Education policy in the field of legal studies: the constraints of development of capable of policy design

Level of government knowledge

Already in 1920-es, all scientific and analytical work was stopped and replaced by ideological studies. In 1929, the party organs demanded to involve all of scientists and teachers in an active socialist construction. In this connection, the ideological control over the pedagogical science was growing. In 1970, the Research Committee on Sociology of Education was created, it even implies the international cooperation with East Europe (Astafev & Shubkin, 1966).Moreover, Soviet Sociological Association was established in 1958, it was an association bringing together social scientists, working in the Research Institute of the USSR Academy of Sciences and branch institutes. It had sociological laboratory, university professors working there. There were presented people from the party apparatus that were engaged in ideological work. (Astafev & Shubkin, 1966).Such sciences as statistics and mathematics were also under control of Communist party. The real number was not important. The country needed non-real numbers for promoting welfare. In fact, there was a lack of real numbers about different situation, for example there were no data about potential requests of labor market for lawyers (Saraphimov, 1979). However, the government had the numbers in terms of the amount of students that should be studied and graduated. The government controlled the general amount of students that was enrolled at law faculties and amount of students that was graduated. Also, the number of professors and their ranks were under control.The only one center of political and administrative power in Soviet Russia, which had a monopoly on unconditional acceptance of all the strategic decisions, was the Communist Party.The level of governmental knowledge shows us the knowledge not only about the problem itself, but also it encompasses the knowledge about the different policy alternatives and policy tools. In conditions described above, it was impossible to develop and discuss appropriate policy alternatives and instruments.

Policy capacity in the Soviet Union

In order to analyze policy capacity (see table 12), which is crucial element for design and non-design policy formulation spaces, we take the Howlett approach, where he defines policy capacity as the set of skills and resources--or competences and capabilities--necessary to perform policy functions (Wu, Ramesh, & Howlett, 2015). Thus, we make analysis according to the table 4 from the chapter one, which give us opportunity to analyze policy capacity through nine components. We start from the analytical capacities at the individual level that deals with public officials at the governmental bodies. According to the theory, «all governments need a significant number of officials with a modicum of analytical capacity, defined as the ability to access and apply technical and scientific knowledge and analytical techniques» (Wu, Ramesh, & Howlett, 2015). Thus, at the individual level, we analyze typical officials that were personnel of the Ministry of Higher and Secondary Special Education of the USSR that was responsible for the education. In particular, there was a body called the Main Governance of Universities and of Economic and Legal Higher Educational establishments that was in charge of training and educating of professional lawyers. We suggest that officials of those bodies were not capable of performance of deep analytical work. Their main objective was to perform all tasks according to the ideological approach.Theory says about the organizational level that governments and their agencies also must have some organizational-analytical capacity, it means that there should be an efficient information system for collecting and disseminating information within and across public sector agencies. In the other words, there should be machinery and processes for collecting and analyzing data (Wu, Ramesh, & Howlett, 2015). In our analysis, we assume that there was low capability in data collection, because of the lack of software and hardware for analysis in state bodies.Systemic-analytical capacity is defined as the general state of scientific, statistical, and educational facilities in a society which allows policy makers and workers to access high quality information to carry on their analytical and managerial functions (Wu, Ramesh, & Howlett, 2015). It is hard to find the world university rankings that would include USSR higher educational establishments, however we found the Educational index, which equals 0.576 in 1980 and 0.619 in 1985(see graphic 1). For comparison, in the same years, Education index in US was 0.790 and 0.805 respectively, in UK, it was 0.608 and 0.622, in Switzerland, it was 0.678 and 0.675, in Netherlands, and it was 0.667 and0.686. However, in France and Italy the indexes were even lower that in the USSR, it was 0.543 and 0.571 in France and 0.542 and 0.556 in Italy. Thus, we see that the level of educational capacity was not very low in comparison with some European countries, but at the same time, it was not at the highest level.(«Education index | Human Development Reports», 2016). Moreover, there was not any policy advisory system, especially there could not be such advisory organizations outside the government.

