One of President Vladimir Putin’s major achievements in the 2000s was considered to be his dismantling of Russia’s regional clans, which had controlled whole swaths of the country. Many thought that compromising Russia’s federalism was an acceptable price to pay for such a victory. However, fast forward two decades, and Russia’s regional clans are again on the rise—this time as a result of Putin’s ultraconservative approach to staffing and his reluctance to replace top officials in Moscow.
In some regions, clans are forming around Kremlin-appointed governors who have served for several terms, and who have effectively merged with local elites. In others, while governors have been rotated, they are all from the same elite group.
In the mid-2000s, governors chosen by the Kremlin began to replace elected regional heads following the abolition of gubernatorial elections. Unlike their predecessors, these Moscow-appointed governors were regularly rotated, with the Kremlin keen to avoid giving them the chance to put down roots. Usually, this meant that control of regions was passed between powerful federal clans.
On the one hand, this allowed the Kremlin to limit the power of its appointees, who were outsiders among local businessmen and politicians, and often had to turn to Moscow for help. On the other hand, it blocked local elites from accessing the levers of power. Moscow was able to divide and rule, and stave off bids for local autonomy.
Now we are seeing the reversal of this process. Technocrats who accepted jobs in the regions in the hope that they would be stepping stones to national government have been bitterly disappointed: no one is finding them plum jobs, and Putin has almost completely stopped carrying out top-level reshuffles. Prior to the mini-reshuffle following Putin’s inauguration for a fifth presidential term in May there was still some hope, but only four governors ended up being elevated to ministerial positions.
The number of those seeking such jobs was far larger. The governor of the Nizhny Novgorod region and a former deputy minister, Gleb Nikitin, was not moved back to Moscow, for example. Another two former deputy ministers were also left in place—Alexander Tsybulsky in the Arkhangelsk region and Stanislav Voskresensky in the Ivanovo region. Former deputy energy minister Alexei Teksler, the governor of the Chelyabinsk region, also failed to land a promotion.
Several other ambitious Kremlin-appointed governors previously parachuted into regions were also overlooked. They include the head of the Stavropol region Vladimir Vladimirov, and the head of the Sverdlovsk region Yevgeny Kuyvashev.
As a result of Russia’s increasingly sclerotic system, some Kremlin-appointed governors are becoming resigned to their positions. After all, a governorship is better than nothing. Having realized a promotion is unlikely, they are settling in for the long haul and putting down roots. At the same time, their teams are gradually being incorporated into the local elite.
This trend has been accelerated by the Kremlin’s decision to scrap governor term limits in 2021, including for Russia’s two largest cities, Moscow and St. Petersburg. Sergei Sobyanin has now been mayor of the Russian capital for almost fourteen years, managing to preserve its status as a state within a state. Meanwhile, St. Petersburg governor Alexander Beglov, who was appointed in 2018, has prevailed in a standoff with the city’s wayward elites, crushing the last outposts of resistance.
Putin’s mini-reshuffle in May revealed yet another trend: even if governors are rotated, regions often remain under the control of the same influential clan—or even former governors.
In the Kaliningrad region, for example, governor Anton Alikhanov, who is closely tied to the group formed around state-owned defense conglomerate Rostec, was replaced by Alexei Besprozvannykh, a former deputy minister of trade and industry from the same clan. The governor of the Kursk region, Roman Starovoit—considered to be close to the powerful Rotenberg brothers—was succeeded by his deputy Alexei Smirnov, from the same group. Both Sergei Tsivilev in the Kemerovo region and Alexei Dyumin in the Tula region were replaced by their deputies when they got Moscow jobs.
Furthermore, we’re seeing some elite groups establish spheres of influence that extend across multiple regions. Several governors in the Urals are close allies of Sobyanin, having worked with him when he was governor of the Tyumen region between 2001 and 2005. Until May, those governors were formally overseen by another Sobyanin ally—Vladimir Yakushev—in his role as presidential envoy to the Ural Federal District. Sobyanin’s domain is only growing: his ally Ruslan Kukharuk runs the oil-rich Khanty-Mansi autonomous district, and after leaving his presidential envoy role, Yakushev was made secretary of the general council of the ruling United Russia party.
It’s clear that even if the Kremlin wanted to return to its divide-and-rule policies, that would be difficult. In the 2000s, Moscow was able to punish regional heavyweights by moving them to junior posts, but it can’t do that with technocrats. Not only is there nothing to punish them for, but they often have friends in high places who will intercede on their behalf.
The resulting compromise is that officials are being kept in governorships for lengthy periods of time. While governors are seeing their hopes of a top job in Moscow dashed, the Kremlin has to reconcile itself to the emergence of a new group of feudal lords in the Russian regions.
Another restricting factor is that there are few suitable candidates to appoint to governorships. Being made a governor is now seen as an honorable exile, rather than a career trampoline. Deputy ministers and even departmental heads in government ministries do everything they can to avoid such jobs. In any case, being sent to work outside Moscow is only possible with a green light from the clan in control of that particular region.
By leaving governors in place, the Kremlin risks growing decentralization. Moscow-appointed governors no longer need the Kremlin’s protection from rapacious local elites because they have grown to be a part of those elites. And at a federal level, those governors can be protected by their powerful clans. If Russia experiences a period of political unrest, the voice of these regional leaders will sound louder and louder. And having a power base in the regions could be a decisive factor for political clans battling it out in Moscow.
The emergence of regional fiefdoms indicates one possible iteration of a post-Putin Russia. It looks a lot like the Russia that Putin inherited when he came to power.
