ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses important tendencies of Russian politics under Putin's dominance. It shows how the continuous centralization drive since the turn of the century simultaneously amassed power within the central state and within Putin's patronal system. The centralization drive was very broadly constituted, moving power from the regions to Moscow, and also from the legislative to the executive branch and from the executive branch to the person of the president. Under Putin's rule, the Russian state was strengthened and stabilized, and legal performance increased in many spheres, not least with regard to the ‘everyday justice’ – mundane cases directly involving the common citizen. The legal reforms, however, hardly challenged the political prerogatives of the ruling elites. The broad centralization instead resulted in increased regime control over legal actors and thus also over quasi-legal practices. In Russia under Putin, selective law enforcement became less of an external challenge, and more of an integrated part of the political regime.
