The paper examines, from a constitutional law perspective, the identity of the Russian education system as a key element of sovereign state development. The author distinguishes between the categories of national and constitutional identity, arguing that in its constitutional process Russia is moving toward a more complete formalization of historically established values that determine the education system. The constitutional identity of the education system is defined as a set of its essential parameters shaped by the values, principles, linguistic and civilizational distinctiveness of the people, explicitly or implicitly enshrined in the Constitution of the Russian Federation and deriving from the national heritage. The key characteristics of this identity are determined as fundamentality, the unity of educating and upbringing, and the connection of education with life and the pursuit of progress. The author substantiates that Russian education is based on a holistic paradigm, in which the individual acquires meaning through service to the people and the state rather than through autonomy from society. This paradigm finds its constitutional consolidation, especially following the 2020 constitutional amendment, which directly linked education with the objectives of patriotic upbringing and the strengthening of sovereignty. The paper emphasizes the central role of the teacher as a bearer of the values of Russian civilization and provides a critical analysis of such challenges as the introduction of the competence-based approach and artificial intelligence technologies. Conceptual proposals are formulated for improving legislation and law enforcement practice in the field of education.

   In pre-revolutionary Russia, the activities of legal societies encompassed several areas, and the development of legal scholarship and education held an independent and important place. The pursuit of this objective was associated, inter alia, with publishing activities, manifested both in the issuance of individual works on jurisprudence and in the establishment of legal periodical press. In the second half of the nineteenth century, Yuridicheskii Vestnik (Legal Herald) and the Journal of Civil and Criminal Law (later renamed Vestnik Prava — Herald of Law) emerged as journals of the legal societies of Moscow and St. Petersburg. There also existed a number of periodical publications that featured materials on the activities of professional associations of jurists. In the course of the present study, the author examined the thematic scope of the published texts, the composition of authors and editorial boards, and the readership. Particular attention is devoted to the personal impressions of the editor of one of these journals, which makes it possible to gain insight into the specific features of the editorial work of legal journals.

   The study is devoted to the analysis of cryptocurrency staking as a specific type of activity associated with the creation of new digital currency, as well as to the examination of the possibility and necessity of subjecting income derived from such activity to corporate income tax and personal income tax. The paper addresses issues relating to the emergence of income as a result of staking, the moment of recognition of such income (at the stage of receipt or upon disposal of the digital currency), the deductibility of expenses, the specific features of the taxation of liquid staking, and the imposition of withholding tax at source. An analysis of Russian legislation, academic research, and the technical and other characteristics of staking has led to the conclusion that it is necessary to: tax income arising from staking; provide statutory definitions of the concepts of «staking» and «staking pool»; and introduce into the Tax Code of the Russian Federation special provisions governing the tax consequences of transactions involving digital currencies obtained through staking.

   A course toward sustainable socio-economic development, in accordance with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, has been adopted and supported by the Russian Federation. At the same time, these plans require long-term implementation, continuous adjustment, and recognition of the fact that the goals of sustainable socio-economic development of a state cannot have a final outcome — they must be accepted by the state, society, and the individual as an element of public policy and as part of the overall culture. Such a profound awareness of the priority of modernizing the socio-economic life of society necessitates substantial changes in the body of legislative acts. The paper examines issues of financial and legal regulation of the activities of state extra-budgetary funds as institutions ensuring the implementation of the social function of the state. The author raises the problem of the efficiency of the formation, allocation, and use of public financial resources of state extra-budgetary funds. Proposals are formulated regarding the creation of financial and legal foundations for a mechanism of investing the monetary resources of state extra-budgetary funds. It is concluded that the development of new financial and legal mechanisms for the use of monetary resources of state extra-budgetary funds should be oriented toward global trends in economic development and should also be carried out with due regard to a risk-oriented approach, so that state extra-budgetary funds are able to respond flexibly to new challenges and threats. The significance of changes to the legal framework governing the use of monetary resources of state extra-budgetary funds may require amendments to federal legislation, including the Budget Code of the Russian Federation, since such changes cannot be implemented exclusively at the level of subordinate rule making.

