The Ideological Legacy of Dmitry Dril: The Formation of the Russian Anthropological School of Criminal Law

The purpose of this article is to comprehend the creative legacy of Dmitry A. Dril and the principles of the Russian anthropological school of criminal law of the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries, at the origins of which he stood, in relation to the current state of Russian culture and social and humanitarian science. The author uses the historical-systemic, retrospective and rationalistic methods as research tools. It is emphasized that Dmitry Dril and his followers, actively borrowing the achievements of European scientists of their time (in the field of both natural and social sciences), pursued their own path, dictated by the specifics of Russian legal and socio-political realities, which significantly differed from those in the West. In his critique of the so-called classical school of criminal law, the Russian criminologist does not copy the ideas of Cesare Lombroso and his adherents, but clearly distances himself from the extremes of Lombrosianism. He consciously advocates for the comprehensive study of humans, including criminals, drawing on a range of scientific disciplines, thereby heralding interdisciplinary integration, which is increasingly becoming one of the main trends in modern science. Dmitry Dril is aligned with post-non-classical science in his unwillingness to be confined to purely theoretical knowledge and his conviction of the necessity of close interaction of science and other forms of world exploration and personal self-realization (justice, religion, and morality). The article concludes that the concerns of the Russian society in the Silver Age era retain their relevance at the present time. In this regard, acquaintance with Dmitry Dril’s ideas allows us to more adequately describe the state in which our country is today and to better assess the prospects for its immediate development in general and the law enforcement system in particular. 

Keywords: Dmitry A. Dril, criminal law, Russian anthropological school of criminal law, legal anthropology, criminal sociology, methods of natural sciences in criminology, interdisciplinary integration