The article outlines the Russian historiography of the Russian Empire, Soviet, and today’s periods dealing with the issues of the state administration in the northern area territories of Russia. The survey of the Russian Empire historiography reveals that, before 1917, the issues were viewed in the context of the general political and socio-economic trends of Russian history as well as that of the geographical study of outlying lands and the Arctic seas. They discussed mainly if it were worthwhile to involve the territories of the Extreme North in the sphere of influence of the regular Russian state. Soviet historiography concentrated mainly on the socio-economic development of the territories of the Extreme North, especially in the 1930s and in the 1970-80s. However, the matter was given consideration primarily in order to ground the focal development within the framework of the development of territorial production complexes and the Northern Sea Route. The works of the current period concretely deal with the issues of the efficiency of the state control over the current socio-economic development of the Arctic area. Besides, the new methods appearing nowadays, the active use of the frontier modernisation theory, and the introduction of the data of various disciplines into the study enables one to bring research works to a new level. By and large, the survey of the historiography makes it apparent that, at present, many important aspects of the control over the socio-economic development of the Russian northern area territories have been studied. However, lacking is a complex study of the systems and structures of the state administration in the northern area territories and the state control over their development at different times of Russian history.