to this day.
Legal scholars distinguish five types of laws that make up the subject of legal science:
- The relationship between simple scientific components: legal relations and the rule of law.
- The relationship between more complex phenomena, such as legal systems.
- General laws inherent in both the state and law.
- Connection with other areas of life - the economy, social sphere, etc.
- Patterns of knowledge of law and state.
Legal Science Methodology
The subject of the history and methodology of legal science are, first of all, the foundations of the functioning of the legal system in the state.
In almost any science, a method is a group of rules, principles of knowledge of science, as well as its conceptual apparatus, which includes concepts and categories.
Legal science has many methods that can be combined into the following large groups:
- General methods, rather, the principles of knowledge (objectivity, knowability of the world, comprehensiveness of knowledge, etc.).
- General methods that are characteristic of absolutely any science, for example, analysis and synthesis.
- Special techniques that were originally developed and used outside of legal science. These are groups of mathematical, psychological, statistical methods.
- Private techniques developed by lawyers for use exclusively within the framework of legal science.
For example, using the method of interpretation of law, scientists explain the meaning of legal norms, as well as what the legislator wanted to say when adopting this norm.
A comparative legal method is the identification of similarities and differences among the laws of various states by analyzing the text of laws or other regulatory legal acts.
History of Law
The history of legal science is of particular interest, because it allows you to analyze the process of formation of knowledge of law in a specific historical period of time.
Scientists believe that the history and methodology of legal science originated before our era and distinguish its stages:
- knowledge of the Ancient World about jurisprudence (about 3000 BC - the end of the 5th century AD);
- teachings on the law of the Middle Ages (end of the 5th century AD - the beginning of the 16th century);
- legal knowledge of the New Age;
- legal science in modern times.
In the West, it was born and existed simultaneously with society, which, being a class, determined its main paradigms.
Most Greek legal science was revealed in the works of outstanding geniuses - Aristotle and Plato, who developed methods of cognition, the logic of knowledge, developed criteria for the search for scientific truth.
After the Roman attack on Greece and its subsequent conquest, the development of legal science began to be associated with ancient Roman figures - these are the well-known Cicero, Seneca, Marcus Aurelius. The specifics of their work was to state the principles of the existence of a slave-owning society, determine the legal status of slaves and free people, and also develop the institution of private property. Many jurists believe that it was precisely this period that formalized jurisprudence as an independent branch of knowledge.
After the collapse of the Roman Empire, barbarian states (for example, Frankish) were formed, which had customary law (based on customs and traditions), enshrined in a document called the "Truth". For several centuries, legal science in these states has not developed at all.
Only during the Renaissance and the Reformation (the struggle between church and secular power) did outstanding medieval philosophers - Thomas More, Niccolo Machiavelli, Martin Luther laid the foundations for a fundamentally new legal science. It is these foundations, for example, the right to freedom from feudal dependence and entrepreneurship that became the first step towards the formation of bourgeois ideology.
After bourgeois revolutions, freedom of the individual was recognized as the main social value, which had a positive impact on the development of legal science. Prominent scientists of this time are John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Hugo Grotius. They advocated formalizing the legal status of an individual in the state, and attributed to the state the role of defender of that person and public order.
A separate word should be said about the provisions of Marxism, which propagated the right of the working people to create and manage a state without the presence of the bourgeoisie in it. This doctrine advocated the building of a socialist, and then a communist society.
The following factors have a huge impact on modern legal science:
- Globalization.
- The dominant position of international law over national law.
Modern problems of legal science
Despite the fact that the history of legal science is analyzed, and the methodology is structured and worked out as never before, there are several rather serious problems:
- For example, legislative activity in relation to Russian legislation, and not only, is not a perfect mechanism. Often, at the exit you can see the adoption of a law that is not fully developed, or that has significant gaps.
- Negative phenomena such as corruption and bureaucracy existing in public administration are also a major problem in legal science that needs to be addressed immediately.
- The actual rule of law over law, often found in the laws of many countries. In this situation, it is difficult to talk about building a rule of law.
Theory of state and law: concept and functions
The theory of state and law is a subject that studies the laws governing the emergence and functioning of institutions such as law and the state. Without exaggeration, it can be considered a basic, fundamental discipline in the system of studying the methodology and history of legal science.
Like any other science, the theory of state and law performs a number of functions, of which the main ones are:
- Cognitive, the essence of which is the accumulation of knowledge about the state and law.
- Applied - the development of proposals aimed at improving the legal reality.
- Predictive, as the name implies, its goal is to identify trends in the further development of the state legal mechanism.
- The heuristic function is to search for patterns of development of law and state institutions.
- Educational, aimed at the formation of citizens of justice and legal culture.
Sources of Law Studies
There are a lot of sources for studying the methodology and history of legal science; they can be distinguished into the following large groups:
- Legislation. These are laws and normative legal acts (decrees, decrees, orders) that are currently in force or have lost their force.
- Legal customs.
- Arbitrage practice.
- Statistical data.
- The work of legal scholars.
Scientists have difficulties in working with many sources. For example, translation of text from an ancient language or handwritten source. The most significant are the works of famous researchers.
The article examined contemporary problems, history and methodology of legal science. She occupies a special place among all knowledge. It is thanks to legal science that society gains knowledge about the legal system of the state and its organization.