Criminal-Legal Response in the Historical Aspect
Authors: Kleymenov M.P. , Kleymenov I.M. 
Published: November 2024

Introduction. In recent years, significant attention of specialists in the field of criminal law is given to criminally-legal influence, which is understood quite broadly as any purposeful positive impact of criminal law on the criminal situation in the country and social life in General; as based on officially-imperious will of the system enshrined in the criminal law measures needed to ensure the protection of the interests of the state, society and individuals from socially dangerous encroachments. Disclosure of the content of this concept leads the authors to the field of criminal policy, which intersects the issues of criminal law, criminological, administrative law, criminal procedure, criminal Executive. In other words, the content of the concept under consideration is blurred, becoming more and more uncertain. In this regard, it is productive to limit this concept to the definition of criminal law response, defining it as the implementation by the competent authorities of punishment, testing and other measures of a criminal law nature against persons who have committed a socially dangerous act, or the legal refusal of such implementation. Purpose. Identification of the essence of criminal law response at different stages of development of human civilization and in different state and legal conditions. Methodology. Comparative-historical method which allows to reveal regularities in development of criminal-legal response to socially dangerous acts, to establish its models and features. Methodology. Comparative-historical method which allows to reveal regularities in development of criminal-legal response to socially dangerous acts, to establish its models and features. Results. There are four models of criminal law response to socially dangerous acts: antediluvian, old Testament, new Testament and postmodern. The first model is based on the system of magic and taboo. The second is on Talion's law of equal or proportional retribution. It widely applies the death penalty. The old Testament model is characterized by extreme rigorism, which, on the one hand, is explained by the desire to establish such prohibitions, which in the shortest way form a socially acceptable moral image of a person. On the other hand, it is stated that the violation of the boundaries of the illegal leads to the destruction of the individual and the destruction of the genus. The old Testament model of criminal law response is characteristic of Muslim criminal law. It is important to emphasize the peculiarity of the old Testament tradition: prohibitions are accompanied by threats of punishment not only in the earthly but also in the afterlife. The old Testament model of criminal law response is being replaced by the new Testament model based on the Christian doctrine of crime and punishment. The principle here is the strengthening of morality, the harmonization of law and morality. Despite more than 2000 years of existence of Christianity, it should be recognized that the new Testament model of criminal law response has not been implemented anywhere and in any state. Such a model remains an ideal from which the world is moving away rather than approaching. Criminal-legal response up to the middle of the XX century was reduced to criminal repression, which did not hit the targets, but the areas. “Punishment and intimidation” were her watchwords. If we compare the practice of criminal law response to crime in Russia in different historical periods, we can say that it was closest to the new Testament model in the atheistic times of “developed socialism”. The postmodern model, which is anarchic in spirit and threatens the existence of the state and national security, is currently being popularized. Conclusion. Effective criminal-legal response, in our opinion, is possible on the basis of an integrative model, which, taking all the positive universal experience in the design and application of criminal penalties, will provide scientific justification of