Consular Service in Russia from Sources and to the Present: Development and Formation

Abstract

The article is devoted to the problem of establishing the Consular Service of Russia from the very beginning to the collapse of the USSR and the emergence of the Russian Federation. The author of the article analyses the theoretical grounds of consular relations in the legal discourse of the XIX century, which according to his viewpoint, is still relevant nowadays for the International Relations Studies. The article covers the genesis of the consular service step by step and considers the process of its legal establishment through the most significant clauses of the Consular Charters as the founding legal documents regulating consular service in this country. The author provides the arguments which allow to maintain that the Soviet period in the history of consular service in this country was by no means counterproductive, but on the contrary contributed to the development of consular relations and their legal grounds.