Graphic 1 Education index 1985 and 1980

At the individual-managerial level, the authors take in consideration the ability of individual managers to perform key managerial functions such as strategic management, communication, negotiations, conflict resolution. In our case, workers were getting plans and they had to fulfill it, moreover all their work depended on the state order. As failure to fulfill plan was a serious misconduct and could result in serious consequences for the entire department, we believe Soviet official had well-developed managerial function, they could coordinate and communicate with each other, however as there was a strict order, probably they could not use techniques of conflict resolution.Organizational-managerial capacity tells us about the internal organization of public agencies the political-institutional environment within which managers and other officials work. The system of governmental agencies in terms of education, in particular legal was well established. The main body that was functioning long time during Soviet period was the Ministry of Higher and Secondary Special Education, this ministry was coordinating its work with governmental bodies in republics of the USSR. Moreover, legal education was partly under control of the Ministry of Justice of the USSR. In addition, we have already mentioned a special body called the Main governance of universities and of economic and legal higher educational establishments. All these bodies were coordinating with each other in order to implement policy, and all of them were under control of the Communist party.Systemic-managerial capacity or governance capacity is about coordination of governmental and non-governmental efforts to address collective problems. In this case, we can say that there was no inclusion of non-governmental actors in the policy process. Moreover, governance capacity includes adequate fiscal system to fund programs and projects. Thus, we say that the percent of education expense from national income was quite high. It was 6.8% in 1970, 6.7% in 1980, 6.6 in 1985, and 7.4% in 1988 ("Федеральный образовательный портал ЭСМ", n.d.). Political dimension starts from political acumen capacity, which implies political knowledge and experience, it means that individual policy actors should be able play effective role in policy process. In our case, managers has ideological approach, they understand the interest and position of only one stakeholder, which is Communist party. Thus, judgment of political feasibility depends on the ideology. Speaking about the political resource capacity, we pay our attention at the relationships of government structures with public and attitude of other politicians towards particular policy. In USSR, the Communist party was the only one party, so all agencies were under its control and thus all it could enjoy all political support. However, the public could not monitor the government's activities as the government does not invite public to participate in policy process.The last component of policy capacity is legitimating capacity that is shaped by the level of public trust and public participation. In USSR, public did not participate in policy process. Moreover, the system was absolutely non-transparent. However, there was a high level of public trust, because the major part of society was under the influence of ideological brainwashing.

Table 12 Policy capacity in USSR

Legal Education Policy process in Soviet Union is influenced very much by ideology that is why government intention absolutely depends on ideology needs. Moreover, ideology penetrates into the level of governmental knowledge and policy capacity and creates there drawbacks that hard to overcome.

3.2 Constraints of Russian Education Policy in legal studies in 90-es

First of all, we have to say that the system of policy actors in comparison with Soviet times completely has changed. State education policy in Russia started to be defined by the decisions of the new legislative and executive authorities. Nowadays, llegislative power is represented by the State Duma, the Federation Council, which are the houses of the Federal Assembly and take part in law making process in terms of education policy. The State Duma is the lower house of the Federal Assembly of Russia (legislature), its main activity is to adopt decrees on issues relating to its authority. The State Duma includes in its structure Education Committee, the main task of which is the preparation of law drafts in terms of education. Another legislative body is the Federation Council that also plays important role in education policy. The Federation Council is the upper house of the Federal Assembly of Russia, in terms of legislation, this body approves or rejects law that is adopted by the State Duma. The Federal Council includes the Committee of Education, Science and Culture. This committee engaged in monitoring of realization of provisions of Federal Laws.The executive branch is represented by the highest collegiate federal executive body, which is the government. The Government develops and implements the unified state policy in the sphere of education and science, also develops measures of state support for the development of science and education. The government consists of ministries, services and agencies.Thus, different state bodies were in charge of higher professional education policy, they were changing actively during 1990-es. The first executive body that was engaged in issues of higher professional education was the Ministry of Science, Higher Education and Technical Policy of Russian Federation. It was created in 1991 and was existing until 1993 and was reorganized into the Russian Federation State Committee for Higher Education. The committee was existed until 1996. During this time, the issues of school education were under control of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation, which was created in 1991. In 1996, there was created the Ministry of Education and Science by merger of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation and the Russian Federation State Committee for Higher Education that existed until 1999. Then it was renamed into the Ministry of Education. In 2004 it was renamed again into the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation.The President is the highest official that has a wide range of powers, including education field. He has the power to approve the list of federal state educational institutions of higher education,which have the right to implement educational programs on the basis of educational standards and requirements established by them independently. Also president has the right to establish measures and requirements for the development of education in the country. The president signs law passed by the State Duma and approved by the Federation Council, and also has a veto on these laws. He issues legal acts in the field of education in the form of decrees and orders.As we see, the whole political system was reorganized, the same happened with educational system.This stage of development of professional education in legal field is linked to the reform of the entire higher education in the RSFSR. The following acts were approved: Decree of the President of the RSFSR (1991) «On Priority Measures for the development of education», Law of Russian Federation (1992) «On Education»(Ostapovich & Musinov, 2014) and Law of Russian Federation «On Higher and Postgraduate Professional Education» (1996). The whole educational system needed reorganization.

