Propiska in the Soviet Union

A propiska (Russian: пропи́ска, IPA: [prɐˈpʲiskə] ( listen)) was both a residency permit and a migration-recording tool, used in
the Russian Empire before 1917 and in the Soviet Union from the 1930s. Literally, the word propiska means "inscription",
alluding to the inscription in a state internal passport permitting a person to reside in a given place. For a state or third-party
owned property, propiska meant a person was included in the rental contract associated with a dwelling. Propiska was
documented in local police (Militsiya) registers and certified with a stamp in internal passports. Residing anywhere for longer
than a few weeks without a permit was prohibited.

In the USSR, there were both permanent (прописка по месту жительства or постоянная прописка) and temporary
(временная прописка) propiskas. A third type, the business propiska (служебная прописка), was an intermediate type,
permitting a person and family to live in an apartment built by an economic entity (factory, ministry) as long as the person
worked for the owner of the housing (similar to inclusion of house rent into a labour contract). In the transition period to the
market economy, the permanent propiska in municipal apartments was one factor leading to the emergence of private property
rights during privatization (those who built housing at their own expense obtained a permanent propiska there by definition).

Contents
Etymology and history
History
The limit system for migrant workers
Some details of the system
Sanitary norm
Housing property rights and mortgage
Propiska fee in Moscow
Propiska and education
Modern usage
See also
References
External links

Etymology and history

The Russian verb "propisat" (Russian: прописа́ ть) is formed by adding the prefix "про~" ("pro~") to the verb "писа́ ть" ("to
scribe, to write"). Here this prefix emphasizes the completion of the action, which supposes permission (like in Russian:
"пусти́ть – пропусти́ть", "let [go]" – "yield [the way]") or other related formal action (like in Russian: "дать – прода́ ть", "give"
– "sell").

Originally, the noun propiska meant the clerical procedure of registration, of enrolling the person (writing his or her name) into
the police records of the local population (or writing down the police permission into the person's identification document - see
below). Dahl's Explanatory Dictionary describes this procedure as "to enroll [the document] in a book and stamp it".[1] Page 20
of the internal passport of the Russian Empire (see illustration) was entitled: Russian: "Место для пропи́ски ви́довъ поли́цiею"
("Space for registration of vids by police"). Five blank pages (20 to 24) were gradually filled with stamps with the residential
address written in. It allowed a person to reside in his/her relevant locality.
Article 61 of the Regulations adopted on February 7, 1897 (see p. 18–19 of
the passport) imposed a fine for those found outside the administrative unit
(as a rule, uezd) in which they were registered to live.

As a clerical term, the noun vid (Russian: "вид", lit. 'view') is short for
Russian: "вид на жи́тельство". Although translated into English as a
"residential permit", in Russian, this combination of words also conveys a
presence of the right of a resident to live somewhere. In the sense of a "
[legal] right" the word vid also appears in the Russian: "иметь на неё виды"
("planning to gain husband's rights with her"). Among many explanations of
"вид", Dahl's Explanatory Dictionary indicates a "certificate of any kind for
free passage, travel and living", mentioning "passport" as its synonym.[2]
Internal passport, issued 1910 in
Propiska stamps (handwritten texts as an exception) in the passports of the Imperial Russia

Russian Empire used one of two verbs to describe the civil act committed: to
present or to claim (Russian: "яви́ть" or "заяви́ть") . Their non-reflexive
form (no postfix "~ся") clearly rules out the binding of this act to the owner of the document so it is not the person who appeared
(presented himself) in a police department but the passport itself. Vladimir Dahl mentions both verbs in his description of
"propiska" procedure as related to passport.[1] Presenting a passport to the officer implied the claim of a person to stay at a
designated location.

History
In the Russian Empire, a person arriving for a new residency was obliged (depending on the estate) to enroll in the registers of the
local police authorities. The latter could deny undesirable persons the right to settle (in this case, no stamps were made in
passports). In most cases, this would mean the person had to return to the permanent domicile. The verb "propisat" was used as a
transitive verb with "vid" being the direct object.

After reintroduction of the passport system in the Soviet Union in the 1930s, the noun propiska was also associated with the result
of residential registration. In common speech, the stamp in the passport in which the residential address was written into was also
called "propiska". Permanent propiska (Russian: "постоя́ нная пропи́ска") confirmed the housing rights of its owner. Temporary
propiska (Russian: "вре́менная пропи́ска") could be provided alongside a permanent one when a resident had to live outside the
permanent residence for a long period of time. As an example, students and workers leaving to study or work in other cities
received temporary propiskas at their dorms.

When reintroduced in the 1930s, the passport system in the USSR was similar to that of the Russian Empire where passports were
required mainly in the largest cities and in the territories adjacent to the country's external borders. Officers and soldiers always
had special identity documents, while peasants could obtain internal passports only by a special application.

