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Any struggles in the nomination and appointment of constitutional justices and failed renewal of the composition of the constitutional court might corrupt the perception of the independence of the guardian of constitutionality. The recent wave of impropriate renewals of constitutional courts throughout Europe leads to substantial concern. There are numerous more or less serious examples, including the well-known cases of Poland and Hungary, but alongside with them Latvia, Lithuania, the Slovak Republic, etc. In an era of democratic back-sliding more significant in some countries and less in others, it leads to wondering whether the influence of politics in power could be the critical factor distorting the composition of constitutional courts and whether this can be seen as a new virus infecting new democracies. After analyzing the recent failures to appoint constitutional justices, caused essentially by malfunction due to political actors participating in the process, the paper argues that in the selection, nomination, and appointment of constitutional justices, ensuring the depoliticization of this procedure is not the best choice, because the participation of democratically elected institutions in the formation of the constitutional courts enhances their legitimacy and credibility. The former, entrusted with the power to adopt erga omnes decisions, desperately need this legitimation. Different political cultures and contrasts in states' constitutional orders suggest that there is hardly one recipe that fits all. However, some universal and fundamental criteria stemming from the principle of the rule of law intended to ensure the independence of constitutional justice could bind the discretion of political actors participating in the nomination and appointment of constitutional judges and contribute to preventing constitutional crises.

This paper presents a phenomenological study that reveals how psychologists studying for a diploma in existential psychotherapy, in Lithuania, experience personally significant learning from a client in a therapeutic relationship. The structure of such experience is described and discussed in the context of existential-phenomenological practice and a broader psychotherapy research.

The object of research is management system of the country’s economic security and the consequences of the influence of the shadow economy on it. Research is carried out on the example of Ukraine, as a country with a fairly high level of shadow processes in business.Shadow incomes and agreements are currently one of the main problems of the management system of income distribution and redistribution. The global scale of the economy and the deregulation of international mergers and acquisitions take shadow capital beyond individual countries, giving them global importance for the economic security of different countries. An analysis of the influence of the shadow economy on all stages of merger and acquisition agreements in Ukraine was carried out. The negative effects of shadowing on attracting foreign and national investments, which reduces the effectiveness of the country’s economic security management system, were analyzed. The article presents a comparative analysis of the dynamics of economic development indices of the country and the level of the shadow economy.In the process of the research methods of analysis and synthesis, methods of logical design, tabular and graphical methods of data presentation are used. Correlation-regression analysis was used to study the relationship between the indicators of the shadow economy and the level of economic security of the state.On the basis of statistical indicators, the comparison of indicators of development of shadow economy and separate indicators of economic security of Ukraine is carried out. Correlation-regression analysis was used to study the relationship between the indicators of the illegal economy and the level of economic security of the state in the conditions of geopolitical transformation. The results of the calculations showed that for most indices of economic security and the level of the shadow economy there is a direct relationship. The established dependencies can be the basis for determining the key vectors of the state policy of counteracting the development of the shadow economy and tools for influencing the most sensitive indicators of Ukraine’s economic development.The research conducted in this article can be useful for scientists who research economic security management systems, for government institutions with the aim of forming an economic security program. The methodology can be used to determine investment priorities based on the analysis of the impact of the illegal economy on the economic security of society.Keywords: shadow economy, geopolitical security, state structures, mergers and acquisitions, macroeconomics, management system, economic reform.

This article is devoted to the synthesis and analysis of a set of key performance indicators (KPI) for energy companies. The authors look at several large enterprises operating in the energy sector of Russia to answer the question: what factors play a critical role in the development of KPI for the power supply companies?

In the presented work, an attempt to assess the correlation between the performance indicators of several sectors of the Russian economy and a set of restrictive measures taken by the Government of our country against the backdrop of the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic is made. In addition, a comparative analysis of the impact of this pandemic on the neighboring countries of Russia, which, in the recent past, were part of the USSR and, therefore, have similar health care organization structures, is carried out.