   The paper examines the exercise by prosecutors of their authority to challenge in court child support agreements concerning minor children on the ground that the terms governing the provision of maintenance substantially violate the best interests of the minor. The paper examines the content and peculiarities of the special basis for the recognition by the court of an alimony agreement as invalid, the tasks and status of the prosecutor filing a motion to the court with a demand to invalidate the agreement in the public interest. The paper elucidates, for example, that a prosecutor considers sources of information about the violation of the rights of minors by the terms of alimony agreements. The author analyzes the judicial practice of considering cases of challenging agreements on the payment of alimony on a special basis on claims of legal representatives of minors. The paper concludes on the need for a comprehensive analysis of the practice of law enforcement in terms of observing the interests of minors when concluding alimony agreements, the adoption by prosecutors of other measures to ensure the rights of children to maintenance, as well as on changes in legislation.

   In 2025, the legislator and the Bank of Russia amended the list of types of bonds that non-qualified investors are entitled to purchase subject to the successful completion of special testing. The paper assesses these innovations. Despite attempts to take into account all types of high-risk bonds when introducing the testing requirement for non-qualified investors purchasing such financial instruments, certain bonds remain available for acquisition without testing and contain latent economic risks that materialize during periods of economic crisis. The economic crises of 2014–2016, 2022, and mid2023–2025 led to a sharp increase in the key interest rate, which significantly affected bond prices and interest rates; thus, during these periods, the risk of loss of bond liquidity materialized. The paper substantiates the necessity of establishing successful completion of testing as a prerequisite for granting the right to purchase bonds issued for a term exceeding three years (including those with a credit rating of not lower than A+).

   The institution of litigation costs plays an important role in procedural relations: on the one hand, it ensures the realization of the right of parties to judicial protection and qualified legal assistance; on the other hand, it creates a balance of interests among participants in judicial proceedings, acting as both an economic incentive and a barrier in the exercise of the right of access to court. However, the fragmented legal regulation of this institution, the presence of conflicting provisions in its regulation, and the absence of a unified judicial approach to a number of theoretical and practical issues concerning the allocation of litigation costs result in divergent development of judicial practice. In this context, issues related to the reimbursement of litigation costs incurred in connection with various procedural actions become particularly relevant, among which the imposition of a judicial fine is of special interest. Owing to its specific features, namely: its public law nature, dependence on judicial discretion, the possibility of its application at any stage of the proceedings at the initiative of different actors, and on the grounds provided by law, this procedural institution gives rise to differing approaches in judicial practice regarding the reimbursement of litigation costs incurred in connection with the imposition of a judicial fine. In the paper, the author examines the variability and specific features of arbitrazh courts’ positions on this issue, analyzes the reasons for such divergence, identifies existing problems, and proposes ways to address them.

  It is difficult to envision any sphere of social relations that has not been affected by pervasive cybernetization. The sphere of the creative industries is no exception in this regard. Contemporary works of digital art authenticated by tokens are actively entering civil circulation, forming an object basis for digital transactions within smart contracts. At the same time, in practice, difficulties often arise in the legal qualification of an object that has acquired a digital embodiment: in some cases, it is the result of intellectual activity itself that is subject to tokenization, while in others it is the proprietary right to a corresponding material or intellectual asset. Based on an analysis of various scholarly approaches, the author determines the procedure and conditions for the representation of objects of intellectual rights in the digital environment and proposes a system of variants for the digital objectification of intellectual property. Separately, within the framework of the study, the legal nature of original works of digital art is substantiated, allowing for the application of a property-law regulatory regime to them.

