Abstract

An analysis of the historical past is one of the ways of understanding of the present and the future. Evaluation of the past allows revealing that the Russian «statewas historically evolved as a personified one. Grand dukes, monarchs, general secretaries de facto were sole rulers, who subordinated the functioning of the political system to their interests. It has been found in the study that the basis for preserving the subjectivity of the autocrats and the non-institutionalization of other political actors in both tsarist and soviet Russia was a system of historically established mechanisms that ensured a «goodequilibrium (balance) within the framework of archaic politics. It has been noted in the article that the main mechanisms for monocentrism’s maintaining are of a patrimonial nature, which is closely connected with primordial values. The main directions of the preservation of the state monocentrism have been singled out: a) the strengthening of the power potential of the autocrat (the sacralization of the status and personality of the autocrat, identifying him/her with the Divine Viceroy or the representative of the whole population; provision to the sovereign ample opportunities to select elites and non-institutionalisation of «state bodies», clientelism, etc.); b) the weakening of elites (the formation of a conflict inter-elite space, the reproduction of the conflict between the elites («boyarsand «party nomenclature»), represented in «institutionsand the population, c) Sustaining the society at the pre-class level, while preserving its primitive organization - the sovereign and «the others(employees and officials); d) the use of repressive practices, censorship, which are aimed at the creation of a sense of fear among the population with its orientation toward serving the sovereign state as a guarantor of the integrity and stability of the system. These mechanisms are intertwined and complement to each other, contributing to the preservation of politics in its initially formed form. The conducted research broadens the nature the «Russian powerconcept, deprives it of the mythological core, and allows developing (borrowing from the general civilization paradigm) alternative mechanisms of Russian political management that orient the «stateto serving individuals and peaceful coexistence with various actors of the world political system.