Lively discussions on civil liability of companies’ directors towards the creditors of financially distressed companies have been going on for decades. Recent trends in Lithuanian case law, however, show that, in parallel, creditors of private limited liability companies have also shifted their focus to other real masters of business—controlling shareholders—by, rather aggressively, enforcing shareholders’ liability for obligations of insolvent companies. Since recovery rates of unsecured creditors in insolvent liquidations are rather modest, creditors seek to by-pass collective bankruptcy proceedings and bring actions against the abusive shareholder exclusively for their own benefit outside bankruptcy proceedings. Based on comparative examples, the article aims to analyse and evaluate the Lithuanian legal framework by addressing the standing of an individual creditor to hold an abusive corporate shareholder liable for an insolvent company’s obligations from the perspective of competing damage claims between an individual creditor and a bankruptcy administrator. The analysis includes both ordinary and fraudulent bankruptcies.

This article serves a twofold purpose. It firstly examines the concept of EU administrative law, which has, so far, remained vague despite being widely researched over the last decade. The present research attempts to fill in this gap by elaborating on a conception of EU administrative law adapting the general structure of national administrative law. The article then explores administrative activity as the main criterion for the identification of national public administrators as well as EU public administrators. Therefore, the study looks at the attempts to create a unified EU administrative law code, refers to European Parliament resolutions of 2013 and 2016 and the ReNEUAL Model Rules on EU Administrative Procedure. The article finishes with identifying EU-level public administrators, focusing on issues related to EU agencies. This study defines EU-level public administrators, rules, judge-made law that constitute EU administrative law and encourages EU legislator to finally adopt a unified administrative procedure act.

The Short-Term Assessment of Risk and Treatability: Adolescent Version (START: AV, Viljoen, Nicholls, Cruise, Desmarais, & Webster, 2014) provides a structural professional judgement on the risk of adverse outcomes related to harm to others and rule violations. The advantage of START: AV is in that it includes the assessment of both strengths and vulnerabilities. As it is a relatively new assessment tool, the questions related to psychometric properties of the measure are still topical, especially in intercultural context. The reliability and convergent validity of START: AV ratings were examined in a sample of 159 male juveniles (Mage = 16.97, SD = 0.81) on probation. Information about the psychosocial functioning of the minors was collected during the interviews with probation officers and rated by the researchers according to the START: AV User Guide. The Subtypes of Antisocial Behaviour (STAB; Burt & Donnellan, 2009), the Triarchic Psychopathy Measure (TriPM; Patrick, 2010), and the Criminal Sentiments Scale-Modified (CSS-M; Shields & Simourd, 1991) were used as convergent measures in this study. The results provided evidence for the reliability of the START: AV ratings and associations between behavioural variables, psychopathy constructs and START: AV are in favour of its concurrent validity. Pro-criminal attitudes were not associated with START: AV ratings, and further research is needed to test the manifestation of pro-criminal attitudes among juvenile offenders on probation. These findings support for further testing the START: AV on its predictive validity as well as utility in work with juvenile offenders.

In addition to acquiring occupation-specific knowledge and skills, students need to develop a set of career self-management skills - or resources - that helps them to successfully maneuver the various career-related challenges they face and that stimulate their well-being, engagement, and performance in studying tasks. In the current study, we apply the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) theory in an educational setting and suggest that career adaptability and career competencies are important career resources that predict both life satisfaction and academic performance via students' satisfaction with the choice of their major and study engagement. Undergraduate students (N = 672) from nine different colleges and universities in Lithuania participated in the study. The results revealed that career adaptability and career competencies were positively linked to students' life satisfaction, both directly and via study engagement. In addition, these career resources were positively, yet indirectly, related to academic performance via study engagement. Overall, the results suggest that career resources contribute to study engagement, life satisfaction, and academic performance. The results of our study further support JD-R theorizing and its applicability in student samples. Further theoretical and practical implications are discussed.