Level of government formulation intentions

Against the background of the fast changing situation, and the crisis situation that surrounding the Russia Federation in 90-es, the government could not have rational intentions in terms of education of qualified lawyers. The governmental intentions were quite non-instrumental as it has to meet politically-driven goals. The government wanted to work new system and for this purpose it needed people that could secure this work, however the level of their education quality was not important during that times.The job distribution stopped to exist in the early 1990es together with the obligation to accept a three-year state posting. Law student became free in choosing their own jobs. In the early 1990es, the growth of private sector created a strong demand for lawyers, excellent employment opportunities were opened. The system was demanded not only the bigger number of lawyers, not another quality of lawyers, they should have different skills and knowledge about the functioning of new types of institutes of law. The demand for lawyers has been particularly intense in the business - both public and private, and the potential of the available of higher education network was insufficient: by the number of law students of the USSR and Russia lagged behind the developed countries. (Popova, 2014).That times, many law students started to have part-time jobs in private sector that became far more lucrative than full-time career position in state bodies. According to the State Committee of Higher Education, in 1995 graduates of public and private schools in Russia filled only half of the positions available the state sector. The reason is the low salaries in the state sector, entry level salaries are usually lower from 10 to 20 percent of those in private sector. The most popular jobs in private sector are positions on Russian offices of foreign firms, banks, insurance companies. Together with the development of private sector the number of full-time jobs in private sector is growing. Against such background of growing need of lawyers, law schools faces challenges in improving education and training many more legal professionals, while education budget stagnate. (Sahlas & Chastenay, 1998). The state economical troubles could also be considered as contextual constrain for capable policy design. In such situation, the first change that affected the educational system in very radical way was the abolishing of state monopoly on the governance and establishment of educational bodies. In this connection, there was created a large amount of private institutions that provided legal education for future professionals. The number of private institutions was growing very fast, thus it was about 334 private institutions in Russia by 1999(ABA/CEELI, 2003).Opening of private educational establishments brought some positive aspects in the educational system. The lack of state financial resources for the development of education was not so hard problem in conditions of the necessity of new lawyers, because private institutions could provide education for the big number of people interested in it. Since 1992 new private law schools began to offer programs emphasizing training for private sector. These range from two to four years; the four-year programs closely resemble those of public universities, but they are oriented towards the practical application of legal knowledge and development of related skills (Sahlas & Chastenay, 1998). Such private institutions, suggested new courses that were oriented towards the development of skills that are demanded in conditions of market economy. The state institutions were not flexible in terms of innovations, the private institutions, on contrary, enabled the introduction innovations in educational process.However, wide spreading of private institutions also brought some problems as very soon it became obvious that there were graduated too much lawyers, especially poor qualified. Moreover, some private institutions did not have enough places for studies, libraries and there even were not enough teaching staff. Many of the core courses offered by the private universities were taught by university professors hired on a part time basis. Thus, no private school has been able to assemble the range of resources available in public system (Sahlas & Chastenay, 1998). By the way, the big part of private and even state institutions was aimed at the earning of profit that is why they did not pay much attention at the quality of education. Weak market economy could not balance the demand and supply of lawyers at the market, because of that many lawyers became unemployed and some started to be engaged in jobs that requested lower qualifications that those that were receiving at the law faculty. Thus, it was irrational use of human and financial resources. Law level of legal education resulted in low level of public trust in law and legal profession. However, the lack of adequate information at the market allows weak private institutions to be prosperous, while more equipped institutions can not be a part of educational process.Nevertheless, as new system was not controlled by ideology, the government tried to produce some instruments for control of the level of education. By the laws of Russian Federation (1992) «On Education» and «On Higher and Postgraduate Professional Education» (1996), the government established the system of licensing. License is a kind of permission for implementation of educational activity. Educational institute should apply to the state body and then it conducts an expertise. The application should include the list and description of offered programs and courses, the information about the infrastructure of the institute, the information about the availability and quality of libraries, information about the professional staff and their scientific ranks, the information about the financial recourses. Then, for conduction of expertise, there creates a group of experts that composed of different members such as state officials, municipal body officials that are in charge of local education. The group of experts visits the institute that applied for licensing and checks whether it fulfills the needed conditions or not.The process of licensing is aimed at the giving permission only to those universities that are able to perform and provide high quality educational services, however because of some weak organization of the licensing process, poor quality universities remained at the market. The process of licensing suffers from the lack of transparency, strict conditions and objectivity. Moreover, the following access to the universities that already got the license and control over their activity was very poor and limited. Thus, it allowed existing of phenomenon called «one-day university», when the licensed university enrolled students, collected money for their studies and soon disappeared(ABA/CEELI, 2003).Because of that, the programs of the private schools do not lead to the diplomas equivalent to those earned through the state education. Universities anв government bodies generally refused to recognize the credentials of graduates of private law schools.Moreover, there were other instruments over the control of the activity of the universities, they were attestation and accreditation. Attestation is aimed at the evaluation whether the content, level and quality of studies of students and functioning of the university is in accordance with conditions of Sate Educational Standards. Until 2000, the Uniform State Standard of Higher Professional Education was used, which was approved by Decree of the Russian Government in August of1994 ("Постановление Правительства РФ от 12.08.1994 N 940 "Об утверждении государственного образовательного стандарта высшего профессионального образования", 1994). In 2000, the State Educational Standards of the first generation are approved by the Ministry of Education, in particular, there was created a State Educational Standards for the legal specialty. According, to this standard, the lawyer should know how to:

