(1956 - 2009) Russian politician
Now young politicians have become a common phenomenon in Russia. The appearance of Yegor Gaidar in the highest echelons of power in the historic year 1991 was perceived quite differently, when the thirty-five-year-old economist was appointed Deputy Chairman of the Russian Government. What Gaidar accomplished in this post turned out to be so significant that even the most active opponents of reform began to treat him with respect.
In the most critical moments, he looked for the only correct and possible solution and not only knew how to prove the need for just such an approach, but also practically brought it to life. Perhaps a certain genetic experience, inherited from his grandfather, Arkady Golikov (Gaidar), who became a regiment commander at the age of nineteen, also played a role here.
Yegor Timurovich Gaidar grew up in a prosperous intelligentsia family: his father was a military sailor, later a journalist, and his mother, the granddaughter of the famous writer Pavel Bazhov, was a professional historian. Egor graduated with a gold medal from a prestigious mathematics school, and then from the Faculty of Economics of Moscow State University. After defending his PhD thesis under the guidance of the famous economist Academician S. Shatalin, the young scientist began working at the Institute for System Research in 1980.
In 1986, Egor Timurovich defended his doctoral dissertation, after which he became the head of a laboratory at the Institute of Economics and Forecasting of Scientific and Technological Progress. At the same time, even under Yuri Andropov, Yegor Timurovich Gaidar was an expert in the commission that studied the possibilities of economic reforms. It was there that he met his future colleagues in political activity - P. Aven, A. Chubais and other young energetic people who were full of desire to rebuild the Soviet economy.
In December 1986, the first conference of economists and supporters of reforms took place near Leningrad, where Gaidar became their recognized leader. The following year, at the invitation of member of the CPSU Central Committee I. Frolov, editor-in-chief of the Kommunist magazine, Gaidar headed the economics department in this magazine. But it was not possible to tame him. This already became clear in December 1988, when Yegor Gaidar issued a memo warning about the excessive wastefulness of the 1989 budget. After this, Mikhail Gorbachev put a discussion of Yegor Gaidar’s recommendations on the agenda of the next Politburo meeting, and they were accepted, but no one was in a hurry to implement them, since the Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers N. Ryzhkov opposed these proposals.
In 1990, Gaidar moved to the position of head of the economics department of Pravda, and soon became director of the Institute of Economic Policy, created on his own initiative.
Around the same time, he unveiled his economic program, in which he defended the main role of financial stabilization of the economy. He believed that it was the key to the successful implementation of the privatization program proposed by A. Chubais.
During the putsch in August 1991, together with other employees of the institute, Yegor Gaidar participated in the defense of the White House, and in September 1991 he joined a group of economists that, under the leadership of G. Burbulis, developed a project for reforming the Russian economy. Many of the members of this group subsequently took leading positions in the Russian government: A. Golovkov, A. Chubais, A. Shokhin.
When in November 1991 Yegor Gaidar became deputy and then acting Prime Minister, as well as Minister of Economy and Finance, these people became the core of the group that opponents of reforms called “Gaidar’s team.” It was Gaidar who drew up the final version of the Belovezhskaya Agreement, in which the leaders of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus announced the dissolution of the USSR and the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
At the end of November 1991, Yegor Timurovich Gaidar outlined a plan of priority action, in which he called for an immediate release of prices and wages while simultaneously pursuing a tough financial policy. However, his team managed to begin the practical implementation of reforms only at the beginning of 1992, after the resistance of opponents of the reforms was overcome. It is clear that such harsh measures, which were called “shock therapy,” caused a wave of criticism from both opponents and supporters of the reforms.
At that time, everyone believed that Yegor Gaidar was unlikely to be able to stay in power for more than two or three months. However, he did not lose optimism, although already in April 1992 he was relieved of his post as Minister of Finance.
Soon Yegor Timurovich Gaidar announced the resignation of his government, citing the fact that the Congress of People's Deputies, with its resolution, practically blocked reforms. And yet, in that very difficult period for Russia, a compromise was found, and at the end of April 1992, Gaidar managed to achieve Russia’s admission to the International Monetary Fund. This meant international recognition of the correctness of the chosen tactics for the economic transformation of the country.
