Аннотация:
In the present article the author refers to the current problem of the modernity bribery, as one of the types of corruption, which is present in our reality and, especially, among the office holders. In the author's opinion, the sources of this problem shall be searched in the traditions of society, established in different formation periods of the statehood. Due to the retrospective analysis, the author provided a possibility to see, how far the bribery was extended among the bureaucrats, as well as their responsibility for this type of crime in the legislative acts of the imperial Russia, qualified as "rent-seeking" and "extortion". It is the so-called tradition of gifts, fully formed in the society and the bureaucratic system of the Empire, in the author's opinion, that explains the wide occurrence of bribery among the office holders of the studied region.
