The historical rationale for the norm of justified risk in the criminal legislation of Russia

The subject of this study is the genesis of justified risk in the legal system of Russia as a circumstance excluding the criminality of an act. The underutilization of the norm of justified risk in investigative and judicial practice throughout the entire period of its establishment in criminal law, the lack of statistical reporting, as well as the overview of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation on the application of the provisions of Article 41 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, combined with the historical events of the early 1990s that had a direct impact on the legal system of Russia, underscores the relevance of this research. The goal of the study is to determine the justification for supplementing the criminal law with the norm of justified risk through studying and understanding its genesis in the criminal law legislation of Russia. The author examines the main stages in the formation of the risk institute in direct correlation with the historical events accompanying each particular stage. The methodological foundation is presented by universal dialectics, as well as a combination of general scientific methods (analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction) and specific scientific methods (historical-legal, formal-legal, structural-functional). As a result of the conducted research, the author substantiates the following conclusion: the legislative recognition and establishment of justified risk in the list of circumstances excluding the criminality of an act is not the result of a fundamental revision of the legal system of Russia due to the change of government in the early 1990s; the genesis of justified risk was accompanied by a prolonged process of its emergence and development within social relations, investigative and judicial practice, and criminal law doctrine. The reason for the underutilization of this legal norm is not the absence of actions to which the provisions of Article 41 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation should apply, but rather the accumulation of a significant array of theoretical and practical problems that hinder the "free" reference to the provisions of the studied criminal legal norm in the process of law enforcement activities.