And yet, in December 1992, the Seventh Congress of People's Deputies demanded that President Boris Yeltsin change the government. In order to maintain the course of reforms, B. Yeltsin was forced to compromise with the people's representatives, and V. Chernomyrdin was appointed Chairman of the Government.
Immediately after his resignation, Gaidar was offered to become the leader of the democratic camp. He did not immediately, but nevertheless accepted this offer and since then has not stopped engaging in politics, combining with this activity the leadership of the Institute of Economic Problems. Under the leadership of Yegor Gaidar, a program of economic reforms in the Yaroslavl region was developed and implemented.
After Yeltsin's victory in the referendum in April 1993, both political scientists and economists were very active in discussing the question of whether Gaidar would return to the government. But everything remained at the level of speculation, and no official offer was ever made to him.
Obviously, this is why, from the beginning of 1993, Yegor Gaidar became the head of the Russia’s Choice bloc. In this capacity, he developed the most realistic election program, which was distinguished by the depth of its economic justification. One of the priorities of the program is the primary use of economic rather than forceful methods of solving problems. In it, he, in particular, called for refraining from sending troops into Chechnya, believing that economic methods could be used to influence the leadership of the republic much more effectively.
Currently, Yegor Timurovich Gaidar is one of the major politicians and consistently opposes the communist revival of Russia.
He is married for the second time and has three children.
Today, many remember with a shudder the dashing 90s, when millions of people were forced to experience all the hardships of the transition period from socialism to capitalism. One of the key figures in the political arena of that time was Yegor Gaidar. Although 5 years have passed since the death of this politician, disputes over the economic reforms carried out according to the plan he developed still do not subside.
Yegor Gaidar: biography, nationality of parents
The name of this politician in the former USSR was known to every schoolchild, since millions of Soviet children were brought up on the example of the heroes of books written by his grandfather, Arkady Golikov. During the Civil War, he fought in the Red Army, and while serving in Khakassia he acquired the nickname Gaidar. Later, the writer took it as a surname, which then passed to his son from his second marriage with Leah Lazarevna Solomyanskaya - Timur, and then to his grandson. Thus, Yegor Gaidar’s father is Russian only on his father’s side, and on his mother’s side he has Jewish roots.
Timur Arkadyevich was born in 1926 and devoted his entire life to the USSR Navy, rising to the rank of rear admiral. In parallel with this, he received a second higher education at the Faculty of Journalism of the VPA named after. Lenin and after completing his military career he worked as a correspondent for the newspaper Pravda abroad. In 1955, he married the daughter of the famous Russian writer P. Bazhov, Ariadna Pavlovna, and in 1956 they had a son, Yegor Gaidar, whose biography, nationality and activities in the political field are described below.
Childhood
Yegor Timurovich Gaidar (biography, the nationality of his parents are already known to you) was born in Moscow. As already mentioned, he was the grandson of two famous writers. As for the politician’s nationality, he considered himself Russian.
IN early age Egor ended up in Cuba, where his father was sent as a correspondent for the newspaper Pravda. There he met Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, who were visiting the house where Yegor Gaidar's family lived.
In 1966, the boy was taken to Yugoslavia, where he became acquainted with literature banned in the USSR, and also discovered the true, unperverted meaning of the economic works of Marx and Engels.
In 1971, the family returned to the capital, and Yegor Gaidar began attending school number 152, from which he graduated 2 years later with a gold medal. Having entered the Faculty of Economics of Moscow State University, the young man began studying planning issues in the industrial sector, and after graduating he continued to improve his knowledge in graduate school.
Career and scientific activity in the pre-perestroika period
In 1980, Gaidar Egor Timurovich defended his PhD thesis on the mechanisms of self-financing, joined the ranks of the CPSU, of which he remained a member until August, and was assigned to the Research Institute for System Research.
There he began working as part of a group of young scientists led by the famous Soviet economist Stanislav Shatalin. Soon, Gaidar and his colleagues involved in comparative analysis of economic transformations in the countries of the socialist camp formed a firm conviction in the need for radical reforms in the USSR.
During the same period, the scientist met Anatoly Chubais, and a circle of like-minded people formed around them, united by the desire for changes in the economic sphere.
