The article is dedicated to the conceptual framework for political analysis of municipalities at their «lowest» level of settlements. To achieve this goal the author presents the survey of existing theories (local government, city regimes, mediation and structuration, place in politics, locality) and operationalizes them for the smallest units of subnational politics. According to the article the settlement can be studied from three points of view. Firstly, the settlement is a local administrative unit, in Russia - municipality of the lowest level being subdivision of municipal rayon . Secondly, the settlement can be studied as a local political community. From this point the settlement becomes a political actor and not just an administrative unit acquiring qualities of political subject. In such cases settlements become the areas where specific political interests and/or identities are formed. However such developments are not necessarily confined to the administrative borders of settlements. Thirdly, the settlement is a possible area of local political regime. From this point we pay much attention towards local political actors such as interest groups, parties, bureaucratic groups, social movements etc. Their study has a great potential in Russia.

The article is devoted to the consideration of possible alternative development paths associated with increasing the role and weight of the local level of territorial organization and management in modern conditions. The authors considers this problem in the context of a controversial and crisis process of transforming established spatial and territorial hierarchies and making the management model more flexible and adapted to the needs of socio-economic development. Along with a number of new promising opportunities, a number of crisis phenomena at the local level of the territorial hierarchy is discovered. Its solution requires the search for new power-management models and strategies.

Russian Federation keeps one of the highest rates of regional inequality in the world which creates a great potential for political instability and regionalism. Regional social and economic inequality rose up after collapse of the Soviet Union and its planned economy. Attempts at smoothening if not erasing striking spatial differences were made in the course of both liberal reforms of the 1990 s and centralizing efforts done by president Putin. In this empirical study authors starts with analyzing the very magnitude of Russia’s spatial using variance coefficients and Gini indices for economic (gross regional product), financial (regional revenues), and social (people’s income) indicators. The research question is about the impact of post-Soviet institutional reforms and regional policies (in general and in relevant periods of time) on regional inequality in Russia. The main idea is to give in-depth analysis of institutional factors influencing spatial inequality in comparison with general economic factors. Using cross-correlation and regression analysis the author concludes about partial success of Putin’s centralization in terms of fixing economic spatial disparities at a certain level while reducing social disparities.

The paper analyzes the electoral statistics of the results of regional elections in Parliament and Governor in five regions of the Central Black Earth Region. Systematization of the data of the CEC of the Russian Federation allows comparing the results of voting at the level of district and territorial election commissions before and after the «party reform» of 2012-2014. The analysis records a decrease the level of participation in regional elections of the Central Chernozem Region, a decrease in the electoral activity of «city» voters, in comparison with the rural voters, greater support by the rural voters parties and candidates «from the authorities». Opposition parties and candidates in the observed period have insufficient electoral potential for full-fledged competition, with a tendency to reduce it. At the same time in 2017-2018 a decrease in electoral support of candidates «from the authorities» was recorded.

The article examines dynamics and factors of municipal models reforming in the municipal settlements of modern Russia. The author focuses on the cancelation of the municipal heads’ elections. The key analytical method is matching of the regional legislative regulation with financial and demographic statistics. The author study case of the Central federal district and reveal four groups of the regions with different practices of the elections’ cancellation. The main shift in this process occurred in the 2014, when regional legislatures massively passed laws regulating models of the municipal governments. The main factor influencing the specific of the regional legislative regulation was the budgetary strength of the municipalities. Generally regional governments were seeking for the control over the settlements with poor income or significant amount of the delegated government competences. In the other cases regions sought to control resources of the wealthy settlements. The small amount of the exceptions was tied with normally provided settlements without significant number of the delegated government competences

The article discusses some results of the implementation of the Russian reform of local self-government in the Saratov region, in particular, in this context, the experience of the formation and evolution of the local political regime at the settlement level. The basis of the study is the concept of «local political regime», the resource-factor approach to the assessment of relations in the region through «regional vs local» interactions.

Modern Russian legislation has not regulated inner city division since collapse of the Soviet Union. The set of the socio-economic factors demonstrated process of local communities’ destruction: changes of the cities’ social structure caused districts identities erosion and economy shifts decentralized the labor market, destroyed strong connection between citizens and their home area. However, legislative amendments in the 2014 created new municipality types - city district with inner division and inner-city districts. Big cities were supposed to decentralize their administrative models and increase citizens’ participation in the local governance, but only three cities used this possibility - Chelyabinsk, Samara and Makhachkala. The article examines experience of these cities with focus on the administrative competences, financial capabilities and level of the civil initiatives. The research results consist in the fact of decentralization fail and lack of the districts deputies’ institutional strength. In authors opinion, the reforms followed political purposes of the regional governments. However, this institutional model has at least three different perspectives of further applying. First of all, it could be one of the legislative alternatives for regulation of the agglomerative pro- cesses. The second option is providing with additional autonomy city districts with strong local identity. The last alternative is compromise variant in the case of settlements abolishment (new city district).

