History of the issue
During Boris Yeltsin's presidency, there were several attempts to reform the civil service. In December 1991, the Chief Directorate for Civil Service Personnel Training was established, which developed a civil service reform concept and a number of draft laws. The Directorate, however, was disbanded after two and a half years. In July 1995, the law On Civil Service Principles in the Russian Federation was adopted. It was a framework law, which required numerous clarifications. In 1997, attempts at reform were continued by an expert group headed by Presidential Advisor Mikhail Krasnov. The group prepared 12 reform concepts however they were never realised due to frequent Government changes.
The Centre for Strategic Research, headed by German Gref, was developing reform strategies in 1999-2000. The Centre worked within the framework of the future President Vladimir Putin's election campaign. Civil service reform was part of Mr Putin's electoral programme.
In August 2001, Mr Putin approved the concept of the reform. For its realisation, a commission and a working group were formed, led by Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov and Deputy Head of the Presidential Executive Office Dmitry Medvedev, respectively. They prepared a programme for civil service reform to be executed between 2003 and 2005. It was adopted in November 2002.
In April 2003, the law On the Civil Service System, prepared under the supervision of Dmitry Medvedev, was adopted, replacing the 1995 law. Unlike the previous law, it established a division of state services into civil, military, and law enforcement segments; introduced a bureaucratic rank system instead of skill categories; and a competition-based vacancy filling system. On February 1, 2005, to realise the law, Prime Minister Putin approved the competition procedures for filling vacancies and the bureaucratic rank qualification exams, allowing fulfillment of the law.
