• Українська
  • Русский
  • English
Where there is no law, but every man does what is right in his own eyes, there is the least of real liberty
Henry M. Robert

Yegor GAIDAR: "Serious reforms will start in Ukraine only when they have considerable public support"

17 November, 1998 - 00:00

While giving a speech at the international economic conference "Ukrainian
reforms: lessons and hopes," and generalizing the experience of Russian
reforms, Russia's former Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar said that a government
has only three possible solutions to its budget problems brought on by
beginning transformation. First, they can pretend there are no problems
at all (what the Chernomyrdin government was famous for). Second, they
can speed liberal changes (what the Kirienko government tried to do). Third,
they can switch on the money printing presses (what the Primakov government
decided to do).

For all the obvious differences between Ukraine and Russia, we cannot
but notice, that the hallmarks of government economic policy Gaidar mentioned
with extraordinary precision also describe the ways Ukraine is seeking
to get out of its economic crisis. Just like they did, we tried to avoid
seeing what was obvious, we tried introducing a "partial" market, and we
tried printing money. Now, like they, we are getting ready to go down the
same garden path all over again. Russians, however, are likely to have
a different view of Ukrainian realities. And this is the topic of our interview
with Yegor Gaidar.

"For two days you have been hobnobbing with Ukrainian reformers and
looking at Ukrainian reality. Did you note anything that would be able
to keep Ukraine from going the Russian way - from cranking up the money
printing presses? Should we do it at all? Because the imminence of falling
living standards will stimulate people to support liberal reforms."

"I was always against such experiments in Russia. It was clear that
should the Left and Communists get a chance to be in the driver's seat,
the political effect will favor the reformers. But I always thought it
was immoral to run experiments in a country, which had already suffered
so much from them. That is why I did everything possible to prevent this.
But it happened anyway, so now we have a less which we can put to good
use. As for Ukraine, I am in no position to give advice."

"In our country (as in yours recently) the IMF is the only obstacle,
which keeps the government from openly giving up on market reforms. Do
you think Ukraine will be able to use the IMF support to continue market
reforms?"

"I think that under conditions of democracy, it is rather difficult
to force society to accept a policy it does not want to. This is why serious
reforms will start in Ukraine only when they have considerable public support,
and not when the IMF asks for them. When society gets fed with its current
ills, do-nothing policies, and twisting in the breeze between an already
collapsed socialism and still badly operating market, then they will understand
that they are the ones who need reform, not the IMF."

"Do you think we can come to a conclusion or consider it a lesson
that Russian reforms have taught us that a deep economic fall is needed
before a phase of active market reform? Or, in other words, will a fall
similar to Russia's have to happen in Ukraine before the authorities and
people start demanding real reforms?"

"This was not a lesson. There are countries, in which agreement on what
to do was achieved long ago and was widely supported by the political elite.
These are the countries, which started growing long ago and have constantly
growing income. People there lead normal lives. Unfortunately this does
not apply to all the postsocialist states. And countries where they failed
to find a compromise have to pay way too much for reforms."

"So you think Russia will soon begin to revive economically?"

"Of course, it's just a matter of time. It's a question of how much
time and economic difficulties we will have to go through."

"Is there hope that Ukraine will manage to avoid following the Russian
example?"

"There's hope but no confidence."

 

 

 

Rubric: