Policy elites of Russia's multiethnic regions: a social portrait

He study of Russian elites is one of the urgent topics of post-Soviet political science. The numerous works of domestic and foreign authors, as well as the emergence of a separate research direction “Elitology” has become the result of the growing interest to this social group. Along with the federal political elite, the researches study regional elites. The subject of research is the functioning of the group, standing at the top of the social hierarchy, as well as its social portrait, the features of recruitment, and system of values. The latter due to its particular importance and insufficient coverage, are of the greatest interest. Taking into account this fact, we analyze one of the key elements of a social portrait of the studied social group - the level of education. One of the first overall studies of republican political elites we carried out in 2009-2010, during the survey 618 representatives of executive, legislative and municipal authorities of the republics of Buryatia, Sakha (Yakutia), Tyva were interviewed (576 questionnaires were analyzed). In addition to the questionnaire survey, we also conducted expert interviews in three studied regions of Russia. Within the framework of the study, based on the analysis of biographical documents, we identified and systematized the types, places of education, and training programmes of the representatives of republican political elites, as well as information about their academic degrees. In the article, we also focused on the correlation between the level of education of political elites and the pace of development of the Russian state.