The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (Russian: Российская Советская Федеративная Социалистическая Республика, tr. Rossiyskaya Sovetskaya Federativnaya Sotsialisticheskaya Respublika), commonly referred to as Soviet Russia, the Russian Federation, or simply Russia, was the largest, most populous and economically developed republic of the Soviet Union. The Republic comprised sixteen autonomous republics, five autonomous oblasts, ten autonomous okrugs, six krais and forty oblasts. Russians formed the largest ethnic group. Under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin, the Bolsheviks established the Soviet state on 7 November [O.S. 25 October] 1917, immediately after the Russian Provisional Government, which governed the Russian Republic, was overthrown during the October Revolution. Initially, the state did not have an official name and wasn't recognized by neighboring countries for five months. On 25 January 1918, at the third meeting of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets, the unrecognized state was renamed the Soviet Russian Republic. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed on 3 March 1918, giving away much of the land of the former Russian Empire to Germany in exchange for peace during the rest of World War I. On 10 July 1918, the Russian Constitution of 1918 renamed the country the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic. By 1918, during the Russian Civil War, several states within the former Russian Empire seceded, reducing the size of the country even more. Internationally, in 1920, the RSFSR was recognized as an independent state only by Estonia, Finland, Latvia and Lithuania in the Treaty of Tartu and by the Irish Republic. On 30 December 1922, with the creation of the Soviet Union, Russia became one of six republics within the federation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, the final Soviet name for the republic, was adopted in the Soviet Constitution of 1936 — by that time, Soviet Russia gained roughly the same borders of the old Tsardom of Russia before the Great Northern War. On 25 December 1991, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the republic was renamed the Russian Federation, which it remains to this day. This name and "Russia" were specified as the official state names in the 21 April 1992 amendment to the Russian Constitution of 1978 and retained as such in the 1993 Constitution of Russia. The RSFSR's economy was heavily industrialized, accounting for about two-thirds of the electricity produced in the USSR. It was the third largest producer of petroleum, trailing only the United States and Saudi Arabia. In 1974, there were 475 institutes of higher education in the republic providing education in 47 languages to some 23,941,000 students. Health care was provided through a network of territorially organized public health services.

• published: 12 Mar 2013
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