The destruction of the Soviet model of public administration in the early 1990-s and the reform of local government gradually laid the necessary preconditions for the formation and development of local self-government, and later the emergence of a qualitatively new branch – municipal law. The basis for the formation of the institution of local self-government and the development of a new branch of law was the theory of the rule of law; the idea of a social contract as the idea of a government based on consent; development of the concept of separation of power horizontally and vertically; civil society theory; liberalism, which declares that the initiative (active), free economic and political activity of individuals is a real source of progress in public life. This is due to the formation of local self-government not only as a form of citizens to solve the most important issues of the territorial team, but also the perception of its properties as one of the main institutions of Ukrainian statehood.

         The aim of the article is a generalized analysis of approaches to define the concept of “municipal legal relations”, highlighting specific features of municipal legal relations as a subject of municipal law, development of theoretical and applied recommendations for improving the regulation of municipal legal relations.

        Theoretical problems of proving the separation of municipal law, identifying and disclosing the specifics of the block of social and legal relations, which establish distinctive, specific features of the relationship, characteristic only of the subject of municipal legal regulation. It is proved that in the scientific literature when defining the concepts, essence and types of municipal legal relations there is mainly the dominance of public law bias, which does not fully reflect the specifics of municipal law, because still remain uncovered social relations arising in connection with self-organization and self-government of territorial collectives and communities to resolve local issues (self-taxation, resolution of other issues at the general meeting of citizens at the place of residence, cooperationof territorial communities, etc.).

        The problem of the correlation of local self-government and municipal law is analysed. It is substantiated that local self-government is the material basis for the formation of municipal law. With the development of local self-government there is a wide range of public relations of public (power-political) nature, associated with the functioning of bodies and officials of local self-government, and private relations arising from selforganization of the population to address local issues, conducting economic, business and other activities not prohibited by current legislation of Ukraine. The regulation of public relations in the field of local self-government is carried out by means of legal norms, and not only municipal, but also civil, financial, labour, etc., and therefore, despite the close connection of these two concepts, they cannot be identified. Highlighting the specific features of municipal legal relations, their qualitative homogeneity, based on such elements as the subject, object and content of public relations, further improvement ofthe municipal law system is key to sustainable development of local self-government in Ukraine.

Bibliography

Authored books

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2. Batanov O, Munitsypalne pravo Ukrainy: pidruchnyk (Odissei 2008) (in Ukrainian).

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Edited books

8. Baimuratov M (red), Munitsypalne pravo Ukrainy: pidruchnyk (2-he vyd, Pravova yednist 2009) (in Ukrainian).

9. Martynenko P (red), Munitsypalne pravo zarubizhnykh krain: navchalnyi posibnyk (Znannia Ukrainy 2006) (in Ukrainian).

Journal articles

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12. Demydenko V, ‘Evoliutsiia zmistu munitsypalno-pravovyi vidnosyn’ [2019] 30 (69) Vcheni zapysky Tavriiskoho natsionalnoho universytetu imeni V. I. Vernadskoho. Seriia: Yurydychni nauky (in Ukrainian).

13. Kaminska N, ‘Subiekty mistsevoho i rehionalnoho samovriaduvannia: natsionalnyi i mizhnarodnyi vymiry’ (2016) 1 Publichne pravo 121–28 (in Ukrainian).

14. Korzh I, ‘Detsentralizatsiia ta yii vplyv na rozvytok rehionalnykh suspilnykh vidnosyn’ (2018) 4 Informatsiia i pravo 9–14 (in Ukrainian).

15. Lialiuk O, ‘Munitsypalne pravo Ukrainy yak haluz prava’ (2010) 110 Problemy zakonnosti 37–46 (in Ukrainian).

16. Melnyk R, ‘Munitsypalne pravo u systemi natsionalnoho prava’ (2011) 2 Yurydychnyi visnyk Prychornomoria 50–60 (in Ukrainian).

17. Pasternak O, ‘Implementatsiia zakordonnoho dosvidu u sferi munitsypalnykh vidnosyn’ [2012] 1 (43) Pravo i Bezpeka 35–9 (in Ukrainian).

18. Sergeev D, ‘Municipal’noe obrazovanie kak podsistema sistemy mestnogo samoupravlenija’ (2014) 5 Rossijskaja justicija 6 (in Russian).

Theses

19. Molchanova Yu, ‘Munitsypalne rehuliuvannia zdiisnennia chlenamy terytorialnoi hromady prava na uchast u mistsevomu samovriaduvanni’ (dys kand yuryd nauk, 2019) (in Ukrainian).