The article analyze the basic tendencies in development of political sociology from 1995 to 2011. There role of leading sociologists P. Bourdieu, A. Giddens, S. M. Lipset and others in the development of political science in highlighted. The author shows features of a methodological choice in analysis of interaction of society and power.

A set of problems in the study of power in urban communities have been classified and discussed (which groups dominate in local politics, what are the bases and manifestations of their influence, how to study power in communities etc.) Special attention has been paid to the evolution of the aims and problems in the study of power in communities and modern research models.

The article examines how Russian social reality is organized as the institutional structure constituted on specific principles that for the most part are distinct from those of civil society. Contradictions between tendencies of social integration and societal disintegration result into the fragmentation of political order. The competing pattern of formal-informal interaction emerges from patrimonial dominance-submission. While the latter is illegal it remains to be legitimate because in usual practices personal relations are of great importance: they are accepted in most cases not only in protecting civil rights, but also in resolving of conflicts with authorities. The discrepancy between the formal rules and practices which ought to be regulated by these rules will be constantly reproduced until the Russians elaborate and realize more or less successfully the strategies of civic activity aimed at the transformation of institutional structure. The reorientation from civic participation to civic activity is essential for this transformation.

Based on the data of Russian regions on the 1996 presidential elections this article provides the evidence that the incumbent is able to maximize the electoral support due to monopolistic access to state resources which may be converted to the patronage goods. Though the most influential approaches treat patronage as form of particularistic goods supplied to voters under conditions of monitoring and punishment, the author argues that public goods distributed for political loyalty may also be considered as patronage. Therefore the regional budgets' welfare spending is the best way to trace the effect of incumbent's spending on voters' behavior.

The article submits the results of the qualitative (ethnographic) sociological research, devoted to the study of the contribution of self-organizing to keeping up the quality of the life of citizens during the period of crisis. The author describes one of the essential characteristics of existence of social movement - the strength (durability) of the social ties, concerned as the combination of dynamics of the development and self-organizing effect.