The study is devoted to the problem civil-political interactions' activation in local urban communities by conflict situations. Considered are theoretical aspects of the local communities participation in conflicts, the trajectories of their development in conflict and post-conflict periods. The methodological basis is used the principles of the conflict paradigm in social research, in particular, the necessity to analyze the subjective component in conflict relations. Are applied methods of observation, analysis the network communities’ activity, the case-study. As an empirical base is employed three conflict situations in Krasnodar, in which the local communities participation is clearly manifested. The specific participation’s features and consequences, their functioning peculiarities after the end of the conflict. The conclusion is made about the significance of the conflict for the formation of a civil-political subjectivity of local communities in the field of urban policy. Their long-term activation also depends on factors not directly related to the conflict, such as the level of community heterogeneity, participation in network relations, the presence the civic activists’ core, and the variety communication’s channels.

The main results and conclusions on attitudes of the Russian youth in the sphere of civil and political online activity collected with the all-Russian research are shown. The author analyzes the Russian young generation attitudes to various types of civil and political network participation, measures the assessment of youth problems related to the content destabilizing the socio-political situation in society distribution. Positive attitudes of the Russian youth regarding digital volunteering / volunteering, as well as the possibilities of implementing online electoral behavior are revealed. The paper presents empirical evidence of the skeptical attitude of the Russian young generation to online political advertising, the development of online political associations and online political talk shows. The differentiation of attitudes of young people of the Russian Federation in relation to online forms of political and civil participation, depending on the type of strategy of professional adaptation. The specific characteristics of network political and civil participation of so-called «idealists», «pragmatists» and «traditionalists» are analyzed. The distinctive features of the implementation of political and civil participation of online students in comparison with students and graduates are shown.

The article examines the stability of electoral support of political parties and candidates on subnational elections in Moscow. This study investigates the dynamic of voter turnout on different levels and types of elections, as well as the stability of the reproduction of electoral voting patterns based on a comparative analysis of federal, regional and municipal campaigns. The research covers the elections which took place between 2003-2018 in Moscow. The results of research suggest that the drop of voter turnout on subnational level of elections occurs due to a decrease of electoral support of «United Russia». The study also shows that opposition mobilization could be effective on the subnational level. Basically, the analysis showed that campaigns of mayoral election can be described by widespread pro-government mobilization in the absence of strong competitors to incumbent, or by consolidating the electorate of systemic and non-systemic opposition around an active opposition leader. Consequently, electoral authoritarianism is not able to restrain the protest mobilization in the existence of consolidation leader on the mayoral elections.

The article focuses on the reasons for Alternative for Germany electoral gains after 2015 migrant crisis and at the 2017 Bundestag elections. The author used the funnel of causality to interpret electoral behavior in Germany. Five German states (Lower Saxony, Baden-Württemberg, Hessen, Saxony and Bavaria) are compared based on historical development, political culture and citizens’ attitudes towards «the other». It is emphasized that some Germans have negative attitudes towards Muslim-migrants which are reflected in their electoral behavior. Statistics shows correlation between Muslim migration and AfD growth, economic growth within the states and xenophobic attacks against them. The reasons for the Russian Germans to vote for AfD (which sees the Russian Germans as the core electorate) are outlined. The author concludes that disagreements within the CDU party, Muslim migration, the Germans’ desire to preserve their identity and the Russian Germans’ longing for a comprehensive integration in the German society advances AfD electoral success.

The aim of the study was to research the mechanisms of recruitment, processes of formation and allocation of the political elites of the settler local government in Russia. In order to implement the issue a number of expert interviews with representatives of the elites of three Voronezh region districts (Semiluksky, Novousmansky and Bobrovsky) were conducted. Along with that a biographical analysis of the current deputy corps and heads of administrations in settlements of the Voronezh region was held. As a result of the study, it was found that the conditions of accession to the ruling elites are more informal. There is a persistent tendency to the predominance of state employees among the deputies of the Soviets and heads of administrations. It was revealed the tendency to uneven distribution of power resources between the branches of power with a clear advantage of the administration and the head of the settlement.