CIAO DATE: 04/05

Democratic Transformation of the Security Sector in Russia: A Sad Saga of Failure

Abstract

The motto "Yet who could guard the guards themselves?" used as the epigraph is often quoted in academic and political literature on civil-military relations. Indeed, it consists of two questions in one; both of which related to the essence of democratic transformation of the security sector in post-totalitarian societies: firstly, whether civil institutions are able to "guard the guards", in fact to control military and law-enforcement agencies, and, secondly, whether these institutions are democratically formed or they are of authoritarian or totalitarian nature.

A democratic transformation of a security sector is an attribute and requisite of a successful transition from totalitarianism to democracy. The Hungarian analyst Reka Szemerkernyi noted quite rightly.

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