A legal basis for holding international volunteer campuses (camps) in the field of preserving historical and cultural heritage

The article actualizes the problem of legal regulation of application of volunteer labor in the field of preservation of cultural heritage objects. The aim is to analyze and evaluate the legal norms of the Russian legislation regarding the organization of international volunteer campuses. The empirical basis of the study was formed by legislative acts regulating specialized volunteer work. The study uses mainly a system-structural approach and comparative legal and formal legal methods customary in legal sciences and used in the analysis of legal acts. The author briefly considers the history of holding international campuses and determines the need to develop legal and regulatory support for their activities. She states the heterogeneity and diversity of domestic regulatory legal acts regulating the issues of holding international campuses. She also notes that at present the complex of legal documents includes numerous laws, regulations and instructions that define the rules for organizing such campuses, and contain requirements for participants’ living conditions, food, and health. The author comprehensively studies the legal acts of the Russian Federation regulating the activities of volunteer and non-profit organizations, the protection of historical and cultural monuments, the procedure for cooperation between cultural institutions and volunteer organizations, conceptual and program documents (passports of national projects and the Concept for the Development of Volunteering in the Russian Federation), regulations governing the recreation and health of children, safety rules on campus, as well as documents that determine the procedure for foreign citizens’ entry and stay on the territory of the Russian Federation. The author concludes that the existing norms can be considered as a kind of a symbiosis of official rules established by Russian legislation that cover various (both general and private) aspects of holding volunteer camps and providing the necessary services for voluntary assistants (volunteer activities, organization of tourism, summer holidays and rehabilitation, protection of historical and cultural monuments, migration issues). At the same time, stays, meals and accommodation at volunteer campuses do not have a clear legal regulation due to the age of most of the volunteers participating in them. The need to develop uniform guidelines for the organizers of international volunteer campuses is indicated, which will allow them to effectively coordinate volunteer activities in the field under study.