Draft: August 2005
Russian Civil Service and Its Reform in Comparative Perspective
Alexei Barabashev
Dean, School of Public Administration and Urban Management
Higher School of Economics,
Moscow, Russian Federation
and
Jeffrey D. Straussman
Associate Dean and Chair
Department of Public Administration
Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs
Syracuse University
Abstract
Diffusion is a concept that has received considerable attention in a number of social
science disciplines including political science, economics and sociology. While the concept has
received less attention among public management scholars, there has been some speculation
about the sources of diffusion of public management concepts and practices across countries.
Most of the speculation has focused on Westminster parliamentary countries democracies and
other mature democracies. To the extent that diffusion and its cousin, policy transfer, has been
part of discourse about administrative reforms, it has generally been couched in the language of
the New Public Management. Less scholarly work on the diffusion of public management
concepts and practices has been written about countries in transition. In this paper we explore
the sources of diffusion of norms, institutions and practices to Russia by focusing on the
evolution of civil service reform from 1991 to the present. By doing so we hope not only to
describe the sources of diffusion but, in addition, draw some conclusions about the relative
importance of external factors versus sources of diffusion that are “home grown.”
(Prepared for 8th Public Management Research Conference, School of Policy,
Planning, and Development, University of Southern California, Los Angeles,
September 29 to October 1, 2005)
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Administrative reform has been a key feature of countries in transition since 1989 in Central
and Eastern Europe, and since 1991 in the countries of the former Soviet Union. In China and
Vietnam, where power still resides in the communist party, administrative reform has not only
sparked interest among the political leadership; it has led to actual changes in administrative
practice. Why should administrative reform be so salient?
The argument we present in this paper is straightforward. Administrative reform can be
viewed as a process of transnational policy diffusion that produces remarkably similar processes
across both time and space. Without minimizing country specific features that shape the
evolution of administrative reform and its implementation, we will argue that the diffusion of
norms establish the architecture of administrative reform in countries in transition. This
argument is not new. Scholars have examined diffusion in a number of settings such as the
adoption of international norms (Fennemore and Sikkink, 1998), redistributive social policies
(Shiffman, 2004) and institutions (DiMaggio and Powell, 1991). The theme of policy diffusion
has been implicit in most discussions of the New Public Management (NPM) since scholars
generally refer to reforms in more than one country and search for similarities and differences
(see Zhang and Straussman, 2003). In this paper we will show that this literature is useful in
interpreting the evolution of civil service reform in Russia.
Policy diffusion and administrative reform
Despite the fact that policy diffusion has been investigated for several years, scholars use
different terms that have overlapping, though not necessarily, identical meaning. Some refer to
policy transfer; others use the phrase norm diffusion; a few scholars have used the phrase lesson
drawing (see Stone, 1999). In this paper we include the transfer of values, institutions and
practices that shape civil service reform in Russia. For the sake of consistency we use the word
diffusion to refer to all three.
The sources of diffusion include international organizations and bi-lateral donors of aid.
Even a casual search of the World Bank website, for example, shows several dimensions of
administrative reform proposals with specific applications to Russia. These include mechanisms
to promote greater transparency and accountability, anti-corruption practices, rationalizing
ministerial structures and meritorious practices to recruit and retain competent personnel. As we
show later in the paper, the evolution of reform in the 1990s in Russia included all of these
elements of reform. Bi-lateral aid from different donors focuses on one or more of these
standard features of reform. In other words, external pressure from international organizations
and donor assistance often serve as a catalyst for reform and may therefore be a source of
diffusion.
Administrative reform ideas, generally under the conceptual umbrella of NPM, may also
be a potential catalyst of reform (see Kettl, 2000). NPM has now had a twenty year history and,
regardless of its real impact in specific countries, certain features have become global, at least at
the rhetorical level. This is especially true of principles that espouse performance-based
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practices that aim to hold agencies and government employees accountable for results. There are
two specific issues with respect to NPM-type ideas that appear to have a global reach. One is
empirical, that is, does a country like Russia in the throes of reform adopt NPM-type reforms as
it goes about changing its administrative practices, especially the civil service? The second issue
is normative: Is it desirable for a country like Russia to entertain NPM-type reforms in its current
stage of development? Some have issued a strong caution that NPM-type reforms should not be
introduced in countries that have not first successfully implemented traditional Weberian style
bureaucracy (see Schick, 1998; Minogue, 2000). This is an important theme that we will return
to later in the paper.
A third source of reform is internal, coming from politically influential individuals or
groups who develop a reform agenda. In the context of international relations such individuals
have been referred to as “norm entrepreneurs”--people who promulgate convictions about right
and wrong behavior (see Finnemore and Sikkink, 1998). Applying the concept more generally
to domestic affairs we can change the meaning slightly to individuals or groups that advocate for
a particular policy, program or practice. There are many examples in history of policy
entrepreneurs who have spearheaded major domestic changes (see, for example, Barzelay and
Fuchtner, 2003). Reformers, of course, get their ideas from somewhere and, in the case of civil
service reform, influences can include international norms and policy convergence which may
come from the current conventional wisdom and shared values that are widely held by specialists
in a specific policy domain (Shiffman, Stanton, Salazar, 2004). Again, using the language from
constructivist international relations theory, the cascading of ideas would occur in venues such as
professional conferences, regional and international associations and professional organizations
that press for selected changes in values, institutions and practices (Finnemore and Sikkink,
1998). As we will show later in the paper, there is a broad consensus among professionals in
Russia about the appropriateness of the current civil service reforms proposed in Russia. But, as
Polidano (2001) points out, reforms require both leadership and organizational sinew that gives
ideas shape within the political landscape at a particular point in time. (This is one of the
weaknesses of civil service reform in Russia.)
