PHILOSOPHICAL AND LEGAL NATURE OF THE LAW PRINCIPLE: METHODOLOGICAL PROBLEMS OF RESEARCH

The article explores the legal nature of law principles from the perspective of philosophical and legal analysis. The purpose of the article is to form scientifically based knowledge on the philosophical and legal nature of the category law principle using postclassical methodological tools. Research Methods: The methodology of the article is based on the postclassical scientific rationality. The authors use an integrative approach to the study of legal reality in combination with a phenomenological and synergetic methodology, thereby using a number of general scientific and special scientific methods in a particular logical system, which makes it possible to study law principles both ontologically, in terms of their role in law in general, and epistemologically as well as axiologically. Moreover, the content, functioning and development of law principles are considered phenomenologically, as well as in the context of law communication. Results: The law principle in the ontological aspect is a fundamental form of law, reflecting the most significant ideas concerning regulation of public relations; the law principle is used as a direct regulator along with the rule of law. The epistemological law principle can be interpreted as a generalizing category, reflecting interpretation and assessment of legal reality from the standpoint of postclassical methodology. From an axiological point of view, the law principle embodies the law and social values and traditions that are dominant within the framework of a given socio-cultural chronotope, and is also used as one of the fundamental tools for constructing legal reality and its development. Conclusions: the law nature of law principles is determined with the account of postclassical methodology onto-logically, epistemologically and axiologically, in terms of their dual role in formation, development and construction of legal reality at all of its levels, in the context of both objective and subjective factors. The findings can be applied in drawing up concepts of legal and judicial reforms in terms of targeted construction of legal reality, as well as in the process of predicting the development of the Russian legal system.