Civil society control over public authority activities

This article states that control by Ukrainian citizens over the activities of public authorities is a necessary condition for ensuring the constitutional exercise of power. At the same time, attention is focused on the purpose of the control being carried out - facilitating the timely identification of problems, the development and implementation of measures aimed at adjusting the course and content of the activities of the objects of control in order to prevent the emergence of problems and crises. It is determined that the task of the control should extend only to the powers of the controlled object, and the state of the object's functioning is being controlled. It is noted that in Ukrainian realities the above-mentioned control has not found either its proper definition or, even more so, its full application - that is, it is carried out only partially, and only in relation to public executive bodies, under which public councils have been created to promote public participation in the formation and implementation of state and regional policy. It is noted that in the past there have been many attempts to legislatively regulate the mechanism of public control over public authorities, to give it a definition. However, this issue remains unregulated to this day. And the reason for this is seen in the divergence of interests between representatives of the political elite and citizens, since such individuals, in our opinion, enter public authorities to pursue their mercantile interests, that is, to create for themselves advantages of a material, financial nature over others, primarily public interests, for example, in creating the prerequisites for the privatization of successful state-owned enterprises. Therefore, it is considered appropriate to create advisory councils of civil society at all branches of public authorities. At the same time, the procedure for their creation should be determined by law. The paper presents the author's definition of public control as the activity of a self-organized society (its institutions) and individual citizens to identify shortcomings in the activities of public authorities, their officials and service personnel, with subsequent public influence on them in order to eliminate the identified shortcomings and contribute to increasing the efficiency of their further activities, raising the issue of bringing persons who have committed offenses to legal responsibility. It is emphasized that the term “public control” is associated with such terms as “legal order”, which, in turn, is associated with the term “legality”, as well as with the term “legal security”, which form the basis of the democratic, legal life of people and must be ensured by public authorities. It is stated that the absence of a single legislative act that would determine the mechanism for implementing the people's right to control the activities of all branches of public power creates obstacles for every citizen to demand the proper implementation of the Constitution and laws of Ukraine from public authorities, their officials and employees, and often gives rise to civil conflicts and confrontations at the state or regional level. An approximate content of such a law is given, as well as examples of such control in individual countries of the European Union. A conclusion is drawn about the urgency of adopting the aforementioned law.