What exactly is being diffused? One way to answer the question is to consider three
different levels. At the broadest level diffusion may center on the transfer of norms of values.
Drawing on a constructivist framework from international relations theory, we can ask the
question, why do some values seem to dominate discourse at a particular point in time? The
explanation offered is that, through interaction with the wider community, certain norms become
adopted and eventually embedded in political systems and practices (Shiffman, Stanton, Salazar,
2004): 381). Norms are not suspended in space; rather, they are attached to national and
international actors that foster them.
Consider the term democratic governance which is used frequently in discourse about
transitional regimes. Countries in transition are, to be literal, transitioning from an authoritarian
political system (with the corresponding values and behavior of such a transition) to a democratic
one. Values relevant to the transition include the nature of representation, rights of citizens,
accountability of elected officials, rule of law, and independence of the media. These values can
be operationalized and measured so that it is possible to determine progress or regression on one
or more democratic values (see Kaufman, 2003).
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Institutions represent a lower level of abstraction. When we speak of democratic
governance we assume a set of institutions that provide the structures within which norms and
values operate. Consider the example of representation again. The value of representation is
embedded with judgments about the relationship between those who hold legitimate authority to
govern and the populace. Who is consider fit to govern and who counts as a citizen are contested
issues that nations determine over time and are resolved through specific historical and cultural
conditions. Rules established that define rightful authority and citizenship are the institutions
that frame the concept of representation and establish the conditions for values to move from
abstractions to reality.
Practices are the place where the proverbial “rubber meets the road”—where institutions
are given shape through specific rules, regulations and procedures. Staying with representation,
a practice may define who is eligible for elected or appointed office such as residency, age or
educational requirements. Similarly, citizenship would be defined to establish who has specific
rights including voting. Practices are important in our analysis because they are the easiest to
define and are therefore ripe for transfer because, on the surface, they appear straightforward.
They are the substance of aid programs and are often portrayed as “best practices” to reflect the
prevailing wisdom of international consultants.
The above brief description of diffusion ignores both the historical and cultural contexts of
the recipient country. Rather, it presumes external and internal agents of reform and a compliant
host ready to accept whatever is being diffused. This is naturally simplistic at best and highly
dubious in specific settings. Administrative reform is a lens through which it is possible to
examine the interrelationships among sources of diffusion and the characteristics of history and
culture that are likely to give shape to the way reforms are implemented. We shall see this in
some detail as we explain the evolution of civil service reform in Russia from 1991 to the
present. As a preview, the Soviet legacy is important and can be interpreted as a constraint on
the diffusion of norms, institutions and practices since contemporary images of administrative
reform are explicitly antithetical to Soviet values, institutions and practices.
Who is a “public servant” in Russia?
The diffusion of civil service reform in Russia begins with a definition of the term “civil
service” since it does not have a universal definition (see Nunberg, 1999). At the country level
the definition of civil servant depends on the categories of public employees who are counted,
what positions are considered government positions and how one is recruited to the public
service. This is true everywhere and Russia is no exception.
According to the Federal Law “The System of State Service in the Russian Federation”
(passed in 2003), the civil service is comprised of professionals whose activities ensure the
execution of decisions made by persons occupying posts at the federal level and regions of the
Russian Federation. This definition outlines a number of characteristics distinguishing the civil
service in Russia from the public service in many other countries. First, only those employees
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vested with management authority of budgetary (i.e. funded from the federal, regional or
municipal budgets) organizations are considered to be public servants. School teachers,
university professors, and doctors, by contrast, are not state servants. Second, the state service in
Russia includes not only the civil service but also military and law enforcement services.
Therefore, unlike most western definitions of the civil service, the Russian meaning is more
expansive and therefore not directly comparable with countries that restrict the definition of civil
service to civilian agencies only. Third, according to the Constitution of the Russian Federation
and the federal law, “The General Principles of Organization of Local Self-Government in the
Russian Federation” (passed in 2003), local government employees are not included in the
definition of the Russian civil service. This also distinguishes Russia from other countries that
grant civil service status to municipal employees. More clarity came to Russia’s civil service in
2003 when new legislation passed by the Duma divided the civil service into types and levels
and also distinguished among civil, military and law-enforcement services and further legislation
differentiated the status of civil servants employed by the national and regional levels of
government.
A statistical snapshot of the Russian civil service
By January, 1, 2002 the aggregate number of civil and municipal servants in Russia
amounted to 1140.6 thousand people (8 per 1000 of population)--697.6 thousand civil servants
and 443 thousand municipal servants. 1 By January 1, 2003 this number was 1252.3 thousand
(728.8 thousand civilian servants plus 523.5 thousand municipal servants), i.e. an average of 9
per 1000 of population. By September 1, 2003 there were 666.8 thousand civil servants (the data
for the number of municipal servants by September, 2003, is missing from the respective volume
of the Goskomstat report).
