Class Rank: Past, Present. Future?

The phenomenon of ranks characterizes the national model of civil service and, more broadly, the relationship between government and society. In this paper we examine changes in the essence of class rank during its existence in the Russian civil service up to the present day. The study is interdisciplinary in nature and uses diachronic, comparative legal, retrospective, biographical, and statistical methods, as well as case studies. For the first time, materials from the funds of the State Archives of the Russian Federation (Moscow), Boris Yeltsin Presidential Center Archives (Yekaterinburg), as well as documents from personal archives are introduced. The results of archival research reflect different points of view on class ranks (qualification categories) during the debates over the Fundamentals of Legislation on Civil Service (1992–1993), the Regulation on the Federal Civil Service (1993), bills "On the Federal Civil Service" (1994–2001), "On the Fundamentals of Civil Service of the Russian Federation" (1994–1995), "On the System of Civil Service of the Russian Federation" (2002–2003), "On the State Civil Service of the Russian Federation" (2003–2004) and draft by-laws. The empirical study of the specifics of assigning class ranks to senior civil servants of federal ministries demonstrates a clear division there between career civil servants and political appointees, according to the model by Christopher Hood and Michael Lodge. The assigning class ranks varies across departments depending on the prevailing type of personnel policy. In conclusion we identify contradictions between the regulations and law enforcement, and propose ways to overcome them.