Federalism and Local Politics in Russia

Balance in local government reform 265the powers of institutions. The second was Law 95 of 2003, which dealt withExecutive and representative arrangements in subjects of the federation(regions), and which included for the first time a closed list of regionalcompetences. 8 On the basis of these laws all the sectoral legislation thatcovered the shared competences set out in articles 72 of the Constitutionwere altered.The reform of local government thus needs to be seen in the context of thewider reform, in which its role was, initially, to be a means of achieving awider reform of federal–regional relations, not an end in itself. The reform oflocal government was not even on the agenda of the Kozak Commission atits inception in 2001. At that stage the emphasis was on altering sectorallegislation, and the idea of revising the law on local self-government of 1995only came to the fore During 2002, once it became clear that a closed list ofregional powers was not possible without also clarifying local government’spowers. It was not anticipated then that Law 131 would become the mostvisible and most widely debated of the changes initiated by the Commission(with the exception of Law 122 on the monetization of benefits, althoughhere the Commission played a secondary role in a government-ledreform).At the same time it would be misleading to link Law 131 with all federalpolicy initiatives regarding local government, as if there were some elaborateconspiracy to centralize power away from local government. Differentgroups within the federal centre have entirely different agendas regardinglocal government. Broadly these may be divided into those who wish to seean unbroken vertical hierarchy running from the presidency to the subregionallevel, and those who saw local self-government as a basis for thedevelopment of a democratic state.The Commission’s ApproachThe Commission was convened to provide a rational solution to the broaderproblems of Russian federalism as it had developed, including:1 Overlapping jurisdictions and responsibilities, originating in Article 72 ofthe Constitution.2 Unfinanced mandates created both by ill-informed or vague federal legislation,and by unclear responsibilities at each level of government.3 Distribution of finance, and sources of finance, unconnected with functionsand responsibilities at each level of government.4 Excessive inequality between subjects of the federation (real and perceived),and unsustainable anomalies (such as subjects being located onthe territory of other subjects).5 Lack of checks and balances at the level of the subjects of the federation– local authorities over-dependent on subjects financially, and federalagencies numerous but (allegedly) operationally weak.