In 1986, Yegor Gaidar, as part of a group led by Shatalin, was transferred to work at the Institute of Economics of the USSR Academy of Sciences, and in the scientific community, as a result of the policy of glasnost announced by Gorbachev, it became possible to discuss issues related to preparations for the transition to market relations.
Work in the field of journalism
Gaidar’s ideas of economic liberalization might have remained unknown to the general public if the scientist had not accepted the offer to become deputy editor of the Kommunist magazine, and a little later, head of the economic department of the Pravda newspaper. During this period of his activity, he actively promotes the idea of reducing budget expenditures in areas that do not bring tangible benefits. At the same time, at the initial stage of his activity as a journalist, Gaidar was a supporter of gradual reforms that could be carried out within the framework of the existing Soviet system.
Serving as Acting Chairman of the Government of the RSFSR
On the famous August night of 1991, Yegor Gaidar participated in the defense of the White House. There he met the Secretary of State of the RSFSR G. Burbulis. The latter convinced B. Yeltsin to entrust the development of a program of economic reforms to Gaidar’s group. In October 1991, it was presented at the 5th Congress of People's Deputies and received the approval of the delegates. A few days later, Gaidar Yegor Timurovich was appointed deputy chairman of the RSFSR government, in charge of economic issues, and on June 15, 1992, he became acting prime minister of the Russian Federation. He held this post until December 15, 1992 and played a key role in the creation of many state institutions of the Russian Federation, such as the tax and banking systems, customs, financial market and a number of others. At the same time, today Gaidar’s critics hold him responsible for the negative consequences of the reforms: the depreciation of the population’s savings, hyperinflation, a decline in production, a sharp decline in the average standard of living, as well as growing income differentiation.
Political and parliamentary crises of 1993
Yegor Gaidar, whose biography contains references not only to ups, but also to downs, did not receive the support of deputies of the 7th Congress of People's Deputies regarding his appointment as chairman of the country's government. This refusal to approve a politician for one of the most important positions in the state, along with a number of other reasons, led to the beginning of a political crisis.
From December 1992 to September 1993, Yegor Gaidar was engaged in scientific work. In addition, he advised the President of the Russian Federation on economic policy issues. The politician was one of the key figures during the year, a few days before which he was appointed deputy chairman of Chernomyrdin’s government. It was he who addressed Muscovites on television and called on them to gather near the Mossovet building. As a result, on the night of September 22, barricades appeared on Tverskaya, and by the morning the White House was stormed, ending in the victory of Yeltsin’s supporters.
It soon turned out that Gaidar and Chernomyrdin had fundamental disagreements on the most important issues of the country’s economic policy, so Yegor Timurovich submitted his resignation, having previously explained the reasons for his action in a letter to the president.
Further activities
From December 1993 to the end of 1995, Gaidar was a deputy of the State Duma of the Russian Federation. In parallel with this, he headed the Democratic Choice of Russia party. During the Chechen war, politician Yegor Gaidar opposed the fighting and called on Boris Yeltsin to refuse to run for the next presidential term. However, after the publication of a plan for a peaceful settlement of the armed conflict in Chechnya, the party he led supported the current head of state.
In 1999, the Union of Right Forces bloc was formed. It also included Gaidar's party. In the elections held in December of this year, he was elected to the State Duma of the third convocation. While working in the country's highest legislative body, Gaidar participated in the development of the Budget and Tax Codes.
Death of a politician
IN last years Throughout his life, Yegor Gaidar had certain health problems. In particular, in 2006, he lost consciousness during a public speech in Ireland, was taken to the intensive care unit of one of the local hospitals and remained there for several days. Since this event occurred the day after the report of the polonium poisoning of A. Litvinenko, rumors appeared in the press that Gaidar was also a victim of an assassination attempt. An investigation was carried out, but no signs of poison were found.
The death of Yegor Gaidar occurred on December 16, 2009 in his house located in the village of Uspenskoye near Moscow. The famous economist was only 53 years old at that time. The children of Yegor Gaidar, in particular his daughter Maria, reported that their father died of a heart attack. As for the doctors, they named a blood clot as the cause.