In the USSR, the term residential permit (Russian: Вид на жи́тельство, romanized: vid na zhitelstvo) was used as a synonym for
temporary propiska, particularly with regard to foreign nationals. By the end of the 1980s, when emigrants from the USSR could
return, those who had lost Soviet citizenship could also apply for an identity document with this title.

The "passportization" of the citizen of the USSR reached its all-encompassing scope only in the 1970s. In the 1970s, the right
(and obligation) of every adult (from 16) to have a passport promoted the propiska as the primary lever of the regulation of
migration. On the other hand, the propiska underlined the mechanism of the constitutional obligation of the state to provide
everyone a dwelling: no one could refuse or be stripped of the propiska at one location without substitution with another
permanent propiska location.
All employers were strictly forbidden to give jobs to anybody without a local "propiska". To provide themselves an extra labour
force, the largest enterprises had to build housing for their workers beforehand. In addition to dormitories, some of them also built
conventional apartment blocks for individual resettlement. Registration in these apartments was called a "work-related" residency
permit (Russian: "ве́домственная" or "служе́бная" пропи́ска, romanized: "vedomstvennaya" or "sluzhebnaya" propiska).

The limit system for migrant workers

The system of a propiska limit existed in the last 30 or so years of the USSR. This was the only means by which outsiders could
settle in big cities like Moscow and Leningrad, except marriage. This meant that enterprises in large cities built hostels with
dormitories at their own expense, to provide accommodation (with "vedomstvennaya propiska") for migrant workers from
smaller towns and rural areas. After long-term employment at an enterprise (around 20 years), a worker could be given an
apartment (as opposed to an individual hostel room, which often shared a single bathroom and kitchen per floor and was ill-suited
for family life), with permanent "propiska" rights to it. Millions of people were using this system.

The system was introduced with the aim of social fairness in the allocation of housing which was in very short supply, and in a
way replaced the Western system of mortgage (except that service years on the enterprise were used instead of real money).

Nevertheless, conditions in these hostels were often very bad, worsened by the mandatory security outposts on the hostels'
entrance, who would disallow any non-dwellers (without proper documents) to the hostel. While reducing the chances of the
hostel being used for criminal purposes, it was a major hindrance for relations with the opposite sex and for planning and raising
a family. There was usually no official gender segregation in the hostels, but since many jobs and student specialities were and
are gender-imbalanced (the future teacher was usually female, and the future engineer, more or less usually male, with nearly
exclusively males in all military schools), there was often de facto gender segregation in the hostels.

Students from rural areas or smaller towns lived in very similar hostels, with the termination of right of abode in the hostel on
graduation or on exclusion from their schools.

The native populations of large cities like Moscow often despised these migrant workers ('limit-dwellers'), considering them rude,
uncultured and violent. The derogatory term "limita" (limit-scum) was used to refer to them.

Some details of the system

The verb "propisat" was used with both the passport and its owner as a direct object. Reciprocally, "propiska" became an object
which one can have, e.g.: "to have a propiska in Moscow" (Russian: име́ть пропи́ску в Москве́).

The propiska was recorded both in the internal passport of a Soviet citizen and at local governmental offices. In cities it was a
local office of a utility organisation, such as РЭУ (District Production Department), ЖЭК (Housing Committee Office), ЖСК
(Housing and Construction Cooperative). The passports were stamped at the local police precinct's Ministry of Internal Affairs
(MVD) office, with the Military Comissariat (the draft body) also involved. In rural areas, it was a selsoviet, or "village council",
a governing body of a rural territory. A propiska could be permanent or temporary. The administrations of hostels, student
dormitories, and landlords (very rare case in the USSR, since the "sanitary norm" would usually cause rejection of temporary
propiska for such a person) were obliged to maintain temporary propiska records of their guests. The propiska played the role of
both residence permit and resident registration of a person.

Acquiring a propiska to move to a large city, especially Moscow, was extremely difficult for migrants and was a matter of
prestige. Even moving to relatives did not automatically provide a person with a permanent propiska because of the minimum
area limit for each resident of a specific apartment.
Owing to Soviet property regulations (officially based on the Universal Right to Housing for all), the permanent propiska (which
provided the permanent right to dwell in this housing) was nearly impossible for authorities to terminate. The only major
exception was a second criminal sentence (after serving the penalty for the first sentence, the inmate returned to the old
permanent propiska). If the authorities needed to rule in a certain case, they might refuse a permanent propiska for an individual,
but usually not revoking the existing permanent propiska.

This also resulted in a situation in which if a spouse agreed (at marriage) to provide the marriage partner with permanent propiska
at their apartment, the propiska could not be terminated by divorce, and so exchanging the apartment for two smaller ones was
often the only possibility.