Another way to look at the composition of the Russian civil service is to compare the
federal level and the regions. The largest number of government employees work in the civil
service at the federal level (504.9 thousand by January, 1, 2002; 522.2 thousand by January, 1,
2003; 491.8 thousand by September, 1, 2003). The overwhelming majority of them work in the
territorial branches (representations of the federal bodies of executive power in the subjects of
the Russian Federation): 467.7 thousand by January 1, 2002; 488.4 thousand by January 1, 2003;
454.7 thousand by September 1, 2003. The number of civil servants in the subjects of the
Russian Federation amounted to 192.7 thousand by January, 1, 2002; 206.6 thousand by January,
1, 2003; 175 thousand by September, 1, 2003. Finally, the staff of the central machineries of the
federal government bodies totaled 37.2 thousand by January 1, 2002; 33.8 thousand by January
1, 2003; 37.1 thousand by September 1, 2003. Accordingly, the number of federal civil servants
in Russia is approximately 2.5 times as large as the number of civil servants in the subjects of the
Russian Federation; and the number of the servants in the central machineries of the federal
bodies of executive power equals approximately 5 percent of the total number of civil servants.
The statistical data summarized above show that, despite the administrative objectives
since 2001, it is unlikely that there will be a significant reduction in the size of the civil service.
A more important expectation of reform is that the central machinery of the civil service will
become more professional and, in particular, be in a position to influence the overall functioning
1
State Committee of the Russian Federation on Statistics
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of the civil service because of its elite status in the central government. If this actually occurs,
this will be very much in line with trends in East European countries such as Hungary, Poland
and the Czech Republic and, more generally, international trends.
Age. The Russian civil service is aging and a large percentage began their government
employment in the Soviet Union. According to 2002 data, at the federal level 70 percent of the
civil servants were older than 40 years. At the senior levels, over half of the staff is older than 50
years. As the “Program of Reforming the Civil Service in the Russian Federation (years 20032005)” (Program) mentioned, if these tendencies continue during the next 10 years, more than
half of the civil servants occupying key positions will retire. There is some concern that this will
lead to a shortage of highly qualified senior civil servants with sufficient knowledge and
experience. The other side of this equation is that these retirements will eventually lead to the
extinction of Soviet era trained government employees.
Level of Professionalism. The level of professionalism of civil servants can be divided according
to the draft of the federal law “State Civil Service in the Russian Federation” into two
components: length of service and level of education.
Using 2002 as the cutoff year for the length of service, 30.8 percent of civil servants have
5 to 10 years of experience; 12.2% have between 11 and 15 years of experience; 39 percent have
more than 15 years. These data indicate that employees with the medium length of service (11-15
years) tended to leave government employment for jobs in other sectors of the economy leading
to an “experience gap” in the civil service.
By 2002 70.4 percent of public servants had professional education. About a third of
them had higher education in economics and management, a fifth in law and a fifth had higher
technical education. “Public administration” is a new category and, at present, 2.3 percent have
degrees in this area. While civil servants are highly educated there is a mismatch between skills
needed and the fields of specialization distributed among public employees.
Gender. The gender breakdown in the civil service does not correspond to the distribution in
women in the overall labor force in Russia. Data in 2002 show that women comprise 70 percent
of the civil service, men make up 30 percent. However, men dominate the higher levels in the
civil service.
Remuneration. Based on 2002 data the average monthly salary (including social payments) for
public employees was 7.2 thousand rubles in 2002 (about $240 by the exchange rate of 30 rubles
for 1 USD). Central government civil servants earned salaries 1.4 times higher than civil
servants who worked in the regions. However, the gap between senior managers in the private
sector and top civil servants is quite high, as much as 10 to 15 times higher thereby making
government employment unattractive for many potential public administrators.
Analysis of statistical data
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The data indicate a number of problems in the Russian civil service that cover all the
functional areas. Of course, the existence of these problems is relative and depends on what is
the desirable in terms of the optimal civil service in Russia. The Conception of the Civil Service
System Reforming in the Russian Federation (Conception) №Пр-1496, passed on August, 15,
2001 formulated the model of the state including the civil service, which should serve as a
guideline for the identification of the problems confronting the public sector in Russia. The
Conception sets the goal of creating an integrated system of state service, based on the following
principles:




professionalism (implementing a merit system as an integral principle for recruitment and
promotion);
serving societal needs (ensuring the rights and freedoms of the persons and citizens;
cooperation with the institutions of civil society; openness and transparency of civil
service);
effectiveness (the ability of the civil service to achieve government objectives in a cost
effective manner);
stability of the of civil service (in terms of employment, longevity and remuneration).
There is still a significant gap between these goals and reality. This is due to several
current shortcomings in the structure of the Russian civil service that are reflected in the data as
follows:
 Imbalance between the center and the local level—there are 2.5 times more employees at
the federal level as the municipal level;

Civil service is aging;

The experience gap in the most active group (11-15 years of service);

Mismatch of fields of expertise (based on higher education) of civil servants and the most
pressing needs faced by the Russian government;

Lack of women at the higher levels of the civil service;

Low salaries in the civil service which are uncompetitive with the non-public sectors;

Inequities in salaries between civil servants employed by the federal government and
those working in the territories.
In addition to these challenges, there are additional negative dimensions that create
challenges for the reform of the Russian civil service. According to the results of a public
opinion poll in October 2003 (carried out by the Russian Academy of State Service of the
President of the Russian Federation Sociological Center) citizens have low trust in civil servants
and there is a great deal of cynicism about the influence of personal and business interests on
decisions taken by civil servants. Similarly, citizens do not believe that the civil service is
incapable of providing public services effectively, nor do citizens feel that they are protected
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from arbitrariness in administrative decisions. Survey results also indicated little faith in the
ability of administrative reform initiatives to improve the quality of life in Russia.
The lack of transparency is another significant challenge. Surveys show that more than
half of the citizens believe that they are not informed about the plans and actions of government
officials at different levels because the decision making process is opaque. The transparency
issue is circular since top officials are reluctant to provide information while citizens and public
interest groups are passive about asking for it.
Corruption is similarly a major challenge that stands in the way of substantial reform of
the civil service. While there are only indirect estimates of the level of corruption, one such
estimate prepared by INDEM Fund found that the total sum paid to public officials by the
businessmen in 2001 amounted to about 33.5 billion USD, which is approximately the same size
of government revenues in that year. More recently, Transparency International’s Corruption
Perceptions Index ranked Russia 90 out of 145 in 2004
(http://www.transparency.org/cpi/2004/cpi2004.en.html).
Additional problems with the civil service include the disjunction between income and
the effectiveness of civil servants; insufficient opportunities for promotion; instability in
employment because of changes in leadership. These negative assessments are all based on
surveys of civil servants suggesting that poor morale in endemic among public employees.
All of the problems in the Russian civil service have historical reasons. It is reasonable to
divide these historical reasons into three groups: the Soviet period, the years between 1991 and
2000 and 2001 to present.
The Soviet Legacy
When we examine the evolution of reforms to the Russian civil service, it is essential to
consider the legacy of the Soviet period for the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 did not
automatically usher in a major overhaul of the Soviet bureaucracy. For former socialist
countries, international norms, institutions and practices are invariably grafted onto existing
structures and these antecedents have been impediments to reform. We can identify three
obstacles to civil service reform in Russia that have their roots in the Soviet legacy: negative
public opinion toward the bureaucracy, low salaries of public servants and the lack of
transparency in administrative systems. The negative public attitude toward bureaucracy is
difficult to document empirically since, during the Soviet period sociological survey research
was not carried out. Nevertheless, different groups in the population depending on age, class,
level of education and nationality had contradictory attitudes to the Soviet bureaucracy. More
generally, negative attitudes actually increased during Gorbachev’s Perestroika when the gap
between rhetoric and reality became more pronounced and visible.
The low salary of public servants is also a heritage of the Soviet period. However, this
condition is more complicated. Low salaries were, in part, compensated by significant indirect
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benefits and subsidies such as medical care as well as sanatoria and health resorts, and subsidized
goods including food. While wage disparities existed the general low income level with little
variations of salaries and welfare in the country had a leveling effect that quickly became
unglued after 1991. With the collapse of the Soviet Union the acquiescence to low wages eroded
as many non-wage compensation benefits that were the lifeblood of government employment in
the Soviet period were ended. This explains why some older civil servants express nostalgia for
the past and believe (based on their personal experience) that the previous regime’s approach to
compensation would restore a lost era of government service without significant a substantial
increase in the salaries of civil servants nor ostensibly require a significant modification in the
way budgets are constructed for government organizations. Of course, given the way that civil
service systems have evolved, and the pressures to reform from international organizations, it is
inconceivable that this longing for the past would be a credible alternative for the Russian civil
service after 1991.
The lack of civil service transparency is connected directly to the Soviet period with its
atmosphere of secrecy and ideologically inspired methods of government decision-making. The
postulate about the communist party as the vanguard of the working class and peasantry has
always claimed that it knows the needs of the society better than others so transparency was
never important during the Soviet era. An important quality for the Soviet bureaucrat was to
implement and even predict the leaderships’ demands, follow the “Party guidelines,” but never to
work directly for the interests of the citizens—a bourgeois concept at best. This lack of
transparency, endemic to Leninist systems, carried over to Russia after 1991 and has been slow
to change. Perhaps most important in terms of the Soviet legacy is the prevalence of informal
rules in civil service. One Russian observer of this phenomenon noted that this is due to two
factors: the gap between official responsibility and actual responsibility and the prevalence of
personalities over procedures. In fact, Jakobson suggests that this tradition even predates the
Soviet period (Jakobson, 2001: 41).
The problems originating form the post-Soviet period
The post-Soviet period of recent Russian history, and the formation of its state system
(including the origin of the civil service instead of the Soviet party bureaucracy), generated new
problems in the government machinery, that are not traced directly to the Soviet period. For
instance, the imbalance in the size of the civil service between the federal level and the
subnational level was aggravated during the 1990s. The distribution of personnel in favor of the
federal government bodies directly leads to the centralization of power. President V.V.Putin’s
intention to strengthen the “vertical line of power” in 2002 added to the existing numerical
superiority of the federal civil service over the regions, strengthening the center. Due to the
imbalance between the center and the regions it is safe to say that the regions have, even prior to
2000, lost the struggle with the central government machinery over political authority. Similarly,
a comparison of municipal employees with civil servants illustrates the weakness of local selfgovernment (along with other indicators such as modest budgets and narrow functions).
