Last modified: 2006-09-30 by antónio martins
Keywords: respublika | oblasth | kraĭ | okrug | raĭon | avtonomniĭ okrug | avtonomnaâ oblasth | namestniĉestvo | guberniâ | uezd |
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Russia is divided in 89 entities, called collectively subjects of the federation (субъекты федерации | subwekty federacii, sing.субъект федерации | subwekt federacii). As an heritage from the soviet era, each of these fall into one of the following cathegories (followed by the number of units for each):
Although Russia is still a very centralized country, it is nominally a federation and these first order divisions have each a constitution and locally elected government and parlament — as they are also entitled to have each a flag, an anthem and a coat of arms.
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000
Immediately after 1991, the republics inherited (or upgraded themselves to) the status soviet ASSRs enjoyed, nominally autonomous inside RSFSR — as opposed to the other divisions at the same level. In 1994, though, this state of affairs changed and the privilegies enjoyed by the republics were extended to all russian first order divisions.
There are still differences between republics and other first order divisions. For instance, while the former have a president (президент | prezident), the latter have a governor (губернатор | gubernator); while the former have a capital (столица | stolica), the latter have a center (центр | centr); the word "republic" is always capitalized, while the other names are always in lower case; etc. But these are skin deep differences and in practice the way each region deals with the central government has little or nothing to do with its cathegory (again, except autonomous districts though including Chukotka). And this, as said, includes flags.
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000
Republics and the other federation subjects have equal rights, but
we see only the 21 flags of republics near the building of Federation Council
in Moscow.
Victor Lomantsov, 06 May 2002
Of course the motive for soviet differentiation of
ASSRs was the fact that these are regions inhabited by ethnic non-russians
— though a severe critique about fairness and accuracy in the
implementation of this principle would fill a thick book (it did fill some,
actually). The same rationale applied to the autonomous districts and
autonomous regions.
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000
As for second order divisions (subdivisions of first order divisions) in Russia, they fall on either of these cathegories:
Federal cities, though, do not have second order divisions, rather (for their size) being subdivided in third order divisions, just like second order divisions themselves. These are also of several types:
Seats of Village Councils may be:
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000
In the portuguese newspaper Público of May 19 there’s
a report on a division of Russia in 7 large regions, each with an appointed
representative of the central power, designed to control the subjects of the
federation. [See list and
map.] I suppose these regions have no flags, at least
yet.
Jorge Candeias, 26 May 2000
At first glance, these seem to coincide with the economic regions, but there are a lot of differences:
There are also the economic regions
(экономический
район |
êkonomiĉeskiĭ raĭon) [See
list], which are not administrative divisions
and do not have flags. There are 11 of them, and their borderlines follow
the limits of the first order divisions. These regions are almost identical
to those of the soviet era, the only differences
being the new Northern economic region (including
Karelia, Komia,
Nenetsia, Vologda Region,
Arkhangelsk Region and Murmansk
Region) carved out from the Northwestern economic region, and the joining
to the Northwestern economic region of Kaliningrad
Region. I am not sure wheather these regions will be superceded by the
recently approved federal districts.
António Martins, 04 Apr 2000 and 01 Jun 2001
See also: Historical coats of arms of Russian subdivisions
In Russian Empire the main and basic
administrative and territorial unit the Уезд was.
In 18 century Uezds have been incorporated into Guberniyas.
In 1920th years of Guberniyas have been
transformed into Krays and regions (Oblast) and Uezds
have been divided into Rayons (analog for county). Some Rayons
were made Okrug (analog for district). In 1930th years Okrugs
have been abolished, except for national Okrugs and
special Okrugs. The Okrugs is an administrative-territorial
unit, which is more important, than Rayon. One Okrug includes
some Rayons.
Mikhail Revnivtsev, 07 Oct 2005
Possible translations to English:
"Наместничество"
and "губерния" were two
names of one thing. Before 1799 many of gubernias were known as
namestnichestvo; the head of administration was namestnik.
It was official name of the administrative parts of Russia. The citizens
of XVIII century thought that "namestnichestvo" is a “more
russian” word. In 1799 czar Pavel I renamed all
namestnichestvos to guberniya and namestniks to
gubernator (governor). Not all guberniyas were
namestnichestvo in the past. For example, Moscow guberniya was
"guberniya" always (from 1708).
Victor Lomantsov, 15 Oct 2001
Some former autonomous units upgraded themselves to full “sovereignship” inside the Fussian Rederation since 1991:
This means that only Adygeya,
Altay Republic,
Karachay-Cherkessia,
Khakassia,
Jewish Autonomous Region and
Chukotka changed their dependent status (the two
latter not having changed their denominations, which is most confusing).
All other areas (Aghin Buriatia,
Evenkia,
Yugra, Koryakia,
Nenetsia, Perm’s
Komia, Taymyr, Ust-Ord
Buriatia and Yamal) were and remain dependent
from another federation subject, though all 89 of them are considered to be
federation subjects of their own (which is also most confusing).
António Martins, 29 May 2000
See also: Flags on Russian stamps
I think that stamps issued by subnational entitied within Russia are mostly
official, though issued exclusively as philatelic items, and thus quite seldom
used to post letters and parcels. And if so they’re mint in Moscow and
are almost surely not avaliable on the locations they supposedly refer to,
like Australian Antartica stamps and so on.
António Martins, 07 Nov 2000
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