The politician's funeral took place at the Novodevichy cemetery. Yegor Gaidar's wife and other members of his family did not want to disclose their date, so the burial took place without the presence of strangers.
Personal life
For the first time, Yegor Gaidar married quite early, at the age of 22. The chosen one of the 5th year honors student at the Faculty of Economics of Moscow State University was Irina Smirnova, whom the politician met at the age of 10. As Yegor Gaidar himself later admitted, his personal life during his graduate studies and in the first years of work at the Scientific Research Institute for System Research did not work out. Therefore, even though he had two children in his first marriage, after the birth of his daughter he began to think about divorce.
Some time later, Gaidar entered into a second marriage with Maria Strugatskaya. Thus, the politician became related to the famous Soviet science fiction writer Arkady Strugatsky, who became his father-in-law, and to the famous sinologist Ilya Oshanin, who was his wife’s grandfather. Yegor Gaidar's second family existed until his death, and in this marriage he had a son.
Children of Yegor Gaidar
As already mentioned, the politician had two children from his first marriage: a son and a daughter. After her parents’ divorce, the girl remained with her mother, while her brother, Peter, Irina Smirnova agreed to leave her husband’s parents, who doted on him.
In addition, Yegor Gaidar’s second wife, who had a son from a previous relationship, gave birth to another boy in her second marriage. This happened in 1990, and the child was named Pavel. He is the grandson and great-grandson of Arkady Gaidar and Pavel Bazhov.
Thus, the politician has only three natural children and one adopted child.
Maria Gaidar
Of all the children of the politician, the daughter from her first marriage, Maria Gaidar, is currently attracting the greatest interest. After her parents divorced at the age of 3, the girl remained to live with her mother, who soon remarried. When Masha was in third grade, the family moved to Bolivia. Before the trip, the girl’s last name was changed, and she became Smirnova. After 5 years, Maria returned to Moscow with her mother and stepfather and began attending a special school with a Spanish bias. She returned her surname Gaidar only at the age of 22, after graduating from the Academy of National Economy.
Having received a law degree, the girl changed several professions, working as a teacher, manager and planning expert, and then the daughter of Yegor Gaidar tried herself as a presenter on the O2TV channel, and since 2008 on the Ekho Moskvy radio station.
In parallel with this, Maria Egorovna was actively engaged in political activity and since 2006 has been a member of the Presidium of the Union of Right Forces. She always held opposition views and repeatedly took part in rallies and marches organized by opponents of the country's current authorities.
On March 26, 2009, Yegor Gaidar became the daughter of Yegor Gaidar; however, in 2011, she announced her resignation due to the desire to continue her education in the USA, at the School of Public Administration. J. Kennedy at Harvard.
Returning from the States, Maria worked for some time in the Moscow government, and then was nominated as a deputy of the Moscow City Duma, but was not registered by the election commission due to the discovery of violations in the documents. This decision was appealed in court, but the latter upheld it.
In the summer of 2015, M. Gaidar was appointed deputy chairman of the Odessa regional administration on the recommendation of Mikheil Saakashvili, and a little later she renounced Russian citizenship.
The most important scientific works
Yegor Gaidar, whose biography you now know, undoubtedly played an important role in the modern history of our country. Our descendants have yet to evaluate it, but we cannot diminish the merits of this politician as a scientist, many of whose ideas were confirmed after his death.
Among the most interesting scientific works of Yegor Gaidar are:
- the book “State and Evolution”, dedicated to the relationship between power and property in the Russian state;
- the work “Anomalies of Economic Growth”, which examines the causes of the collapse of the socialist economy;
- article “On the reform of global financial institutions”, etc.
At the moment, the work “The Death of an Empire,” written in 2006, is of particular interest. There, Gaidar predicted the possibility of a crisis that could arise due to fluctuations in oil prices.
Former head of the "government of reformers" of the Russian Federation
Well-known economist, director of the Institute for the Economy in Transition (1990-1991, 1992-1993, 1995-2009). Former co-chairman of the election bloc and the SPS party (2001-2004), co-leader of the public bloc "Right Cause" (1997-2001), chairman of the party "Democratic Choice of Russia" (1994-2001), deputy of the State Duma of the first and third convocations. From 1992 to 1993, he was an adviser to the President of the Russian Federation on economic policy issues. Former Deputy Chairman of the Government of the RSFSR (1991-1992) and Acting Chairman of the Government Russian Federation(1992), head of the “government of reformers”, author of “shock therapy” and price liberalization. Died December 16, 2009.
