Yeltsin's reforms of Boris Nikolaevich - economic and political: pros and cons, consequences

The head of the "government of reformers," who before the presidency promised sovereignty to the regions and weapons to the military. Over the years of governing the country, Boris Yeltsin suggested such changes, the consequences of which Russian society will long praise and curse, but it should be analyzed.

Reforms of Yeltsin's government today

Boris Yeltsin had a "crust" on twelve working specialties, but went to party work. He rebelled against the conservatism of the CPSU and left the party, taking the place at the top of the democratic opposition. The president, a month after the election of which the putsch struck, wanted to completely dislodge the resources of the command economy, but led the country to default.

Almost a synonym for default today is the name of Boris Yeltsin. Other strong associations include racketeering and crimson jackets, poverty and unemployment, the cruelest Chechen campaign and emigration, ridiculous public statements by the president and the complete collapse of Russia's authority in the world. And also the failed economic and political reforms of Yeltsin. However, not everything is so unambiguous, not all attempts by Yeltsin to direct the country along the positive vector have been unsuccessful. To do this was to be on new, clearly not formulated and therefore many incomprehensible to this day ideological positions and a shaky economy. Controversial transformations, but not entirely negative. Pros and cons of Yeltsin's reforms are now even clearer than in the nineties.

New reforms for a new country: positive

The new Russia of the Yeltsin period is characterized by several advantages, they are usually not questioned, although there is less agreement on their quality of consistency. However, let's call them:

1. Yeltsin's Russia was welcomed by Europeans and Americans. Boris Yeltsin often met with politicians and heads of state, demonstrating full readiness to agree with them and with all his might to build a market economy in Russia. Some of this item would probably be moved to the next part of the article - about cons, but in the 1990s our country could hardly afford to aggravate international relations, although real friendship - economic and political - could not be achieved.
2. There is no censorship in the country, and representatives of creative professions are no longer monitored. There is no control either in the cultural sphere or in the media. Proclaimed freedom of speech.
3. Privatization. Russians become owners of apartments and enterprises as a sign of a confident movement towards democracy. So far, they are arguing when listing points of positive influence on Yeltsin's market reforms.
4. Freedom of choice of power began with Boris Yeltsin.
5. There are many banks, especially small ones. But they served mainly the interests of the new class - the new Russians, as well as the owners of factories and companies.
6. Yeltsin's political reforms with a democratic course: a multi-party system, resolution of impeachment and parliamentary elections.
7. The tax reform in Russia in 1991 is the first stage, the foundations of the tax system are laid.
8. The iron curtain collapsed finally - the borders are open.

So, not all positive points are absolutely such. Some then raised doubts.

New reforms for a new country: negative

Destroying the Soviet Union, the initiators hardly imagined what would happen next. Having abandoned the planned economy, they thought that any planning was considered a survival of the Soviets. Short-sightedness of such an almost romantic position will soon have a bad effect on the population and the state system. Perhaps, it was not good to make plans for more than a month. As the well-known "five" of the economic bloc of the early nineties later recognized, they worked exactly that way. Problems mostly did not predict, but tried to solve. The tasks did not set, they often became hostages of the conditions that created these tasks.

The unsuccessful transformation and consequences of Yeltsin's reforms:

1. The war in Chechnya. Russia was weakening in the eyes, this was taken advantage of by nationalists in the regions. In the Chechen Republic, independent Ichkeria was proclaimed, ethnic cleansing of Russians began. Yeltsin sends troops to Chechnya. This caused a split in the parliament. Yegor Gaidar, who headed the party "Democratic Choice of Russia," with the party members announced a protest, but could not influence the decision. Yeltsin has a new line of opposition, democratic. In Moscow anti-war rallies were held, the media were full of statements against the war. The big tragedy, of course, was not flared up in the government and parliament, but in Grozny, Gudermes, Argun and other settlements. The meager equipment of the troops, consisting mainly of conscripts, inept command and demoralized army. They call different data on losses, from 4 to 14,000 dead. The war in Chechnya, or as it was called the establishment of a constitutional order in the Chechen Republic, stung Yeltsin's reputation as a ruler capable of acting in a critical situation and deprived him of political dividends received at the dawn of a new Russia.
2. High criminalization, rampant banditry, corruption and racketeering. Yeltsin's market reforms proclaimed freedom of ownership, and some understood it as an indulgence to use the right of the strong. In the Russian cities, bandit groups appear that, without fearing anyone or anything, seizing business, killing competitors and opponents, dissenters and witnesses of crimes. Law enforcers often did not intervene in the disassembly, there are cases of police involvement in crime. Often, the gangs were unemployed, mostly young people who fell under the reduction, and also wanted to easily cash in. The era of contract killings began.
3. Unemployment and delay in wages for months, massive cuts in production and liquidation of plants. Particularly affected agriculture and industry. The consequences of Yeltsin's reforms have been felt by these areas to this day.
4. The default is the main shortcoming of the Yeltsin reforms. Economic experts say that it was possible to avoid depreciation of the ruble, if not for earlier decisions of the president or authorized them in the economy and social sphere. The Russians became impoverished.
5. The US and other "friends" of the new Russia cease to take into account the interests of the country.
6. Yeltsin's constitutional reform was promising, but in fact and in practice it almost did not work. Laws did not fight racketeering and corruption. The average Russian turned into a "little man", as in the novels of the classics. Pessimistic moods of the people increased and did not promise Yeltsin a credit of trust.
7. People began to leave the country - in search of work, security or professional prospects. A lot of specialists and scientists leave. Another loss due to the transformation.