The experience gap in the most active group of civil servants with the medium length of
service can be naturally interpreted as an outcome of the intention of those civil servants, who
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have made their way in the bureaucracy and formed a network of contacts, to transfer to other
sectors and use there favorable position for personal gain. After 10 to 15 years of service many
civil servants secured enough power to secure “reserve” positions in private companies and
companies with government shares. This process of implicit “privatization of the government”
by civil servants of middle positions in the 1990s was widespread and is reflected in the
statistical data summarized above.
Wages during the Soviet period were uniform for the whole country and were
differentiated due to the single list of factors. The token of goodwill from the central government
towards regional elites in the post-Soviet period lied not so much in the slogan “Take as much
sovereignty as you can” (only radical groups of regional bureaucratic elites accepted this
proposal seriously and tried to use it), as in the right of regional elites to create their own
budgets. In spite of the policy of redistribution of regional revenues and expenditures by the
central authorities, a new tendency of inequitable remuneration for regional civil servants
developed (as a concession to the regional elites) during the 1990s (the salaries of federal civil
servants in territorial bodies tended to be lower than the salaries of the civil servants of the
subjects of the Russian Federation, even though they usually work next door and execute a
comparable amount of functions). It is likely that this disparity will lesson as President Putin
strengthens the “vertical line” of power by increasing the salaries in the territorial bodies to the
level to that in government bodies of the subjects of the Russian Federation. This move would
ease the tension between the levels of the civil service and facilitate its unification.
The usual complaint about the lack of opportunities for promotion and the instability of
positions due to the leadership changes can also be attributed to the post-Soviet period. During
the formative years of the Russian Federation in the immediate collapse of the Soviet Union
there was no separation of career professionals from political appointees for certain categories of
positions—a hallmark of most modern civil service systems. As a result, almost all civil service
positions became de facto political appointments.
Not all of the negative roots of the Russian civil service can be found separately either in
the Soviet period, or in the post-Soviet period. Most of the negative aspects have complex
historical causes influenced by both periods of Russian history. These causes include the aging
of civil servants, disjunction between the educational backgrounds of civil servants with the job
requirements, gender disparities, corruption, and the failure to link performance to the
remuneration system.
Two factors have caused the aging of the civil service. The first is the demographic gap
of the mid 1990s to the present that was aggravated by the country’s low birth rate. The second
explanation is the unattractiveness of employment in the civil service for the younger generation
that prefers employment in the other sectors. (This process started in the Soviet period.)
The gap between educational attainment and knowledge requirements for a modern civil
service can be traced to the Soviet period. There was no special education for public
administration in the Soviet Union. During the 1990s insufficient governmental support for
public administration education essentially had the effect of extending the gap that was formed in
the Soviet era.
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The prevalence of women in civil service may be related to lower career expectations
(with a great traditional orientation on the family). Therefore, they decided to be employed in
the civil service despite the fact that it lacked prestige as a type of employment. On the other
hand, in 1990s all quotas on the percentage representation of different categories, i.e. women, in
the civil service were removed which also led to an increase in the number of women employed.
Corruption in the last decade has various explanations. One legacy of the Soviet era is a
view that all the wealth of the country has Soviet collective qualities and can therefore be
appropriated by the initiative of any citizen. Beyond this veneer of Soviet ideological
rationalization for stealing the state, the broad confluence of several negative features of the
Russian civil service already documented—low salaries, lack of transparency and openness, lack
of job descriptions encouraging civil servants to act on their own, lack of mechanisms to resolve
conflicts of interests—all contribute to corruption. Finally, the lack of a performance based
remuneration and reward system is rooted in the Soviet tradition of wage leveling and failure
during the previous decade to implement international performance-based measurement
mechanisms.
Reforms of the State Service in Russia.
Despite the obstacles to civil service reform that have their roots in both the Soviet era
and the transitional decade since 1991, it is our view that civil service reform will happen in
some fashion. The question is, will reform be based on international experiences?
The first attempts of reform have been based on the components of international
experience that are suitable for Russian conditions. The 19th century argument between
“pochvenniki” and “zapadniki” parties--whether Russia needs to copy western practice or find its
own way of development has still not been definitively answered. In reality, it is neither possible
to implement international practice completely nor avoid implementing some parts of
international practice. Russia is not unique and is following some of the transitional trajectories
found elsewhere, but there are obviously social and cultural traditions that militate against
uncritical adoption of international practices. As the following section shows, Russian attempts
at reform during the 1990s have been difficult.
Beginning in 1992-1993 some initiatives to resolve problems in the state service were
started to deal with the systemic challenges described above. The first step was the creation of a
specialized public institution responsible for all state service issues (Roskadri of Russia). It had
three goals: (1) to educate and increase the level of education of civil servants, (2) to create a
system of civil service administration and (3) to evaluate the professional preparation of public
employees. However, only the first goal was accomplished. Due to the activity of Roskadri of
Russia, the first colleges offering a specialization in “public and municipal administration” were
established in addition to the federal Academy of State Service of the President of the Russian
Federation (the former Party school that served the central committee of the Communist Party of
the Soviet Union) and a system of the regional academies. The civil servants’ resistance to the
evaluation of their competencies and the uncertain status of Roskadri of Russia in the
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governmental hierarchy left the other two goals unfulfilled. Though all the political and
bureaucratic elites understood the need for the transformation of the Soviet political bureaucracy
into a new civil service, there was no agreement on the concept of what a modern Russian civil
service should look like.