· interpret and apply the laws and other normative legal acts;

· enforce legislation in the activity of state bodies, individuals and legal entities;

· qualify the facts and circumstances in legally correct way;

· develop legal documents, to carry out a legal review of regulations, to give expert legal opinions and advice;

· take legal decisions and perform other legal actions in strict accordance with the law;

· establish the facts of offenses, define measures of responsibility and punishment;

· take the necessary measures to restore the violated rights;

· improve their professional knowledge, to study the legislation and legal scientific literature. ("030501 Юриспруденция. Государственный образовательный стандарт", 2000).

From this list of competences, we can understand that this kind of lawyer is favorable for the work in state bodies, but not appropriate for support of business transactions or for communication with client. There did not mentioned such competences as ability to negotiate, mediate, conduct dispute resolutions, to make policy or business analysis. Moreover, the State Standard suggests particular subjects: Foreign Languages, Russian History, Cultural Studies, Politics, Logic, Russian language and Culture of Speech, Sociology, Philosophy, Economics, Informatics and Mathematics, Concept of Modern Natural Sciences. As we see, this is the courses that are from the general part, mostly, there are very much theoretical, what is also bad, they are very broad. The lawyer at each specialization should have almost all this courses that do not give good and deep knowledge, only superficial. There is no subjects that could help lawyer to be an entrepreneur.The next part of State Standards includes legal subjects: Theory of State and Law, History of political and legal doctrines, History of domestic state and law, History of state and law of foreign countries, Constitutional law of Russia, Constitutional law of foreign countries, Civil law, Administrative law, Labor law, Criminal law, Criminal Law Proceedings, International law, Environmental Law, Land law, Roman law, Private International Law, Financial law, Russian municipal law, Family law, Law enforcement authorities, Legal psychology, Criminal executive law, Procurator's supervision, Russian business law, Commercial law. The international aspect is very poor, the comparative aspect is lacking, and we can not see deep cross-cultural interaction. Moreover, all subjects are very theoretical and do give poor practical legal skills. Again, all courses include a broad bulk of knowledge. Thus, as we see attestation is the main mechanism of education quality control and licensed educational institutions should undergo attestation according to the schedule drawn up by the Ministry of Education. Attestation consists of two stages, at the first stage, the educational institute should prepare self-analytical document that includes the aims of intuition, the information of infrastructure, about the quality of students and professional staff, about libraries, study courses and methodological plans. At the second stage, the group of experts visits the educational institutes and collects additional information. Members of expert groups can attend classes and interview students and professors. The quality of legal disciplines could be evaluated by special group of experts that would consist of professors or practicing lawyer that are appointed by the Ministry of Education. After all, the expert group sends the report to the attestation and accreditation department of the Ministry of Education. Then, department makes its decision about the attestation (ABA/CEELI, 2003). After getting licensing and attestation, the educational institute can apply for accreditation. Accreditation is a procedure as a result of which is the decision about the capacity to make educational activity. Educational establishment with accreditation receives the certificate with rank: university, academy, or institute. The procedures of attestation and accreditation have its weaknesses as well as the procedure of licensing. Sometimes, the educational establishment could receive attestation and accreditation because of good connections with members of expert group or with officials from the attestation and accreditation department or even because of bribe. In the other cases, the expert groups just did not pay much attention at the real quality of education because of the lack of time. These all lead to the fact that there were many institutions can not ensure appropriate level of legal education.

