According to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, the ideal of a human person free from fear and want can be realized only if such conditions are created under which everyone can enjoy their economic, social and cultural rights. Given the obvious fact that Ukraine is a European state, the purpose of the article is to analyze the conceptual and theoretical foundations of the European standards of social human rights through the prism of the scientific heritage of Professor P. Rabinovych. Nowadays, it has become axiomatic for legal science to state that one of the necessary prerequisites for the reality and protection of human rights is their consolidation by the state in formally binding rules of conduct – legal norms. This also applies to social rights, the implementation of which is recognized as a defining feature of a social state: after all, it is this implementation that serves as the “litmus test” by which successes and miscalculations in the process of its development are clearly manifested. An extremely important factor in this process is the legislative mediation of the “sociality” of such a state. The latter is an important direction for ensuring social security of citizens in the conditions of the development of a market economy and is carried out by forming a special “area” of objective legal law – social law – and the corresponding branch of legislation. It is emphasized that a certain confusion in the works of a number of researchers regarding the actual identification of social and economic rights is explained, in particular, by the fact that for a long time the term was used that combined these two types of rights into the so-called “socio-economic rights”. However, it is clear from the very name of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights that this “mechanical” association is not always and not entirely correct.The analysis conducted, based on the needs-based research approach of P. Rabinovych, made it possible to characterize the subject of social law, its inherent method of regulation and systemic and structural status in all objective legal law. Based on the developed by S. Alekseev’s provisions on complex branches of law as secondary, derivative legal entities (which are “layered” over the main structural units - the main branches of law), it seems possible to qualify modern social law as a complex integrated branch of law, in which certain norms of such branches of national law as social security law, labor, housing, medical and educational law find a “second residence” (the list is not exhaustive). At the same time, social law should not include all legal norms of each of these branches, but only those that regulate issues related to human social security. The concept of social law can be defined as a complex integrated branch of objective legal law, which is a system of legal norms aimed at regulating such social relations that mediate human social security, implemented by the social-donative method. At the same time, the understanding of the phenomenon of social law presented in this article through the prism of the scientific heritage of Professor P. Rabinovych, we believe, is a proper theoretical basis for further development of the concept of European standards of social human rights.

Authored books

1. Pankevych O Z, Sotsialna derzhava ta prava liudyny “druhoho pokolinnia” (zahalnoteoretychne doslidzhennia) (Astron 2006) (in Ukrainian).

2. Rabinovych P M, Osnovy teorii ta filosofii prava (Medytsyna i pravo 2021) (in Ukrainian).

3. Rabinovych P M, Prava liudyny i hromadianyna u Konstytutsii Ukrainy (do interpretatsii vykhidnykh konstytutsiinykh polozhen) (Pravo 1997) (in Ukrainian).

4. Rabinovych P, Sotsialisticheskoe pravo kak tsennost (Vischa shkola 1985) (in Ukrainian).

5. Verlanov S O, Ekonomichni i sotsialni prava liudyny: yevropeiski standarty ta yikh vprovadzhennia v yurydychnu praktyku Ukrainy (zahalnoteoretychne doslidzhennia) (Krai 2009) (in Ukrainian).

Edited books

6. Rabinovych P M, ‘Prava liudyny: kontseptualni zasady’, Prava liudyny i hromadianyna: problemy realizatsii v Ukraini (Rabinovych P M zah red, In Yure 1998) (in Ukrainian).

Journal articles

7. Bolotina N, ‘Kontseptsiia kodyfikatsii zakonodavstva Ukrainy pro sotsialne zabezpechennia’ [1996] 7 Pravo Ukrainy 51–53 (in Ukrainian).

8. Halushko O I, ‘Pravo sotsialnoho zabezpechennia: osnovni haluzevi poniattia’ [2024] 78 Visnyk Lvivskoho universytetu. Seriia yurydychna 264–274 (in Ukrainian).

9. Maliuha L Yu, ‘Yevropeiski sotsialni standarty v konteksti prava na sotsialnyi zakhyst v Ukraini’ [2019] 22 Almanakh mizhnarodnoho prava 15–25 (in Ukrainian).

10. Podorozhnii Ye Yu, ‘Pravove zabezpechennia upravlinnia sotsialnymy ryzykamy v Ukraini: problemy ta perspektyvy’ [2024] 4 Sotsialne pravo 19–28 (in Ukrainian).

11. Pylypenko P, ‘Sotsialne pravo: stanovlennia ta perspektyvy maibutnoho’ [2022] 2 Pravo Ukrainy 64–75 (in Ukrainian).

12. Rabinovych P M, ‘Ievropeiski standarty prav liudyny: zahalnoteoretychna kharakterystyka’ [2003] 5 Biuleten Ministerstva yustytsii Ukrainy 26–41 (in Ukrainian).

13. Rabinovych P, ‘Universalnyi kanon liudskykh prav’ [2018] 9 Pravo Ukrainy 109–123 (in Ukrainian).

14. Rabinovych P, Pankevych O, ‘Sotsialne pravo: deiaki pytannia zahalnoi teorii’ [2003] 1 Pravo Ukrainy 104–107 (in Ukrainian).

Theses

15. Anpilohova B Yu, ‘Sotsialnyi ryzyk yak osnova yurydychnoho mekhanizmu sotsialnoho zakhystu’ (dys d-ra filosofii 2025) (in Ukrainian).

16. Petrosian K Ye, ‘Zabezpechennia pryntsypu verkhovenstva prava v protsesi realizatsii konstytutsiinoho prava na sotsialnyi zakhyst’ (dys d-ra filosofii 2024) (in Ukrainian).

Conference materials

17. Pankevych O Z, ‘Sotsialne pravo: deiaki zahalnoteoretychni mirkuvannia kriz pryzmu potrebovoho pidkhodu profesora P. M. Rabinovycha’, Naukovyi spadok Petra Moiseiovycha Rabinovycha i aktualni problemy zahalnoteoriinoho pravoznavstva: materialy mizhnarodnoi naukovoi konferentsii (Lviv 28–29.03.2025) (Medytsyna i pravo 2025)206–211 (in Ukrainian).