The efforts of Roskadri of Russia did produce a “Fundamentals of State Service in the
Russian Federation” law in 1995; however, the agency had already been terminated by that time.
While the legislation introduced the concept of state service and defined how it was supposed to
function, no clear goals of state service reform were articulated thereby producing inconsistent in
interpretations of the law and several incompatible directions for the development of the civil
service service.
The second attempt of the state service reform was undertaken in 1997-1998 by the group
of President Boris Yeltsin advisors within the framework of the “Conception of Public
Administration Reform.” Borrowing from international practice, this effort tried to identify key
elements of a modern civil service such as the perceived value of the merit system and the notion
that civil servants serve the public interest. Conceptually, these principles were a sharp departure
from the Soviet era. While an important outcome of this stage of reform was the adoption of
selected principles both by professionals and by political officials without significant resistance,
no mechanisms for implementation of these principles were established. Thus, the reform
gradually terminated without really getting off the ground.
The third attempt of reform was implemented during 1999--2000 and is associated with
Vladimir Putin’s presidential election campaign (“Program of the State Service Modernization,”
designed in the Center of the Strategic Research, the so-called Center of German Gref2). The
Program included possible measures for state service modernization and its transformation into a
professional civil service. However, those steps were not implemented because of the specific
situation before and during the elections in Russia at that time.
Reform efforts continue to the present
Following the election of 2000 a renewed effort was made to jump start civil service
reform through two pieces of legislation--“The System of State Service in the Russian
Federation” and “State Service Reforming in the Russian Federation: 2003-2005.”
The federal law “The System of State Service in the Russian Federation” was introduced
to the State Duma in November 2002 and was passed in May 2003 (№58-ФЗ). The law
establishes three main categories of public servants (federal civil service, military service, lawenforcement service) and two levels (federal civil service and regional civil service) of
employees. A central feature of the legislation is a requirement to measure the performance of
civil servants through the use of certification tests and qualification examinations. The law also
establishes the principle of competitive promotions and the application of employment contracts.
The law creates a system of transfers from one type of state service to another and determines the
relationship between civil, diplomatic, military ranks as well as special ranks given within the
2
http://www.csr.ru/english
12
federal state service. Perhaps most important, the legislation establishes the administrative
preconditions to implement all of these reforms at both the federal and regional levels. The
legislation was followed by a presidential decree in 2002 (Decree №1336) that created the
enabling elements to implement the reform. These elements included the financial requirements,
action plans and pilot projects. This notion of pilot testing reforms was explicitly adopted as a
method used widely around the world as a way to introduce reforms in civil service systems.
Assessment of the current attempt and the reform trends
The 1990s have not been kind to civil service reform in Russia. The explanations include
bureaucratic resistance, lack of political will, inconsistency of the reformers or negative socioeconomic environment formed after the financial crisis in 1998. However, there was no
disagreement among the experts on the core principles of reform, nor how to implement them.
Yet, while there was general agreement on principles—most of which came from international
experience—there was no clear consensus on the organizational requisites of civil service
reform. Roskadri of Russia was terminated because it failed to find an organizational structure
for reform, not because of a lack of consensus on reform principles. In the mid 1990s the
concept of a merit based professional state service based on the promotion of the public interest)
was adopted by the professional community as well as political officials without any significant
resistance.
Certainly, the extent of the consensus among public sector experts on the conceptual
fundamentals of a professional civil service for Russia should not be overestimated. In spite of
the agreement on the principles of the civil service and its institutional framework, researchers
argued about the implementation of these principles. The main issues in the discussion were as
follows. How can the contract system be organized to increase effectiveness and productivity of
professional activities? What are the most efficient ways to disclose conflicts of interests and
what preventive mechanisms can be used in Russia? How can the funding of the state service be
changed? How can the components of the reward system be modernized to guarantee the
sufficient level of social support and security of the state servants, as well as stimulate their
effectiveness and productivity? How can the elements of labor and administrative law be
optimally combined in the legal framework of the state service?
The fact that there are no problems in the experts’ assessment of the state service is
crucial for the Russian Federation as a constitutional state based on democratic principles. Lack
of such problems also helped in the development and adoption of the “Conception of State
Service Reform.” Compared to all other legal documents that were passed in the beginning of
2000s, this law, though it was the first official document of civil service reform, was approved
without much dispute or delay.
Currently, professional experts are responsible for the design and initial evaluation of the
reform process whereas political officials are in charge of decision making and their
implementation. Legislative authority naturally is involved in the processes when legal
documents need to be developed.
13
One could ask, is reform initiated by the top levels of authority vital for Russia? The
answer is obviously yes. Since the state service involves a great number of public servants and
representatives from different public groups, the reform influences their interests, changes their
status, causes hopes and fears, and creates and ruins the unity of the groups. Any reform effort
will falter if there is no conciliation of interests. Also, reform initiatives can cause resistance in
society to state service reform. Since civil service reform is but one element in broader civil
society initiatives, the broader society needs to identify with the reform in order for it to be
successful. This suggests new non-Weberian ideas about the state service and functioning and
administration listed in Box 1. But is this list realistic?
