Nevertheless, the educational reforms can be considered an example of successful gradual and consistent implementation of new institutional arrangements. Initially, these initiatives were implemented as experiments concerning the approbation of new mechanisms in some regions. It was impossible to introduce the Unified State Exam in all Russian regions simultaneously due to both organizational and institutional constraints (lack of experience, high level of uncertainty of outcomes, and high cost of potential failure of the reform) and political ones (most politicians, professionals, and ordinary citizens did not accept the idea of an educational reform). The decision on the Unified State Exam was de facto adopted and implemented by the Ministry of Education. The legislative formalization of the Unified State Exam happened only in 2009, when the State Duma was under the full control of the presidential administration. At the same time, the same strategy contributed to the failure to implement the GIFO system, which could demonstrate reliable results only nationwide and not on the level of individual regions.53
To summarize, the institutional changes in educational policy demonstrate the limits of presidential influence on implementing reforms. Even modest presidential support helps the adoption of major decisions and their implementation despite the resistance of various interest groups, especially if the reformers can preserve at least part of their proposals without major concessions to interest groups. But the performance of the mid-range and street-level bureaucracy54 can reduce the efficiency of implementing top-down ideas.
Administrative Reform: from Bad to Worse
The administrative reform was aimed at solving the problem of inefficiency of public administration, which hindered the country’s social and economic development. By the end of the 1990s, a paradox of poor quality of governance was widely observed in Russia: formally, the government had many regulatory powers, but its performance was inefficient.55 The influence of big business on the adoption and implementation of many important policy decisions led to state capture.56 At the same time, entrenched state officials formed their clienteles, which included representatives of different businesses and other interest groups.57 The functions of ministries and state agencies often duplicated one another. The formation of Russian “bargaining federalism” in the 1990s generated politically motivated division of powers between federal and regional authorities.58 The decline of state capacity and state autonomy raised doubts about the federal government’s ability not only to implement any reforms but also to conduct routine daily governance.
Formally, the administrative reform was launched in 200359 and officially continues even now. However, the most significant policy measures—(1) the revision of the functions of government agencies; (2) the revision of the so-called redundant functions of the government; (3) the redistribution of other functions between federal and subnational government agencies; and (4) major structural changes to the federal government—were implemented in 2003–2004.60 After that, the reform was focused on the technologies of improving government services provision, advancement of digitalization, and so forth, but no longer involved politically relevant changes.
In fact, the reform failed to contribute to improving public administration in Russia.61 The redistribution of powers between layers of government led to a recentralization of governance that more resembled a unitary state.62 The transformation of the federal government into three types of organizational entities (ministries, federal agencies, and federal services) and the revision of their powers did not contribute to transparent and efficient governance but rather complicated the interactions between the governmental agencies that were responsible for the same policy areas.63 The only meaningful outcome achieved by these policy changes was a significant increase in the officials’ salaries and quantity of civil servants, while the quality of personnel and the motivation of officials, which had been heavily criticized,64 did not change in practice. Major elements of the reform, such as accountability of public servants, transparency of state agencies and bureaucratic procedures, merit-based recruitment and promotion of state officials, and the like, remain merely on paper. Thus, despite several technological innovations in the everyday practices of interactions between bureaucrats, business people and ordinary citizens, the quality of public services has not much improved. Moreover, in many instances it has become even worse. But why were the results of administrative reform so poor?
One might argue that the administrative reform was on the periphery of presidential attention. Initially, the development of this reform was one of the key items for the Center for Strategic Research.65 Later, this reform became a priority for the government and the presidential administration. In his annual address to the parliament, Putin paid specific attention to it. In 2003, admitting significant problems in achieving the policy goals, he even promised to provide “needed political impetus” for more active policy in this area.66 However, Putin did not take the most important step: he did not provide any organizational support for the planned reform. All basic policy measures in this area were coordinated by the governmental Commission for Administrative Reform, which was headed by one of the deputy prime ministers ex officio and worked on an ad hoc basis. Thus, the impact of this coordination center on policy changes was relatively low. In addition, this commission did not possess enough powers to implement reforms; its role was limited to policy proposals. Its scope was restricted to proposing changes in the structure of the government and in the functions of different kinds of governmental agencies. The reform of public service, changes in its personnel, and the revision of other major regulations were delegated to the Commission for Reforming Public Service, headed by Dmitry Medvedev (at that time, the first deputy head of the Presidential Administration). The members of that commission took a conservative approach to reforming public service in Russia.67 As a result, the policy reform was organizationally divided and full of internal contradictions. All attempts to strengthen the influence of the Commission for Administrative Reform or establish a new strong organization in charge of this reform have failed. For example, in 2004, the Ministry of Finance blocked the adoption of a federal program that could have provided financial resources to implement the administrative reform. At the same time, the proposal to establish an agency in charge of implementation of the reform and allocation of funds was rejected. The implementation of the Conception of the Administrative Reform in 2006–2008 was delegated to the heads of the governmental agencies: in other words, Russian public service had to be reformed by the officials themselves although they were not interested in challenging the status quo and did not have any incentives to implement the reform program. It is no wonder that the administrative reform greatly contributed to the major rise in quantity of state officials: according to the official data of the Russian State Statistical Committee, while in 2001 their numbers counted to 1,140,600 persons, by 2009 these numbers increased up to 1,674,800 persons (mostly due to reorganizing state agencies and a major increase in the scope of their regulatory functions).68 In addition, the failure of administrative reform sent a strong signal to Russian elites and society at large that despite the loud rhetoric, the top leadership in Russia was not interested in improving the quality of governance.69