I’ve long argued that the legal manipulation carried out during the state’s theft of Yukos and other abuses of courts (see the spy-mania trials) by the Federation has had enormously negative implications for rule of law and development of the legal system. One of the clearest signs of this rapidly deteriorating independence of the judicial system is Russia’s dramatic rise in corruption and bribery. This fall international watchdog Transparency International ranked Russia 143 out of 180 in the Corruption Perceptions Index, while other indications and informal reports show that bribery continues unabated. Given the more recent high-profile extortion by the Russian government of energy companies like Royal Dutch Shell, BP, Imperial, and Russneft by regulatory authorities, there is also credible evidence behind the theory of “centralized corruption” – as officials willing to wet their beaks go higher and higher up in hierarchy, the Russian government becomes a “one-stop shop” for bribery (credit due to Laura Citron at nEUrosis for that one).