Yegor Timurovich Gaidar was born on March 19, 1956 in Moscow in the family of a war correspondent for the Pravda newspaper, Rear Admiral Timur Gaidar. Both of Yegor Gaidar's grandfathers - Arkady Gaidar and Pavel Bazhov - are famous writers.
In 1978, Gaidar graduated from the Faculty of Economics of Moscow state university named after Lomonosov, in November 1980 he graduated from graduate school at Moscow State University. In graduate school at Moscow State University, Gaidar studied under the guidance of academician Stanislav Shatalin, who is considered not only his teacher, but also an ideological like-minded person. After graduating from graduate school, Gaidar defended his Ph.D. thesis on evaluation indicators in the economic accounting system of enterprises.
In 1980-1986, Gaidar worked at the All-Union Research Institute of System Research of the State Committee for Science and Technology and the USSR Academy of Sciences. In 1986-1987, he was a leading researcher at the Institute of Economics and Forecasting Scientific and Technological Progress of the USSR Academy of Sciences, where he worked under the leadership of Academician Lev Abalkin, who later became Deputy Prime Minister Nikolai Ryzhkov.
In 1982, Gaidar met Anatoly Chubais (later the main ideologist of privatization), being invited to St. Petersburg to speak at “Chubais” economic seminars. According to other sources, Gaidar met Chubais and Pyotr Aven (later a major businessman) in 1983-1984, when he participated in the work of a state commission that studied the possibilities of economic reforms in the USSR.
In the summer of 1986, Gaidar, Aven and Chubais organized their first open conference in Zmeinaya Gorka near Leningrad.
In 1987-1990, Gaidar served as editor of the economics department and member of the editorial board of the Kommunist magazine. In 1990, Gaidar was editor of the economics department of the Pravda newspaper.
On August 19, 1991, after the start of the GKChP putsch, Gaidar announced his resignation from the CPSU and joined the defenders of the White House. During the August events, Gaidar met Russian Secretary of State Gennady Burbulis.
In September, Gaidar headed a working group of economists created by Burbulis and Alexei Golovkov under the State Council of the Russian Federation. In October 1991, Gaidar was appointed to the post of Deputy Chairman of the RSFSR Government for Economic Policy, Minister of Economy and Finance of the RSFSR. The name of Gaidar is associated with such events in Russian history as the famous “shock therapy” and price liberalization. He took this post during the collapse of the Soviet Union, when laws ceased to apply, instructions ceased to be followed, and security forces ceased to function. The Soviet system of control over foreign economic activity did not work, and customs ceased to function. According to Gaidar himself, in a situation where there were no reserves left - neither budgetary nor foreign exchange, the only way out was to unfreeze prices.
In 1992, Gaidar became acting Prime Minister of the Russian Federation. As the head of the “government of reformers,” Gaidar took an active part in the creation of the privatization program and its implementation in practice.
In 1992-1993, Gaidar served as director of the Institute for Economic Problems in Transition and was an adviser to the President of the Russian Federation on economic policy issues. In September 1993, Gaidar became the first deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers - the government of the Russian Federation.
On October 3-4, 1993, during the constitutional crisis in Moscow, Gaidar called on the people to take to the streets and fight for the new regime to the end. .
From 1994 to December 1995, Gaidar was a deputy of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation, chairman of the Russia's Choice faction.
In June 1994, Gaidar became chairman of the Democratic Choice of Russia party (he remained the party leader until May 2001). Colleagues in the Far East gave him a playful nickname - “Iron Winnie the Pooh” - for his characteristic appearance, unbending character and increased efficiency.
