The article examines the most important changes in the legislation on criminal liability for the spread of sexually transmitted diseases that occurred in the 1920s of the formation of Soviet Russia. Particular attention is paid to the content of the legal norms presented in Art. Art. 155, 155-a of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR of 1922, their new editions, as well as the content of the norms indicated in Art. 150 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR of 1926. The authors study the decree “On measures to combat venereal diseases”, issued on January 24, 1927 by the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People’s Commissars of the RSFSR, which the health authorities, in terms of granting the right to forcibly attract patients with venereal diseases to re-examination and treatment. An assessment by Soviet lawyers of the normatively regulated measures to combat venereal diseases in the initial period of the formation of Soviet power is given. The authors came to the conclusion that during the indicated period, a completely high-quality law-making basis was laid in counteracting the spread of venereal disease as a dangerous crime against health. The state of criminal law from liability for infection with a venereal disease, presented in Art. 121 of the current Criminal Code of the Russian Federation of 1996 leaves much to be desired, and therefore it is reckless to discount what was developed by the predecessors, even if almost a century ago.

The article deals with the problems of qualifying banditry, in particular, on the basis of the armament of an organized group, the number of committed or planned crimes. Judicial practice on the qualification of organized crimes is controversial in terms of determining the presence or absence of the criterion of armament, as a result, recognizing an act as banditry. At the same time, the Resolution of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, although it contains a reference to the Federal Law “On Weapons”, still does not sufficiently reveal this criterion and contains definitions that are ambiguous for understanding. In this regard, court decisions in similar cases are also different, which in turn contradicts the principle of justice. It is proposed to make changes to amend paragraph 1 of clause 5 of the Resolution of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation dated January 17, 1997 No. 1 “On the practice of applying by courts of legislation on liability for banditry” to resolve the problem under discussion.

This article deals with the debatable problem of the subject-object specificity of the sociology of law. We give an analysis of two polar opinions of scientists (sociologists and legal scholars) on the scientific status of sociology of law in the Russian historical retrospective. We also reveal the reasons for the low levels of trust in the subject-object nature of this science among two conditional camps of researchers in the history of its formation and evolution. We note the importance of constructing cross-scientific, interdisciplinary objectivity of a relatively new legal discipline in Russian science. Lastly, we emphasise the role and significance of the interdisciplinary synthesis of sociological and legal research.

The article analyzes the main approaches to the concept of legal space in modern legal science. At the same time, the process of strengthening the unified legal space of Russia is highlighted. In connection with the 2020 Amendments, the directions for the development of the legal space of the republics within the Russian Federation are outlined.

The article is devoted to the study of the problems of legal support for integrated rational subsoil use in the Arctic zone of the Russian Federation. The author’s proposal to impose additional environmental obligations on the subsoil user with their inclusion in the license for the use of subsoil, which may include obligations to eliminate accumulated environmental damage in the Arctic zone of the Russian Federation, deserves attention.

Based on the analysis of the 1st and current Constitution of North Ossetia, the laws on the abolition of regional justice, the process of centralization of judicial power is revealed in the article. Taking into account this and other processes of state-building, the version of the unitarization of the state is expressed. The author substantiates the complexity of creating constitutional councils as established contrary to the legal principle of not being a judge in your own case. Comparative-historical, comparative-legal and logical research methods are used to study these and other issues.

The activities of the Imperial Russian Geographical Society represented a new stage in the development of historical and ethnographic science in the study of Northeast Asia. The article presents the direction of the Society’s work in terms of attracting the public to the systematic collection of historical and ethnographic material about the peoples of the region by developing and distributing various kinds of programs for collecting material, which, in addition, formed a scientific interest in «ethnography», promoted and organized ethnographic research attracted a large number of researchers. The materials collected as a result of the implementation of the programs have preserved unique valuable information for science.

Based on mainly archival documents, the article examines the number and composition of people forcibly deported to a settlement in Yakutia from the western territories of the USSR during the Second World War. Data are presented on the difficult living conditions and work of special settlers - Lithuanians, Poles, Germans - and their adaptation to the harsh natural and climatic conditions of the Far North, on high mortality among them. The novelty is seen in the fact that the research turnover includes archival documents that influence not only the formation of a historical understanding of a certain stage in the history of Russian society, but also the reconstruction of the picture of historical memory. The relevance of the study is due to the fact that in recent decades, the issues of the functioning of the totalitarian system in the USSR, forced migration, and the memory of deportations as a scientific discourse have been of great interest. It is concluded that the opening of materials from state archives makes it possible to gain wide access to little-studied aspects of violent politics, to show the static nature of the system and the social consequences of deportations.

The article discusses the issue of defining the meaning of the term «duty» in constitutional law. The philosophical category of concept is at the basis of the research, stressing the semantic meaning of duty and its moral and legal (philosophical) nature. The article underlines the fact that each period in the development of legal science was rich in ideas and theoretical and practical examples of the research issue. Antiquity includes the views of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. The modern age is the perception of duty in the works of Immanuel Kant, Jeremy Bentham, David Hume, and others. The previous century and the contemporary period are marked by the ideas of philosopher Vladimir Soloviev, researchers Timofey Radko, Stepan Kechekyan, Nikolay Vitruk, Suren Avakyan, and others. Boris Ebzeyev notes that “the category of duty has not only ethical, but also legal significance and should be understood and considered both in the science of constitutional law and the practical implementation of the Constitution”. [1, 514]. Notwithstanding such interest of scholars whose works form the basis of this research, it is possible to state that there is insufficient understanding of this category from the legal point of view. Incorrect use of concepts and legal terms in jurisprudence, especially constitutional law-making, can diminish the rights and freedoms of individuals and citizens and may lead to conflicts of policy and law. Furthermore, there is no sufficient scientific understanding of such a terminological cliché as ‘constitutional duty’. Research articles often include phrases that are based on this concept (‘public duty’, ‘legal duty’), however, the meaning behind these phrases is often omitted. Thus, the goal of this research is to define the role of the ‘duty’ concept in constitutional law by first examining the category of duty in the retrospective of philosophical understanding; second, ‘calculating’ the relationship between the category of duty and another legally relevant category of obligation; third, classifying the category based on its broad interpretation, defining the meaning of the ‘constitutional duty’ subcategory.

The article is devoted to the study of the constitutional foundations of the idea of the common good in the Russian Federation. The content of the idea of the common welfare, various approaches and correlation with related categories are considered, the Constitution of the Russian Federation and foreign constitutional and international acts are analyzed, the need to introduce the idea of the common good into scientific discourse and political and legal practice is argued.