Dear members of the BISC Group:
I should like to share with you a concern of mine -- a concern about the evolving economic and political situation in Russia. My feeling is that a serious crisis -- with wide-ranging repercussions -- may be around the corner. But first, a bit about my background.
I was born in Baku, Azerbaijan, at the time when Azerbaijan was a part of the Soviet Union. My parents were Iranian citizens. My first language was Russian. I am still fluent in Russian. When I was ten years old, my parents returned to Iran and placed me in an American (Presbyterian) Missionary School, later renamed as Alborz. My teachers were mostly from the Midwest. For me, they were role models. It was at that point in my life that I fell in love with the United States. After receiving my BSEE degree from the University of Tehran, I came to the United States in 1944 and entered MIT as a graduate student.
I have always been and continue to be interested in what goes on in Russia. I watch TV news from Moscow every day, and watch a Russian-language news program from New York. I watch Russian TV News Channel 24 because it is serious and objective, with little or no propaganda. It is a 24 hour-a-day news program, with news on the hour. The information which I get includes both what is positive and what is negative about what goes on in Russia. The New York news channel focuses on what is negative.
For many people, the collapse of the Soviet Union was a cause for celebration. I felt differently because, in my view, the Soviet Union was not prepared for an abrupt transition from authoritarianism to a democracy led by Yeltsin--an incompetent party official who was fond of alcohol. Clearly, there was a need for structural reforms when Gorbachev became the leader of the Soviet Union in 1985. He proved to be an inept leader. What did not help was that the price of oil was around $10 a barrel. He made many serious mistakes. His fatal mistake was the abandonment of the one-party rule. In large measure, it is this mistake that led to his own demise and the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Russia was not ready for democracy in 1991, and is not ready for democracy today, twenty-two years later. In the post-collapse years, wholesale privatization transferred national wealth into the pockets of corrupt oligarchs -- oligarchs whose enormous wealth is now hidden abroad. Freedom was abused. While institutes were closing, casinos were opening --at one time 68 in Moscow alone. Eventually, casinos were banished, but right now a top official in prosecutor's office in Moscow is in court charged with accepting multi-million bribes from the operators of underground casinos.
One of the principal problems in today's Russia is pervasive corruption, from top to bottom. Almost every day there is a disclosure of a major scandal involving high-level officials. Former Mayor of Moscow, Luzhkov, bought a residence in London costing over 100 million dollars. The same pattern of acquisition of choice properties by Russian officials and rich businessmen is observable in France, Spain and many other countries. The government talks loudly about fighting corruption. Incredibly, a recently adopted law grants amnesty to perpetrators of so-called economic crimes--about 15,000 in number. Is granting of amnesty to perpetrators of economic crimes a new way of fighting corruption, or is it a matter of protection of high-level officials? Currently, there are over 80,000 Russian tourists in Egypt and over 30,000 in Thailand, while millions of Russians live in poverty. Infrastructure inherited from the Soviet Union is deteriorating, but there is not enough funding for replacement and upgrading.
Recently, Russia was admitted to the World Trade Organization (WTO), after knocking on the door for over 18 years. In my view, this is a serious blunder. WTO is an invention of exporting countries. In large measure, Russia is an importing country, except for oil, gas and minerals. Entry into WTO is likely to result in a decline in domestic production. The Space Program is in trouble. On July 2, a Proton rocket carrying three Granat satellites exploded shortly after launch. This was the seventh failure in two-and-a-half years. The latestfailure calls into question the sustainability of Russia's Space Program. Right now, an incredible event took place. On July 3, the government introduced a bill calling for a drastic reorganization of the Russian Academy of Sciences -- a vast enterprise and a sacred institution in the Soviet era-- with the expectation of approval by July 5. After a storm of protest, the final approval was deferred till autumn.
The stock market is steadily declining. Capital is fleeing the country at the rate of about 70 billion dollars a year. There is a shortage of skilled labor. Many of the best graduates are moving abroad. The rate of growth is declining, while the deficit, though very small, is increasing. A new wave of privatizations is taking place, depriving the government of major assets and enriching corrupt officials. In coming years, the income from oil and gas is expected to decline. Inflation stands at close to 7%. The mounting economic problems which lie ahead may stir unrest. Fears of unrest may well play an important role in strategic decisions by the leadership of Russia, both internally and externally. A gradual return to authoritarianism may well be viewed as a necessity for survival. What is the prognosis? A great deal depends on the price of oil and gas in coming years. If the prices stay high, as they are today, Russia may gradually overcome its problems by tightening the screws and moving away from democratic reforms. If not, the dark clouds may be a harbinger of unrest and discord. Note. I am a pessimist by nature. Comments are welcome.
Regards,
Lotfi
--
Lotfi A. Zadeh
Professor Emeritus
Director, Berkeley Initiative in Soft Computing (BISC)
Address:
729 Soda Hall #1776
Computer Science Division
Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences
University of California
Berkeley, CA 94720-1776
zadeh@eecs.berkeley.edu
Tel.(office): (510) 642-4959
Fax (office): (510) 642-1712
Tel.(home): (510) 526-2569
Fax (home): (510) 526-2433
URL: http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~zadeh/
BISC Homepage URLs
URL: http://zadeh.cs.berkeley.edu/
I submitted the following comment about Professor Zadeh's post:
I was born in Riga, Latvia. As my mother grew up, she leaned, first, Polish; second, Russian; and, third, Latvian. Her favorite poet was Pushkin (in Russian, of course). Though I did not speak Russian or know much about Russian literature, I had warm feelings toward Russian culture. (I particularly admired Russian chess and Russian prowess in many sciences.) But I did not have warm feelings toward the Soviet Union or Russian imperialism. (The New Soviet Man spoke principally Russian). This was and is understandable: Stalinists deported my maternal grandparents in June 1941 to Siberia in cattle cars for the crime of being bourgeois (I do not exaggerate; I have copies of the NKVD arrest warrants) and in 1944 my mother fled Latvia with her two children to escape arrest for the crime of having bourgeois parents. So to the extent that the collapse of the Soviet Union led to the independence of the Baltic Republics, I do not regret the collapse of the Soviet Empire. However, I do agree with Lotfi that there were grand elements in the old Soviet Union. For example, it is true that chess, theoretical physics, and mathematics flourished in the Soviet Union as almost nowhere else. It is also true, the perversions of Stalinism notwithstanding, that there was something noble about the Soviet Union's aspirations toward universality, toward the general brotherhood of the common man, or the proletariat. But the mass killings and deportations and so on of the Soviet era were so vast and horrendous that it is understandable that Latvians could not easily forgive and forget, and that post-Soviet Russia had to pay the price of its past by granting the Baltic Republics (and other nations) their independence.
I arrived in the U.S. when I was six years old. I became almost completely (but not completely) Americanized. Although America has faults - in the post-2001 era it has some very serious faults - America has been good to me; and, despite the hardships my family experienced in the U.S. when I was young, I am glad I grew up here .
See http://tillers.net/personalhistory/history.html (visual personal history)
Peter Tillers
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