On the anniversary of the Institute of the Presidency in Russia

Abstract

The article is dedicated to the thirtieth anniversary of the establishment of the Russian President o ce to be celebrated in 2021. Besides, in 2020, his immediate predecessors, the office of the USSR President, on the one hand, and the office of the Chairman of the RSFSR Supreme Council, on the other hand, would celebrate the same anniversary. the latter office is in its turn relative to the office of the USSR Supreme Council Chairman, first elected in 1989. Thus, three decades ago, our country was in the middle of the chain of events and measures aimed at transferring the functions of the head of state back to a sole leader.

The initial concentration of powers in the office of the President had been followed by a long sequence of constitutional and statutory amendments that involved significant expansion of his powers. Numerous changes had been proceeding in parallel through the following three decades. The transformation of the original concept of presidency manifested primarily in the shift of the RF President’s position within the system of separation of powers, as well as in the set of legal liability measures applicable to the President. However, in the bulk of changes in the constitutional arrangements that took place in 2020 one can see both the continuing trend to enhance the President’s position within the federal government and a recurrence to the ideas that used to be part of the original design of the USSR and of the RSFSR presidencies, but were rejected later on in the RF Constitution of 1993.

The documents reproduced below cannot be regarded as little-known or inaccessible. However, due to their high relevance, it seemed proper to reproduce their content, at least in abridged form.