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Sustainable development advocates in Russia and around the world promote an economic, environmental, and social system that ‘‘meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’’(WCED 1987, 43). The concept emerged in the late 1960s, reflecting a new understanding of the interdependence of economic development, environmental protection, and human wellbeing. The principles of sustainable development did not exert a powerful influence on Russian politics until the early 1990s, however, when Russia’s post-Soviet political and economic transition initiated a search for new styles of governance. At that time, Russia seemed to offer fertile ground for sustainability, a prospect that energized both the international environmental community and Russia’s domestic environmentalists. Yet even though sustainable development has been advanced enthusiastically by Russian greens and the concept codified into a variety of Russian laws, in practice, it plays only a minor role in Russian governance, environmental and otherwise. Why was sustainable development embraced by many Russian actors in the early 1990s? Why now, fifteen years later, are environmentalists struggling to promote the cause of sustainability? This chapter answers these questions by exploring which features of Russia’s cultural, political, and economic landscape facilitate the advancement of a sustainability agenda—and which limit it. Thus Russia’s strategy for recovering from the post-Soviet economic crisis and its growing political centralization make the practical application of sustainable principles less likely …