Lutskyi A., Lutskyi M. War as a factor in rethinking statehood and the legal paradigm: the ukrainian context

DOI: https://doi.org/10.33098/2078-6670.2025.19.31.88-95

Purpose. This article aims to explore how the full-scale war has influenced the transformation of perceptions of statehood and legal ideology in Ukrainian society, taking into account changes in legitimation practices, political discourse, public law, and legal consciousness, as well as to identify new contours of the legal paradigm emerging under conditions of existential threat to state sovereignty. Method. This study employs an interdisciplinary methodological framework that combines systemic and structural-functional approaches to analyze the transformation of state institutions, hermeneutic and discourse analysis of political and legal narratives, comparative legal methods to examine the experience of other countries that have undergone war crises, and historical-legal and sociocultural analysis to investigate the shifts in legal consciousness and ideological understandings of sovereignty, legitimacy, and the rule of law. Results. The article substantiates that war, as an extreme factor, radically transforms the legal paradigm by shifting the dominant approach from normative to axiological-critical. It demonstrates that under martial law, law operates not only as a regulatory mechanism but also as a symbolic resource for legitimizing authority and mobilizing the nation. The derogation of rights is examined as an indicator of changing legal priorities, reflecting the primacy of public interest over individual freedoms. It is established that legal consciousness in wartime acquires new meanings capable of reshaping legal ideology. The study analyzes the shift in models of state legitimacy—from procedural to mobilizational—and their impact on political identity. It also proposes a vision of postwar legal culture as the institutionalization of wartime experience within a democratic paradigm. Scientific novelty. For the first time, a systemic conceptual justification of the wartime legal paradigm is offered as an independent theoretical-legal phenomenon in the context of statehood transformation. Practical significance. The findings may be applied in the fields of public policy, legal reform, and the development of a strategy for legal culture in Ukraine during wartime and the postwar period.

Key words: legal paradigm, war, state, derogation, legal consciousness, legitimacy, public interest, legal culture.

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