Translated material
New Acropolis
Outlines for a plan for the modernization of Russia
Today Dmitry Medvedev will sum up the development of Russia in 2009 on live television. Almost the key word in the political lexicon in the past year has been the word “modernization.” Russian scientists working in the United States, but constantly in contact with Russian authorities and the scientific community, talk about how our country can make a breakthrough to an innovative economy.Revive the intelligentsia as a class
President Dmitry Medvedev, in his address to the nation, called for making Russia one of the leading scientific and technological powers in the world. This is a turn from “sovereign democracy” and “energy superpower” to a course towards innovation and creation, comparable in radicalness and “steepness” only to that made by Lenin at the height of war communism, suddenly announcing the NEP.
The similarity with the leader of the world proletariat does not stop there. In off-the-record conversations, Russians quick with nicknames have already benevolently dubbed the Russian President “the second Kremlin dreamer.” However, for those who watched the telecast of the head of state’s address to the Federal Assembly in America, Israel, Canada, Australia, Finland and other European countries, Medvedev’s calls for the future seemed surprising for a completely opposite reason: because in all of these and many other countries the innovation economy has existed for decades.
If you look from Boston, Haifa or Stockholm, the speech of the President of the Russian Federation is striking in that, it turns out, in Russia, the country that was the first to launch an artificial satellite into space, there is no innovative economy. It is amazing how a country with a great scientific and cultural tradition, which not so long ago was the most read and one of the most educated in the world, could reach such a state. This is a question that requires turning to the past, without which no worthy future can be built.
During the president's address, and then during Prime Minister Putin's speech at the United Russia congress, television cameras kept showing the hall. Among those who came into focus there was not a single person similar to those who create scientific and technological innovations. People whose life's work is knowledge and creation, even physiognomically and psychologically, are completely different.
On Police Day, state leaders appeal to the police officers sitting in the hall to restore order on the streets, on Chekist Day - to the security officers, and on International Women's Day they congratulate women. Why, among those to whom the president and prime minister appealed to make Russia an innovative country, were there no people capable of these innovations? Why weren’t conversations about innovation directly addressed to outstanding engineers and technologists, and managers of Russian companies successfully operating on the world market? Where are the Russians for whom working on the creation of new devices is happiness? Those who have the appropriate qualifications to be not home-grown kulibins, but competitive in the world championship of innovation. After all, in technology, regional and even national competitions have not been held for a hundred years, because local winners - the best car in Russia or the best mobile phone in Syktyvkar - are not needed by anyone in the 21st century.
The answer is sad and obvious: there are almost no such people in Russia today. The scientific and technical intelligentsia, which under the Bolsheviks constituted the most powerful creative class (not a layer sandwiched like cheese in a sandwich between the peasantry and the proletariat, but a class!), was driven out of the country in the years following the fall of Bolshevism. Not the way a new breed of cow is bred through selection, but the way bedbugs are bred with dust. The Russian scientific and technical intelligentsia was humiliated, doomed to poverty, and pushed out of the country. As a result, there are as many people as want to lead innovations in Russia, but there is no one to do them.
Everyone who applauded Medvedev in the Kremlin, and then Putin in St. Petersburg at the United Russia congress, believed that innovation would be carried out by someone else. But who? Does the country have a sufficient number of specialists capable of creating products that are competitive in the global technology market?
Shortly before the president’s address, leading television channels showed an evening in memory of Bulat Shalvovich Okudzhava, who met with fans of his work in the first half of the nineties. We were impressed not only by the performance of the great poet and bard. The faces of those sitting in the hall were no less striking: bright, honest, thoughtful, decent, reasonable, accustomed to prolonged mental stress and intellectual work. But there were several million such people who made up the scientific and technical intelligentsia in Russia - we remember this well.
Where did they go and why? After all, these people, if protected from arbitrariness, given the opportunity to receive additional education and practice in Western universities and companies (before perestroika, such an opportunity was closed for employees of research institutes and industrial engineers), could transform their Motherland in a matter of years. They transformed, but, alas, not Russia.
