Panchenko Pavel - Professor, Head of the Department of Criminal Law and Criminal Process, Nizhniy Novgorod Campus of National Research University Higher School of Economics, Honoured Lawyer of  Russian Federation, Doctor of Juridical Sciences. Address: 25/12 Bolshaya Pechyorskaya Str., Nizhniy Novgorod, 603155, Russian Federation. E-mail: panvest@mail.ru.

The paper analyzes the legal law institution of compromise representing a system of legal norms allowing the parties in the event of the conflict of interests to reach (within certain limits) implementation of such norms. This is a tactical device based on: 1) refusal of the state from criminal law response to the crime if e.g. a) the committed crime or the person who committed it is characterized with a minimum of danger, or the forbidden by law deed was committed for a good purpose provided by law; b) a possibility is given to exchange a foreign citizen who committed a crime against the interests of the Russian Federation or a person without citizenship to the Russian Federation citizen prosecuted abroad; 2) agreement between the state and its citizen suspected or accused in committing a crime as to the behavior of the person such as: a) relief from criminal liability or punishment; b)mitigating the punishment. Taking into account the special features of the parties, the compromise may be divided into at least two types: a compromise between state and society as to a)general principles, causes and limits of criminal responsibility; b) crime and punishment of special types of dangerous for society deeds; 2)between the state and its citizens as to a) their guilt, liability and a specific punishment; b) agreement between the guilty and victim as to the ways of resolving a conflict involving criminality; 3) state and another state as to a) exchange of the prosecuted persons — citizens of different states or living there and a person without citizenship; b) extradition to another state the prosecuted a foreign citizen or a person without citizenship. It has been suggested to improve the efficiency of the institution of compromise in criminal law.