S. Tagantsev, MI Kovalev), but in the legislative definition of the crime it is not specified for some reason.

It is impossible to understand the law if we turn away from the mechanism of its implementation in society.

Under the implementation of law understand the transformation, implementation of legal norms in life through the lawful conduct of the subjects of public relations (government organizations, officials, public bodies and citizens).

The implementation of the law is always associated only with the lawful conduct of people, ie such conduct that corresponds to the legal order. In one case, these are active positive actions (use or right to perform a duty); in another – it is the inaction of the subjects (deterrence from illegal actions). Thus, the lawful conduct of the subjects of public relations implements the rule of law, illegally – violates.

Legal norms are implemented in various forms. This is due to a number of circumstances: 1) the position of a subject in the general system of legal regulation, its relationship to legal regulations. 2) the form of external manifestation of lawful conduct.

REFERENCES

Alekseev SS Problems of the theory of law, S.– 1972. Alekseev SS Theory of law. – M., 1994. Vengerov AB Theory of State and Law, – Moscow: New Lawyer 1998. General Theory of State and Law. V.V. Kopeychikova. – K.: Yurinkom, 1997. Kotyuk VO Theory of law. – K.: Venturi, 1996. Fundamentals of State and Law. V.M. Shtogrina. – K.: "Femina" 1995. Fundamentals of state and law. S.D. Gusarev, RA Kalyuzhny, A.M. Collodion. – K .: Lybid, 1997. Jurisprudence. – Lviv, 1994. Modern problems of the state and law. – K., 1998. Theory of state and law edited by AS Pigolkin, – M .: MSTU 1996. Theory of state and law. Ed. V.V. Lazareva // New Lawyer. M., –1997. Khropanyuk VN Theory of the state and law, – M .: DTD 1996.

09/14/2010

The concept, characteristics, composition and types of stages of the crime

Only for the commission of a crime a person is subject to criminal liability and criminal punishment – the most severe state coercion

Lawyers of all times and epochs, starting with the lawyers of ancient Rome, have tried to answer this question, but there is still no satisfactory answer to it today.

The most common is the definition of a crime as an act (violation of the law) that is prohibited under threat of punishment. The most significant disadvantage of this definition of the concept of crime is that it does not indicate – why this act is prohibited by law. The main thing in a crime is the evil it does to a person and society, as can be clearly seen from its Ukrainian name. This main feature of the crime was noted by almost all prominent lawyers (C. Beccaria, V. Blackstone, MS Tagantsev, MI Kovalev), but in the legislative definition of the crime it is not specified for some reason.

The Soviet criminal law literature presents a very common and equally unfounded critique of the definition of crime in foreign legislation ("bourgeois"), but the Soviet legislative definition of crime is even worse, because it is not scientific or legal. Article 7 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine of 1960 defines a crime as a socially dangerous socially dangerous act (action or omission) that encroaches on the social order of Ukraine, its political and economic system, property, person, political, labor, property and others. rights and freedoms of citizens, as well as other encroachments on the rule of law – a socially dangerous act provided by criminal law.

The double reference to the social danger of an act in this definition does not make it scientific, because its main content is an ideological stamp – "encroachment on the social order", "political lab report writing assignments and economic system", because no single crime can encroach on the social order, nor on the political or economic system of the state.

Thus, the legislative definition of a crime does not have certain features, does not indicate its significant differences from other offenses, which makes it too difficult to study the concept of crime. K. Kenny advises beginners to move to the study of the concept of crime after studying other institutions of criminal law.

The concept of crime is defined better in the Criminal Code of Ukraine than in the current Criminal Code of Ukraine, but it also has significant shortcomings and shortcomings. Article 11 "defines a crime as a socially dangerous, culpable act (action or omission) prohibited by criminal law under threat of punishment."

First, such a definition of the concept of crime does not answer the question – why this act is prohibited by criminal law? On what grounds does the criminal law classify it as a crime?

Secondly, this definition does not make it possible to distinguish a crime from an administrative act or from a civil tort, which are also socially dangerous.).