Sanitary norm
Spouses could always provide one another a permanent propiska, but explicit consent was required for this. Children were
granted a permanent propiska at one of the parents' permanent propiska locations, and this could not be terminated during the
lifetime of the child even as an adult (with the exception of a second criminal sentence), unless the grown-up child voluntarily
relocated to another place (and was granted a permanent propiska there).

It was not this easy for any other relatives. For such cases, as also for any unrelated people, the so-called "sanitary norm" was
used: a propiska would not be issued if it would cause the apartment area to fall below 12 m² per person. Also, the number of
rooms in the apartment was important: two persons of different sex, one or both being older than 9 years, were forbidden to share
a single room. If the new "propiska" of the new dweller violated this rule, the propiska would not be granted (spouses being an
exception). This was officially meant to prevent unhealthy overcrowding of apartments and sexual abuse, but since most Soviet
people had only a little over 9 m² per person, it was also an effective method of migration control.

The above norms were very similar to the norms of getting onto the governmental (not dependent on particular employer)
"housing list", which was yet another Soviet form of mortgage (again with real money replaced by years—the queue was free in
terms of money). The main difference was that to gain admission to the housing list the space had to fall below the required 9 m²
per person in an existing apartment (and, due to the dwelling-area rule already mentioned, children of different gender also raised
the chances of getting to the queue). This housing list was very slow (much slower than employers' list), and sometimes it took a
person's whole life to get an apartment.

As a result of the above, practically the only way for a person legally to improve their living conditions was marriage or
childbirth. This was also a serious driving force in migration of young people to "monocities", the new cities built from scratch,
often in Siberia or the Arctic, some around a single facility (factory, oil region or such).

Housing property rights and mortgage

In the USSR, there were some so-called "cooperative" apartments, owned on a mortgage basis, but they were scarce and getting
one was very difficult. These were the only apartments which passed down to children by inheritance; in normal apartments,
when the last dweller died, the apartment was returned to the government. Since, when the grandparents became older, they
usually preferred to live separately from their children and grandchildren, this was usually connected to cheating of the propiska
system: the grandparents were registered not for the apartment in which they lived but the apartment of their children, to avoid
the return of their apartment to the government after their death.

Violations of propiska system within a single city/town were rarely actually punishable. Also, Moscow employers were allowed
to employ people from Moscow Region living in a given radius (around 40 km) from Moscow.

In theory, it was possible to exchange apartments over mutual agreement between parties. Few people wanted to move from a
large city to a smaller one, even with additional money, but the exchange of two flats for one in a larger city was sometimes
possible. Also, apartment exchange with money involved was something like a "gray area" near a criminal offence, and there was
a real possibility that the participants would be prosecuted as for an economic crime, and realty agents arranging such things were
strictly outlawed and prosecuted, living in a "gray area" and hiding their activities from the authorities.

Many people used subterfuge to get a Moscow propiska, including a marriage of convenience and bribery. Another way of
obtaining Moscow residency was to become a limitchik: to enter Moscow to take certain understaffed job positions, such as at
cleaning services, according to a certain workforce quota (limit). Such people were provided with a permanent living place
(usually a flat or a room in a shared flat) for free. Some valuable specialists could also be invited by enterprises, which provided
them with flats at the expense of the enterprise.

At a certain period, residents of rural areas had their passports stored at selsoviets (officially "for safekeeping") which prevented
them from unofficial migration to the areas where they did not have apartments. This was intended to prevent cities from an
influx of migrants who sought higher living standards in large cities but had permanent registration far away from their actual
place of residence.

In 1993, propiska was restructured as resident registration, so the modern Russian legislation does not use the terms "propiska"
and "propisat" (with the exception of situations where a reference is needed to the facts of the Soviet period). However, it is still
used as a colloquial abbreviation for permanent residency registration.

Propiska fee in Moscow

In the early 1990, just before the collapse of the USSR, the authorities in Moscow introduced an official charge to be permanently
registered in Moscow even in their own property. The toll was around US$5,000, around a quarter of the price of a small
apartment at that time.

This system only lasted several years, causing major public uproar from human rights activists and other liberals, and was
abolished after several rulings of the Constitutional Court of Russia. Late in 1997, it was finally abolished.

Propiska and education

Students not of the city in question were provided a temporary propiska in the dormitories of their university campus (generally,
dormitory space was not provided to students studying in the same city as their parents' residence, but they often wanted it to be
free from their parents). After graduation, this temporary propiska was terminated.

In Soviet times, this was connected to a "distribution" system: mandatory official assignment of the first job placement for the
graduate (even from the same city), where the graduate had to work for around 2 years "to pay back for their education". Only
postgraduates were freed from this requirement.

This system was despised as being a violation of freedom, since nobody wanted to relocate from a larger city to a smaller one, but
it still provided at least some propiska (and dwelling space connected to it) to a graduate. Also, such a "young specialist" could
nearly never be fired, the same as a pregnant woman and other beneficial (in terms of labor laws) categories of people.

