Statutory Analogy in the Settlement of Housing Disputes
Authors:   Irkutsk Institute (Branch) All-Russian State University of Justice (RPA of the Ministry of Justice of Russia), Suslova S. I. , Formakidov D. A. ,   Perm State University
Published: October 2024

Introduction: despite considerable attention to statutory analogy in juridical literature, many theoretical issues remain controversial, and the courts have no clear and understandable guidelines for applying analogy and justifying its admissibility. If we look at housing legislation, studies on these issues are fragmentary in nature, there are no monographic works, while research articles mainly analyze individual situations in which the courts apply statutory analogy in resolving particular housing disputes, or such articles justify the need to apply analogy. Thus, there are no doctrinal studies on the application of analogy in housing legislation. Although statutory analogy has been applied in a significant number of housing disputes, the conceptual framework for this application has not been developed, which indicates the relevance of the current study. Purpose: to form an understanding of statutory analogy in housing legislation; to develop an approach to distinguishing between statutory analogy and subsidiary application of civil law rules to housing relations; to develop criteria to be used in housing disputes in order to identify similarities and differences in legal relations under judicial consideration and thus decide on the possibility of applying analogy; to substantiate the use of teleological (targeted) interpretation for the detection of contradictions to the essence of housing relations as grounds for refusing to apply analogy; to describe the most difficult practical situations related to the application of statutory analogy in the settlement of housing disputes. Methods: based on the dialectical method, which is basic for legal research, the study explores approaches to the understanding of statutory analogy and criteria for its applicability, evaluates the existing scientific views on the identification of similarities of relations for applying statutory analogy, and analyzes the institute of analogy in unity and interrelation with other legal categories. The study also employs the comparative legal method, the method of alternatives, the structural and functional method, the formal legal method, the historical and legal method, the method of interpretation of legal rules. Results: the paper provides narrow and broad definitions of analogy; justifies the use of the term ‘direct subsidiary application’, which made it possible to substantiate that such application of civil law rules to housing relations cannot be regarded as inter-branch analogy; identifies the similarity criteria for legal relations to be used when applying analogy in the settlement of housing disputes. Conclusions: to apply statutory analogy when resolving housing disputes, the similarity of legal relations should be based on the following criteria: the nature of the subjective right (property/obligation/corporate); the nature of legal relations concerning the residential premises in question (free (commercial) / unfree (social)); residing conditions (gratuitous / non-gratuitous). Contradictions to the essence of housing relations should be identified based on teleological (targeted) interpretation rather than through reference to the nature of the subjective right to housing.