Dmitry Magonya, managing partner of ART DE LEX, delivered a report at the VI White Nights Legal Forum
Source: The Federation Council of the Federal Assembly
The Committee of the Federation Council on Constitutional Legislation and State Building and the Government of the Arkhangelsk Region held the VI White Nights Legal Forum.
The White Nights Forum is a community of experts uniting around the idea of an open discussion about law and its role in Russian society. Representatives of the legal community, government bodies, business leaders, historians, and famous scientists attended the event. The main theme of the 2015 forum was “Rights in the cultural space.” The participants discussed the issues of legal regulation in various spheres of culture.
Anna Grischenkova, a partner in the law firm KIAP, spoke about “Why, how, and where the law interferes in the creation, preservation, and access to works of art.” Valery Zinchenko and Aleksey Dobrynin, partners of the law firm Pen & Paper, presented “Between carnival and an offense to the holy: legal aspects.” They highlighted issues of enforcing the Criminal Code related to insults of believers. Alexander Ermolenko, a partner in law firm FBK Pravo, spoke about “The professional culture of Soviet and post-Soviet lawyers and their role in the formation of the rule of law.” Saushkin Denis, a partner of the law firm Zabeyda, Kasatkin, Saushkin, and Partners, focused on "What really guides the law enforcement agencies in deciding to prosecute alleged ‘anti-sacred’ actions?”
Dmitry Magonya, the managing partner of ART DE LEX, presented a paper titled "Is there or should there be religious foundations with the right to help people and society formulate and implement their ideological beliefs?" He considered the following issues:
• the construction of laws, the separation between laws and religious foundations, as well as personal values and the fear of God in the structure of justice;
• the material world, social contract, religion, and other effects on the law–what drives lawmakers?;
• to what extent does contemporary law qualitatively accomplish the task of supporting individual freedoms, based on a person’s beliefs?;
• examples of how people’s ideas about the foundation of the world order differ, including “anti-sacred” actions and the legitimation of sin.
Boris Mezdrichem, the former director of the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet, spoke about recent developments involving the controversial staging of Richard Wagner’s opera “Tannhäuser.” The director of the State Archive of the Russian Federation, Sergey Mironenko, addressed the forum about the process of de-Stalinization in the Soviet Union and modern Russia.
Several others also took part in the forum: A. Klishas, the chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Constitutional Legislation and State Building; K. Dobrynin, both the deputy chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Constitutional Legislation and State Building and a representative of the executive body of the Arkhangelsk Region; Lyudmila Kononova, a representative of the Federation Council of the State Legislature of the Arkhangelsk Region; and Elena Shatkovskaya, the director of the Kenozero National Park.