Ratified December 12, 1993 Signatories Citizens of Russia | Location Moscow Kremlin | |
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The current Constitution of the Russian Federation (Russian: Конституция Российской Федерации, Konstitutsiya Rossiyskoy Federatsii; [kənsʲtʲɪˈtutsɨjə rɐˈsʲijskəj fʲɪdʲɪˈratsɨɪ]) was adopted by national referendum on December 12, 1993. Russia's constitution came into force on December 25, 1993, at the moment of its official publication, and abolished the Soviet system of government. The current Constitution is the most long-lived in the history of Russia, except for Stalin's constitution.
Contents
The 1993 Constitutional Conference was attended by over 800 participants. Sergei Alexeyev, Sergey Shakhray and sometimes Anatoly Sobchak are considered as co-authors of the constitution. The text of the constitution was inspired by Mikhail Speransky's constitutional project and current French constitution.
A constitutional referendum was held in Russia on 12 December 1993. Of all registered voters, 58,187,755 people (or 54.8%) participated in the referendum. Of those, 32,937,630 (54.5%) voted for adoption of the Constitution. It replaced the previous Soviet-era Constitution of April 12, 1978 of Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (which had already been amended in April 1992 to reflect the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the sovereignty of the Russian Federation), following the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis.
Structure
The constitution is divided into two sections.
Section One
- Fundamentals of the Constitutional System
- Rights and Liberties of Man and Citizen
- Federative system
- President of the Russian Federation
- Federal Assembly
- Government of the Russian Federation
- Judiciary
- Local Self-Government
- Constitutional Amendments and Revisions
Section Two
- Concluding and Transitional Provisions
Overview
Especially on human rights and fundamental freedoms, the Constitution provides for human rights and freedom of citizen according to the universally recognised principles and norm of international law as well as the Constitution and affirms that the listing in the Constitution of the Russian Federation of the fundamental rights and freedom shall not be interpreted as a rejection and derogation of other universally recognised human rights and freedom.