Continuing the set of publications that is supposed to retrace the development, in contemporary Russia, of institutions carrying out mediatory functions, this article addresses to diverse types of think tanks and public policy centers – in the cases of Moscow, St-Petersburg and Nizhniy Novgorod. The subjects treated – in a comparative perspective – are, in particular, history of their formation and their relations with the authorities and with civil organizations. As the authors conduct the analysis, they point to the decrease of public centers’ activities during the first decade of the new century and, besides, dwell on the difference of the patterns of think tanks’ development in Moscow, on the one hand, and in St-Petersburg and Nizhniy Novgorod – on the other.