Level of governmental knowledge

After the dissolution of Soviet Union, new relationships started to emerge in the political system. New political groups with particular interests started to shape, they were connected with oligarchs, financial and industrial groups, the major banks. Some groups concentrated the large part of national resources within their possession, other groups became owners of administrative state resources, and thus particular social and political groups got the access to the policy making. The growing influence on the political decisions of such groups could be explained by two factors. Firstly, the state apparatus was quite weak and could not establish legal norms and sanctions obligatory for everybody. Secondly, the weak development of the civil society institutes could not enable the promotion of society interests. (Pavroz, n.d.). Against this, background, scientific and analytical centers that would represent the civil society became a new phenomenon in Russia. In 1987, there was created one of the research centers, called Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM). VTsIOM conducts marketing, social and political research, from instrument design and data collection to analysis and presentation of findings to the clients ("О компании ВЦИОМ", 2016). The center belongs to the state, because of that it was accused in researches by state order. The influence of other centers on the development of policy alternatives was insignificant. In addition, in 1994, the Public Chamber under the Russian President was created by decree of Boris Yeltsin. It included 250 representatives of public organizations: trade unions, creative unions, corporate organizations, business associations, religious groups ("Общественная палата: инструмент власти или общества?", 2005). However, its effectiveness of its activity was also under the question. Thus, the government remained still the dominant in policy formulation spaces with limited level of knowledge.

Policy capacity

In this part we are going to assess the policy capacity in 90-es in Russia in terms of education policy, in particular in legal field (see table 13). We start with analytical capacity at the individual level, which became more develop in comparison with Soviet times. According to the governmental decree from 1992, the Ministry of Science, Higher Education and Technical Policy of Russian Federation had the following responsibilities:

· Design and implementation of the state scientific and technical policy;

· Organization of scientific and technological forecasting;

· An accelerated transition to market relations mainly in the field of research and innovation;

· Promotion of the development of various forms of innovation entrepreneurship;

· Creation of conditions for the development of fundamental research;

· Organization of international scientific and technological cooperation;

· Implementation of the state policy in the sphere of legal protection of intellectual property, development of research and innovation;

· Funding for research and development activities ("Нормативно-правовые акты Российской Федерации Министерство юстиции", 1992).

Therefore, we see that activity of this body is not only the control over the content of study plans and programs, publishing study and methodological materials, control over the teaching staff, it also includes such activity as forecasting. It means that officials working there should have analytical skills in order to make forecasts. Moreover, the Ministry deals with innovations and is aimed at international cooperation. We believe that this international cooperation includes not only connections with East European countries, but also with other countries.

However, despite the improvements of analytical capacity, analytical techniques still are not developed enough. Officials still have Soviet education with ideological background.Moving to the technical capacity, we should say that the capability of data collection was improved, however, there still was a lack of software and hardware for analysis.Systemic-analytical level implies the presence of policy advisory systems and the general state of educational and research availability. According to the Education index, during 90-es Russian education system was in the state of stagnation. The index was 0.660in 1990 and 1995 (see graphic 2). However, in comparison with Soviet Union period, the index became higher. It grows from 0.619 in 1985 to 0.660 in 1990. Nevertheless, if USSR had the average place comparing with other countries, the Russian Federation has weak position. By the way, during 90-es no one Russian University was in the world ranking of universities.However, the appearance of VTsIOM shows that government need to conducts marketing, social and political researches that could help to shape policy instruments.

Graphic 2 Education index in 1990 and 1995.

