Land Relations and Land Law in Legal Doctrine of Ukraine.

Development of both land relations and their legal regulation in XX- XXI centuries is studied. It is proved that by its structure land relations, as a subject of legal regulation, should be divided into land relations, land relations of civil nature and land relations of environmental nature. Such nature of land relations leads to the necessity to apply to its regulation norms of both civil law and environmental law. However, the authors back the concept according to which land relations including civil land as well as environmental land (land-protective) relations should be regulated by norms of land law as a separate branch of legal system of Ukraine. Civil legislation may be applied in regulation of civil land relations unless such relations are regulated by norms of land law. Finally, the norms of environmental law are prior to application in only those environmental land relations where land is a part of environment. The necessity of land law as a separate branch of law is grounded by its functions which can be divided into two relatively separate groups, namely: exclusive functions of land law and functions which land law fulfills in close interrelations with other branches of law, mainly with civil law and environmental law. It is also substantiated that in natural resources usage the relations regarding land are often transformed from civil land into environmental land relations and vice versa without losing main features of land relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]