Social Rights: Constitutional and Legal Essence

Social rights have a number of specific features that distinguish them from general human and civil rights and freedoms. In particular, the paper highlights that these rights do not have a clearly established list of powers; they are largely determined by positive legislation, etc. These features make it necessary to raise the question of the possibility of their identification as constitutional rights. Most often, an individual enjoys sectoral social rights: the right to pension and social security, the right to medical care, etc. — as they are defined by positive legislation. However, according to the Constitution of the Russian Federation, all the rights that it provides are natural: they are inalienable, belong to everyone from birth, inherent to the nature of man, and are not granted by the State, etc. The authors attempt to substantiate the legal nature of constitutional social rights. They conclude that the constitutional right is directly expressed in the ability to challenge the model of its implementation proposed by the legislator from the standpoint of the content of this right. In the same case, when the model of ensuring this constitutional right used by the legislator does not fulfill such a function, a citizen can apply to the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation with a request to find it as inconsistent with the Constitution of the Russian Federation.