The article is devoted to the examination of the formation of new vectors for international relations development within the global format of cooperation. The establishment and unification of BRICS in the international legal sphere through a wide range of common interests and views of its members towards issues facing the modern world reflect objective tendencies of world development to the formation of amultipolar international relations system and determination of particular large country actors of broad integration and having many dimensions. The authors reveal particular characteristics of the international-legal status of BRICS, which make it possible to have an effective impact on challenges facing the modern world. The legal BRICS status differs crucially from traditional legal approaches to international organizations. Acting as a special subject of world politics, creating more trusted interaction conditions, BRICS focuses its attention on the alternative world order principles within the new model of global relations. Such a format of multilateral cooperation, as well as more trusted and additional mechanisms of international interaction, gives the members an opportunity to demonstrate their geopolitical and geoeconomic world significance, and in addition their demanded humanitarian role, which, as the analysis of the mentioned actor demonstrates, is aimed at forming its own interaction model. The logic of the BRICS agenda extension to the level of an important global management system element demonstrates the goal in the field of action and, accordingly, intensive progress of humanitarian imperatives. For these humanitarian imperatives, the issues of international peacekeeping, security, protection, encouraging human rights and providing stable development are an objective necessity, especially for active demonstration of the members’ viewpoints on the international scene. For understanding the process of the alignment of international security humanitarian imperatives it is necessary to study the existing objective needs in conjunction with each country, member of BRICS.

The article examines certain issues relating to the constitutional and legal regulation of local self-government in Russia and South Africa in the context of their cooperation within the partnership of the BRICS countries, as well as the constitutional reforms of local self-government carried out in these states. It is noted that, despite the fundamental difference in the historical prerequisites for their implementation, the constitutional and legal approaches to determining the legal nature of local self-government and identifying its status in the general system of public authority in these countries have similar features. This circumstance, according to the author, indicates the potential for a convergence of the systems of legal regulation of these countries and actualizes the need to exchange experience in legal regulation in this area in order to solve similar problems of development of local self-government.

The objective of this research paper is to provide an in-depth analysis of the essence of the constitutional and legal regulation of personal status, which is the primary obligation of present-day national governments with respect to preserving and protecting major human values when globalisation processes are underway. Consistent and comprehensive human development, politicisation of the law, the elimination of poverty, the fight for equality, global economic injustice, the search for a new ideal constitutional model and other issues are relevant and are on the agenda for the entire global society. Countries with different economic levels of development, historical traditions, cultural origins, and legal systems have varying concepts of human rights, freedoms and duties, which they implement in practice in various ways. These issues are of paramount importance for Russia, which has equal participation rights in matters of international relations and in the system for global governance and international law making. Solving the problem of satisfying the national interest and preserving prestige and the standard of living of every person depends on the primary social responsibility of each person and on the active role of the modern state. Most of all, it is necessary to solve functional problems that are simultaneously political, scientific, organisational, and legal. The most important task here is to enhance the effectiveness of the activity of the state system and the local self-government authorities. To achieve its objective, the paper utilises general scientific-scholarly methods, and specific scientificscholarly research methods including those denominated concrete-historical, logically historical, system-based, comparative legal (law), among others.

Global digitization and the emergence of Artificial Intelligence-based technologies pose challenges for all countries. The BRICS and European Union countries are no exception. BRICS as well as the European Union seek to strengthen their positions as leading actors on the world stage. At the present time, an essential means of doing so is for BRICS and the EU to implement smart policy and create suitable conditions for the development of digital technologies, including AI. For this reason, one of the most important tasks for BRICS and the EU is to develop an adequate approach to the regulation of AI-based technologies. This research paper is an analysis of the current approaches to the regulation of AI at the BRICS group level, in each of the BRICS countries, and in the European Union. The analysis is based on the application of comparative and formal juridical analysis of the legislation of the selected countries on AI and other digital technologies. The results of the analysis lead the authors to conclude that it is necessary to design ageneral approach to the regulation of these technologies for the BRICS countries similar to the approach chosen in the EU (the trustworthy approach) and to upgrade this legislation to achieve positive effects from digital transformation. The authors offer several suggestions for optimization of the provisions of the legislation, including designing a model legal act in the sphere of AI.

The Indian economy has seen steady and sustainable growth over the past decade, even though other countries have been cash-strapped and suffering from stagnation. Most of this development is due to the inflow of foreign direct investment (FDI) into India through cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and the unparalleled rise in the size and number of cross-border M&A in India with a favourable market climate for such trade. As a business strategy, cross-border M&As in India are rife with many legal complexities and issues. This paper documents the steady growth of cross-border M&A activity in India over the years and presents a comprehensive depiction of cross-border M&As, what the applicable laws are, what the legal issues and complexities involved are, and finally how they can be offset. The paper highlights the tax implications and issues involved in a cross-border M&A and how far the Income Tax Act, 1961 is attuned with the corporate laws in force to promote cross-border M&As in India. The paper concludes with a broader observation that cross-border M&As bring massive economic benefits and global stature to a growing economic superpower like India. For this reason, the business and legal environment should be made more conducive to cross-border M&A activity.

The present article is a review of the prospective adoption of a legally binding instrument to regulate, in international human rights law, the activities of transnational corporations (TNCs) and other business enterprises presently being developed under U.N. auspices, aiming for legal control of TNCs’ business functioning. The necessity for international legal control of their business’ functioning with respect to human rights cannot be underestimated as their influence has grown since striving for dominance in world commodity markets and in leading sectors of the global economy. However, quite a number of scholars question the fact that TNCs are not presently recognized as legal personalities rendering the immediate application of international law principles to their business activities all but practically impossible. At the same time, the majority of so called “soft law” principles developed in the U.N. framework in the past fifty years are nothing more than recommendations to TNCs, thus, emphasizing the urgency of developing a legally binding instrument which primarily governs transnational corporations with respect to human rights. Nevertheless, the prospective adoption of a future treaty, currently being developed by the Open-ended Intergovernmental Working Group on Transnational Corporations and other Business Enterprises with Respect to Human Rights, does not look highly promising due to a number of fundamental flaws and inconsistencies analyzed below.

Global digitization and the emergence of Artificial Intelligence-based technologies became a challenge for all countries. The BRICS and European Union-countries are no exception. The BRICS as well as EU countries seek to become the world’s leading countries. At the present time, it is possible if countries implement smart policy and create suitable conditions for the development of digital technologies, including AI. For this reason, one of the most important tasks for BRICS-countries and EU - to develop an adequate approach to the regulation of AI-based technologies. This research aimed at the analysis of the current ways of regulation of the AI in BRICS union and its members and in European Union. It is based on the application of comparative and formal juridical analysis of the legislation of selected counties on AI and other digital technologies. In particular, the norms of the legislation on the AI in the Federative Republic of Brazil, the Russian Federation, the Republic of India, People’s Republic of China, and the Republic of South Africa and in the European Union are analyzed. Authors conclude that it is necessary to design general approach to the regulation of these technologies for BRICS-countries similar to the approach chosen in EU (trustworthy approach),  to upgrade this legislation for achieving positive effect from digital transformation and makes several suggestions for optimization its provisions, including designing a model legal act in the sphere of AI.