Soviet law originally expanded the bounds of jus sanguinis and citizenship by residence more than was common among European countries, before tending to gradually retract from that over time.

After the Russian Revolution, between 1917 and 1923, citizenship questions were subject to the control of various bodies in the "numerous independent and semi-independent republics and regions.

[1] This practice continued through Stalin's 1938 "On USSR Citizenship" law, in order to broaden the number of Soviet citizens.

[1] Marriage to a USSR citizen did not automatically confer citizenship,[3] which was seen as a break from European bourgeois customs.

Details of naturalization in the 1931 law were deliberately kept vague, so as to provide full power to administrative authorities to decide upon who might be admitted to citizenship.

[7] There were no official requirements for residency; knowledge of language, history, constitution, or political system; minimum income; or the like.

[7] In the period leading up to the 1938 law, the Soviet political system made strong use of deprivation of citizenship and reinstatement as instrument of discipline and sanction.

[5] In March 1948, the USSR laid out procedures for Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian nationals living in Latin America to acquire Soviet citizenship.

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the following citizenship laws came into effect in the following post-Soviet states: