ABSTRACT
The Russian Federation was formed after the dissolution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) in 1991. The new state had to undergo a difficult transition, where the political, economic and governance systems had to be reformed simultaneously. The Russian Federation, or Russia, is a multi-national state, and the complex ethno-territorial legacies of the former USSR continue to influence federal dynamics to this day. Including the two territories on the Crimean peninsula, which are internationally recognized as comprising Ukrainian territory, but which were annexed by Russia inMarch 2014, the Russian Federation de facto comprises 85 ‘federal subjects’ (territories): 22 republics, nine krais (provinces), 46 oblasts (regions), one autonomous oblast and four autonomous okrugs (districts), as well as three cities of federal status. The republics, autonomous oblast and the autonomous okrugs (AOs) are ethnically defined regions, although in practice the share of the titular nationality living in a given region varies widely. The oblasts and krais are ethnically predominantly Russian. As occurs in any large federation, the Russian authorities have had to contend with
the dilemmas of federalism: how to provide effective governance without too much internal differentiation, while still maintaining the positive aspects of devolved governance, such as the ability to accommodate very divergent local constituencies. In the 1990s Russia had a weak centre and an increasingly fragmented federation, whereas the federal reforms implemented under Vladimir Putin (President in 2000-08 and from 2012) resulted in the bringing about of a de facto unitary state. The dynamics of Russian federalism have also been influenced by electoral reforms and the development of a party system. In the 2000s the emerging ‘party of power’, known by the middle of the decade as Yedinaya Rossiya (YeR-United Russia), gained an increasingly hegemonic position in the State Duma (the lower chamber of the federal legislature) and the regional legislatures; this remained largely the case in the mid2010s, following various reforms to electoral legislation and the conditions required for political parties to be permitted to register to participate in elections. The ebbs and flows of federalism have also been reflected in the sub-national political institutions: the introduction of a system of gubernatorial elections from 1996 onwards to all territories confirmed the ‘regionalization’ of political power in Russia, whereas the gradual centralization of the political regime was reinforced after the abolition of these elections in 2004. The reinstatement of a system of gubernatorial elections in 2012 had not, following the first three annual rounds of such polls, led to major changes in the political status quo at the regional level by late 2014, and indeed the position of those loyal to or supported by the federal authorities had generally been strengthened.
