State Financial Control: From an Institutional Approach to the Study of Procedures

The ultimate goal set before state financial control — compliance with budget legislation — extends beyond the scope of this legal institution. The possibility of achieving this goal is determined by the activities of both the objects of control and financial, executive, and legislative (representative) bodies, acting as subjects within other control‑related legal relationships. The purpose of the study is to consider state financial control as a holistic control process, having a jurisdictional nature and, as a consequence, its own control proceedings, and being an integral part of the public finance management system. To achieve this goal, the formation of modern approaches to state financial control in the Russian budget legislation was investigated, the goals of state financial control were set, the place and significance of control procedures in control legal relations were analyzed. The article examines the mechanisms for implementing both the immediate objectives and the ultimate goal of state financial control. The research was conducted using historical‑legal, formal‑logical methods, as well as methods of comparison, contrast, generalization, and others. Due to the exclusion of financial and other bodies from the circle of subjects of state financial control, and of the sanctioning of operations from the methods of control, control legal relations within the framework of state financial control have gradually formed into a strict sequence of procedures, and, as a consequence, into a control process consisting of individual stages (proceedings), carried out only by specially authorized bodies — external and internal state financial control bodies. Control procedures existing within the framework of other legal relations (parliamentary and treasury control procedures, control procedures of the main administrators of budget funds and financial bodies) form the external contour of state financial control and serve to achieve its ultimate goal — a positive impact on primary budgetary relations.