Can a genuine opposition party appear in Russia in line with Medvedev’s proclaimed modernization?

Just after the adoption of the new Russian constitution in 1993, the Kremlin set about engineering a party system for sustaining its monopoly on power. This process, initiated by Boris Yeltsin, was furthered by his successor: Vladimir Putin devoted his two terms as president to reforming the party system so as to block free political competition and keep the opposition from playing an institutional role. The goal of an authoritarian modernization of the country was not achieved by the end of Putin’s second term; indeed, it is ever farther away. Once installed as president, Dmitry Medvedev sternly criticized the legacy bequeathed by his predecessor for its chronic backwardness and corruption, its primitive economy dependent on exporting raw materials and its ineffective system of governance. He declared that his presidency would conduct an in-depth modernization of Russia based, for the first time ever, on democratic values and institutions. He failed, however, to recognize that political modernization was a precondition for this. The prospects for the emergence of a genuine political opposition are analyzed through a retrospective analysis of the post-Soviet institutional context.