Law affects relations in society in different ways: in some cases it prohibits, in others, on the contrary, it obliges, and in others it allows. Such behavior in practice and in theory is called legal regulation.
The three options presented actually answer the question of how the law regulates, but does not disclose what means it uses for this. And therefore, in legal science, an institution was developed - mechanisms of legal regulation.
Concept and constituent elements
The mechanism of legal regulation is a special set of means by which the management of relations in society is carried out. At the same time, it is distinguished by a number of signs:
- it is always legal means;
- the purpose of this mechanism is only to achieve the legitimate use of the rights or freedoms granted;
- the task of the process in question is the removal of alleged, but not always mandatory obstacles in relation to the exercise of rights.
Given these characteristics, the legal regulation mechanism can be defined as a special set of means for the legitimate exercise of rights used to prevent probable problems on the way to their implementation.
In addition to signs, scientists distinguish various classifications of the phenomenon under consideration according to the criteria of the role and type of regulation.
So, the mechanisms of legal regulation, depending on the type, are of two types:
- permissive, this category includes both direct authorization and prohibition, the subjects are equal in them;
- permissive - the main and determining subject is the authority.
Depending on the role, division is carried out on the basis of general and individual. So, the latter are aimed strictly at a specific person, while the general ones cover a group of all entities as a whole.
Like any system, the mechanism has its own structure, expressed in the union of the three elements. So, the legal regulation mechanism consists of the legal relationship to be affected, the rule of law that will be applied, and the act of legal implementation.
These elements are directly related to the stages of action of the phenomenon in question.
The mechanism of legal regulation - implementation stages
As a rule, legal scholars distinguish three main stages.
The first stage from which the mechanism of legal regulation begins is the definition of a rule of law. In this regard, the subject of regulation is obliged to accurately choose the legal model of behavior that he intends to fulfill. At the same time, it can be either permissible or binding or prohibitive. An example is the norm that defines the prohibition on the deprivation of life of a person. In this case, the rule clearly refers to the section of criminal law.
The second stage is aimed at identifying the necessary legal relationship. The latter is inherently the interaction of persons in society. Continuing the above example with the norm, the legal regulation mechanism must be involved in the event of a violent death of an individual.
The third stage is the adoption of an act of application of law. In this case, the competent authority of the country is obliged to establish all objective circumstances, determine how much the specified rule of law corresponds to the legal relationship in question, and make a specific decision in the form of a legislative act. In the light of the above example with the norm and legal relationship, the third stage must look as follows. The judge (as the representative of the country) is obliged to establish the facts of the case, i.e. to find out the essence of the relationship between the object and subject composition. Further, he is charged with identifying how the specified content corresponds to the applicable norm, namely: whether there is a fact of violent death, whether it was carried out by the specified subject, and so on. If the first two stages correspond to each other, to pass an act of application of law is a sentence.
Summing up, it should be noted that the mechanism of legal regulation is a multi-stage model of the application of law, compliance with which leads to the creation of a clearly functioning legal system.