The purpose of this article is to identify political factors in the institutionalization of the civil service in Russia at the present stage, the problems associated with them and the prospects for overcoming them. The study demonstrates the applicability of institutional theories of public service; the author proposes a model of institutionalization of the civil service (which is examined in the light of recent reform experience in an appendix) and attempts to identify the roots of existing problems, in the end proposing options for their rectifi cation.
This study bears out the assertion that modern dysfunctions of the civil service have been largely determined by a non-optimal institutional choice made in the early 1990s. The design of civil service reforms is carried out by a narrow circle of the politico-bureaucratic elite, which contributes to the long-term preservation of the institutionalization of the civil service in an unfi nished stage. The more time that passes after the beginning of political transition in Russia, the more the dependence on the previous stage of development increases and the incomplete reform of the bureaucracy leads to increasing political and socioeconomic costs. The political factors for a successful continuation of the institutionalization of the civil service are its integration into the strategic course of the country’s president; provision of support for reform among the civil servants themselves; and the implementation of a one-stage reform permitting the attainment of the goal within a single presidential cycle.