General issues of application of the comparative method in legal science

The article is devoted to the study of general issues of the application of the comparative legal method. According to the author competent and appropriate using of this method in legal science indicates the quality of research. This can become a kind of indicator of the maturity and consistency of the author’s views on a particular legal problem. The comparative legal method does not imply a unified application matrix. Nevertheless, the author believes that it is possible to name the basic rules that should be taken into account in comparative legal studies (definition of the general, particular and individual; the presence of a direct connection, the same order of legal phenomena; taking into account the conditions for the formation and development of compared legal elements, etc.). The analysis is given to the main methods (types) of comparative legal research according to the following criteria: attitude to the historical past; territory; social formation; level, types and forms of comparison; subject of comparison. The author shows that all methods of comparative legal research interact and are applied in combination. The author formulates the main conclusions of the study and emphasizes the importance of using the comparative legal method in legal scientific works at the end of the article.