The penitentiary system modernization concept as a doctrinal political and legal act

In recent years official acts of the atypical legal nature (foundations, concepts, strategies, programs, doctrines etc.) have increasingly become the subject of discussions for lawyers. With the advent of Federal Law No. 172-FZ of June 28, 2014 the category "documents of strategic planning" was brought both into legal science and practice. However, the status of such acts and the bodies which are authorized to pass them, requirements to their content and structure as well as their legal value were not accurately defined. Unresolved questions of the general theory of law result in a number of problems in the concrete fields of political and legal practice, and the activity of the penitentiary system of the Federal Penitentiary Service of the Russian Federation is not an exception. In 2020 the operation of the Concept of the Development of the Penitentiary System in the Russian Federation adopted by the Government of Russia in 2010 will be terminated. Practical work on the preparation of materials for a new Concept has already been started within the framework of the Federal Service. However, from a scientific perspective there is no due clarity about the subject of the new doctrinal political and legal act, about its main objectives, the decision-making level, structure, content and the mechanism of implementation. The author resolves the above mentioned issues and invites to an extensive public discussion on the subject which since Gulag has been very significant and even painful for our society. Using a wide range of sources of both general and special character (specifically in their historical aspect) and penal practice, he expresses and argues a number of judgments pertaining to the new doctrinal political and legal document in the sphere of criminal penalties enforcement in perspective till 2030. According to the author, the future document should be called "The Concept of Modernization of the Penitentiary System" and include only the most important, basic regulations about the purposes, tasks and directions of reforming the system of institutions and bodies involved in the enforcement of penalties. This does not exclude but involves the adoption of a "road map" for the implementation of the Concept. There is no need to mix the questions of penal (and much less - criminal) policy with the questions of the penitentiary system. The latter is the implementation tool for penal policy and not vice versa. Therefore, the aspiration to include separate sections about criminal and penal policy into the Concept of Modernization of the Penitentiary System proves to be unfair. A new Federal Law on the penitentiary system (the current law has become outdated since 1993) should lie at the heart of its modernization. Particular attention should be given to the principles of the new Concept. They do not coincide with the principles of penal legislation established in the law, though they should not contradict them.

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