In December 1998, Russian liberal democrats united into the “Right Cause” public bloc, whose leadership included Gaidar, Chubais, Boris Nemtsov, Boris Fedorov, and Irina Khakamada. On August 24, Sergei Kiriyenko, Nemtsov and Khakamada announced the creation of the Union of Right Forces (SPS) electoral bloc. In the 1999 parliamentary elections, Gaidar, on the SPS list, became a member of the State Duma of the third convocation. The founding congress of the SPS party took place on May 26, 2001, and Gaidar became one of its co-chairs. After the defeat of the Union of Right Forces in the elections in December 2003, Gaidar left the leadership of the party and was no longer included in the new presidium of the Political Council of the Union of Right Forces, elected in February 2004 - according to Leonid Gozman, the party’s curator for ideology, “Gaidar and Nemtsov remain leaders, not holding formal positions."
Gaidar is an honorary professor at the University of California, a member of the editorial board of the journal "Bulletin of Europe", a member of the advisory board of the journal "Acta Oeconomica".
On November 24, 2006, while attending a conference in Ireland, Gaidar suddenly felt ill and was taken to the hospital with signs of acute poisoning. Journalists noticed that this happened the day after Alexander Litvinenko, a former employee of the FSB of the Russian Federation, a sharp critic of the policies of the Kremlin and personally of President Vladimir Putin, died in one of the London hospitals from poisoning with the radioactive substance polonium. However, Gaidar managed to recover and the very next day he flew to Moscow, where he continued his treatment. Gaidar refused to comment on speculation that he was deliberately poisoned.
In September 2008, SPS leader Nikita Belykh resigned from his post as party chairman. The reasons for this politician’s action were soon explained: it was reported that within a few months the SPS would become part of a new right-wing party being created by the Kremlin. Gaidar refused to participate in the creation of a new structure and submitted a letter of resignation from the party. At the same time, according to the politician, he is “not ready to say a word in condemnation” of the position of those who believe that “political structures that are loyal to the regime, but are not formally part of the ruling party” are capable of playing a positive role. However, soon he, together with Chubais and Leonid Gozman, who temporarily headed the SPS, called on party members to cooperate with the authorities to create a right-wing liberal party. Insisting on the need for such a step, the authors of the statement admitted that “a democratic regime does not function in Russia.” They expressed doubt that the right in the future “will be able to protect our values in full.” “But we certainly won’t be forced to defend strangers,” the SPS leaders argued.
On December 16, 2009, Gaidar died at the age of 54. According to RIA Novosti, the cause of death was a detached blood clot, and the next day, Gaidar’s daughter said that he died from pulmonary edema caused by myocardial ischemia.
Three months after Gaidar’s death, in March 2010, the name “Institute of Economic Policy” was returned to the institute he founded and given his name. In May of the same year, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree to perpetuate the memory of Yegor Gaidar. According to him, his foundation and one of the Moscow schools should be named after the former prime minister, and a scholarship named after Gaidar should be established for students of economic universities.
The media wrote that Gaidar is a man of radical right-wing views in politics and economics. He was the author of the monographs “Economic reforms and hierarchical structures”, “State and evolution”, “Anomalies of economic growth”, “Days of defeats and victories”, Long time”.
Gaidar spoke English, Serbo-Croatian and Spanish languages. He was a good chess player and played football.
Gaidar was married for the second time to the daughter of the writer Arkady Natanovich Strugatsky, Marianna, whom he met at school. He left three sons - Peter from his first marriage to Irina Smirnova and Ivan and Pavel from his second (Ivan is Marianna’s son from her first marriage), and a daughter Maria, who was born in 1982, when Gaidar and Smirnova were getting ready to divorce. After the divorce, Peter began to live with his father and his parents, and Maria remained with her mother and bore her last name for a long time. Only in 2004 did Gaidar acknowledge his paternity and she took his surname. Subsequently, Maria Gaidar was an employee of the Institute for the Economy in Transition and actively participated in political life [
His father Timur Gaidar is the son of the famous writer Arkady Gaidar, and his mother Ariadna Bazhova is the daughter of the writer Pavel Bazhov.
Yegor's parents were intellectuals from the sixties who professed democratic views. After graduating from high school with a gold medal in 1973, he entered Moscow State University at the Faculty of Economics.
In 1978, he received a honors diploma and continued his postgraduate studies.
