In what ways has the central control of the government expanded in Russia since 2000? Respond in at least two sentences.

During the Soviet era the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic (the R.S.F.S.R.) was subject to a series of Soviet constitutions (1918, 1924, 1936, 1977), under which it nominally was a sovereign socialist state within (after 1936) a federal structure. Until the late 1980s, however, the government was dominated at all levels by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, which was all-powerful and whose head was the country’s de facto leader. Indeed, in the elections that were held, there was only a single slate of candidates, the great majority of whom were in effect chosen by the Communist Party.