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This study represents the most comprehensive review of fiscal federalism in the Russian Federation, presenting a strong case for greater decentralization. Given its vast size, immense diversity - including economic, geographic, cultural, ethnic, and historical differences across regions - Russia is a prime candidate for decentralization. By succinctly surveying the literature on fiscal decentralization and clearly spelling out the main concepts, the volume sets the stage for the subsequent description of the fiscal system in Russia and its evolution through a succession of reforms guided by a desire on the part of Russian policymakers to craft a workable system of fiscal federalism. The authors not only describe the state of fiscal federalism in Russia at its key turning points, but they also provide insightful critical assessments of the reforms introduced at each stage. The book is rich with examples, which makes it an easy and exciting reading. The book's analysis of the history gives perspective to the authors' assessment of the current state of Russia's federalism. The authors make a strong case for greater decentralization in Russia based not only on the traditional economic benefits of fiscal federalism but also on the political benefits from local government competition. The richness of detail and the careful tracing of the reforms over the past nearly two decades also mean that this study will be an invaluable guide to both current observers with academic and policy interest in the recent fiscal federalism reforms as well as Russia's fiscal evolution since the early 1990s and its current fiscal challenges.

Cover -- Half Title -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- Notes on Contributors -- Introduction -- 1 Towards a Working Class Society: the Russian Class Structure in the 1990s -- 2 Social Mobility in Russian Society -- 3 Labour Markets in Semi-Market Society -- 4 Change and Continuity in Russian Work Organization -- 5 Reproduction and Classes During Economic Crises -- 6 Mental Climate in Russia -- 7 Values in Contemporary Russian Society -- 8 Restoration of Class Society in Russia? -- Bibliography -- Index.

When have you gone into an electronics store, picked up a desirable gadget, and found that it was labeled "Made in Russia"? Probably never. Russia, despite its epic intellectual achievements in music, literature, art, and pure science, is a negligible presence in world technology. Despite its current leaders' ambitions to create a knowledge economy, Russia is economically dependent on gas and oil. In Lonely Ideas, Loren Graham investigates Russia's long history of technological invention followed by failure to commercialize and implement.For three centuries, Graham shows, Russia has been adept at developing technical ideas but abysmal at benefiting from them. From the seventeenth-century arms industry through twentieth-century Nobel-awarded work in lasers, Russia has failed to sustain its technological inventiveness. Graham identifies a range of conditions that nurture technological innovation: a society that values inventiveness and practicality; an economic system that provides investment opportunities; a legal system that protects intellectual property; a political system that encourages innovation and success. Graham finds Russia lacking on all counts. He explains that Russia's failure to sustain technology, and its recurrent attempts to force modernization, reflect its political and social evolution and even its resistance to democratic principles.But Graham points to new connections between Western companies and Russian researchers, new research institutions, a national focus on nanotechnology, and the establishment of Skolkovo, "a new technology city." Today, he argues, Russia has the best chance in its history to break its pattern of technological failure.

Over the last fifteen years, Russia has become a larger part of the global economy-and in the years ahead, it will continue to grow in prominence. If you want to improve your investment endeavors in this market, you must first understand how it operates. With Out of the Red as your guide, you'll become familiar with all the opportunities this country has to offer and learn how to make the most informed investing decision within this emerging arena.

1. Introduction : why no authoritarian modernization in Russia? / Vladimir Gel'man -- 2. Fathers versus sons : generation changes and the ideational agenda of reforms in late-twentieth-century Russia / Vladimir Gel'man and Dmitry Travin -- 3. The dilemma of the perception of the strong state in Russia and the demand for modernization / Markku Kangaspuro -- 4. Framing modernization in Russian newspapers : words, not deeds / Jukka Pietilainen -- 5. Authoritarianism and institutional decay in Russia : disruption of property rights and the rule of law / Andrey Zaostrovtsev -- 6. The Russian people's front and hybrid governance dilemma / Jussi Lassila -- 7. Social network sites and political governance in Russia / Markku Lonkila -- 8. Russia's post-neoliberal development strategy and high-technology considerations / Anna Lowry -- 9. How does the government implement unpopular reforms? : evidence from education policy in Russia / Andrey Starodubtsev -- 10. Choosing between bureaucracy and the reformers : the Russian pension reform of 2001 as a compromise squared / Anna A. Dekalchuk -- 11. Labor reform in Putin's Russia : could modernization be democratic? / Ivan S. Grigoriev.

In the context of growing human rights abuses, religious freedom conditions in Russia suffered serious setbacks. The Russian government's application of its extremism law violates the rights of members of certain Muslim groups and allegedly ""non-traditional"" religious communities, particularly Jehovah's Witnesses, through raids, detentions, and imprisonment. Various laws and practices increasingly grant preferential status to the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church. The Russian Federation has a highly centralized political system, with power increasingly concentrated in the pr