This section describes the internal outlook in Russia, which is important for the country’s future and may affect Finland. To the outside observer, Russia may look like a monolithic structure ruled by one individual, where peace is broken by occasional demonstrations about pension reforms or opposition to corruption. However, we must bear in mind that Russia is the world’s largest country in terms of land area, consisting of more than 80 formally autonomous regions that are, in many ways, very diverse. Russia’s future will be affected by several parallel developments, which may also produce conflicting results. Here, we analyse Russia’s internal security system, the country’s social stability and civil society, as well as its demographic development and economy. The objective was to select from the Russian reality the issues that are significant from the Finnish perspective. The cross-cutting themes of the section include authoritarian rule, corruption and lack of trust in society, which characterise Russian society overall, hampering and complicating many reform programmes. Furthermore, Russia’s internal development is characterised by slow economic growth and a lack of systemic reform in the economy. There is also a difficult demographic situation, which immigration compensates to a degree, while also increasing the shadow economy and leading to the creation of a “shadow society”.