Today, in assessing the fruitfulness of Boris Yeltsin's reforms, two points of view stand out. Some say that the "shaking" of Russia in the 90's gave it the stability of zero. Opponents believe that the two thousandths saved the government that came to replace the crisis, and the crises are the consequences of Yeltsin's reforms and reformers like him.

The market economy is the new course of Russia

The beginning of Yeltsin's reforms started with the reorganization of the economy. The post-Soviet era began under the sign of the market. Boris Yeltsin, once he accepted the country, took it back to capitalism, from which the victorious revolution abdicated in 1917. By the way, the nature of the fear of Yeltsin's financial block about today's return of the planned economy is interesting. The reformers of the 1990s consider it a pernicious appeal to the economic experience of the Soviets. True, they can not formulate any clear grounds for the position.

So, Boris Yeltsin is directing Russia to the market, and this West is approving this major reform.

The new government is headed by Yeltsin, but he entrusts the scheme of economic transformations to thirty-five Yegor Gaidar. It is joined by other young reformers: thirty-six-year-old Anatoly Chubais and Peter Aven, thirty-nine-year-old Alexander Shokhin and thirty-eight-year-old Andrei Nechaev. They were nicknamed "Harvard boys". They did not finish Harvard, but they studied Western economic theory.

How to test the theory

Boris Yeltsin forbade the young reformers to go into politics, but gave complete freedom in trying to build an economy. Gaidar and his colleagues begin to apply the theory in practice with the liberalization of prices. Fill the counter decided, giving the will to pricing, so as to achieve a balance of supply and demand. Everyone was against Gaidar's idea, except for Yeltsin. And from January 1, 1992, all begin to cost the way that is beneficial to the seller. Prices soared to some products in dozens of times.

Real incomes of the population have fallen by half, and all this against the backdrop of growing unemployment. The government either had to pay subsidies or enter a card system. But the budget fell apart and the "cards" were not able to support. And the people would not approve. Left the situation alone, continuing to explain then and now that price liberalization is a painful procedure, but the only possible in the realities of the nineties.

In the stores appeared "outlandish" for Soviet people products and goods, but there was nothing to buy them. Money was enough only for the essentials. Introduce a "living wage" and call for help free trade.

The liberalization of trade

Sell almost everything. Stalls, street rows with trading grandmothers, a lot of clothes and car market. Shuttles are scientists and artists.

But a large revenue was available to the "sellers" of oil, gas and non-ferrous metals. And the difference between high world prices and low domestic prices promised a profit of a thousand percent. For assets in the "dashing nineties" fought with weapons and gangs. Because of the lack of efficient state institutions, the market is beginning to be divided by all available methods. Later, the reformers will say that they could not foresee such a force of criminalization, considering that businessmen will not go beyond small, marginal disassemblies. But business acquired a "roof", cash and assets, often defiantly neglecting the law.

At this time, there are "new Russians". They were enriched in minutes, when the incomes of ordinary people barely kept up with the expenses.

Privatization

When the process of "voucher privatization" was launched in Russia, it was assumed that so the Soviet enterprises would find new efficient owners. The need for reform was written off to the "red directors". So called the leaders of powerful enterprises that used their status as a "feeder" and quietly from the state worked on "gray" sales schemes.

