№ 3 - 2002
Kuz’min A.S., Melvin N., Nechayev V.D.
Regional Political Regimes in Post-Soviet Russia: an Essay of a Typology

The authors make an attempt to outline a typology of regional political regimes that have arisen in post-Soviet Russia. Such typology is regarded as a very important instrument for the analysis of processes going on at the regional level. The authors apply for the purposes of their work the concept of polyarchy introduced by R. Dahl. They also discuss the interrelation, both conceptual and actual, of federalization and democratization and, finally propose an outline typology worked out with the use of the appropriate materials of 31 regions of Russia. With the proposed typology used as the basis, the authors retrace the political development of oblasts, krais and republics within the Russian Federation, demonstrating interdependence of this development and the type of the respective regimes.