Rationalization of Positions in Assessing the Accession of the Finnish Region to the Russian Empire

The article identifies the prevailing positions in public consciousness regarding the legal nature of the process of Finland’s territories’ accession to Russia during the 18th and early 19th centuries, and establishes the relationship between such categories as empire, ethnopolitics, region, autonomization, unification, and hierarchical structure. Based on legislation, archival materials, political statements, and research opinions, the article systematically examines the conditions, directions, stages, and means of integrating the region into the unified political and legal space of the imperial state. The author forms the belief that the established administrative and territorial autonomy was the result of the sanction of the supreme authority of Russia, which was represented in the region by the Emperor himself as the “Grand Duke of Finland” and his representative, the Governor-General, as the highest official of the Principality and the Chairman of the Finnish Senate.