FORMATION OF THE INSTITUTIONS OF THE JUDICIAL SYSTEM OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE IN THE KAZAKH STEPPE (XVIII CENTURY)

Abstract

The aim of the study is to analyze the primary experience of forming the institutions of the judicial system of the Russian Empire in the Kazakh steppe. Its methodological basis is formed by the principles of historicism, systematicity and conditionality, which presuppose a comprehensive analysis of the subject of the study. The author used systemic, comparative, situational approaches, relevant methods of cognition, in particular, historical-genetic, historical-typological, comparative-historical, systemic, structural-functional, etc. The scientific novelty of the study lies in the comprehensive analysis of the processes of formation of the institutions of the judicial system of the Russian Empire, the disclosure of key aspects of judicial and legal policy, reasons, goals, mechanisms, and results of its implementation. Plans for the formation of special courts on the military-administrative border of the Russian Empire with the Kazakh steppe arose from the moment of acceptance of formal citizenship, recognition of vassalage, as part of the Kazakh clans. The bodies of the Russian administration sought to ensure the security of the internal regions of the empire and conditions for international trade, maintaining a balance in the relations and contradictions of local peoples. In the middle of the 18th century. The Collegium of Foreign Affairs and the leaders of the Junior Zhuz recognized the seizure of people and livestock from the Kazakhs as the only available means of influencing the defendants and resolving property disputes. The circle of officials authorized to carry out baranta was limited by law. At the end of the 18th century. Russian supreme power moved from measures to strengthen the military-administrative border to the introduction of primary forms of imperial administration and justice in the Kazakh steppe. The factors that disrupted the stability of the new institutions were both land claims and conflicts between the settled and nomadic population, as well as the internal disunity of the Kazakhs, competition and enmity of the Sultan’s clans and families, the Sultan’s and tribal aristocracy. Despite the contradictory results of the management reform in the Junior Zhuz, the successor of Catherine II maintained the continuity of her policy towards the Kazakhs, considering special administration and justice bodies on the border as its main conductors.