   The paper provides the author’s analysis and assessment of the legal nature of monetary compensation for the delayed payment of wages and other payments due to an employee as a wage guarantee and as a means of ensuring the employer’s performance of its obligation. The author critically evaluates the legislator’s position regarding the application to this institution of the legal construct of the employer’s strict (nofault) liability. Particular attention is paid to the intersectoral links between the Tax Code of the Russian Federation and the Labor Code of the Russian Federation from the perspective of the terminological ambiguity of labor law terms and concepts (compensation, compensatory payments) used in the Tax Code of the Russian Federation for the purposes of taxing the monetary compensation in question. The paper also defines the areas of legal uncertainty. The problems are examined through the lens of subsidiary intersectoral regulation on the basis of a generalization of judicial practice and the official positions of the Ministry of Finance of Russia and the Federal Tax Service. The paper concludes that monetary compensation for delayed payment of wages does not constitute income (in the sense of an economic benefit) and should not be qualified as an object of personal income taxation. As a solution the author proposes to overcome and eliminate legal uncertainty and to optimize intersectoral links by introducing amendments to the Labor Code of the Russian Federation (Articles 164, 129, and 130) with regard to the definition of compensation and compensatory payments and wage guarantees, as well as to the Tax Code of the Russian Federation (paragraph 1 of Article 217; paragraph 1 of Article 422) concerning the procedure for exemption from personal income tax and insurance contributions of compensation for delayed payment of wages and other payments.

   In summer 2025, the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation approved a thematic review of the practice of applying the provisions of Article 53.1 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, the adoption of which is rightly associated with the Concept for the Development of Civil Legislation of the Russian Federation. The focus is on approaches to assessing the good faith and reasonableness of the actions (inactions) of the head of a corporate organization. The work examines trends in legal doctrine and judicial practice of previous years concerning this category of corporate disputes. It highlights the points that judges and practicing lawyers should pay attention to when considering the issue of imposing liability on a person authorized to act on behalf of a legal entity. Changes in the approaches of the courts are demonstrated. Special attention is given to the manager’s responsibilities for organizing the corporate governance system, procedural aspects of distributing the burden of proof in court of damages, the economic impact of the manager’s transaction, which influences the determination of the amount of damages, and the principle of offsetting. New approaches to determining the affiliation (connectedness) of persons in conditions of conflict of interest are revealed. The actual approval of the transaction is examined, which includes the long-term absence of objections. The paper lists striking examples of dishonest and unreasonable behavior of the manager. The procedure for calculating the limitation periods is determined. The above considerations may be useful for improving judicial practice.

   The purpose of the study is to determine the extent to which a corporate agreement can create obligations for the corporation and its management.

   The author concludes that the terms of a corporate agreement may bind the corporation’s managers if it concerns one specific management decision, since it is impossible to speak of the transfer of the powers of such bodies by members of the governing bodies to third parties. Moreover, if all members of the corporation and its director sign a corporate agreement, the director has no right to refer to its invalidity due to the prohibition of consistent behavior. This rule applies even in countries where there is a direct statutory prohibition on opposing the terms of a corporate agreement to the corporation. The author substantiates the need to expand the possibility of taking into account the provisions of a corporate agreement when counting votes at a general meeting of corporation participants, and examines the common shareholder syndicates and the institution of guarantee for the actions of others that are widespread abroad. The author used a comparative legal method and relied on the doctrine and judicial practice of countries adhering to the Romano-Germanic legal tradition.

   Neurogenetics is a rapidly developing field of genetics that is important for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of neurological disorders. The paper scrutinizes the legal aspects of neurogenetics related to the procedure for conducting neurogenetic testing and the use of its results for the development of personalized medicine. The author analyzes the types of neurogenetic testing, problematic issues of obtaining informed consent, and conducting non-invasive prenatal testing. According to the author, the potential use of neurogenetics directly depends on proper legal regulation of the procedure for conducting neurogenetic testing, which may be helpful in identifying specific genetic mutations associated with the occurrence of neurological disorders. However, many aspects of neurogenetic testing, including confidentiality, genetic discrimination, and the procedure for reporting test results, require legislative regulation. Adequate legal regulation will enable the full potential of neurogenetic testing, including the latest diagnostic, preventative, and clinical tools tailored to individual neurogenetic profiles. Regulatory guidance on the use of neurogenetics will facilitate increased access to neurogenetic testing and treatment, which are critical to reducing the burden of neurological disorders.

