Selsoviet
Selsoviet (, ; , silrada) is shortened for a rural council. The full names for the term are in , , . It was the lowest level of administrative division in rural areas in the Soviet Union. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, it was preserved as a third tier of administrative-territorial unit throughout Ukraine, Belarus, and some of the federal subjects of Russia where it was replaced with municipal rural settlements (a unit of local government) in others.
A selsoviet is a rural administrative division of a district ( raion) that includes one or several smaller villages and it is in a subordination to its respectful raion administration.
Larger localities, both rural and urban-type had settlement councils (, possovets), which were of equal administrative level as selsoviets subordinating to the raion administration. Possovets are not part of current administrative division in Ukraine.
Indication of the selsoviet was part of a rural postal address (notice the "upside-down" order of routing); for example:
БССР ( Byelorussian SSR),
Могилевская область ( Mogilev oblast),
Климовичский район ( Klimovichi raion),
Савиничский сельсовет (Savinichi selsoviet),
д. Городешня (Gorodeshnya village)
ул. Ленинская (Lenin Street) (existed in virtually any sufficiently large settlement)
Смычкову Дмитрию (for Smychkov Dmitry) (quite often there were no street numbers)
The name coincides with the name of the local rural self-administration, Rural Soviet, a part of the Soviet system of administration. A selsoviet was headed by the Chairman of Selsoviet (председатель сельсовета).
Formally, a selsoviet was to be elected by a Rural Meeting (). However, the Chairman of the Selsoviet had to be appointed by higher administration.
For a considerable period of Soviet history passports of rural residents were stored in selsoviet offices, and people could not move outside their area of residence without the permission of selsoviet.
Selsoviets in the Russian Federation
Division into selsoviets as administrative-territorial units remained after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in many of the federal subjects of Russia. However, during the course of the municipal reform, they were replaced with municipal rural settlements, which serve as units of local self-government. During the period after the dissolution of the Soviet Union and before the municipal reform the terminology changed to reflect local specifics. The following are the names of the selsoviet-type units during that period of time, listed by federal subject:- Local administrations (, mestnyye administratsii)
- * Republic of Karelia: used together with rural administrations (see below), rural settlement councils (see below), and volost administrations (see below)
- Naslegs (, naslegi)
- * Sakha (Yakutia) Republic
- Okrugs (, okruga)
- * Samara Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see below), selsovets, and volosts (see below)
- * Saratov Oblast
- Rural administrations (, selskiye administratsii)
- * Altai Krai: used together with selsovets
- * Chita Oblast: used together with rural municipal formations (see below), rural okrugs (see below), rural settlements (see below), and selsovets
- * Chuvash Republic: used together with selsovets
- * Irkutsk Oblast
- * Karachay-Cherkess Republic
- *Republic of Karelia: used together with local administrations (see above), rural settlement councils (see below), and volost administrations (see below)
- * Khabarovsk Krai
- * Primorsky Krai
- * Sakhalin Oblast: used together with rural okrugs (see below), rural territorial formations (see below), and selsovets
- *Samara Oblast: used together with okrugs (see above), selsovets, and volosts (see below)
- * Tula Oblast: used together with rural okrugs (see below), rural territories (see below), and volosts (see below)
- * Ust-Orda Buryat Autonomous Okrug
- Rural municipal formations (, selskiye munitsipalnyye obrazovaniya)
- * Agin-Buryat Autonomous Okrug
- *Chita Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural okrugs (see below), rural settlements (see below), and selsovets
- * Republic of Kalmykia
- Rural okrugs (, selskiye okruga)
- * Republic of Adygea
- * Belgorod Oblast
- *Chita Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural municipal formations (see above), rural settlements (see below), and selsovets
- * Jewish Autonomous Oblast
- * Kaliningrad Oblast
- * Kaluga Oblast: used together with selsovets and territorial okrugs (see below)
- * Kamchatka Krai
- * Kirov Oblast
- * Krasnodar Krai: used together with selsovets and stanitsa okrugs (see below)
- * Moscow Oblast
- * Omsk Oblast
- * Ryazan Oblast
- *Sakhalin Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural territorial formations (see below), and selsovets
- * Smolensk Oblast
- * Tomsk Oblast: used together with rural territorial administrations (see below), rural territorial okrugs (see below), selsovets, and territorial okrugs (see below)
- *Tula Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural territories (see below), and volosts (see below)
- * Tver Oblast: used together with selsovets
- * Vladimir Oblast
- * Yaroslavl Oblast
- Rural representations (, selskiye predstavitelstva)
- *Murmansk Oblast: used together with rural territorial okrugs (see below)
- (Rural) settlement councils (, poselkovyye sovety)
- *Republic of Karelia: used together with local administrations (see above), rural administrations (see above), and volost administrations (see below)
- * Orenburg Oblast: used together with selsovets
- * Udmurt Republic: used together with selsovets
- * Vologda Oblast: used together with selsovets
- Rural settlements (, selskiye poseleniya)
- *Chita Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural municipal formations (see above), rural okrugs (see above), and selsovets
- Rural settlements administrations (, administratsii selskikh poseleniy)
- * Republic of North Ossetia-Alania
- Rural territorial administrations (, selskiye territorialnyye upravleniya)
- *Tomsk Oblast: used together with rural okrugs (see above), rural territorial okrugs (see below), selsovets, and territorial okrugs (see below)
- Rural territorial formations (, selskiye territorialnyye obrazovaniya)
- *Sakhalin Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural okrugs (see above), and selsovets
- Rural territorial okrugs (, selskiye territorialnyye okruga)
- *Murmansk Oblast: used together with rural representations (see above)
- *Tomsk Oblast: used together with rural okrugs (see above), rural territorial administrations (see above), selsovets, and territorial okrugs (see below)
- Rural territories (), selskiye territorii)
- *Tula Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural okrugs (see above), and volosts (see below)
- Somons (, somony)
- * Buryat Republic: used together with selsovets; somons cover areas which are more ethnic in population.
- Stanitsa okrugs (, stanichnyye okruga)
- *Krasnodar Krai: used together with rural okrugs (see above) and selsovets
- Sumons (, sumony)
- * Tuva Republic
- Territorial okrugs (, territorialnyye okruga)
- *Kaluga Oblast: used together with rural okrugs (see above) and selsovets
- *Tomsk Oblast: used together with rural okrugs (see above), rural territorial administrations (see above), rural territorial okrugs (see above), and selsovets
- Volost administrations (, volostnyye upravleniya)
- *Republic of Karelia: used together with local administrations (see above), rural administrations (see above), and rural settlement councils (see above)
- Volosts (, volosti)
- * Leningrad Oblast
- * Pskov Oblast
- *Samara Oblast: used together with okrugs (see above), rural administrations (see above), and selsovets
- *Tula Oblast: used together with rural administrations (see above), rural okrugs (see above), and rural territories (see above)