The President and his ministers

Old cadres of Vladimir Putin are returning to the government

May 9 Victory Parade Sergei Shoigu received in the status of acting. defense minister. The government, which has been in place since 2012, was dismissed after the fourth inauguration of President Putin. There are currently no official decrees on new appointments. At the parade, Shoigu was nevertheless addressed as a comrade minister, which meant that formalities were no longer appropriate here. The constitutional procedure for the transfer of executive power in Russia has faded into the background, everything is decided by a system of non-public agreements.

On the one hand, this nullifies classical political analysis, which assumes that ministerial portfolios are divided depending on those groups of influence that dominate society. The procedure for appointing a government in May 2018 — and it’s not just about the Minister of Defense at the parade, of course — demonstrates that we didn’t actually elect anyone, and now no one is accountable to us. Why exactly these people will be responsible in the country for strategic "breakthroughs"? Because it's necessary. Personnel decisions are organized according to the model of the royal court, and not like modern public policy.

On the other hand, the non-procedural nature of the new government explains why many ministers of the 2012-2018 model are said to have found out about their absence from the new lists at the last moment. If you fall out of the indispensable and are preparing for an honorable retirement - for example, to transfer to the diplomatic service - you need to know about it no more than the rest of the citizens.

Finally, the informal nature of the appointment of the 2018 government explains why among the six new deputy prime ministers proposed by Dmitry Medvedev, we will not really see new faces - these will be people transferred from other fronts and the old guard. The right to appoint deputy prime ministers within the framework of the post-Soviet apparatus logic traditionally belongs to the president, and this time it was exactly like this: people who were honored and known to the president were nominated for these positions. There are no other significant criteria for the reappointment of representatives of the Russian political elite. In the absence of political institutions, President Putin has to literally rule the country alone.

Therefore, Dmitry Medvedev predictably retained his post - as a highly loyal, predictable person who favorably sets off figure number one.

The key appointment is related to the career growth of Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, who, being a typical representative of "systemic liberals", unlike his former colleague, Minister of Economic Development Alexei Ulyukaev, ended up not behind bars, but in the chair of First Deputy Prime Minister. The stability of the domestic financial system, which is noted by all Western analysts, even despite the technical devaluation of the ruble in 2014-2015, today remains the key real bond holding the Russian Federation. Again, predictably, there will be no Alexei Kudrin in the government - a man who is too independent. Nevertheless, experts rightly attribute the rise of Siluanov's role to his growing influence over President Kudrin. Geopolitics is, of course, good, but where to get the money?

Dmitry Kozak, who has been working under Putin for a long time, will no longer oversee the development of regions, but will strengthen himself to industry and energy. Thus, Kozak will assume the key functions of Arkady Dvorkovich, Medvedev's main creature in the previous government. Dvorkovich, in his own words, “was involved in everything in the government”, so that part of his powers will go to the former deputy of Sergei Prikhodko Maxim Akimov - he will take care of communications, the digital economy and transport in the government.

Prikhodko himself is also leaving his post as head of the government apparatus, and this looks like a direct reaction to the accusations from Alexei Navalny. Prikhodko's work did not imply public attention to his person, and in the changed conditions they hurried to remove him from under the spotlights. On the other hand, to show that the investigations do not affect our personnel policy, Vitaly Mutko was scandalously appointed curator of the construction industry.

Deputies in the Duma greeted Medvedev's proposal with laughter - but is the one who calculates the losses laughing?

A key element of the personnel policy was the return to the posts of Medvedev's formal deputies of the old cadres with whom Vladimir Putin worked - both during his first presidential terms and in the course of his duties as head of government. The main beneficiary of import substitution in the field of agriculture and seemingly omnipotent Alexander Tkachev risks becoming a subordinate of the Voronezh governor Alexei Gordeev, who will now oversee the agro-industrial complex in the government. Gordeev was the Minister of Agriculture for ten years - from 1999 to 2009.

Gordeev will be accompanied by the head of the Accounts Chamber, Tatyana Golikova, whose candidacy has long been discussed as a trump card for the new government. Golikova was also a minister in the government of Vladimir Putin, and is now returning to Medvedev's second cabinet with a promotion - as deputy prime minister, she will oversee the social sphere.

Apparently, there will be no more bloggers in the government, apart from Medvedev himself. In place of Dmitry Rogozin, who wrote a lot on Twitter, people who have made a career in the real defense industry are coming - Shoigu's deputy Yuri Borisov has received a key appointment here.

We can expect several more appointments already to ministerial posts, but the general logic of the rotations is already clear. The government of Dmitry Medvedev has a minimum number of people close to him.