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This paper deals with the changes that have transformed policing and the motivations of policemen since the break-up of the Soviet Union. It relies on a historical analysis, based on the reading of local archives about the involvement of lawenforcement agencies in the fight against petty economic offences from the sixties to the early nineties. We try to explain how opportunistic behavior came to flourish in policing as early as the sixties up by studying the particular features of bureaucratic organization. We subsequently analyze how these professional practices perpetuated themselves or were renewed in the late eighties in the context economic reforms launched during perestroika.