William Partlett
Russia’s failure to become a democracy after the collapse of the Soviet Union is not an inevitable product of its history. On the contrary, it has been shaped by the adoption of a constitutional system of centralised power in the office of the president. Long term democratic reform will require more than just Putin leaving the office of the presidency. Avoiding a system of ‘Putinism without Putin’ will also require a new Russian constitutional foundation that breaks with centralisation and reshapes the later structural chapters of the constitution to balance power between institutions.
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Dmitry Dubrovskiy
The growing mistrust towards the West in Russia since the early 2000s, as well as general disillusionment with the results of political transition and economic reforms, along with the aggressive anti-human rights propaganda of the Russian regime for a long time, has led to a perception of human rights as a "Western theory" that does not fit the Russian people. This context made it easy in the 2010s to weaponize human rights in the Kremlin’s foreign policy rhetoric and subsequent direct aggression; the rhetoric of "protecting human rights" became the justification for both the annexation of Crimea and the initiation of full-scale aggression against Ukraine.
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Nikolai Bobrinsky
Three decades after the adoption of the Russian Constitution, we must admit that it has not become an effective safeguard against the usurpation of power and state terror. The conditions under which the Russian Constitution could have served as a secure barrier to the revival of authoritarianism and state terror is a profound question warranting a separate discussion. I suggest that we should look a few steps ahead and imagine an optimistic scenario of a new attempt to establish democracy and rule of law in Russia – regardless of how improbable such a scenario may seem at present. One of the priorities of such an attempt will be to overcome impunity for the perpetrators of crimes of the Putin regime.
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Bill Bowring
The question should perhaps be “what went right?”. I argue that for more than 30 years, as a result of a key provision in the Constitution, and the work of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation (CCRF) there were many positive changes to Russian law and practice. These advances were only possible as a result of Russia’s membership of the Council of Europe and ratification of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). But that chapter in Russia’s constitutional history has been closed.
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Olga Podoplelova
In the early 1990s, the Constitutional Court of Russia (RCC) was viewed as an important institution for protecting human rights and facilitating the democratic transition. However, the good intentions of the constitutional drafters were insufficient to overcome the country’s totalitarian legacy and practices. An examination of the RCC’s evolution over three decades reveals two significant trends: Firstly, the RCC transformed into a machine for legitimizing laws designed to dismantle political competition, civil society, and civil liberties. Secondly, this dynamic did not prevent the RCC from losing its independence and political weight after the constitutional amendments of 2020. In this blog post, I will provide a brief overview of the RCC’s most controversial decisions over the past 30 years, along with the measures taken to destroy independent constitutional review in Russia.
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Marianna Muravyeva
Since the beginning of Russia’ aggression against Ukraine, the government’s rhetoric has become more conservative and nationalistic. In 2022-2023, Russia witnessed the introduction of a slew of oppressive legislation directly violating human rights. Against the backdrop of Putin’s focus on the fight against the ‘enemies’ and Russia’s isolation due to ‘fighting for the right cause’ women once again became the target of regulation with a steady and consistent assault on their human rights, particularly reproductive rights. Moreover, as women actively participate in anti-war protests, the authorities have been treating women more harshly during arrest, trial and sentencing as various reports show. Nevertheless, women continue to fight for their rights and freedoms in courts and on the streets, hoping for change.
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Caroline von Gall
The case of Valery Zorkin, chairman of the Russian Constitutional Court, shows how elites prioritize their own survival and therefore do not oppose a repressive and aggressive regime, most likely because they fear revenge from liberal peers and victims of the system. And since the war against Ukraine, elites have another reason to stay loyal. For those who fear being held responsible for a war of aggression and war crimes, Putin is the only “guarantor of stability.”
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Vladimir Gel’man
The negative effects of the 1993 conflict prevailed over the benefits from the end of a confrontation. Its outcomes raised a major barrier to the democratization of Russia and paved the way for the use of violence as a means of preserving power. This conflict contributed to the maximization of presidential power and to the weakening of checks and balances in the constitution, which included significant authoritarian potential. The political order established in Russia after the 1993 conflict largely determined the subsequent trajectory of Russian political evolution and its drift towards a personalist authoritarian regime.
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