ABSTRACT
This chapter is devoted to the state of the power vertical, i.e., the part of the system of public administration responsible for relations between the federal and regional tiers of government. It describes its form, and explains the causes of its formation and its effects in different spheres of public policy. The Belgian Constitution lists the responsibilities of subnational units, while the federal government controls all other spheres of public administration. The Russian Constitution assigns "general issues" of education to the sphere of shared competences of federal and regional governments. From the financial perspective, education is also the biggest area of social expenditure in Russia. The decentralization revealed the fact that many regional authorities did not have well-qualified specialists to administrate tenders in accordance with Russian legislation. The centralized system of curriculum creation complements a decentralized model of the management of educational institutions.
