THE RIGHT OF LEGISLATIVE INITIATIVE IN THE SYSTEM OF POWERS OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION CONSTITUTIONAL COURT

The article considers the right of legislative initiative of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation enshrined in the Constitution of the Russian Federation in the light of amendments made to the Fundamental Law of our state in 2020, as well as subsequent updating of special federal constitutional legislation. It is noted that the problem of practice deficiency in implementing the mentioned power by the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation is not new for the Russian legal science; in general, it is naturally determined and is due to a number of objective factors. However, the process of updating and developing the constitutional provisions on the supreme judicial control body of Russia and, in particular, creating the system of preliminary judicial constitutional control, bring the problem under consideration to a qualitatively new level. The approach itself in terms of granting the mentioned power to supreme courts in the Russian Federation is characterized as atypical for the countries near and far abroad. At the same time, the current lack of practice in exercising the power in question by the Constitutional Court is due to the special role of the latter in the system of supreme state authorities, in particular, the judiciary. The point of view is expressed that the problem cannot be unambiguously solved at the present stage of the statehood development. The author does not share the increasingly expressed point of view today that the right of legislative initiative should be excluded from the powers of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation, since this will lead to a violation of the equality of the constitutional and legal statuses of the two independent supreme judicial authorities. In addition, the shortcomings in the wording of certain constitutional provisions have been identified and possible ways to eliminate them have been proposed.

Reciprocal Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments in China: Promising Developments, Prospective Challenges and Proposed Solutions

Consistent developments since 2016 demonstrate that China is determined to depart from its traditional practice – rejecting reciprocity-based judgment recognition and enforcement (JRE). This is strongly endorsed by China’s ‘One Belt, One Road’ Initiative. To develop the Chinese system of reciprocity-based JRE, China will make two efforts. First, it is likely to propose unbinding memos, like the China-Singapore Memo, to the supreme courts in countries alongside the OBOR. Second, Chinese Supreme People’s Court will issue a judicial interpretation to clarify the scope, requirements of, and defences against reciprocity-based JRE.

Judicial Dialogue in Social Media Cases in Europe: Exploring the Role of Peers in Judicial Adjudication

This Article aims to examine the social media jurisprudence of national courts in a selected set of EU Member States by focusing on judicial dialogue specifically via references to the case law of other courts. Do judges in social media cases engage with the case law of peers, and if so how and to what extent? The analysis investigates whether national judges draw on the jurisprudence of higher domestic courts, foreign courts and/or European supranational courts—the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR)—and explores the use of such jurisprudence. It is based on 147 cases from the constitutional and/or supreme courts of Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Italy, Latvia, Slovakia, and Slovenia. Although judicial dialogue is generally limited in the cases under study, the analysis illustrates the different ways in which courts interact with the rulings of peers and informs on the latter’s contribution to judicial assessment.