Prior to taking this coursera course, I had completed a course "The Canadian Policy Process" at a major Canadian University. Weeks 4-6 of this Russian Course touch on many of the same topics and theories as the Canadian course with respect to modern policy processes (NPM, deliberative democracy, citizen engagement, results-oriented etc) however the Canadian course was MUCH more in depth when explaining these topics. In fact, even though the Canadian course was a Master's level course and was geared towards students who were already employed in the public service, it did not take for granted that the students had any prior knowledge of the various institutions and forces that helped shape public policy. This Russian course, on the other hand, which is geared towards students with "no previous knowledge" spends very little time actually defining of the various concepts and little time giving real life examples of, for example, which NGOs are currently active in various policy circles in Russia. The lessons themselves, which are on average only 10 minutes long, are not nearly long enough to properly explain all of these concepts properly. The course does help to explain how NPM has been adopted by the RF while being tapered to fit contemporary Russian governance, however again, this could really be aided by properly explaining the concepts and how they are implemented. If not for my previous knowledge on some of these concepts I would have been very lost in certain modules.

I really did enjoy weeks 1-3 as I had very little previous knowledge of how the current Russian regime came to be, and found it very informative, balanced and interesting.

I enjoyed learning this course thanks to the professors.

It was really interesting and useful to study Russian Politics. Thanks for such opportunity! Good course!

This course provides possibility to learn basis of Russian policy, society and economy.