14
Box 1
Principles for Non-Weberian Concepts of the Civil Service












Civil service reform can be a general goal and have a number of organizational
objectives.
Each of the objectives needs an individual approach.
There are no unachievable objectives; there is a deficit of resources.
There is no lack of resources for reform.
There is no lack of executors (public administrators who need to operate with the new
rules of a professional civil service); there are challenges to motivate and educate.
There are no bad civil servants (executors); there is bad management.
Each civil servant is a personality, and personalities are not interchangeable within
one management framework.
Each executor (civil servant) is changing the process of implementing his or her
newly formulated functions.
Different groups of civil servants need to be managed in different ways taking into
consideration their individual features.
Management needs to be permanently adjusted.
One of the specific organizational objectives is to report about the results of reform to
the public.
There is no dissatisfaction with the results of reform; there are unprofessional public
relations (PR).
Russia in Comparative Perspective
Six years ago Nunberg (1999) wrote, “Developing effective institutions and mechanisms
to manage Russia’s civil service is a long-term understanding that will undoubtedly remain
on the Russian reform agenda for many years to come” (1999: 190). The overall thrust of
this analysis was sobering and it outlined the many necessary conditions and steps that
Russia needed to take to achieve a modern, professional civil service. As our paper shows,
civil service reform is a work in progress with ambiguous results to date. The international
commitment to reform is exhibited in the World Bank’s donor matrix that shows various
Types of commitment (see
http://www.worldbank.org.ru/ECA/Russia.nsf/ECADocByUnid/E33F89DDA59A6736C325
6E5F004D1EB7?Opendocument). Clearly, several donors want to encourage reform in
several dimensions including civil service reform since this is one crucial element in the
building of state capacity in Russia. It is not at all clear, however, that donor aid is a
dominant driver of reform initiatives as it has appeared to be in many other countries (see
Polidano, 2001).
One could ask the question that we asked at the beginning of this paper, have norms been
internalized? If by norms we mean agreement on some of the basic features of a civil
15
service—adequate compensation, professionalism, accountability, political neutrality, merit
based appointments and promotions—we can say that there is general agreement on the
framework for civil service reform. We can say, further, that there is a cascading of the
norms to a broader political constituency. But it is still an open question as to how deep the
core values of a professional civil service go in Russia.
A second unsettled issue is the sequencing of reforms. International trends have focused
on proposed NPM-type initiatives that are performance based, use market-like incentive
schemes and empower managers throughout administrative systems. (Naturally this is the
ideal and does not refer to any specific country.) But can Russia absorb elements of these
initiatives before it fully implements core Weberian administrative mechanisms?
The
answer, in general, should be a resounding no, although such an answer does not mean
necessarily that some NPM-like ideas are not adopted. For example, the federal program
“Reform of State Service of the Russian Federation (2003-05)” includes some NPM-like
innovations. Schick (1998) made the argument several years ago in general terms. As he
pointed out, the so-called New Zealand model of administrative reform was replete with tacit
assumptions or preconditions that most developing and transitional countries cannot meet.
Specifically, Schick points out that a market oriented reform such as contract models of
delegation presume that accountability through both external and internal controls is working
well. Similarly, informality which provides managers with discretion, while desirable as an
objective in New Zealand-type administrative systems, requires a great deal of personal
responsibility based on ethical standards and codes of behavior. But these take many years to
develop before they are routinized and internalized. An analogy to markets is instructive.
Markets work when the rules of the game are understood and followed but the key ingredient
is the rules such as contracts and property rights are established and enforceable. As Schick
points out, in administrative systems the rules of the game include personnel, procurement
and budget restrictions that are designed to constrain public employees and prevent
wrongdoing. Another way to put it is that external controls are a precondition to internal
controls. Notice that this argument is, in essence, making the point that administrative
reforms have an internal logic—sequencing if you will—that is violated at the reformers’
peril.
The lesson for Russia is to focus on the basics. Whereas as much of the attention at the
international level has been on advancing NPM-type reforms, Russia’s challenges are not
dissimilar to the challenges that reformers faced 100 to 150 years ago in many western
countries when the edifices of contemporary civil service systems were being build. This is
why attention to, say, the concept of merit is so important for, behind this concept lies
important values as well as procedures for implementation.
A simple model for interpreting the Russian case is offered by Manning and Parison
(2004). They describe the traction that reformers have (or do not have) when they try to
influence change in a country’s administrative systems. Traction comes from a combination
of leverage, which can be equated with points of access, and the institutional malleability of
countries that make it more or less receptive to reform. Manning and Parison then use these
concepts to compare and contrast fourteen countries on these dimensions. They array
countries along a low traction to high traction continuum (2004: 41-46).
Their case
16
examples show that countries that are low traction countries tend to focus on basic reforms
such remuneration, recruitment, control of corruption and, more broadly public sector
discipline. To put it differently, low traction countries require a series of reforms that have
been implemented many years ago in western countries. Expectations of large scale reform
need to be tempered by political realities that militate against them. This argument is further
buttressed by a World Bank study that points out that, globally reform efforts that have been
large scale have generally been unsuccessful. Using a crude two by two dichotomy that
distinguishes between governments that are motivated and those that are unmotivated, and
countries that are capable of initiating reform and those that are incapable, one could think of
Russia as being in the middle of each dimension. This would similarly call for modest,
incremental
changes
that
have
some
chance
of
immediate
success
(www1.worldbank.org/publicsector/civilservice/strategies.htm).
