Vyacheslav Volodin

Vyacheslav Viktorovich Volodin (, ; born 4 February 1964) is a Russian politician who currently serves as the 10th Chairman of the State Duma (since 5 October 2016). He is a former aide to President Vladimir Putin. The former Secretary-General of the United Russia party, he was a deputy in the State Duma from 1999 until 2011 and from 2016 to present day. From 2010 until 2012, he was Deputy Prime Minister of Russia. He is also a former first deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Administration of Russia. He has the federal state civilian service rank of 1st class Active State Councillor of the Russian Federation. Volodin engineered Putin's conservative turn in his third term. He is part of Putin's inner circle. Early life and education Volodin was born 4 February 1964 in the village of Alexeyevka, Khvalynsky District, Saratov Oblast, in a large family. His father was the captain of the river fleet; he died at the age of 51 in 1969. After the death of his father, he was brought up by his stepfather. His sister is an employee of a consulting firm, and his brother is a military pensioner. All of them, according to Volodin himself, live in the Saratov Oblast. His mother graduated from the Saratov Pedagogical College. After completing her studies, she refused a job assignment to Leningrad and remained in her native region, because she did not want to leave her elderly mother alone. She worked as a primary school teacher in a rural school. Volodin graduated in mechanical engineering from the Faculty of organization and technology of the Saratov Institute of Mechanization of Agriculture in 1986, and then in law from the Russian State Service Academy under the President of the Russian Federation in 1995. He obtained a Ph.D. in law from the Interior Ministry's St. Petersburg Institute in 1996 with a thesis entitled, "A Russian Constituent Entity: Problems of Power, Law-making and Administration." He worked as a lecturer and assistant professor while he studied in Petersburg.