Abstract: The research object is legal regulation of the nomenclature of scientific specialities, in which candidate and doctor theses are defended. The research object is the nomenclature of scientific specialities. The article analyzes the stages of legal regulation of the nomenclature of scientific specialities, including the pre-revolutionary and the Soviet periods of scientific degrees granting. Special attention is paid to the problems of the contemporary legal regulation if the nomenclature of scientific specialities caused by the unreasonable introduction of new specialities. The author outlines the problem of composing and confirming scientific specialities descriptions. The author applies the dialectical method, the systems analysis, the logical, hermeneutical, and other general scientific methods of cognition. The author uses specific scientific and special methods: historical, comparative-legal, formal-legal and others. The author comes to the conclusion about the need for modernization of the existing nomenclature of scientific specialities, consolidation of scientific specialities, and about the importance of developing a procedure of inclusion of new specialities into the nomenclature. The author offers the mechanism of this procedure. The study substantiates the reasonability of legal confirmation of the procedure of composition and approval of scientific specialities descriptions, which allow differentiating one speciality from another.