Russia, according to Manning and Parison, is a low traction country. This is evidenced
by the failures of reform attempts in the 1990s. Essentially, reform initiatives could not take
hold and essentially died before implementation. What this tells us is that the push from
policy diffusion coming in equal measure from international catalysts and the pull from
domestic reform advocates because of the myriad internal circumstances and unresolved
problems of state service were not strong enough to overcome a climate enveloped by
political inertia in the specific domain of civil service reform. As we argued earlier,
fragmentary evidence hints at some modest change evidenced by the most recent initiatives
in 2003 and 2004.
There is one theme that remains unexplored throughout the discussion of civil service
reform in Russia and this is the connection to administrative reform (which civil service
reform is part of) and the evolution of civil society. The prevailing conventional wisdom is
that Russian civil society, like civil societies in most post-communist countries, is immature
(see Howard, 2003 for an elaboration of this argument). While some indicators are positive,
such as the growth in the number of non-governmental organizations, the political
atmosphere is still not conducive of a fully functioning civil society. Limits on freedom of
the press (often debated and evaluated from various perspectives), continuing high levels of
corruption and, the criticisms of the state of development of civil society leveled by President
Putin in May, 2004 all indicate that the evolution of civil society in Russia has a way to go
before it resembles even the conditions of central Europe, let alone western countries. The
issue is not merely rhetorical because it raises the theme of sequencing once again.
Researchers have not demonstrated unequivocally that administrative reforms (such as
improvements in the civil service) can really take hold in a society with a poorly functioning
civil society. Yet, Russian practice in recent years is to make specific changes in the civil
service that are intended to make public personnel more professional and more stable. We
can think of these changes as technical in nature. There is no doubt, for example, that
improvements in civil service remuneration are desirable and realizable. It is similarly
desirable and also realizable to hire and promote employees based on merit-based criteria.
However, these changes do not, by themselves, change the culture of a civil service. In
particular, they do not create transparency and accountability and establish a service ethic
among public employees. Such changes really require changes in values—they take a long
time and must be nurtured by deep changes in political culture. This is why, in the end,
17
Russia can transfer norms, institutions and practices from the international community up to
a point. But the institutions of civil society play an important role, in a symbiotic way, of
nurturing the norms that will shape a professional and responsive civil service (see Jakobson,
2001: 43-4). So institutions (such as the rule of law) grow out of values that are embedded in
civil society—and civil services practices that eventually become routine follow from
institutions and values, not the other way around. Hard wiring these changes takes
considerable time and the current political situation in Russia is not overly encouraging and
thereby should not inspire expectations of a quick victory for those who may see the glass as
half full.
18
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Chicago Press.
Finnemore, Martha and Kathryn Sikkink. 1998. “International Norm Dynamics and Political
Change.” International Organization 52: 887-917.
Howard, Marc Morje. 2003. The Weakness of Civil Society in Post-Communist Europe.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Jakobson, Lev. 2001. “Public management in Russia: changes and inertia.” International Public
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Kaufmann, Daniel, Aart Kraay and Massimo Mastruzzi. 2003.
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Polidano, Charles. 2001. “Why Civil Service Reforms Fail.” IDPM Public Policy and
Management Working Paper no. 16.
Schick, Allen. 1998. “Why Most Developing Countries Should Not Try New Zealand’s
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19
Zhang, Mengzhong and Jeffrey D. Straussman. 2003. “Chinese Administrative Reforms with
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Websites
http://www.transparency.org/cpi/2004/cpi2004.en.html
http://www.worldbank.org.ru/ECA/Russia.nsf/ECADocByUnid/E33F89DDA59A6
736C3256E5F004D1EB7?Opendocument
Statistical Table: all 6 governance indicators for RUSSIA
Governance Indicator
Year Percentile Rank Estimate
Standard Number of Sources Income Category Average,
(0-100)
(-2.5 to + 2.5) Deviation surveys/
Percentile
polls
Voice and Accountability
2004
25.7
-0.81
0.11
13
List
39.9
Political Stability
2004
21.8
-0.85
0.19
12
List
36.5
Government Effectiveness 2004
48.1
-0.21
0.13
14
List
40.2
Regulatory Quality
2004
30.5
-0.51
0.17
12
List
38.5
Rule of Law
2004
29.5
-0.70
0.11
16
List
37.4
Control of Corruption
2004
29.1
-0.72
0.12
14
List
38.6
Source: Kaufmann D., A. Kraay, and M. Mastruzzi 2005: Governance Matters IV: Governance Indicators for 1996-2004.
Note: The governance indicators presented here reflect the statistical compilation of responses on the quality of governance given by a large number of enterprise,
citizen and expert survey respondents in industrial and developing countries, as reported by a number of survey institutes, think tanks, non-governmental
organizations, and international organizations. The aggregate indicators in no way reflect the official position of the World Bank, its Executive Directors, or the countries
they represent. As discussed in detail in the accompanying papers, countries' relative positions on these indicators are subject to margins of error that are clearly
indicated. Consequently, precise country rankings should not be inferred from this data.
20