After the end of the USSR, distribution was nearly immediately abolished, leaving graduates with the choice of returning to their
home town/village (to their parents) or struggling to find work in the large city where the school was located. To do the latter,
some people became "propiska hunters": people with an urgent desire to marry anybody with permanent propiska in the large
city, just to retain their legal right to stay in the large city after graduation.

Since once provided, the permanent propiska was not revocable, the native people of the large city were very suspicious about
senior-age students from smaller towns or villages when it came to marriage.

Modern usage
Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the propiska system was officially
abolished. The Russian Supreme Court has ruled the propiska to be
unconstitutional on several occasions since the fall of communism and it is
considered by human rights organizations to be in direct violation of the Russian
constitution, which guarantees freedom of movement. Several former Soviet
republics, such as Belarus, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia, chose to keep their
propiska systems, or at least a scaled-down version of them.

Russia changed propiska to registration, though the word propiska is still widely
used to refer to it colloquially. Citizens must register if they live in the same
place for 90 days (Belarusian citizens in Russia and vice versa, 30 days). There
are two types of registration, permanent and temporary. A place of permanent
Signing in (top) and signing out
registration is indicated on a stamp made in an internal passport, and a place of
(bottom) Propiska in a Tajikistan
temporary registration is written on a separate paper. Living in a dwelling Passport.
without a permanent or temporary registration is considered an administrative
offence.

Registration is used for economic, law enforcement and other purposes, such as accounting social benefits, housing and utility
payments, taxes, conscription, and medical care.

Today, registration plays little role in questions of property. In Soviet times, for example, if after a marriage, a wife was registered
in accommodation her husband rented from the state, in case of divorce, she could obtain some part of her husband's place of
residence for her own usage. In modern Russia, this was mostly abandoned due to apartment privatisation, but if a person has no
other place to live, he still cannot be evicted without substitution (Housing Code of Russian Federation, Art. 31, part 4. (Russian)
(http://www.consultant.ru/popular/housing/55_6.html#p399)). This makes many people fearful of registering others on their
property title.

At the same time, many documents and rights may be obtained only at the place where a citizen has permanent registration,
which causes problems, for example, with obtaining or changing passports, voting, obtaining inquiry papers, which are often
needed in Russia. Unfortunately, officials tend to ignore laws that allow people to obtain such things and rights if they exist.

For foreigners, registration is called "migration control" and is stamped on a migration card and/or coupon, approximately one
third the size of an A4 paper, which must be returned to officials before departure.

Migration control is much stricter than internal registration. For instance, to employ any Russian citizen, even with the permanent
registration out of the city in question, the employer needs no special permit; only the employee must be registered.

Employing unregistered people is an administrative offence for the employer, but penalties are rare: sometimes even Western
companies in Moscow employ unregistered people (usually university graduates who have lost their dormitory registration due to
graduation). The penalty is much stricter in the case of foreigners. To employ foreigners, employers must have a permit from the
Federal Migration Service.

The citizens of Belarus have the same employment rights as Russian citizens in Russia.

In Ukraine, the Constitutional Court ruled that propiska was unconstitutional in 2001 (November 14) and a new "informational"
registration mechanism was planned by the government, though it never came to fruition. Additionally, access to social benefits
such as housing, pensions, medical care, and schooling are still based on a propiska as are the location for a driving test and the
associated lessons.
In Uzbekistan, even though citizens are issued a single passport, severe restrictions on movement within the country apply,
particularly in the capital Tashkent. After the 1999 Tashkent bombings, the former Soviet era restrictions were imposed, making it
virtually impossible to acquire propiska in Tashkent.

See also
Eastern Bloc emigration and defection
Passport system in the Soviet Union
Resident registration in Russia
Russian passport
101st km
Hukou system

References
1. "Прописывать" (http://slovardalja.net/word.php?wordid=34462). Толковый словарь живого великорусского
языка (Explanatory Dictionary of the Live Great Russian language). Vol. III. (6th ed.). М.: Гос. изд-во иностр. и
национ. словарей. 1955. p. 503.
2. "Видеть" (http://slovardalja.net/word.php?wordid=3203). Толковый словарь живого великорусского языка
(Explanatory Dictionary of the Live Great Russian language). Vol. I. (6th ed.). М.: Гос. изд-во иностр. и национ.
словарей. 1955. p. 203.

External links
Constitutional Court strikes down internal passport system (https://web.archive.org/web/20040927193711/http://w
ww.ukrweekly.com/Archive/2001/470102.shtml)—article in The Ukrainian Weekly
Russian ombudsman on propiska in modern Russia (http://www.newsru.com/russia/06jun2007/lukin.html)

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