Petchory of the Pskov Region has a special geographical location. First of all, it is situated on the border of two countries - Estonia and Latvia. This territory was a part of these neighboring countries in the 1920s and 1930s.

Secondly, the most western point of the Russian Federation (excepting Kaliningrad Region, which is separated from the main territory of Russia) is in Petchory.

Thirdly, one of the most famous cloisters in Russia, the Pskovo-Petchersky monastery, is located in Petchory area. The fate of this monastery has always been determined by its location on the border. The above reasons explain why the Pechory area is often considered to be a western outpost of Russian orthodox belief, while creating a special social-psychological atmosphere around the border problem.

Political and administrative border division is conducted according to the time of its formation and existence, as well as the degree of penetration. These characteristics determine contact and barrier functions and select filtration. State borders are more complex, than administrative borders.

Nowadays, the former "transparent" political and administrative border between the republics of the USSR is turning into the barrier which is very difficult to trespass. It is turning into something resembling an "iron curtain" of the former USSR. Creation of the five-kilometer zone on the Russian side resulted in the creation of another barrier for the local population (now it limits its freedom of movement, because it is necessary to make a special permit, which is given by the border-guards to enter and leave this border zone).

Such "barrier" character of the border can negatively influence the perspective of the Petchory development as well as the development of the Pskov Region and Southeastern provinces of Estonia, too. Thus we shall talk about the psychological, ethnological, ethnic-cultural and economical components of the border barrier.

A research was conducted by the Geographical department of Pskov Teachers" Training Institute in the Petchory area just before the disintegration of the USSR. It included interviewing around 150 local citizens about the direction and frequency of their everyday and holiday trips. As a result of this interrogation, a "psychological remoteness" of Estonian and Latvian settlements was evaluated in respect to Petchory and Pskov as centers, serving the Russian population.

Already at that time psychological remoteness of the nearest Latvian and especially Estonian settlements depended on the frequency of traveling to the neighboring republics. The more often a local person visits Estonia or Latvia the "closer" it becomes to him or her. Those, who never visit neighboring republics or go there very rarely, imagine them further then the internal regional centers, regardless of the real distances.

This is the reason why the border does not correctly represent the idea of space and the special "psychological barrier" appears. The results of this research testify for the "removal" of any governmental formation from people's minds in case of no connection between them.

Significant restrictions in personal contacts between inhabitants of Russia and Estonia due to expensive visas ("gold curtain") and bureaucratic obstacles in obtaining them lead to the creation of the ethnic-sociological barrier between the countries. The presence of such barrier enables the mass media to create stereotypical ideas about the neighboring nations. It implies the formation of an image of an "enemy" or a "friend", depending on the interests of the ruling political circles. It is virtually impossible in such situation to check the truth by means of personal acquaintances with people of different nations.

The role of mass media in the creation of the ethnic stereotypes during the era of the USSR and even after it, reflects itself in the results of the psychological interrogations among students and pupils of Petchory and Pskov Region. In total, more than 200 people were interviewed (about 40 people for each interview) during the years 1990-1992, 1996 and 1998.

It was suggested to evaluate the preference of the 14 republics of the USSR (later - Baltic countries and former republics) and six regions of Russia (North, Center, South of Eastern part, Urals, Siberia and Far East) one after another (from the most attractive regions to live in to the least attractive ones). This method of research by regional preference was created by G.D.Kostinsky (Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Science, Moscow) and represents a transformed version of the method, created by Peter Gould.

The results of the interviews of the Pskov's students in 1990 show a rather low preference of Estonia (10^th place among the local inhabitants of Pskov and 9^th place among people from other areas of the Pskov Region). By 1992 further decrease in preference of Estonia occurred. It was on the 11^th rank among all groups of the interviewed people. But by 1996, when the social-psychological stress, connected with the disintegration of the USSR, was reduced, Estonia jumped to the 5^th place (among pupils - even to the third one) and two Russian regions - Far East and Siberia were driven back. From 1996 to 1998 the preference of Estonia remained the same.

The change in the attitude of the Pskov's young people from aggressive to more positive towards the Estonians can be illustrated by the associations that the respondents were supposed to match with the territories of preference. Among such associations, related to Estonia, negative emotional-psychological characteristics in different verbal expressions were more often encountered in 1990-1992, than in 1996-1998. Positive associations, such as: "clean", "beautiful" and neutral ones ("sea", "Baltic", "old towns", "Tallinn", "Tartu" etc.) prevailed in 1996-1998. By the way, the negative associations of some people were often connected with the low appraisal of Estonian attraction. Among some new neutral associations in 1998 there were: "neighbors", "border", "custom", "Estonian kroon" - it can also be mentioned.

The border became a hard ethnic-cultural barrier during the years of its existence. The presence of such a barrier is vital for such people as Setus. Ethnologically they are considered to be a subgroup of the Estonian people. Now they form a small part of the population in the Petchory area of the Pskov Region and also in the southeastern provinces of Estonia.

In the 15-16 centuries setus adopted orthodox religion and since 1920 have lived at Russian Land (territory of Pskov Land, further - Pskov Province). At the edge of the 19-20 centuries Setus has been a special economical mediator with Baltic Lands. One can also talk about the formation of the specific Russian-Estonian ethnic contact zone on the territory of the Petchory area.

In 1920 the whole territory of Petchory was a part of the Estonian Republic. And in 1944 the territory inhabited by the Setus was broken into two parts: western part was in Estonia and eastern part became a part of the Pskov Region of Russia. The Setus problem did not have a political meaning, while the border between the union republics of the USSR was an administrative one. However, the border of a "barrier" nature immediately destroyed traditional ethnic-cultural border contacts and the Setus lost their perspectives of development in the Petchory area of the Pskov Region, that is on the Russian side.

The most important contacts between Estonia and the Pskov Region are economical contacts, which are carried out through Petchory's part of the border. Turning the border into an economical barrier will go in perspective with the transformation of the border territories into backward border areas of these countries, so-called "bear corners". Thus, for example, the existence of the border of a "barrier" nature in the 1920s and 1930s suppressed an economical development of the Pskov Region and resulted in the massive departure of population from this area two decades later. Such results should be kept in mind not only by inhabitants of Pskov Region, but also by southeastern Estonians and first of all by the population of Tartu.

Totally different perspectives of development are possible in case of the creation of borders with contact functions. One can observe it happening now in Western Europe, with its dynamic development of the regions at the border with European Union countries and also in transboundering areas at the border with the EU countries. This situation solves different ethnic-social and ethnic-cultural problems, which have a great influence on the relations between the neighboring countries, as well as economic questions.