The concept of crime and its features

A crime, like any other offense, is a human act. That is why it is characterized by all the objective and subjective features that characterize human behavior: physical properties – a movement or abstinence from it, the use of physical, chemical, biological and other laws of the world; psychological properties – a manifestation of consciousness and will, a certain motivation of behavior, its purposefulness.

But unlike other human acts, a crime in its social essence is an encroachment on the relations that have developed in society, reflect its most important interests, and therefore are protected by the law on criminal liability. Crime always contradicts the basic needs and interests of social development. And since it is the objective laws of society, its needs and interests are the criterion, measure of value or anti-value of human behavior, compliance or inconsistency with these needs and interests, crime is always antisocial behavior.

At the same time, as the interests and needs of society are constantly evolving, the assessment of human behavior as antisocial and criminal also changes at a certain stage of social development. Therefore, the concept of crime can not be immutable: it must always correspond to a particular stage of development of society, the needs and interests inherent in this stage. This allows us to draw two conclusions:

the concept of crime depends on the socio-economic relations that exist at a certain stage of development of society, and therefore is historically variable; recognition of a certain human behavior as a crime (criminalization of an act) or its exclusion from the circle of criminals (decriminalization of an act) is a continuous process of assessing the conformity or inconsistency of this behavior with social development.

The concept of crime in criminal law is a universal and fundamental category: it underlies the content of all criminal law institutions. That is why the definition of this concept in criminal law has been and is given great importance.

In the history of criminal law, the concept of crime was defined differently. Depending on why more importance was given to the social or legal characteristics of the crime, three definitions of this concept can be distinguished: formal, material and formal-material.

Formal definition – reflects the legal nature, legal features of the crime: a crime is an act that is provided by law as a criminal penalty (criminal is that punished, or criminal is that provided by criminal law).

Material definition distinguishes only the social essence of the crime, its contradiction to certain social values ​​(crime – a socially dangerous act).

Formal-material definition combines the social and legal characteristics of the crime (crime – a socially dangerous and criminal act).

If we ask the question of which of these definitions is more reasonable, more valuable, it must first be borne in mind that any definition of a concept can only perform its functions when it most accurately and comprehensively reflects the essential, typical signs of a certain action, phenomenon. In this sense, the formal-material definition has an advantage – it allows to answer not only the questions which acts the law recognizes as a crime, but also the question why the law recognizes them as crimes, which together reflect the social and legal nature of the crime.

The Criminal Code of Ukraine gives just such a definition. Article 11 provides:

"A crime is a socially dangerous criminal act (action or omission) provided by this Code, committed by the subject of the crime."

The first thing that is emphasized in this definition is the characterization of the crime as an act: action (active behavior) or inaction (passive behavior). This is of fundamental importance. Crime as a conscious volitional act of a person must be expressed in a specific action or inaction. Thoughts, views, beliefs that are not expressed in acts of action or inaction, even if they are contrary to the interests of society, can not be considered a crime. However, a specific action or inaction, devoid of the psychological basis of the act – the conscious and volitional elements (this, for example, reflex, instinctive actions) – is not a crime. This explains why in Art. 11 indicates that the crime is only an act committed by the subject of the crime, which in accordance with Part 1 of Art. 18 of the Criminal Code is a natural sane person who has committed a crime at an age from which criminal liability may arise, ie a person acting with conscience and will are sufficient to charge him with the act committed.

Analysis of Part 1 of Art. 11 of the Criminal Code shows that it clearly enshrines three features of the crime: the public danger of the act, guilt and predictability of the act in the law on criminal liability. The first two signs – social danger and guilt – are material, revealing both external and internal socio-psychological nature of the crime. The third – the provision of the Criminal Code – is formal, reflecting the legal, regulatory nature of the crime, ie its illegality.

However, the analysis of Part 2 of Art. 1, which defines the tasks of the Criminal Code, allows us to argue that the predictability of the act in the Criminal Code also means its mandatory punishment under this Code. Part 2 of Art. 1 indicates that in order to protect public relations from criminal encroachment, the Code defines "which socially dangerous acts are crimes and which punishments are applied to the perpetrators."