The point of view that the American technological boom of the 90s is directly related to emigration from the countries of the former USSR has good grounds. Thanks to the emigration of Russian-speaking immigrants, Israel has become an intellectual superpower over the past 20 years.
When we listened to President Medvedev (whose speech was absolutely correct and timely, because any “late” is immeasurably better than never), we regretted: why was this address to the nation not announced twenty years ago, immediately after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Despite all the sympathy for Gorbachev and the understanding of the importance of what he did, his slogans of “perestroika” and “acceleration”, looking from the 21st century, sound childishly naive, obviously inadequate to the scale of the tasks facing the superpower.
If the appeal to make Russia a superpower of innovation had been made when the country had a powerful class of scientific and technical intelligentsia, the country would have been completely transformed in five to ten years and become the industrial leader of the world. There is no doubt about it. A powerful common creative impulse would undoubtedly keep the CIS countries in a single orbit even in the event of the collapse of the USSR. Alas, nothing of the kind happened.
Could anyone in the 80s, being in their right mind, predict that with the removal of the CPSU from power in the USSR, the scientific and technical intelligentsia would disappear? Today, when, looking back, you try to explain the destruction of the colossal intellectual potential of the superpower of the twentieth century, it seems that the country was captured by barbarians after the fall of Bolshevism. Meanwhile, the role of the domestic Batu, who destroyed the scientific and technological potential of the superpower, was in fact consistently performed by perestroika, liberals, marketists, Westerners, patriots, security forces, protagonists of “sovereign democracy” And "energy superpower". Through joint consistent “efforts”, having seized the trough for one period or another, despite the dissimilarity of views and principles, without agreeing and even fighting with each other, they brought the country to the point where there is no one to revive it strategically.
Innovation instead of the collapse of the country
However, enough of the sad associations. Russia is a country capable of rapidly and unrecognizably transforming. Since the alternative to the innovative development of the federation, as is said almost every day from the highest rostrums, is its collapse, we must proceed from the fact that the innovative path of development has no alternative. Therefore, you should first, ignoring difficulties, draw up a strategic plan, and then achieve the implementation of the plan, removing from the path everything that prevents its implementation.
If there is a will among the people in power (as history has shown, Russia cannot lack this will in extreme situations), the transformation of the country into a scientific and technological superpower is absolutely possible.
We need to start from the capital. In which, if you just look around, much of what is needed to turn not only into an intellectual, but also into an innovation capital of the world, already exists.
Which building dominates Moscow like the Parthenon dominates Athens? Moscow University. What buildings dominate the areas adjacent to the university? Academic and industry research institutes. They must be turned into citadels of knowledge and creation, that is, into institutions in which fundamental, applied science and technological applications at the research & development (R&D) level are fused together. The pompous (and very convenient for departments responsible for research) beliefs of Soviet times that a scientist is higher than an engineer, fundamental science is higher than applied science, and an engineer, compared to the theoretician’s knowledge of the laws of nature, is generally somewhere in a deep hole, must be discarded as absurd and irresponsible .
Learning-cognition-creation is the fundamental triangle of civilization, in which all three components are equally important.
The geometry of the creative zone, with the university at the center and research and technology firms around it, is correct. This is exactly how the space surrounding the world's leading universities, such as Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford, is structured. The core of the structure, of course, is the university, the citadel of youth education. It also houses research laboratories, largely supported by grants. In the immediate vicinity of the campus there are small applied companies in which the work of students, professors, engineers and businessmen is dynamically structured. Large firms are located, as a rule, further away, at a distance of up to tens of kilometers from the “epicenter”. Such is the geometry of Silicon Valley (with its center at Stanford), the huge scientific and technological zone with its center at Princeton, and others similar.
