Selsoviet

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Selsoviet or selsovet (Russian: сельсове́т, short for се́льский сове́т), literally: rural soviet, was the lowest level administrative subdivision, similar to rural district, in rural areas in Soviet Union. It was preserved in most of the Russian Federation. A selsoviet is subordinated to a raion (district).

Larger settlements, both rural and urban had settlement councils (поселко́вые сове́ты), which were of the same administative level as selsoviets.

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)

Lenin Street (existed in virtually any sufficiently large settlement)

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 aministration. A selsoviet was headed by the Chairman of Selsoviet (председатель сельсовета).

Formally, a selsoviet is to be elected by a Rural Meeting (сельский сход). However since certain moment the Chairmain of the Selsoviet had to be appointed by higher administration.

For a considerable time period of the 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 Russian Federation

Subdivision into selsoviets largely remained after the collapse of the Soviet Union. However in many places the terminology changed, to reflect national specifics (the list may be incomplete):

• Adygeya—rural okrugs (сельские округа).
• Buryatia—selsovets are used together with somons (сомоны). Both types are on the same administrative level, with somons covering areas which are more ethnic in population.
• Kalmykia & Karachay-Cherkessia—rural municipalities (сельские муниципальные образования).
• Republic of Karelia—rural administrations (сельские администрации)
• North Ossetia-Alania—rural settlements administrations (администрации сельских поселений).
• Sakha (Yakutia)—naslegs (наслеги)

In modern Russian Federation, local self-administration is not included into the governmental system of the state. Each subnational entity of Russian Federation has its own statute that defines the scope of local self-administration, including selsoviets (if applicable).