How do Russian leaders balance the need to decentralize governance in a socially and politically complex country with the need to guarantee political control of the state? Since the early 2000 s Russian federal authorities have arranged a system of political control on regional elites and their leaders providing a police control of special bodies subordinated by the federal centre on policy implementation in the regions. Different mechanisms of fiscal federalism and investment policy were used to ensure regional elites loyalty and this competitive authoritarianism created a politically...