The formation and subsequent development of the Baikal rift, which is located on the verge of such large-scale regional structures as the Siberian platform and the Baikal orogen, is obviously related to the evolution of these structures, which are some of the largest on earth. While the Siberian platform is a relatively stable province since its initial development, the Baikal orogen has undergone several active tectonic alterations. One can assume that events taking place in the structures influenced each other to some extent. The modern Baikal rift system and, to a wider extent, the Baikal rift itself were determined in their formation and location by the adjustment movements that resumed in the Cenozoic, according to a displacement system of biggest ruptural dislocations settled in the Archaean. This article contains an original hypothesis of etiology of the Baikal orogen, which is believed to have formed as a result of the creation of a continental system, still being formed cyclically in recent times.