On the question of the legal status of village heads

Based on the normative legal acts the article analyses procedure of formation and termination of village heads’ powers, the conditions of exercising the duties, and their responsibilities. The author has examined the experience of legal regulation of village heads' work in the Komi Republic, the Altai, Trans-Baikal and the Perm regions, Ivanovo, Kaliningrad, Kemerovo, Leningrad, Moscow, Orenburg, Omsk, Ryazan, Sverdlovsk, Tula and Ulyanovsk regions.