Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes Research for this article was supported by the John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, which granted me a residential fellowship from September 2002 to May 2003. I would like to thank Grigorii V. Golosov for his valuable comments on the earlier drafts of the manuscript. I am also grateful to the anonymous reviewers whose comments allowed me to substantially improve the article. Those errors of fact and interpretation that remain, as well as the views expressed, are entirely mine. Michael Laver makes a distinction between government duration and government durability. The former is an essentially empirical concept, while the latter is essentially theoretical. See Michael Laver, ‘Government Termination’, Annual Review of Political Science, 6, 1, June 2003, pp. 23 – 40. Investiture is the formal procedure of the parliament's approval of a new government. Kaare Strom, Eric C. Browne, John P. Frendreis & Dennis W. Glieber, ‘Contending Models of Cabinet Stability’, American Political Science Review, 82, 3, September 1988, pp. 923 – 941. Arend Lijphart, Democracies: Patterns of Majoritarian and Consensus Government in Twenty-One Countries (New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 1984), pp. 78 – 85; Paul Warwick, Government Survival in Parliamentary Democracies (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1994); see also Alan Siaroff, ‘Varieties of Parliamentarianism in the Advanced Industrial Democracies’, International Political Science Review, 24, 4, October 2003, pp. 445 – 464. Daniel Diermeier & Peter Van Roozendaal, ‘The Duration of Cabinet Formation Processes in Western Multi-Party Democracies’, British Journal of Political Science, 28, 4, October 1998, pp. 609 – 626. Jean Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World (London and Beverly Hills, Sage, 1985), especially pp. 130, 136 – 137. Lawrence C. Dodd, ‘The Study of Cabinet Durability: Introduction and Commentary’, Comparative Political Studies, 17, 2, July 1984, pp. 155 – 161. Eric C. Browne, John P. Frendreis & Dennis W. Gleiber, ‘An “Events” Approach to the Problem of Cabinet Stability’, Comparative Political Studies, 17, 2, July 1984, pp. 167 – 197. Paul Warwick & Stephen T. Easton, ‘The Cabinet Stability Controversy: New Perspectives on a Classic Problem’, American Journal of Political Science, 36, 1, February 1992, pp. 122 – 146; Daniel Diermeier & Antonio Merlo, ‘Government Turnover in Parliamentary Democracies’, Journal of Economic Theory, 94, 1, September 2000, pp. 46 – 79. For a detailed literature overview see Laver, ‘Government Termination’. Kaare Strom, Minority Government and Majority Rule (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990). Gregory M. Luebbert, ‘Coalition Theory and Government Formation in Multiparty Democracies’, Comparative Politics, 15, 3, April 1983, pp. 235 – 249. William Bernhard & David Leblang, ‘Political Parties and Monetary Commitments’, International Organization, 56, 4, Fall 2002, pp. 803 – 830. Scott Mainwaring & Matthew Soberg Shugart, ‘Juan Linz, Presidentialism, and Democracy: A Critical Appraisal’, The Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies, University of Notre Dame, Working Paper No. 200, July 1993. Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, pp. 122 – 125. Nelson W. Polsby, ‘The Institutionalization of the U.S. House of Representatives’, American Political Science Review, 62, 1, March 1968, pp. 144 – 168 at pp. 145 – 146. Peverill Squire, ‘Membership Turnover and the Efficient Processing of Legislation’, Legislative Studies Quarterly, 23, 1, February 1998, pp. 23 – 32. Morris P. Fiorina, Congress, Keystone of the Washington Establishment (New Haven, CT, Yale University Press, 1977). John M. Carey, Frantisek Formanek & Ewa Karpowicz, ‘Legislative Autonomy in New Regimes: The Czech and Polish Cases’, Legislative Studies Quarterly, 24, 4, November 1999, pp. 569 – 603; Scott Morgenstern & Benito Nacif (eds), Legislative Politics in Latin America (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002), pp. 415 – 417. Lyn Ragsdale & John J. Theis, ‘The Institutionalization of the American Presidency, 1924 – 92’, American Journal of Political Science, 41, 4, October 1997, pp. 1280 – 1318 at pp. 1290, 1303. Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, pp. 135 – 136. Michael Curtis (gen. ed.), Introduction to Comparative Government (New York, Harper and Row, 1985), pp. 35 – 114 at pp. 82 – 83. R. A. W. Rhodes & Patrick Dunleavy (eds), Prime Minister, Cabinet and Core Executive (Basingstoke, St. Martin's Press, 1995), pp. 11 – 12. Jan-Erik Lane, David McKay & Kenneth Newton (eds), Political Data Handbook OECD Countries (Oxford and New York, Oxford University Press, 1991). Heikki Paloheimo, Governments in Democratic Capitalist States 1950 – 1983. A Data Handbook (University of Turku, Department of Sociology and Political Science, Studies on Political Science No. 8, 1984). Jaap Woldendorp, Hans Keman & Ian Budge, ‘Introduction’, European Journal of Political Research, 24, 1, August 1993, pp. 1 – 13. Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, p. 82. This method is often used in comparative studies of ministerial duration. See Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, pp. 79 – 81. www.systema.ru/ and law.optima.ru/; db.informika.ru:8082/home.htm; www.vcom.ru/law/rf_law_2.shtml; businesspravo.ru/. www.integrum.ru/; www.eastview.com/; www.public.ru/. www.nns.ru/; www.panorama.ru/; www.cityline.ru/politika/; allrus.info; www.rfefl.org and www.friends-partners.org. Laver, ‘Government Termination’, p. 25. Arend Lijphart, ‘Measures of Cabinet Durability: A Conceptual and Empirical Evaluation’, Comparative Political Studies, 17, 2, July 1984, pp. 265 – 279; Eric C. Browne, John P. Frendreis & Dennis W. Gleiber, ‘The Process of Cabinet Dissolution: An Exponential Model of Duration and Stability in Western Democracies’, American Journal of Political Science, 30, 3, August 1986, pp. 628 – 650; Warwick, Government Survival in Parliamentary Democracies. Lijphart, ‘Measures of Cabinet Durability’; Carol Mershon, ‘The Costs of Coalition: Coalition Theories and Italian Governments’, American Political Science Review, 90, 3, September 1996, pp. 534 – 554. Richard Sakwa, Russian Politics and Society (London and New York, Routledge, 1993), p. 79. The cabinet of Mikhail Fradkov is the eleventh cabinet. The official title of the head of the Russian government was and has been the ‘Chairman of the Government’. ‘Prime minister’ is an unofficial title of the chief executive. Jean Blondel & Ferdinand Müller-Rommel (eds), Cabinets in Eastern Europe (Basingstoke, Palgrave, 2001), p. 196. Current Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov is included. Michael Laver & Kenneth A. Shepsle, Making and Breaking Governments (New York, Cambridge University Press, 1996). For a detailed exploration of this argument in a comparative perspective see Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, chapter 6. According to the 1993 Constitution, the president appoints and dismisses the cabinet, which is named the ‘highest organ of executive power’ in Russia. Komsomol'skaya pravda, 13 April 1999. Neil Robinson, ‘The Presidency: The Politics of Institutional Chaos’, in Neil Robinson (ed.), Institutions and Political Change in Russia (London, Macmillan, 2000), pp. 11 – 40. Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, chapter 5. Josephine T. Andrews, When Majorities Fail: The Russian Parliament, 1990 – 1993 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002), pp. 113 – 123. John P. Willerton, ‘Yeltsin and the Russian Presidency’, in Stephen White, Alex Pravda & Zvi Gitelman (eds), Developments in Russian and Post-Soviet Politics, 3rd edn. (Durham, Duke University Press, 1994), pp. 25 – 56 at pp. 33 – 39; Thomas F. Remington, The Russian Parliament: Institutional Evolution in a Transitional Regime, 1989 – 1999 (New Haven and London, Yale University Press, 2001), pp. 93 – 98. In October 1991 President El'tsin requested authority to form a government without approval by the parliament. The parliament agreed to give El'tsin powers he requested for a period of one year. The Duma votes on confirmation of the prime minister and on motions of no confidence in the cabinet. If the Duma rejects the president's nominee for the prime minister position three times in a row, the president dissolves the parliament. Terry M. Moe, ‘The New Economics of Organization’, American Journal of Political Science, 28, 4, November 1984, pp. 739 – 777. Mathew D. McCubbins, ‘A Theory of Political Control and Agency Discretion’, American Journal of Political Science, 33, 3, August 1989, pp. 588 – 611. Peter Aranson, Ernst Gellhorn & Glen Robinson, ‘A Theory of Legislative Delegation’, Cornell Law Review, 68, 1, November 1982, pp. 1 – 67; Morris P. Fiorina, ‘Group Concentration and the Delegation of Legislative Authority’, in Roger G. Noll (ed.), Regulatory Policy and the Social Sciences (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1985), pp. 175 – 196; David Epstein & Sharyn O'Halloran, Delegating Powers: A Transaction Cost Politics Approach to Policy Making Under Separate Powers (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 75 and 85. Iulia Shevchenko, ‘Who Cares about Women's Problems? Female Legislators in the 1995 and 1999 Russian State Dumas’, Europe-Asia Studies, 54, 8, December 2002, pp. 1201 – 1222. Iulia Shevchenko, The Central Government of Russia: From Gorbachev to Putin (Aldershot, Ashgate, 2004). Such circumstances accounted for the removal of the government of Mikhail Kas'yanov. See Aleksandr Osobtsov, ‘Yazyki za kremlevskimi zubtsami’, Rossiiskie vesti, 24 – 30 March 2004. President El'tsin as prime minister in 1991 – 92 is excluded. The figure also excludes chairmen of the council of ministers of the autonomous republics located on Russian territory who up to the end of 1993 were central government members ex officio. The current government of Mikhail Fradkov does not include women. Both total and interrupted averages are slightly lowered because the tenure of those seven ministers who continue in office in the Fradkov government is limited to February 2004. Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, pp. 86 – 92. Blondel & Müller-Rommel, Cabinets in Eastern Europe, p. 197. According to the 1992 Law on the Government, four so-called power ministers (foreign affairs, defence, security and internal affairs) were to be appointed with the Supreme Soviet's consent. This norm, however, was repealed as soon as the parliament was disbanded. If a dismissed minister is offered another ministry, different from the one he/she previously headed, such a reshuffle is counted as well. Resignations of ministers who then join a new cabinet to continue to head the same ministries are disregarded. Reappointments of ministers who preserved their positions in a new cabinet are disregarded. Gordon M. Hahn, ‘From Chernomyrdin to Kirienko’, Problems of Post-Communism, 45, 5, September – October 1998, pp. 3 – 16. John D. Huber & Cecilia Martinez-Gallardo, ‘Cabinet Instability and the Accumulation of Experience: The French Fourth and Fifth Republics in Comparative Perspective’, British Journal of Political Science, 34, 1, January 2004, pp. 27 – 48. Iulia Shevchenko, ‘Explaining Electoral Results: 1993 – 1996’, in Vladimir Gel'man & Grigorii V. Golosov (eds), Elections in Russia, 1993 – 1996: Analyses, Documents, and Data (Berlin, Edition Sigma, 1999), pp. 200 – 225. Edwin Bacon, ‘The Power Ministries’, in Neil Robinson (ed.), Institutions and Political Change in Russia (London, Macmillan, 2000), pp. 130 – 150. Nodari Simonia, ‘Economic Interests and Political Power in Post-Soviet Russia’, in Archie Brown (ed.), Contemporary Russian Politics (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 269 – 285 at pp. 274 – 275. Bacon, ‘The Power Ministries’. Eugene Huskey, ‘Overcoming the Yeltsin Legacy: Vladimir Putin and Russian Political Reform’, in Archie Brown (ed.), Contemporary Russian Politics (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 82 – 96. Up to the establishment of the presidency, the executive branch was altered by the parliament. In 1991 – 93 both president and parliament took part in government reorganisation. Since 1993 the executive branch has been altered by the president. Once appointed, the prime minister submits proposals to the president on the structure of the executive. The notion of ‘reorganisation’ includes abolition, alteration or a fall in the institutional status which leads to exclusion from the cabinet. See also Blondel, Government Ministers in the Contemporary World, pp. 171 – 172. Interior Minister Rashid Nurgaliev is excluded. There was a short break in Shoigu's ministerial career because from November 1991 to May 1992 his agency was attached to the presidential office rather than being an independent unit of the government. See also Jean Blondel, The Organization of Governments: A Comparative Analysis of Governmental Structures (London and Beverly Hills, Sage, 1982), pp. 146 – 148. The Presidium of the government was abolished in 2000. Eugene Huskey, Presidential Power in Russia (Armonk, NY, M. E. Sharpe, 1999), p. 109. See also Michael McFaul, ‘Why Russia's Politics Matter’, Foreign Affairs, 74, 1, January – February 1995, pp. 87 – 99. In the last decade of Soviet rule the Soviet government had 11 regular deputies and two first deputies. Article 8 of the law. The appointment of Fradkov as prime minister was not entirely in line with a political tradition because Fradkov was not a cabinet member. However, his post of Russia's envoy to the European Union was assigned ministerial rank. In Fradkov's cabinet Khristenko was appointed minister of industry and energy. In the spring of 2003 Matvienko became presidential envoy to the Northwest federal district and then won the early gubernatorial election in St Petersburg. The numbers of deputy premiers differ from the numbers given at the beginning of the section because some officials were promoted to a deputy premiership more than once. In January 1996 President El'tsin dismissed the agriculture minister and appointed deputy prime minister Aleksandr Zaveryukha acting head in his place. Zaveryukha performed the duties of agriculture minister until May 1996. Shevchenko, The Central Government of Russia. Warwick, Government Survival in Parliamentary Democracies, p. 4. Iulia Shevchenko & Grigorii V. Golosov, ‘Legislative Activism of Russian Duma Deputies, 1996 – 1999’, Europe-Asia Studies, 53, 2, March 2001, pp. 239 – 261. Carey et al., ‘Legislative Autonomy in New Regimes’; Morgenstern & Nacif, Legislative Politics in Latin America, pp. 415 – 419. Ezhenedel'nyi zhurnal, 15 March 2004; Vremya novostei, 10 March 2004.