With Harvard University (which, like Moscow, is located in the city), the situation is slightly different: there technology firms are located on the streets adjacent to the university, and larger ones are located outside the city. It is precisely this structure that seems natural for Moscow. Moreover: this is exactly what it was created under the Bolsheviks, on a truly Russian scale. The intellectual zone (consisting of a university and academic institutions) is in the southwest of the capital. Intellectual zones around leading institutes such as Physics and Technology, MEPhI, as well as science cities - at a distance of up to 150 kilometers from the Moscow ring road. Many of these cities were secret and are now about to be revealed. The system of their specialization and interaction with technology firms (corresponding to the profile of science cities) should be thought out within the framework of the presidential plan for the modernization of Russia.
The president's plan should change not the structure of Moscow, but its spirit. The energy of the Russian capital is enormous: theater, music, and exhibition life is in full swing here. But learning-cognition-creation has seriously lagged behind the world level. And as far as academic institutions are concerned, in some places they are completely on their last legs: graduate students and retirees - and no one in between. However, given the presence of a powerful global Russian-speaking intellectual Oecumene, this situation can change in a matter of years, provided that Russia becomes an attractive destination for creative activity no less than the United States, Finland, Australia or Israel.
It was this path that helped Japan, China, India, and South Korea rise to technological leadership in the world. At the same time, only narrow-minded people can treat Russia all over the world as something foreign and almost hostile. Today, for a Russian, it is sometimes easier to enroll in a European or American university than in Moscow State University. There are few Muscovites (including those occupying the most responsible positions) who do not have relatives working abroad temporarily or permanently.
Well, that’s great, we should be happy, and not hypocritically sad. It is only necessary to create conditions so that these people can work normally in their country. Let us recall, by the way, that China spends enormous amounts of money not only on returning intellectuals to the country, but also on ensuring that they remain abroad, maintaining business and intellectual ties with the Middle Kingdom.
Practice has shown that in the West, companies in which Germans, Russians, Indians, Chinese, Jews, Americans, Japanese, and representatives of other cultures work in the same team are growing powerfully. So why shouldn’t they grow on Russian soil, solving technological problems characteristic of the Russian mentality, primarily fundamental and interdisciplinary?
Let us recall that there is at least one area in which Russia has fully integrated into the world community, functioning according to the rules accepted in the world and achieving success: this is sports. The fact that outstanding Western coaches and players in hockey, football, and basketball work in Russian clubs, and Russian ones in foreign ones, has become the norm. This successful experiment needs to be extended to science and technology. There is nothing wrong with inviting an outstanding foreign organizer of education, science and technology business, who has proven his highest competence in the best universities and companies in the world, to the position of head of a laboratory or department, director of an institute or rector of an educational institution. A step no more decisive and no less detracting from patriotism than inviting the Dutchman Hiddink to the position of head coach of the Russian football team.
International Russian experience, which has proven its effectiveness in sports, must be extended to education, research and industry. The competence and interests of the business must come first. And whether the invitee is Canadian, Russian, Israeli, German, French or Indian, it does not matter.
If conditions for technology firms are created in Russia, only comparable to those in Scandinavia, China, Israel, and the USA, the country will begin rapid technological growth. According to American professors of Russian origin with whom we discussed this problem, in a year or two, and according to the conviction of one of our colleagues from Israel (a small country that today has hundreds of technology firms operating on the world market, being one of the technological superpowers, and Most of the managers of these companies came from the former USSR), a vibrant scientific and technological life in Russia could begin in just four months. We repeat, if conditions become just the same as in the West.
It is necessary to create an environment for the work and growth of technology firms in which kickbacks, redistribution of property, extortion of officials and other “charms” of modern Russia are impossible. If this is not done, Russia's role in the world will steadily decrease.
Russia is too big to do everything everywhere at the same time. In addition to Moscow, of course, we should not forget about St. Petersburg, and science cities, and university cities throughout the country. But in order to begin to implement the program of transforming Russia into a power of innovation and technology in real time, it seems obvious that three people who together have the necessary resources, experience and influence should gather to discuss strategically important steps: the President of the Russian Federation, the Chairman government and the mayor of Moscow.
