THE DOCTRINAL FACTOR OF LEGAL COMMUNICATION

It is a matter of scholarly consensus that legal doctrine has significantly influenced the development of law — at least within the Romano-Germanic (continental) legal tradition. However, the mechanisms through which doctrine exerts its law-shaping influence remain insufficiently explored in Russian legal scholarship. One may also note conceptual gaps and inconsistencies in the terminology employed in studies on this subject. This article attempts to describe the functioning of doctrine in the formation of law through the concept of the “doctrinal factor of legal communication” — a notion that has not yet undergone thorough scholarly analysis within the framework of post-nonclassical legal understanding — and to provide a definition of it. The methodological foundation of the study is built upon the communicative theory of law (one of the leading approaches in post-nonclassical legal science) and contemporary theoretical perspectives on the functions of legal doctrine as components of the process of constructing legal reality (legal systems). As a result of the study, the author proposes a definition of the doctrinal factor of legal communication as that segment of legal communication mediated by doctrinal texts, through which the legal system is constructed. The proposed definition integrates various manifestations of doctrine within legal communication and appears preferable in terms of conceptual comprehensiveness.