Journal of Security and Sustainability Issues

Revenues from public finances and taxes are very important conditions for the country‘s economic policy. No state can exist without taxes, so taxes are one of the most important components of a state’s fiscal policy, especially during a pandemic. Of course, it is especially important to collect enough tax revenue in the event of an emergency in the country. This is exactly the situation with a pandemic, especially in the case of the COVID19 virus development in 2020-2021. Taxes are the main source of revenue for the national budget, and redistribution accounts for government spending. Because the government does not create real products or services, the implementation of various state functions requires enormous resources. Taxes are therefore a really important and significant source of public finance revenue. The research problem may be a different tax burden in Lithuania during the pandemics. In addition, individual tax receipts and personal tax metrics may vary. The topic of the publication is the aspect of general and personal tax burden in Lithuania during the pandemic situation. The aim of this publication is to present the concept of individualized tax burden in modern times and restructural movements of the public finances. The main research methods used are: analysis of tax revenues in the scientific literature, data collection and systematization, comparative statistical data analysis, presentation of data, proportional analysis.

Scouting is a system that developed at the beginning of the last century and is now entering the era of information society. A sense of brotherhood increases the feeling of security. Scouting is a proposal for an upbringing based on active and compassionate values related to relationships with others, for others and for self-improvement and the common pursuit of the ideal. Scout activity, his willingness to serve, experience and interact with other brothers scouts around their world promotes the opening of values in their different dimensions.

This paper is devoted to the assumptions of the protection of combatants, prisoners of war, civilians and refugees during armed conflicts. It describes the legal regulations for the protection of combatants and prisoners of war, the norms of international law relating to the protection of civilians, and prohibited means and methods of military operations. The content of this chapter was intended to outline the legal status of persons protected in armed conflicts. The phenomenon of war is very often connected with the problem of human rights violations. Increasingly, during armed conflicts, the civilian population is disadvantaged alongside the armed forces of the fighting parties. Bearing in mind the above, international organisations have taken a number of initiatives to protect human life and health. However, a reflection arises that the legal standards in the field of international humanitarian law of armed conflicts and human rights are not properly respected during wars and armed conflicts.

Despite rich experience indicating that waging wars is risky and not very ‘profitable’, particularly from the last decades’ perspective, and it also has a demoralizing effect on societies engaged in the conflict strengthening the tendency to aggression, nationalism, at the same time destroying the natural environment, it is difficult to imagine the world without an armed confrontation in the future. Such a course of action is proven by ‘the Ukrainian scenario’, or the situation in the Middle East. Motives pushing people to armed confrontations are quite complex and do not result from a simple need of domination and possession. War is quite closely connected with the domain of the sacred. Violence and religion are placed in close neighbourhood. Thus can values represented by great monotheist religions be ‘useful’ in the conducted polemological-irenological discourse and in the process of building a desired international security system? Do the components fostering war aggression dominate over ‘pacifist reflection’ in Judaic-Christian and Islamic spirituality? One may risk a statement that religion regardless of time and latitude, is not an indifferent factor from the point of view of waged conflicts.

Włókiennicza Street in Łódź is currently undergoing a revitalisation process, which is also to include specific social activities for its residents. The revitalisation aims to raise the urban and architectural standard of this street, formerly known as Kamienna Street. The author describes Włókiennicza Street’s cultural transformation in the context of the theory of the relationship between the physical environment and crime. In particular, the author analyses the transformation from a street of wealthy residents to a street that is notorious for crime and poverty, and the contemporary hopes for changing the character of this part of the city as a result of a revitalisation project. Based on this, he raises the question about the necessary pedagogical and social measures in addition to strictly architectural measures.

In the study presented here, the author attempts to answer questions about the acquisition of information by prison staff that may have a bearing on their safety related to their service and work, the safety of isolated persons, and the general public. Internal regulations of the Prison Service (PS) related to the process of obtaining, processing, collecting and using information are indicated and discussed. Based on the research, the knowledge and action of PS officers in this area was analysed. The article aims to show information as an important factor directly affecting the security of penitentiary units.

The article was inspired by the desire to broaden the knowledge on the existence of adult men just after the loss of freedom – that is, during the transitional period of imprisonment. The research was inspired by the specific nature of the temporary cell and the conviction that for many researchers, this area is almost inaccessible and the research itself difficult to conduct. The aim of the research is an attempt at identifying factors that may be related to the sense of security among inmates in the temporary cells of prisons and detention facilities. I have personally conducted three studies among men in the transitional period of imprisonment, twice in the correctional facility in Pińczów (2013 and 2016) and in 2017 in the Detention facility in Kielce. The randomly selected research sample includes 422 inmates. the author’s own questionnaire for studying the sense of security among inmates in the temporary cell of the correctional facility and detention facility also made it possible to examine their moods and a tendency to present oneself in an excessively favourable manner. In order to verify the research hypotheses, a diagnostic survey method and a method of statistical and comparative analysis were adopted.A factor analysis revealed that the sense of security among inmates in temporary cells is determined by three factors: fear of inmates’ threatening behaviour, fear of inmates and anxiety. It appeared that the first-time inmates in temporary cells demonstrated more Fear of Inmates than the prisoners returning to it. As far as the fear of inmates’ threatening behaviour and anxiety are concerned, there were no significant differences between first-time inmates in the temporary cell and the prisoners returning to it.

The aim of the article is to present Chechen terrorism as a consequence of violations of basic human rights, including the crimes of genocide committed by the Russian Federation in the First Russo-Chechen War in 1994-1996. It has been argued that terrorism has become a dramatic way of drawing the international community’s attention to the tragedy taking place in Chechnya. Over time, Chechen fighters were influenced by radical Muslim groups and used terrorist fighting methods. On the other hand, the Russians did not shy away from bombing entire villages they suspected of sheltering wanted fighters. All this led to an escalation of terrorism and radicalization of religious views among a large part of the society. Moreover, the lack of a decisive reaction from the West to the policy of exterminating the Chechen population by the Russian Federation has led to an increase in anti-Western sentiment, which had not been recorded in Chechnya before.

The study attempts to present the impact of Russian policy on Saudi Arabia in terms of economic security. Analyses of primary data on the quantitative states of the possessed oil and gas resources and their annual consumption, as well as the state of essential armaments of Russia and Saudi Arabia were carried out and evaluated. As a result of the analysis of the literature of the research, it was observed that the potential of Russian-Saudi military cooperation is unrealized. One of the goals of Russian policy is to seek to limit the influence of both Saudi Arabia and the United States in the Middle East region. This limitation allows Saudi Arabia itself to not dictate world oil prices. The United States, on the other hand, due to its huge demand for oil, is forced to pursue such a policy in order to be guaranteed an adequate price and continuity of supply to meet its oil needs now and in the future.

The article presents a multidimensional comparative analysis of the drops in the number of passengers transported by rail in 28 European countries on a quarterly basis in 2012-2020 in terms of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and economic security. Data collected from Eurostat on the number of passengers transported by rail in 28 European countries were aggregated and further analyzed in order to emphasize the regularities governing them. The research has observed a growing trend on an annual and quarterly basis in the total number of passengers transported by rail in 28 European countries in 2012-2019. Additionally, in the unnamed (quarterly) data, a quarterly seasonality was detected. Since 2020, there have been declines in the number of passengers transported by rail in all of the 28 European countries considered. The declines were subjected to a comparative analysis, adopting various criteria, in order to assess which countries were most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of rail passenger transport.