Toward a constitutional project by the Institute for Global Reconstitution (IGREC)

The gradual transition of post-Soviet Russia from a constitutional, legal state to a so-called “authoritarian regime” has successfully done away with most of the principles of constitutionalism, such as the separation of powers, rule of law and limits on sovereign power.

Russia is not unique in this sense. We are witnessing a spectacular failure of the so-called  “transition” and “democratization” announced in the 1990s. Most of the new constitutions written since the fall of the Soviet Union have been transformed into more or less monarchic regimes, with the exception of the countries admitted into the EU and those aspiring to membership (such as Ukraine and Moldova), with Georgia and Armenia being unstable outliers. Moreover, liberal constitutionalism is on the retreat even in countries with older constitutions such as Israel and Turkey.

There is therefore a demand among the political opposition to Russian authoritarianism to reimagine the future of Russia after the inevitable collapse of the personalist monarchy through the lens, again, of a constitution. Modern constitutions are, apart from their other functions, utopian visions later accepted to serve as retrospective testaments. What could an alternative Russian constitution look like?

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