ABSTRACT
Among the various factors contributing to the post-communist transformation in Russia—which includes institution building, democratization, the evolution of public opinion, the formation of civil society, economic reform, and the interrelationship between the center and the periphery—the institution of political leadership plays a particularly significant role. Political leadership, in fact, is the core of the political regime that is a form of interaction between the leader, on the one hand, and the elites and society at large, on the other. 1
