OLD RUSSIAN COMMUNITY – THE ORIGINS OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT

Abstract

The article explores the community phenomenon in the context of the origins of territorial self-government in the socio-economic system of the East Slavic society. The main features of a communal social structure are characterized and the influence on the processes of statehood development is shown. The author analyzes the numerous historiography, which operates with different paradigms of the origin of the neighboring (territorial, rural) community in the Eastern Slavs, including the concept without the community development of the village. Attention is drawn to a certain unity in the views of scientists when it comes to the fact that the tribe consisted of separate related communities. It was families who rallied into communities that independently decided their affairs, at their discretion and within the limits of material resources. The cohesion of the community was manifested in the common faith and the practice of religious cults, the celebration of significant events and traditional holidays, joint financial responsibility to the supreme authority for the collection of taxes and duties, as well as for offenses committed by individual members. Actually, this self-governing system became the foundation on which Eastern Slavic statehood began to develop. It is noted that the urban community of Russia acquired a state nature and became the carrier of state relations and a source of power. The East Slavic society demonstrated the path of political genesis when intracommunal power relations begin to develop into political relations within the community itself, turning it into a political structure.