   The author studies the possibilities of using information technologies in the production of preliminary investigations. The conclusion is substantiated that any neural network is capable of operating only with formalized, mathematically represented data. Artificial intelligence cannot possess the moral qualities that are so necessary for a law enforcement officer in criminal proceedings. At the same time, the advantages of artificial intelligence in relation to forensic methods and evidence in criminal cases are described. The proposed approach can be implemented only after resolving the conceptual and normative problems in the current model of criminal procedure and preliminary investigation. These are examined considering the experience of the pre-revolutionary and Soviet periods of our country’s development, and are analyzed through the lens of the mixed and adversarial types (forms) of criminal procedure. Consequently, a conclusion is drawn regarding the danger of shaping the developmental trajectory of Russian criminal proceedings within the framework of the Anglo-Saxon framework, and the expediency of developing and implementing an authentic model of preliminary investigation (and criminal procedure as a whole) in the spirit of Continental legal traditions. Only after this should the capabilities of artificial intelligence be applied to forensic methods and to the investigator’s evidentiary work, which will serve to improve the quality of his work and strengthen the guarantees of fair justice in general.

   The study analyzes Article 205.6 «Failure to report a crime» of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. A socio-political and legal assessment of the crime it provides for is given. The paper argues that criminal prosecution for failure to report a crime is problematic as an appropriate tool for countering terrorist threats. It is noted that the addressees of the state-coercive impact of this norm are not individuals involved in terrorist or extremist activities, but citizens who are not involved in them and for one reason or another have not reported the relevant criminal facts to the authorities. The focus is on the compliance of failure to report a crime with the criterion of public danger as a necessary condition for criminalization. The classification difficulties in applying this criminal law norm are reflected, and an opinion is expressed about its inconsistency with the principle of certainty of criminal law prohibition. The relationship between criminal liability for failure to report a crime and the goals of criminal punishment is analyzed. Based on the results of the study, it was concluded that it is advisable to revise the legislative approach to criminal liability of citizens for failure to report a crime.

   The loss of biodiversity is a global environmental problem.

   In the context of sustainable development, the goal is to preserve land and sea ecosystems, which requires joint efforts at the interstate level.

   A special emphasis in the strategy, public policy, and legal regulation of biodiversity conservation in national jurisdictions is placed on defining the legal mechanism for the conservation, access, circulation, and protection of the genetic resources of animals and plants. A comparative analysis of the legal regulation of biodiversity conservation, including the genetic resources of fauna and flora, in the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China has made it possible to identify the legal peculiarities of regulation and the problems of biodiversity conservation. The authors propose directions for improving the legal regulation of this sphere of social relations, taking into account the experience of both countries, based on the model of legal regulation of biodiversity conservation, including the genetic resources of fauna and flora, proposed by the authors.

   There are significant contradictions in legal theory and judicial practice regarding the classification of legal relations between couriers and platform companies (platforms). The Civil Code and Labor Law currently in force in the PRC cannot ensure adequate legal regulation of the activities of various legal entities in the new context of platform trading. In practice, couriers cannot be held liable for compensation for damages caused to others during their work; the rights and interests of couriers as platform employees are not protected. Based on an analysis of current litigation between platforms and couriers, the authors summarize the approaches used by the people’s courts of the People’s Republic of China to establish a balance between the legal liability of platforms, couriers, and victims in order to maximize the protection of the rights of all civil parties within the platform trading model. Conclusions are made regarding the need to develop the concept of part-time employment relationships in relation to the official activities of couriers and some steps to develop Chinese legislation in this area.