Kudrin's case

As always, in June, as always, in St. Petersburg, as always, in the presence of top officials, the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum was held

This is not the first time Alexei Kudrin has had to be the protagonist of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. This is not the first time that his speeches are poorly understood - although the audience of the forum is usually called "brilliant", they try to bring intellectual brilliance to SPIEF every year by inviting ever brighter world intellectual stars - precisely because of the shortage of prophets in their own country. However, in June 2016, when Alexei Kudrin returned to SPIEF for the first time from the semi-systemic opposition as an expert vested with almost government powers, he was no longer understood completely, although the status of one of the main forum participants was returned unquestioningly.

In fact, the head of the Center for Strategic Research is to blame himself - all these three days he behaved completely differently than expected, and spoke completely different from what they were used to hearing. Already on the first day at the typical SPIEF macroeconomic panel, Kudrin refused to participate in an exciting and rather meaningless discussion with Finance Minister Anton Siluanov and Central Bank head Elvira Nabiullina, as well as with other colleagues, about the parameters of the budget deficit, the maximum short-term capacity public debt and the key rate - about what we used to read daily in the newspapers. For some reason, these things did not bother him at all. Moreover, when the moderator of the session (they are now almost always taken on the Russia 24 TV channel) decided to ask something suggestive of a conditionally “cannibalistic” answer - about reducing government spending on state employees, Alexei Kudrin answered completely inappropriately that, in his opinion, it would be nice if the growth in the well-being of the population was a constant criterion for assessing the effectiveness of the government, its KPI. The head of the CSR interspersed the fascinating debates about institutional and structural reforms with rather mysterious and, in general, rather scary and dim aphorisms. For example, he asked who in general would link their fate with a shrinking economy. Or he said that there can be no final reforms at all, that the idea of ​​a static society and perfect power should be abandoned, that one should not be afraid to quarrel with any social group and prepare for the fact that society should be in a situation of constant dynamic disequilibrium - according to at least that's how I understood it. In these remarks, Alexei Kudrin did not look like the head of the working group of the Economic Council under the President on structural reforms, but more like German Gref - with the difference that the head of the CSR did not look like a person blinded by new knowledge, but rather a little crushed by them.

One of the most unusual SPIEF sessions, in which Alexei Kudrin participated, was a PwC round table on creative industries — sectors of the economy that are tied to creative work and non-technical innovations, from design to music. Here the head of the CSR knew exactly what he wanted: the thesis about the possible constant growth of the contribution of the creative industry to the growth of Russia's GDP was followed by a quite intelligible conversation on this topic. And it was completely clear that for some reason Alexei Kudrin now sees design, city theater and opera festivals (as well as social dynamics, in general, the calculations of sociologists, anthropologists and specialists in social and political sciences) as at least as important as macroeconomic stability, budget strategy and tax collection.

Of course, SPIEF is one of the worst places to demonstrate these changes. When already in 2012, and then every year twice as confidently, the best minds of the White House told the public that the old model of economic growth seemed to be exhausted, they somehow forgot to add that the old model is, in practical application, chairs , offices and positions of most of those present in the hall, and not some budget figures. When people talk about structural shifts, nothing more follows from this than that at a certain moment visitors stop coming to the stand of the Transneft company, which builds oil pipelines. Most of the forum participants are always sure that building a "new economy" on the ruins of the old one is, in fact, their future business. After all, only an existing business has the resources, money, time, specialists and government connections to promote new ideas, from blockchain to bioprinters. Someone will invest in a bright future through their work, for example, Rostec, and some of the officials - and as a highly intelligent private investor - in a Californian LLC with Russian roots. The future belongs to the one in whose hands the present is, that's what they say to each other.

All these three days, Kudrin behaved completely differently than expected, and spoke completely different from what they were used to hearing.

I'm afraid Alexei Kudrin has been hopelessly ruined by the few years he spent outside the government. He hardly needs to explain now that modern German industry has its roots in the all-European specialization of a number of German cities in the production of children's toys: this is largely accurate - the toys are small. He also understands that the modern design industry has emerged from the ruins of the northern Italian economy since 1947 - beyond any IMF forecast, from nothing, from rags. This magic (and it looks magical when realized on its own) has its own laws, but they are non-utilitarian and quite often lie at the intersection of morality, economics and society: only very professional governments are interested in them.

In general, the fact that at SPIEF only a few are ready to talk about the real ties between politics, culture and the economy, that this is one process of the development of society, and business is only one side of the matter, is a problem: of course, the country needs a government that is capable of both not only talk about all this. So plainly do not know how, even in the developed countries of the world. But there is no economy in the world that is so much in need of precisely this knowledge and skills than Russia.