Legal status of the subject: terminological aspects and content

• Irina I. Shamshina

  Irina I. Shamshina. Lugansk. Vladimir Dahl State University. Lugansk. Russia

The publication is devoted to the study of terminological aspects and content of the legal status of the subject. The subject of this study is the legal norms establishing the content of legal status and doctrinal approaches to defining the concept of "legal status" and its structural content. The purpose of this publication is to harmonize scholarly views on defining the legal status of an entity and its structural elements, as well as to determine the role of a subject's legal status in regulating social relations. The methodology of the published article includes general scientific methods – systemic-structural and functional approaches; specifically legal methods – formal-legal, technical and legal. The novelty of the published work consists in substantiating an innovative approach to determining the legal status of the subject, according to which the theory of law should distinguish two independent legal categories: "objective legal status" and "subjective legal status", improving the conceptual and categorical apparatus. The field of application of the obtained research results can be professional law-making, law enforcement and interpretative activities. A comprehensive analysis of doctrinal approaches to defining legal status, concepts of multi-element and narrow structure of its content, legal nature and structural content of legal personality is presented. The place of the legal status of the subject in regulating social relations and promising areas of legislative reflection of the legal status of the subject are revealed. In the course of the study, the author's formulations of the definitions of objective legal status and subjective legal status were developed, revealing the legal nature of these legal categories. Elements of the structural content of these legal categories are highlighted. The relationship between objective legal status and subjective legal status is shown. The arguments are presented that the recognition by the theory of law of the categories of “objective legal status” and “subjective legal status” will allow to link together the existing positions in legal science regarding the concept and structure of the legal status of a subject, eliminate ambiguity and inconsistency in the scientific interpretation of this most important legal category, ensure the development of the conceptual apparatus, improve legal terminology, and will contribute to the display of the industry specifics of the legal status of a subject. Keywords: subject of law, subject of legal relations, objective legal status, subjective legal status