Politics

How the state is set up

Russia is a federal republic with a president, a government, a parliament and courts. The parliament has two chambers, the State Duma and the Federation Council.

In practice power is very concentrated in the executive, and there are strong limits on the opposition and press freedom. International groups and observers talk about this a lot.

Read with context

To understand it, it helps to separate the formal constitution, how institutions really work, and what different sources say about them.