From Fragmentation to Balance: The Shifting Model of Federalism in Post-Soviet Russia

• Author: Alexander N. Domrin
• Position: Former Chief Specialist of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Russian Supreme Soviet, Moscow
• Pages: 516-552

Page 516

I Summary

The Russian Federation is currently undergoing major legal reforms. Overall, it is clear that despite the constitutional provisions and all official statements to the contrary, Russia has unsettled relations with federalism. Federalism in Russia is hardly a "destiny," it is more a "marriage of convenience." Adoption of the 1993 Federal Constitution was not a culmination of Russian history or of Russia's constitutional development. Rather, it was just the beginning of Russia's experiment with "federalism." The ultimate outcome of this experiment cannot yet be predicted.

Even though complete abandonment of federalism in Russia is very unlikely in the foreseeable future, one may argue that the current expansion of Russia's federal government activity in virtually all spheres of life can be considered a sign of a shift in the model of federalism Russian follows. Specifically, it signifies Russia's transition from "fragmented" federalism based on treaties between the federal center and subjects of the Federation, implying a relationship more reminiscent of political equals, to "balanced" federalism that is based on the Federal Constitution and strict compliance with it by the federal units. In essence, it is a transition from the current "asymmetric" federation to a more structured union, with presumably one type of subject of the Federation rather than six different types.

II Introduction

1. Russia's Current Status as a Federal System.

The December 1993 Constitution defines Russia (or the "Russian Federation") as a "federal" state¹ composed of eighty-nine federal units, or component units, described in the Constitution as "subjects" of the Page 517 Federation.² Most of the subjects (fifty-seven of them) are named after a territory in which they are located, while the remaining thirty-two federal units are named after a titular ethnic group historically living in that area. Federal units of Russia do not offer their own "citizenship," and-unlike the republics of the USSR-do not have a right of secession.³

Unlike in the United States and some other federations of the world whose states, provinces, or lands enjoy equal political status, subjects of the Russian Federation have varying statuses. Even though the Constitution proclaims that federal units have equal rights and responsibilities and "enjoy full state power outside the limits of jurisdiction" of the Federation or the spheres of "joint competence,"⁴ in practical terms, some subjects enjoy "full state power" more than others.

In this respect, it is fair to say that some component units of the Russian Federation (always those with a relatively significant percentage of ethnic minorities in their population) are more "equal" than others.

The Constitution divides all subjects of the Russian Federation into six groups: 1) republics, 2)-3) national-territorial units: autonomous regions and autonomous areas, and 4)-6) administrative-territorial units: regions, territories, and two federal cities (Moscow and St. Petersburg).⁵

Such division makes Russia an "asymmetric" federation.⁶ For instance, autonomous areas share formal equality (in their rights and responsibilities) with larger territories or regions. In reality, such equality is problematic because autonomous areas are usually constituent parts of these larger territories and regions.⁷

Federal units of Russia vary widely in terms of their size and population. The territory of the largest subject of the Russian Federation, Yakutia, which covers 3,103,200 square kilometers (approximately the size of India and twice as large as Indonesia),⁸ is 408 times larger than the smallest subject of the Federation, Adygeya, which comprises a Page 518 territory of 7800 square kilometers.⁹ Even though, overall, there is an average population of 1.9 million people per "subject" of Russia, Moscow (with its official population of 8.54 million citizens) ¹⁰ is, in terms of population, 474 times larger than the least inhabited region, Evenkia, which has a population of only 17,700 people.¹¹ "Only the Roman Empire can vie with the Soviet Union in the number of ethnic entities within its border and their cultural and linguistic diversity." ¹² Since the disintegration of the USSR in December 1991, Russia remains the most multinational and multiethnic country among all other former Soviet republics, with over 100 nationalities and ethnic groups, and representatives of all the main world religions living in its territory.

There is no consensus among Russian scholars as to the future of Russia as a federal state. The existence and remarkable economic development of China as a unitary state negates any argument that large countries like Russia must necessarily have a federal structure. Further, it is hard to agree with authors who proclaim that historically Russia has tended toward federalism. Neither the Russian Empire nor the USSR were true federations. ¹³ Unlike many other federations of the world, Russia historically was not formed as a product of treaties between various regions of a political union, but rather grew by acquiring, either forcefully or voluntarily, neighboring lands. For more than one thousand years of its history Russia was a strong unitary state, flexible enough to afford autonomy to some territories, yet it was not a federation.

Even though Russia is a multiethnic country, ethnic minorities constitute no more than 15 percent of Russia's population, as is the case in France. Even among ethnic "republics" named after a titular nation (like Yakutia, which is named after "Yakuts," Udmurtia-named after "Udmurts," Buryatia-named after "Buryats," etc.), one can hardly find many subjects where the titular group constitutes a majority. ¹⁴ By Page 519comparison, the Russian-speaking "minority" in Latvia, now one of the independent Baltic nations, constitutes about 40 percent of its population and more than the half of the population of Riga, Latvia's capital, ¹⁵ yet this Baltic state is not a federation. Voting patterns in Western and Eastern provinces of Ukraine, one of the largest states of Eastern and Central Europe, traditionally lead to absolutely different, irreconcilable results, as if people in those parts of Ukraine live in different countries. Yet, the whole issue of turning unitary Ukraine into a federation is viewed by its Western-leaning political elite as undermining the Ukrainian nationhood. In 1992, immediately after getting independence of the USSR, the government of Georgia preferred to send troops to three of its ethnically non-Georgian provinces Abkhazia, Adjaria, and South Ossetia rather than consider their demand for federalization of the country. ¹⁶ These countries demonstrate that multiethnic societies do not automatically equal federalist political structures.

In economic terms, only fourteen to sixteen subjects of the Federation¹⁷ have proved to be fully sustainable, and these subjects play the role of "donors" in the Russian federal budget. Budgets of all other units are formed (sometimes up to 93.3 percent, like in Ingushetia) by subsidies and donations from the federal center. ¹⁸ Survival of such subjects, often artificial quasi-federal formations, depends not on truly federative, but rather paternalistic decisions of Russia's federal center.

B The Existence of Federalism in Russia's Past?

As a country that covered one-sixth of the earth's land surface and was inhabited by more than 200 ethnic groups who spoke more than 150 Page 520 languages or dialects, pre-revolutionary Russia had a loose centralized governmental structure. ¹⁹ This structure relied heavily on local legal orders and traditions, with canon law playing a strong role in matters of daily and family life.²⁰ However, the Russian Empire technically was not a federation, but rather a unitary state with a number of autonomous regions that enjoyed special legal and political statuses (similar to Finland, Poland, or Ukraine).²¹

Many of the current Russian ethnic, national, and federative problems were not inherited from the imperial past, but are rather a legacy of the USSR period. For the very first time in its history, the country was defined as a "federation" in the Declaration of the Rights of the Toiling and Exploited People (adopted by the Fifth Soviet Congress on July 10, 1918) ²² and the first Constitution of Soviet Russia of July 1918.²³ While federalism was a politically useful theory in the days of the Bolsheviks' accession to power, in October 1917, and at the creation of the USSR, in December 1922, as a "means against disorder and . . . amalgamation of the odd territories,"²⁴ the Soviet "federal" structure, and the related right of nations to self-determination, proved to be a ticking time bomb.

Officially proclaimed as a multinational...