The Personality of International Criminal (on Materials of Nuremberg and Other Judical Proceedings)

Abstract

The article considers the personality of an international criminal as a complex category. Based on modern achievements in legal science, the author comes to the conclusion that this phenomenon should be studied not only from the standpoint of international law itself, but also from related legal disciplines: criminology, legal psychology, sociology of law, and others. Consideration of the problem under study is also impossible without referring to another complex phenomenon — system criminality, which is traditionally understood as the practice of committing mass lawlessness as part of a policy supported or directly implemented by the state. The essence of such a regime is the need to obey orders that run counter to modern civilized regulation. It is stated that when committing mass lawlessness, there is a specific combination of the personality of the offender and the criminal situation associated, as a rule, with an armed conflict, illustrated by the thesis of "ordinary people within extraordinary circumstances". As a consequence, this gives rise to a situation of moral choice in which potential violators of the norms of the international community find themselves. The following types of international criminals are distinguished: a manipulative politician, a "victim of circumstances", a bureaucrat, a "man of duty", a sadist, a profiteer. The article presents some personal characteristics of persons who have committed crimes under international law, in particular, socio-demographic, professional and others. The author comes to the conclusion that despite the fact that taking into account the identity of the offender when sentencing is a normative requirement enshrined in the statutes of organs of the international criminal justice, the scientific development of this phenomenon has not yet reached a level adequate to its significance. In general, the data obtained allow us to state that most often international crimes, especially at the middle and grassroots levels, are committed by people with certain defects in moral and legal consciousness, the main of which is conformism. Moreover, in the case of mass crimes, it acquires a special character, becoming a kind of psychological prerequisite for the individual's readiness to participate or condone mass lawlessness. It is stated that the current level of informatization of society renders untenable the reference to the ignorance of the subject regarding the commission of international crimes by the side of the conflict with which he identifies himself. The paper makes a final conclusion about the need to form a special field of knowledge located at the intersection of international law and criminology — supranational criminology.