[Academician V.E. Sokolov is the head of the General Biology Department].

This paper considers the activity of Academician V.E. Sokolov as head of the General Biology Department of the Russian Academy of Sciences, which he headed from 1985 to 1998. The history of the struggle for the preservation of biological science, carried out by Sokolov and the Department headed by him over more than ten years, is shown based on archival and little-known published materials. Examples are given of the activity of the General Biology Department that had great scientific, public, and nature-conservation significance.