Annotation

The present study attempts to critically analyse the most famous stereotypes about the federal structure that have developed in the world doctrine. From the standpoint of critical realism we analyse the liberal stereotypes characteristic of the world doctrine of federalism due to the influence of US ideological imperialism, which include the identification of federalism and democratic regime, attributing to federalism the goal of protecting human rights and freedoms, as well as the identification of federalism with maximum decentralisation of power. The problems identified in this way go considerably beyond the issues of federal structure and can be found in other elements of the matter of Russian constitutional law.