The subject. In modern conditions, the problem of independence and impartiality of arbitrators within the decentralized, fragmented and largely ad hoc Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) system manifests itself in three main forms: issue conflict, repeat appointments, and double hatting. This article focuses on the latter phenomenon. Methods. The research is based on traditional methods of system analysis, deduction and induction, as well as the study of international legal instruments, arbitral decisions and national court practice. Main results. Investment arbitration, having inherited key features from international commercial arbitration – particularly the parties’ right to appoint arbitrators – reveals specific complexities. Arbitrators are typically not full-time adjudicators and often combine this role with other professional activities. On the one hand, such duality ensures the availability of highly specialized expertise. On the other hand, it creates risks, as the only formal requirement for appointment is the parties’ choice. The widespread practice of double hatting – simultaneously or sequentially acting as arbitrator, counsel, or expert – may undermine the principles of independence and impartiality, and ultimately the rule of law. Against this background, current ISDS reform discussions, including proposals for a permanent investment court, aim to reduce or eliminate role combination. However, the justification and usefulness of such reforms remain debatable. Conclusions. States are increasingly focused on strengthening safeguards of arbitrators’ independence and impartiality. This includes limiting double hatting, tightening eligibility criteria, refining appointment and challenge procedures, and enshrinement in international law the duty of arbitrators to disclose relevant circumstances or decline appointments. At the same time, a new form of “moral capital” is emerging, reflected in the fact that arbitrators voluntarily renounce performing multiple roles.
The article analyzes the essence of environmental offenses, including administrative offenses in the field of ecology; reveals the types, as well as the substantive features of administrative environmental offenses, outlines areas for improving mechanisms for identifying environmental risks and their institutionalization as torts at the level of legislation on administrative responsibility. The object of this research is the social relations that develop in the field of implementing the mechanism for applying administrative penalties for committing administrative offenses that infringe on public order in the field of ecology and the environment. The subject of the research is the legal structures of legal norms, the principles and mechanisms of legal support for administrative and tort policy, and administrative practice in the field of environmental protection and ecological safety. The research is based on the analytical method, which allows us to study approaches to implementing strategic directions of state policy aimed at increasing the effectiveness of the organizational, legal, administrative, and jurisdictional mechanism for environmental protection. The formal legal method helps to identify systemic and structural connections, legal and technical features of the legal regulation mechanism, as well as problems in its functioning and law enforcement practices in the field of public relations in Russia. The empirical basis of the study is based on regulatory legal acts of Russian legislation, administrative practice, doctrinal positions and applied provisions (conclusions) stated in scientific publications. Among the information sources were used statistical materials, reports of national authorities, as well as analytical reports, monographs, scientific articles concerning the issues of development of the institution of environmental administrative liability. Main results. Environmental protection and ensuring human ecological well-being is an important area of public policy that requires the use of a wide range of tools, including organizational, legal and regulatory ones. The institute of legal and, above all, administrative responsibility is one of the mechanisms for countering potential threats and risks of causing damage to the environment and the environment. The institute of administrative responsibility for environmental offenses is characterized, the role of administrative responsibility in the implementation of state environmental policy aimed at minimizing (reducing) environmental risks is outlined. Modern regulatory, technical and enforcement problems of administrative legislation in the framework of countering the commission of environmental offenses, are separately investigated, promising areas of administrative and legal influence in terms of establishing administrative responsibility in certain areas of environmental relations are identified.
