Grab-it-ization

What Ukrainian wags have long dubbed prykhvatyzatsiya (grab-it-ization) has happened in all the postcommunist countries except for East Germany, where everything that could be sold was done so at a time the local people were in no position to buy anything. This in turn made the former GDR into an instant colony such that just about all the rich and powerful people were from West Germany. Germany has been faced with major problems because of this, and the sticky fingers type of privatization elsewhere at least kept countries from becoming colonies and gave them some kind of indigenous elite. After all, one can understand those who concluded, “If we’re going to have private property, as much as possible of it might as well be mine.”

That is not the problem, nor is the corruption the West is so concerned about. In fact there is nothing that can be done about this country’s dreadful level of corruption: in a situation where those in a position to demand bribes or steal cannot support themselves and their families on their official income, you can impose the death penalty for corruption like China has done. It will not really change anything: everybody will still do it, and everybody will look the other way. The problem is that nobody here can make money outside the web of official and outright criminal structures that keep inefficient industries afloat and more efficient projects out. This is why the flow of investment is out of this country, sucking it dry economically and making small business, the most dynamic sector of any modern market economy, damned well impossible. It is so sad to see this country, potentially among the world’s economic powerhouses, being run into the ground by those who are running it in their own, not the national, interest. It is all so unnecessary, and that makes it even sadder.