To the question on institutional disproportion of the Constitution of the Russian Federation

Abstract

The subject of this research is the structural characteristics of the Constitution of the Russian Federation from the perspective of cross-disciplinary institutional approach. The author describes the peculiarities of application of institutional and neo-institutional methods of analysis in political science and jurisprudence. Two main vectors in application of methodology of institutional analysis in the constitutional-legal research are proposed: internal constitutional analysis of the branch of Russia’s constitutional law; and external institutional analysis, the object field of which includes interaction of the constitution with external environment of public authority and public policy. The author provides arguments for existence of institutional imbalance in the Constitution of the Russian Federation, which is substantiated by historical conditions and complexity of the state structure. Scientific novelty of the article is defined by application of cross-disciplinary methodology of institutional analysis towards studying structural specificity of the Constitution of the Russian Federation. Peculiarities of implementation of institutional analysis in political scientific and constitutional-legal research are revealed, which opens a new perspective upon correlation between various constitutional norms and institutions contained in the main law of Russia. The examples of institutional imbalance of the Constitution of the Russian Federation are demonstrated: a qualitatively and quantitatively complex model of federative structure; recognition by the Constitution of limited sovereignty of the republics as the constituent entities of the Russian Federation; entrenchment of a broad list of constitutional rights and freedoms without elaboration of the more effective mechanism of their implementation; imbalance between the rights and responsibilities; division of powers between central government and regional governments; absence of sufficient guaranteed of the system of local self-governance, etc. It is noted that to a certain extent, the ongoing constitutional reform eliminates the institutional imbalance of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, and the work in this direction should be continued.