From that moment, even under the Soviet system, Gaidar had ideas about economic transformation.In 1980, under the leadership of Stanislav Shatalin, Gaidar defended his Ph.D. thesis on the topic “Evaluation indicators in the economic accounting mechanism of industrial enterprises.”
Later, his theory of economic transformation was practically implemented during his work in the State Duma and the Russian government.
After this, Gaidar was invited to work at the All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Science and Technology and the USSR Academy of Sciences, where projects for economic transformation in the country were developed. With his colleagues in 1984, he was involved in the development of documents on the idealization of national economic management by the Politburo Commission.
No matter how the then leadership implied radical changes, Gaidar’s team was determined, having studied the experience of socio-economic reforms in Eastern and Central Europe.
In 1985, economists planned to create a single team to study the structure of Soviet society, the economy, and thoroughly analyze the paths of transformation. This group included Yegor Gaidar.
In a short period of time, the created community, where Gaidar was one of the leaders, revealed significant distortions and misinformation about Soviet reality, where there was greater reliance on the administrative market. This community has had a significant impact on the country's economy for more than 2 decades.
Yegor Gaidar's activity led to him being entrusted with the post of head of the economic department of the theoretical organ of the CPSU Central Committee, the magazine Kommunist. A little later, he created the Institute of Economic Policy of the USSR Academy of National Economy - the future Institute of Economics in Transition. Gaidar led it until the end of his days. In 1990, he presented his doctoral dissertation on the topic “Hierarchical structures and economic reforms.”
During the August putsch, Gaidar also played a significant role, where decisions were made in a short time that influenced the future fate of now Russia. Some time later, Gaidar was appointed Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs, where he prepared an economic program for Yeltsin. His colleagues also ended up in the same government.
Starting from the end of 1992, Gaidar held various positions, but due to his active insistence on his ideas, he was removed. But all this was a temporary phenomenon, since his achievements and influence remained outside the government corridors. To ensure political support for the reforms, he creates the “Choice of Russia” electoral bloc, which was one of the two largest parties in the State Duma.
In 1999, Gaidar appeared as a deputy of the State Duma and one of the leaders of the Union of Right Forces. At the international level, Gaidar tried to resolve the conflict in Yugoslavia and participated in the Russian-American dialogue. Yegor Gaidar reflected his political and economic views in his works “Days of Defeats and Victories”, “A Long Time”, “Anomalies of Economic Growth”, “State and Evolution”, “Death of an Empire”, etc.
On November 24, 2006, at a seminar in Dublin, Gaidar was hospitalized with severe poisoning. On December 16, 2009, he died.
On March 19, 1956, Yegor Gaidar, one of the main ideologists and leaders of economic reforms of the early 1990s, was born.
Private bussiness
Yegor Timurovich Gaidar (1956—2009) Born in Moscow in the family of a war correspondent for the Pravda newspaper, Rear Admiral Timur Gaidar. Both of his grandfathers - Arkady Gaidar and Pavel Bazhov - were famous writers.
With the outbreak of the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962-1964, he lived in Cuba, where his father wrote materials for Pravda. Raul Castro and Ernesto Che Guevara visited their house. In 1966, my father and his family went to Yugoslavia. In 1971, the family returned to Moscow.
In 1978, Egor graduated from the Faculty of Economics of Moscow State University, in 1980 he defended his thesis, the topic of which was estimated indicators in the cost accounting system of enterprises. Gaidar's scientific supervisor was academician Stanislav Shatalin, who was considered not only his teacher, but also an ideological like-minded person.
In 1980-1986 he worked at the All-Union Research Institute of System Research. For the next two years, he was a senior researcher at the Institute of Economics and Forecasting Scientific and Technological Progress, working under the leadership of Academician Lev Abalkin, later deputy chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers.
In the early 1980s, he met Anatoly Chubais and his colleagues. A Moscow-St. Petersburg group of economists and sociologists emerges, analyzing the real state of the Soviet economy and society, international experience of reforms and prospects for reforms in the USSR. Yegor Aidar becomes the leader of the Moscow part of the group.
In 1983-1984 he participated in the work of a commission that studied the possibilities of economic reforms in the USSR. By his own admission, even while working at the Research Institute for Systems Research, he realized that the economy of the USSR was in a difficult state, and gradual market reforms were necessary to solve its problems, otherwise “the socialist economy will enter a phase of self-destruction.”
