Dec. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin was named Time's ``Person of the Year'' for bringing his country ``roaring back to the table of world power,'' the magazine said on its Web site.

Putin, 55, who has said he may become Russia's prime minister after stepping down as president next year, has helped lead the country back to stability ``at significant cost to the principles and ideas that free nations prize,'' Richard Stengel, the magazine's managing editor, wrote in an article explaining the choice.

``With dauntless persistence, a sharp vision of what Russia should become and a sense that he embodied the spirit of Mother Russia, Putin has put his country back on the map,'' Stengel wrote.

Time, owned by Time Warner Inc., started the annual ``Person of the Year'' cover story in 1927 with Charles Lindbergh, the aviator who made the first solo trans-Atlantic flight. Last year, Internet users behind the self-made content on Web sites such as Google Inc.'s YouTube.com won the honor.

Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, a Nobel Prize winner, ``Harry Potter'' author J.K. Rowling, Chinese President Hu Jintao and David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, were named runners-up, the magazine said.

Time's nomination ``is not a recognition of Putin's positive impact,'' political analyst Yevgeny Volk of the Heritage Foundation in Moscow said by telephone. ``Many people have been named who played a rather controversial role,'' he said.

Past winners include Adolf Hitler in 1938 and Josef Stalin in 1939 and 1942. Other Soviet and Russian leaders named Person of the Year by Time include Nikita Khrushchev in 1957, Yury Andropov in 1983 and Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987 and 1989.

``It's certainly a recognition of Putin's impact on domestic and world politics,'' Volk added. ``He really plays a big role in shaping the Russian political landscape and influencing international policy.''

To contact the reporter on this story: Chris Dolmetsch in New York at cdolmetsch@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: December 19, 2007 09:27 EST