Methodological approaches to studying civil-law legal constructions

Introduction: the article is devoted to the analysis of the functional purpose and role of some methodological approaches in studying legal constructions of civil law. The author argues not only the relevance of studying civil-law legal constructions, but also the importance of the question on the proper methodological basis for this research area. Purpose: to identify the methodological approaches used or required to be used in studying the essence and application of legal constructions in civil law, to analyze their functional purpose, interrelations and optimal combination. Methods: the author uses empirical methods of comparison, description, interpretation, theoretical methods of formal and dialectical logic, historical legal and comparative legal methods. Results: the article shows the importance of competent selection of methodological approaches, identifies the ways of applying system, essential and instrumental approaches while studying civil-law legal constructions. The necessity of distinguishing a constructional-legal methodological approach is justified. Based on the above-named approaches, the author gives grounds for some conclusions concerning the nature and role of legal constructions, and also introduces the concept of civil-law legal construction. Conclusions: study of civil-law constructions requires the use of different methodological approaches, deliberate selection and skilful combination of which influences achievement of the desirable results. The author insists that the constructional-legal approach is of special importance for such research, since it implies cognition of civil law in terms of identifying the most stable elements of the interior structure (typical scheme) of any given complex phenomenon (phenomena) of legal reality, reflecting its (their) nature.