Managerial capacity became very much important at the individual level, however managers do not have enough practical skills in terms or communication, negotiation or dispute resolution, thus they have to develop managerial capacity at their work place.Administrative capacity probably is not established well, because during 90-es as we have already described several state bodies controlled higher education, they were the Ministry of Science, Higher Education and Technical Policy of Russian Federation; the Russian Federation State Committee for Higher Education; the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian; the Ministry of Education. During 10 years, the state body was reorganized and restructured three times, thus we can not say about good level of intra- and inter- agency communication and coordination. The reformation tells about non-efficiency of agency that was in charge of higher education.Governance capacity is aimed at the coordination of governmental and non-governmental attempts to resolve particular problems. As we have been discussing, the government started to attract so called social organization that suppose to reflect the position of society. Thus, in 1994, there was created the Public Chamber under the Russian President. Moreover, in 1992, there was set up another organization that had direct relation to the legal education. It was the Youth Union of Russian Lawyers. This organization included the young law-students from the Russian leading universities. Moreover, this union had close relationships with the government ("Молодежный Союз Юристов РФ", 2002). We believe, this is the reason of its survival throughout the years, it reflects mostly not interests of society, but mostly political interests. Thus, the government supports only those organization that reflects those political interests that are important and appropriate for it, however, organization that oppose governmental intentions are under the persecution.

Political acumen capacity reflects the idea that individual policy actors should also play effective role in policy process. In our case officials understand the positions and interests of different stakeholders including society and state. However, they do not have opportunity to change situation according their evaluations. Thus, they can not play an effective role in policy process.The next component is political recourse capacity that implies the attempts of government to attract public to collective problems. In 1980-1990, the civil activity of public was quite high, there were created a lot of non-governmental organizations. There were registered such NGOs as Memorial (1989), Moscow Helsinki Group (It was created in 1976, but restarted its activity in 1989), For Human Rights (1997). There also were opened some international non-governmental organizations such as Greenpeace, Amnesty International. The activities of civil society organizations did not meet any serious resistance from the state. But the real support for the civil society from the state also did not provide. Thus, in the middle of 90-es, the civil activity of society has reduced ("Последние 30 | ГРАЖДАНСКОЕ ОБЩЕСТВО | Мнение -- Свобода снизу: развитие гражданского общества в России", 2015).Legitimation Capacity reflects the level of public participation in policy process, as we seen above it surely was improved in comparison with Soviet regime. However, the in reality public could not make significant impact at the policy-makers and policy process. Thus, the level of public trust was low, despite the attempts of government to act in frameworks of the rule of law. Moreover, there was a problem of non-transparency from the state side.

Table 13 Policy capacity in 90-es in Russia.

If we compare 90-es and Soviet period, we can see that policy capacity and level of governmental knowledge have risen significantly. The governmental intentions also stopped being so strict because of removal of ideological constrain, however the governmental intentions still are driven by political interests rather than policy interests, thus it sifts less than level of knowledge and policy capacity

