The Discretion of the Public Administration as an Object of Administrative Justice in the Russian Federation

The article evaluates the principal doctrinal approaches to administrative discretion developed during the Soviet and post-Soviet periods of the Russian state. A comprehensive analysis of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, current administrative legislation, and administrative-procedural legislation substantiates the concept of administrative discretion exercised by the public administration. Such discretion demonstrates itself within the framework of administrative-public functions performed by competent executive authorities, local self-government bodies, organisations endowed with publicauthority status, and their authorised officials. Using this approach, the Author examines the structure of modern administrative discretion in the Russian public administration by comparing it with systematised administrative-public functions, identifying, inter alia, distinct types of discretion exercised in administrative management and in administrative-legal protection. The article further establishes the connection between administrative discretion of the public administration and administrative justice exercised by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, courts of general jurisdiction, and arbitrazh courts. A comprehensive analysis of the Code of Administrative Procedure, the Arbitration Procedure Code, and the Code of Administrative Offenses demonstrates that administrative discretion – as an object of administrative justice – manifests itself in three forms: (1) administrative-protective justice, (2) administrative-enforcement justice, and (3) administrative-sanctioning justice. The integrated approach proposed in the article may be used to identify and concretize provisions of administrative and administrative-procedural legislation that confer excessive administrative discretion on executive authorities, local self-government bodies, and organisations with public-authority status – discretion that may lead to inconsistent judicial decisions in administrative cases and undermine the uniformity of administrative justice.