In our opinion, they should distribute among themselves, as well as powerful organizations and structures subordinate to them, responsibilities in the program with the code name “Moscow Acropolis". It will become only part of the project for the innovative transformation of all of Russia, but it is extremely important and key. Considering that not only more than half of the country’s money is located in Moscow, but also most of the intellectual resources of the federation, the successful scientific and technological transformation of the capital will entail an innovative development of other regions.
Today in Russia there is no single body that could ensure the transition of the country to innovation. The federal government has so many ongoing tasks to keep the country going, as well as problems that suddenly fall out of the blue, that it is unlikely that it will be able to make innovation a top priority in the foreseeable future. The Ministry of Science and Education (as even its name suggests) should not be involved in technology at all. The Academy of Sciences is engaged in the knowledge of the laws of nature, the creation of technological companies is not its competence: an engineer and a scientist are different professions, this must be clearly understood.
In our opinion, the presidential administration should become the body coordinating the innovative development of the country. The emergence of a system of laws promoting scientific and technological creation in Russia should be ensured by the Duma. The mayor of Moscow must ensure that the image of the intellectual capital of the world is complemented by world-class technology firms. Well, the head of government, who has enormous influence on all government bodies, including the security forces, is obliged to ensure the rule of law within intellectual zones (universities, research institutes, innovative technology firms). If not throughout the country at once, then at least on these square kilometers, and it is very tough as he can do it perfectly when it is required. Compliance by the state of laws in relations with technological firms should be under Putin's personal control.
If there is a will and a strategic development plan, the struggle against lawlessness in relation to scientific and technological firms can be effective and at the same time remain within the framework of the law, as happened, for example, in Singapore.
It is necessary to correctly determine the technological and scientific niche that Russia can occupy. Not just like a large country, but as the center of one of the few civilizations in history, which would not be completely different. The Russian civilization since the time of Ivan the Great has always been distinguished not only by the religious confrontation of the West, inherited from Byzantium, but also a special rhythm of life, inertiality, combined with the ability to make rapid turns, uneven combination of obvious contradictions. These abilities to adapt in the world of logical contradictions can be extremely important for survival in the jam of the semiabsurda, into which modern humanity has plunged.
After the collapse of the USSR, Russian civilization became universal. She quickly and powerfully intertwined with other civilizations, retaining her individual character. It is necessary to find those areas of life and spirit, where the Russian Federation can become a world leader as the homeland of civilization, which are the above features organically inherent. One of these natural niches is science: not as an endless catalog, but as a temple of knowledge, In which the highest level of understanding is often more important than a particular study and even discoveries.
Within the framework of this doctrine, penetration into the depths of the object has a higher value than a direct result. This is exactly the desire that distinguished the approach to science in the Soviet Union, and the quality that makes the former Soviet scientists scattered around the world, despite the huge distances separating them. It puts them in a special place in a common space and creates around them large groups of followers and entire scientific schools. It contributes to the phenomenal success of technological firms founded by former Soviet citizens.
One of the priorities should be the creation of a base in Russia for the scientific and technological community based on the above values. A global instability gives many opportunities for the state with such gigantic resources as Russia, and such a unique civilization as Russian, this must not only be understood, but also skillfully used.
In one note, of course, it is impossible to affect all aspects of the plan for renewing the homeland proclaimed by the president. Today, Russia is in a position causing more anxiety. However, this is a power of the great intellectual tradition: great literature, music, great science, which is also capable of rapidly and cardinal changes. An hour of such transformations has come.
Fedor Bogomolov,
Vice President of the International Committe for Intellectual Collaboration (ICIC), professor of mathematics New York University,
Yuri Magarshak,
Professor, President ICIC, President of MatHTHTECH, InC.