The subject. The paper considers the concept of legal regimes, establishes their division into ordinary and emergency ones, and analyzes the regulatory framework of the establishment of emergency legal regimes in certain territories of the Russian Federation under special military operation. The choice of the research subject is due to the fact that the establishment of emergency regimes, as a rule, is associated with the restriction of human and civil rights and freedoms. In this regard, the issue is whether the establishment of emergency legal regimes under special military operation is in accordance with the Constitution of the Russian Federation and whether there is a legal justification for restricting human rights when they are introduced. The issue of implementing federal norms governing special regimes at the level of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation is also relevant. The purpose of the study: to carry out a comparative analysis of emergency legal regimes established by Russian legislation and to consider their legality in applying in the certain territories of the Russian Federation under special military operation. Methodology. When writing a paper, we used historical, comparative legal methods and formal legal ones, and methods of analysis and synthesis as well. Conclusions. An analysis of regulatory legal acts showed that various legal regimes apply to individual objects and subjects of law in all branches of it. Most of them operate in everyday life and do not restrict human rights. However, there are special (emergency) legal regimes that apply in emergency circumstances and require special response measures, including those related to the restriction of human and civil rights and freedoms. These measures can be provided only by federal laws in accordance with Article 55 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation. At present, four those regimes were provided by legislation: the martial law regime, the state of emergency, the counter-terrorism operation regime and the emergency mode. Under the special military operation, three of four emergency regimes are in force in certain Russian territories. The federal authorities have imposed martial law regimes in the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Lugansk People’s Republic, the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions and counter-terrorism operation regime in the Belgorod and Kursk regions as well. The authorities of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation have introduced an emergency regime in the Bryansk, Kursk, Belgorod and Voronezh regions. However, based on statutory definitions of the counter-terrorist operation and martial law, one should establish a state of martial law in the Kursk region. Medium and maximum response modes established by the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation No. 757 "About measures, carried out in the constituent entities of the Russian Federation in accordance with the Decree No. 756 signed by the Russian President in October 19, 2022" were not provided by regulatory acts. Therefore, in accordance with federal law No. 67 "About the protection of public and the territory from natural and technological emergency" the authorities of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation set up the emergency regime and operate within it on the basis of the existing legal framework limited by the norms of the Constitution of the Russian Federation.
The subject. This article examines the concept of property in Lorenz von Stein’s work “On the Agrarian Question”. Stein’s treatise is analyzed not merely as a historical document but as a methodological resource for contemporary legal philosophy, agrarian policy, and state theory. Purpose. The research aims to reconstruct, critically assess, and actualize Stein’s theory of property in order to test its heuristic potential for understanding modern challenges: property inequality, legitimacy of large-scale ownership, and the search for sustainable development models. A central objective is to determine whether Stein’s analysis can inform current debates on the social function of property and the role of the state as an arbiter between economic freedom and social justice. Methodology. The study employs a systematic-analytical approach that combines historical-theoretical reconstruction, contextual analysis, and projection of Stein’s ideas onto contemporary problems. The authors compare Stein’s positions with those of his critics (Marxists, liberals, conservatives) and with modern theories (neo-institutionalism, sociology of law). Results. Stein distinguishes two pathways for the genesis of property: conquest and economic activity (labor, house-building, permanent improvement of land). The latter, he argues, organically transforms mere possession into private property. A crucial social consequence is the conversion of economic inequality into legal inequality: “economic classes inevitably become legal classes”. The state, in Stein’s view, acts as an active transformative force, converting “unfree” feudal property into “free” bourgeois property through the “liberation of land”. The paper systematically reviews comprehensive criticism of Stein’s ideas from Marx, Chicherin, Mikhailovsky and other, concluding that although Stein’s project of a “social monarchy” was rejected by almost all ideological camps, his diagnostic framework retains substantial value. Conclusions. The study confirms the enduring relevance of Stein’s sociological approach to property rights, his analysis of the link between forms of ownership and social structure, and his theory of the proactive state. These ideas provide a valuable methodological resource for analyzing contemporary problems of property legitimation, balancing individual freedom with distributive justice, and defining the state’s role in economic regulation. Stein’s work is thus presented not as a mere historical monument but as a living source for interdisciplinary legal and social research.
Subject. Problematic issues of legislative regulation of Article 2101 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and its application in practice. Methodology. The methodological basis is the principles of scientific knowledge: objectivity, interrelation of phenomena and their characteristics, unity of theory and practice. The purpose of the study is theoretical and practical problematic aspects of the application of criminal legislation for taking the highest position in the criminal hierarchy, and formulates ways to solve them. Main results. The authors have established that there are a number of problems related to the application of Article 2101 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation: there is no legislative consolidation of the concept of a person taking the highest position in the criminal hierarchy, as well as the accompanying conceptual apparatus fixed by law; the legislator does not regulate the list of actions that a person performs for taking the appropriate status in the criminal world, as well as actions to maintain and strengthen it. These shortcomings significantly complicate criminal proceedings and allow the leaders of the criminal world to avoid liability, and this has a negative impact on the eradication of organized crime in the country.
