Volost

Coordinate term: raion (modern Russia)

Next to the village stands the volost, or union of several villages, and this also is governed on the republican plan by elders elected from among the peasants themselves. Then comes the district composed of a number of volosti; […]

The office-holders and agencies which ran the new units – the elder, the clerk, the executive board, the assembly, the court – were elected by the peasants whom they served, but it is only with considerable reservation that volosti can be said to have increased the representative character of the imperial polity.

“They will slaughter each other—Armenians against Azeris, Turks against Armenians, mountain peoples against Turks, Afghans against Tajiks, Tajiks against Uzbeks and so on,” said Mr. Zhirinovsky, whose party looks set to take about a fifth of the seats in Russia’s new parliament following Sunday’s elections. “And then they—or rather, those who are still alive—will come rushing to ask Russia to accept them as volosti (rural districts) or provinces,” he said.

In 1923 Soviet Ukraine’s 102 povity were replaced by 53 larger okruhy (sing. okruha), and its 1,989 volosti by 706 raions.