Social inequality in access to superior quality higher education in Russia is due to the unequal development of the regions of Russia. The country's two biggest cities and the areas adjacent to them account for a quarter of Russia's infrastructure that offers young people an access to a higher education. The regional colleges and universities in Russia have weaker connections with the sphere of science, and provide lower educational quality than institutions in the capital cities. The most important way to solve this problem is to decentralize the development of science in Russia. (Contains 5 notes, 1 footnote, 7 tables, and 2 figures.)