The article presents a historiographical analysis of the development of nomadic state and imperial traditions and institutions of the Golden Horde. The evolution and transformation of the historical views of European and Russian researchers within the framework of formational and civilizational approaches is very similar, because it has gone from an opinion about the static nature of nomadic society to the creation of theories about a special development path and the exclusive influence of neighboring settled agricultural peoples.Considering various approaches and trends in studying the nature of the Golden Horde state and imperial institutions, the researcher comes to the conclusion that most of the historical research comes from a complex and structurally differentiated political organization and the continuity of its management traditions in the system of power and rule of the nomad Khanates and the Muscovite state. The development of modern scientific knowledge has shown that progress is impossible without taking into account scientific methodology and the goal of historical science is to debunk all kinds of myths in the scientific community in order to create a critical, organic history.