Has Putin strengthened the Russian state or merely reinforced a particular regime? Russia's condition and recent development are examined in the context of the succession struggles in post-Soviet Russia.

The parallels between contemporary Russia and the model of the patrimonial service state in which the state is the tsar's patrimony and he can use it as he sees fit without being accountable to anyone, a concept founded on the notion of power as property and the idea that the king's royal domain is indistinct from the state, are explored with attention paid to intra-elite power struggles, institutional changes leading to the current succession, and the development of state corporations.