3.3 Constraints in Education policy in legal field in 2000-es

Level of government formulation intentions

After the dissolution of Soviet Union, the policy legacy played a significant role. Mostly, it concerns the process of education and the traditional view at the role of lawyer. As to the process of organization, we saw that legal studies give a lot of theoretical and doctrinal information. As it was in Soviet times, examines were passed orally, the main preparation for examination was memorizing of the large bulk of knowledge. Such approach precludes the development of analytical skills that are needed in conditions of globalization. Therefore, contemporary legal education can not give sufficient analytical skills as well as practical lawering skills. It is happening because the system of education still is not changed. The majority of classes are lectures and the seminars are just the repetition of theoretical knowledge. The internships, mostly, are formal and allows student only to observe.Moreover, the presence of correspondence programs also connected with Soviet times. But those times, at the correspondence programs could study only students that have work in legal field. Nowadays, there are a lot of students that do not work at all, it can say it is study for non-hard-working students, because of that the level of preparation is very low.However, the main constrain on education policy comes from the Soviet times idea that defined the role of lawyer. As it was already discussed above, lawyer was seen as one of the most important sources of replenishment of the Soviet nomenclature. And law itself was considered as an appendage to the state. With abolishment of ideological approach to the state, the situation supposed to be changed. However, we can see the continuation of such traditional approach, where lawyer is seen as a part of state system.In the interview at the radio station «Commersant FM», the Minister of Education, Livanov said «… the higher education institutions - public, private, headaches universities, and branches - will work only on the condition when all requirements of the federal educational standards are met» (Livanov, 2016). It means that the study and the image of the lawyer is controlled by the government, because of the presence of such obligatory state standards, while there are not at the state level such obligatory standards in Europe. However, in Russia, in accordance with Federal State Standards, some state universities can generate their own standards. Thus, we can surely say that goals of education policy, in particular in the legal field are politicized, what makes the government intention less instrumental. During the meeting with law students devoted to the Day of Lawyer, in 2013, Putin admitted: «I would like to avoid the politicization, there are a lot of politicization, especially redundant, particularly in the humanities. Of course, it is impossible to avoid in the teaching of history and even law...» ("Встреча со студентами юридических вузов Москвы", 2013).During this meeting, students asked questions, thus, for example Natalia Moskalenko, a student of the fourth year law faculty of Moscow State Pedagogical University said: «In February next year, I am going to undergo internship. And as most of the students, I wondered where, in fact, I take it. Our university offered us a choice of about 15 places. However, after examining the list, I realized that, unfortunately, none of them fits me, because one part of them belong to such organs as the court, the prosecution, and the other part were bodies of criminal orientation, for example the Investigation Committee». It again proves the idea, that legal education is aimed at the work in state bodies. We can say that state has intentions to create lawyers as a «state servants», but the economy and society need lawyers will be able to work in private sector. People need advices from the lawyers that not only experts, but also has ability to communicate and can support the client. These important qualities the state do not develop. The state wants lawyers that knows the law norms and can ensure the functioning of such norms. From the one side, we see that Russia is included in the process of globalization, what is seen from the aspiration to participate in Bologna process. The tasks associated with the formation of European Higher Education Area and the assignment of European higher education's leading position in the world, largely attributed to the so-called Bologna process. This process is formally took shape after the signing of the Ministers of Education of 29 European countries in the Italian city of Bologna June 19, 1999 Bologna Declaration, the text of which was prepared by the governments of Britain, Germany, France and Italy after the 1998 conference at the Sorbonne - the University of Paris. It is believed that from this moment Europe has entered an era of universal and profound transformation of national systems of higher education. By the way, the main structural and conceptual transformation of the higher school in European countries began already in 70-80s, and was almost completed in the 90's of XX century. By present time, in the universities of almost all European countries multi-level training system and a system of comparable credits are successfully functioning, (credits) and the problem of mutual recognition of qualifications is solved. What we can not say about Russia (Chistohvalov, 2008).In 2007, there were amended two federal laws of the Russian Federation "On Education" and "On Higher and Postgraduate Professional Education" that adopted the transition of Russian universities at the education of Masters and Bachelor. The process of transition from the traditional five years study to four and two years is very hard for the Russian educational system, it met a lot of critics from the side of conservative professors. Nevertheless, in reality, there were a lot of difficulties associated with the transition: the universities did not know how to reshape the study plans in order to introduce new system. Moreover, there is a question where Bachelors and Masters can work, people wanted to understand the difference. Moreover, new educational system introduces the orientation at the competence-based approach instead of knowledge-based (Simaeva, 2012). The inclusion into the Bologna process should assist students to participate in international programs. However, in reality, the possibility to participate in students' mobility projects, in particular in the international exchanges is limited. From the one side, the majority of universities do not know how to implement the exchanges, how to organize them and how to make re- evaluation of disciplines in the host university, when the student comes back to home university. The exchange programs processes are well-organized only in the big cities, such Moscow and Saint Petersburg. Moreover, the number of student that can really participate in exchanges or double-degree programs is very limited because of lack of financial resources in the country. Moreover, there is a lack of motivation on the side of students, many students do not know why they should participate in international programs. Moreover, while the participation in such programs do not supported by additional