Yeltsin and his government created a class of proprietors and proclaimed the superiority of private property over state ownership. Loud statements about the rights of everyone to acquire property at a nominal price were in fact fictitious. Only those who worked at high-yield enterprises could gain a small profit, and there were few such. In addition, private auctions are beginning to be held. Promised equal rights to state property did not work.

All attempts to stabilize the situation were crashing. "Pavlovsky reform" led to zeroing of deposits. We tried to turn on the printing press, but it did more harm than good.

Gaidar's departure, the first "pyramids" and T-bills

All attempts to achieve a reduction in public debt were not successful, only a deferred payment was achieved. Debts forgave Greece and Poland, but not a weak Russia. Economic stress was exacerbated by the political crisis. In December 1992, people's deputies demanded a change of head of government. Later, Yeltsin proposes Viktor Chernomyrdin, who soon made many mistakes.

In 1993, the exchange of Soviet rubles for Russian rubles began. We took only 35 000 rubles and only two weeks. Sberbank branches were lined up. Yeltsin decides to increase the amount to one hundred thousand rubles and the terms - until the end of the year.

The era of financial "pyramids" begins. There are "MMM", "Selenga", "The Lord" and other smaller. The authorities are watching their activities detached, there was no political will to intervene, nor was there a suitable law. But later they will announce that Yeltsin's economic reforms have largely discredited the "pyramids".

And in parallel with the "pyramids" in Russia there are state short-term bonds to replenish the budget. The state issued bonds and sold them. The money was divided into two parts. One went to cover the budget deficit. On another - through the subsidiaries of the Central Bank the state bought its own T-bills. Initially, GKOs brought money, but by the beginning of the ninety-eighth year, the budget deficit would simply be huge.

Distribution of state property

During privatization, powerful Russian enterprises bypassed this process, formally remaining state ones, but such firms were regulated only by directors and, occasionally, by a narrow circle of management. The "privatization" privatization, approved by the government, was started, in which enterprises were bought out on public money.

The Ministry of Finance transferred money to banks controlled by the oligarchs. An "auction" was appointed, the winner of which, on the security of the shares of the enterprise, provided a loan to the state, consisting of its own funds. And when the state did not pay the loan, the shares remained with the new owner. In private hands for such "auctions" took more than ten enterprises, including, "Norilsk Nickel" and "Yukos". Mikhail Khodorkovsky, for example, paid for the state-owned company with the funds of the Ministry of Finance deposit, which economists placed him.

Default and revolt of miners

In 1998, announced the denomination of the ruble: one thousand rubles turned into one. This year, the financial crisis of Asia came to Russia, and oil prices plummeted to $ 12 per barrel. The authorities tried to keep the ruble "afloat", the Central Bank let the currency in and the "rail war" began. In May, the miners blocked the railway tracks and demanded the resignation of Boris Yeltsin, as well as the dissolution of the State Duma and the government. The demands to return the mines to the state run into opinions about the restructuring required in the coal industry, with the elimination of mines and jobs.

In August, a default broke out, Western economists predicted it, but in Russia, the president did not agree with the forecasts and publicly stated that there would be no default. But it has come, the state declared itself bankrupt, the government acknowledged that there is no more opportunity to keep the ruble in the currency corridor. The Russian ruble fell 1.5 times, and banks stopped issuing deposits. Premieres were replaced: Kirienko, Primakov, Stepashin, and then Yeltsin announced that he was leaving the post of Russian president.

Results of Yeltsin's reforms

In the image sense, Yeltsin's basic reforms became an absolute defeat. Especially Yeltsin's economic reforms. After the surrender of the socialist economy, Russia of the nineties became a country of victorious cash. The business elite created pocket banks, and the government "gifted" factories and enterprises without receiving any benefit to the budget.

The government was not responsible for its people, who suffered shock therapy from reform to reform. Reforms were more like experiments, creating a constant threat of scarcity and hunger.

Was it possible to build a new Russia with other reforms - still arguing, as well as about Boris Yeltsin's presidential capabilities and resources. On the eve of the election, the first to vote for him was business. Expensive and large-scale election campaign "Vote, or lose." Most did not want to lose the businessmen, who were afraid of the victory of the presidential candidate and Yeltsin's rival communist Gennady Zyuganov. Most likely, then all the market "achievements" would have to be returned.

Transformations did not lead Russia to progress, but only slowed the development of the country, hitting the economy and almost every Russian family very painfully. Some say that everything would have happened if there had been no connivance from the authorities on the processes that were destroying the country. However, this time has passed, and now it remains only to analyze past mistakes in order to prevent their recurrence.