Coastal area management should be considered as an element of a more general philosophy – that of natural resource management – which is in the process of replacing the purely ‘protection of the environment’ approach which has dominated most of the 20th century. Specific legislation on coastal management has been adopted by many countries, and today steps have been taken to accumulate all experience accumulated and to harmonize legal regulations on the international level. For the Russian Federation, formerly the Soviet Union, with an enormous sea-shore line to cope with, it is a new experience to develop a concept and a legal regulation specifically tackling coastal area management. The draft of a legislative act on coastal area management reflects the attempts to find ways for harmonizing various economic, environmental and social interests in this huge area, encompassing relevant Russian legislation in force as well as international conventions and treaties, and taking into consideration foreign experience in this field.

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