financial resources, the students have to pay the transfer and accommodation and food by themselves. Surprisingly, the Russian government lunched the program «Global education» ("Государственная Программа «Глобальное образование», Официальный сайт программы «Глобальное образование»", 2016). The program implies that Russian government is going to finance the students that are going to study in foreign world leading university. The main condition is that student must to return back to Russia for further work. Livanov, the minister of Education says: «And if they refuse to do it [come back to Russia], they do not simply offset state costs and they pay twice the amount, thus there is a penalty» (Livanov, 2016). It means that Russian government decided to make high qualified specialists by the hands of foreign colleges.If Russian government can not allow to ensure the participation of all student in the international program, it should assist them to obtain competences in accordance with global trends in Russia.In 2013, the Russian Ministry of Education approved the Federal State Educational Standards of new generation for the Bachelor and Master degrees in legal studies (Федеральный Государственный Образовательный стандарт Высшего образования Бакалавриат, n.d; Федеральный Государственный Образовательный стандарт Высшего образования Магистратура, n.d). These documents show us what competences and where are demanded from the future qualified lawyers. For example, after the graduation, Bachelor students are going to be ready to be engaged in such kinds of activities as norm creating, law enforcement, law protection, expert and consulting. These activities correspond for the work in the state bodies, but are not sufficient for the work in private organizations, where student have to be more flexible in their functions. Moreover, capital economy requests students that are able to work, not only with legal documents, but also with different clients, which not only people, but also organizations. Master degree includes the same kinds of legal activities, but there are three more extra activity, they are organizational and administrative activity, research activity and pedagogical one. The government omitted such important activity as human rights work, which is very topical and needs special competences. This kind of activity is not favorable for the state. In 2013, at the meeting that was coincided with the Day of Lawyer, Putin said: «…rarely somebody never faced with the doctors, and very rarely, when someone does not confronted with the representatives of our profession, it is generally a very rare case. And when, because of the certain life situations, a person is facing with attorneys, investigators, prosecutors or judges, in fact, he entrusts his own destiny to these professionals» ("Встреча со студентами юридических вузов Москвы", 2013). From this quotation, we understand that the president implies under lawyers, mostly, servants of state bodies.However, the attitude towards education from the side of student themself plays very important role for policy process. For example in Europe, education is perceived more as educational service, the interest of student towards such educational services and interest towards educational process are personal his rights. The student has to evaluate the importance and necessity of education by himself. It shows that education is perceived as tool for rising personal competitiveness. In Russian tradition, we can not see the understanding of educational process as individually motivated process aimed the receiving of competences that will become the background for professional career and following career development, and as a result will lead to self-realization. In Russian tradition, state guarantees education from pre-school level to tertiary education. Thus, the majority of students is indifferent to the value of education and perceives it as prescription. Thus, there are academically mature, but practically not effective graduates, it means that it is impossible to transform knowledge-based model into competence-based only by administrative reform and renovation of Federal Educational Standards (Agashev & Grankin, 2014). However, the government continues to use legal instruments in order to achieve its goals in creation of lawyers as state servants. Existing legislation in the field of education has not systemic character both the federal and regional level, it suffers from lack of coordination of federal laws and laws of the Russian Federation subjects, and it contains internal contradictions and gaps. One of the reasons for the imbalance of the current state of legislation in the field of education is a violation of the principle of consistency in its development.Law of Russian Federation «On Education» was constantly being improved in conditions of the active reforming of the Russian society. Since its adoption in 1992, it was changed 73 times, the majority of amendments was in 2007 - 2010. A similar situation was happening with the Federal Law «On Higher and Postgraduate Professional Education» that was adopted in 1996, it was changed 51 times. In general, in the field of education, there are more than 50 federal laws. The norms regulating relations in the field of education include the Civil Code, Tax Code, Budget Code, the Labour Code, Family Code, Land Code. Realizing the right of lawmaking, a number of the Russian Federation subjects adopted special laws on education (Narutto, 2012). The biggest amount of regulation is considered at the level of federal regulations, mainly, it includes the Ministry of Education orders. During the period 2004 - mid-2011, the Ministry adopted more than 2442 normative legal acts. It is doubtful how Ministry of Education can monitor the performance of all its normative acts. By-laws adopted, primarily, not for future situations regulation, but for a specific situation that has already emerged and became problem, therefore they doomed to collisions and inconsistency within the system of education regulations (Narutto, 2012).Thus, as example, we can give the Presidential decree of 2009 «On Measures to Improve Higher Legal Education in the Russian Federation». This decree devoted particularly to legal education, what tells about the extraordinary situation in this field. The reason of adoption of this decree was uncontrolled growth of universities that produced low quality lawyers. However, the president do not have responsibility to control this situation, there are special bodies that should do it (Narutto, 2012).In 2012, there was adopted a new law «On Education» that has to replace Law of Russian Federation (1992) «On Education and Law of Russian Federation «On Higher and Postgraduate Professional Education» (1996). A number of the provisions of the law eliminates the gaps and removes the collisions contained in the current legislation (Narutto, 2012).We see, that there are some problems in terms of policy making in the field of education, however legislation in the field of education should develop in the direction of logical completeness, consistency and integrity.However, one more element that influence level of governmental intention, it is the presence of corruption in the sphere of higher education. The legal education is not an exception. Th...