Crimes in the Sphere of Economic Activities in the Conditions of Turbulence of Socio-Political Life, Collapse of International Law and the Coming of Virtual Reality

The article analyzes, in a comparative aspect with the original version of the criminal law, the state of criminal economic legislation (Chapter 22 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation of 1996, “Crimes in the Sphere of Economic Activity”). It states that the number of articles included in this chapter has doubled. The article highlights the main flaws in the development of the criminal law and its enforcement: while the number of economic crimes is constantly increasing, the registration of crime is also constantly decreasing, and only five articles from Chapter 22 of the Criminal Code are actively used in practice. The author highlights the main characteristics of the legislative regulation of crimes in the field of economic activity, as well as the shortcomings and problems of regulation that have accumulated over the thirty years of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation: the excessive casuistry of the disposition of criminal law norms; the departure from the terminology of the criminal law in the criminal legislation and the endless borrowing of concepts from the “positive” legislation; the legislator’s obvious doubts about the public danger of the act that he is criminalizing; the combination of all the above-mentioned characteristics in one criminal law norm of Chapter 22 of the Criminal Code. The main conclusion that the author comes to is that it is necessary to reduce the number of crimes provided forin the chapter; to improve the quality of legislative technique, including by eliminating unnecessary borrowing of the conceptual apparatus from the legislation of other legal branches.