In 1986, at the Zmeinaya Gorka boarding house in the Leningrad region, Gaidar, Aven and Chubais organized an economic conference, at which the expanded Moscow-St. Petersburg group discussed the real situation in the Soviet national economy and talked about the prospects for transformation.
In 1987-1990, he was editor of the economics department at the Kommunist magazine, and in 1990 he worked in a similar position at the Pravda newspaper.
In 1990, he headed the Institute of Economic Policy at the USSR Academy of National Economy (now the Yegor Gaidar Institute of Economic Policy).
In August 1991, after the start of the putsch, the State Emergency Committee announced its withdrawal from the CPSU and joined the defenders of the White House. In those days, I met the Secretary of State of the RSFSR Gennady Burbulis. Subsequently, Burbulis convinced President Boris Yeltsin to entrust Gaidar's team with the development of economic reforms. In October, Yeltsin met with Gaidar and decided to form a new government based on his team.
In 1991-1992 - Minister of Economy and Finance of the RSFSR, Minister of Finance of Russia, First Deputy Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation and, finally, acting head of government. Under Gaidar's leadership, market reforms were carried out - retail prices were released, freedom of foreign trade was introduced, privatization and restructuring of the fuel and energy complex began.
After the Congress of People's Deputies approved Viktor Chernomyrdin as head of government, Gaidar was dismissed, but retained his influence on the country's economic course and was the president's economic adviser. In September 1993, he was again appointed first deputy head of government. During the constitutional crisis of September-October 1993 (deputies against the president), he called on Muscovites to take to the streets to defend democracy. “Today we cannot shift responsibility for the fate of democracy, for the fate of Russia, for the fate of our freedom only to the police, to the internal troops, to the security forces. Today the people, Muscovites, must have their say,” said Gaidar.
In 1993, he was one of the founders of the “Russia’s Choice” movement, then the Democratic Choice of Russia party. In 1994-1995 - deputy of the State Duma, from 1994 to 2001 - chairman of the party.
In 1998, together with Anatoly Chubais, Boris Nemtsov, Boris Fedorov and Irina Khakamada, he joined the leadership of the Just Cause bloc. The following year, he entered the State Duma from the SPS party, created by Khakamada and Sergei Kiriyenko. In 2001, he became one of the co-chairs of the party; after its defeat in the elections in December 2003, he left the leadership, but remained in the Union of Right Forces until 2008.
On November 24, 2006, during a seminar in Dublin, Yegor Gaidar was hospitalized with symptoms of severe poisoning. This story remains not entirely clear to this day. It is only obvious that the consequences of the poisoning accelerated his departure.
What is he famous for?
Yegor Gaidar
Economist, under whose leadership market reforms were carried out in the early 1990s, which made it possible to move to a new socio-economic structure in Russia. At the same time, millions of people were forced to experience all the hardships of the transition period from socialism to capitalism.
Gaidar's critics hold him responsible for the negative consequences of the reforms: the depreciation of the population's savings, hyperinflation, a sharp decline in the average standard of living and growing income differentiation.
Gaidar himself explained that such tough and rapid reforms were the only way out after the collapse of the USSR economy. “We saw: another two or three months of passivity, and we will get an economic and political catastrophe, the collapse of the country and civil war", he declared.
What you need to know
One of the most famous components of Gaidar’s activities over the past decade and a half is his books and articles. In 1996 - 1997, his memoirs and a fresh analysis of his own activities and the situation in the country were published (“Days of defeats and victories” and “State and evolution”). Subsequently, the scientist prepared a whole series of works with an analysis of the political economic patterns of transition processes in different societies: “The Death of the Empire” (primarily about the pattern of the collapse of the USSR), “A Long Time” (about Russia’s place in the process of world transformations), “Troubles and Institutions “(about the patterns of passing through “troubled” periods and the formation of new institutions as a result of them), “Anomalies of economic growth” (about the specifics of growth in the modern economy), etc.
Direct speech:
Chairman of the Board of JSC Rusnano Anatoly Chubais:“Whatever subsystem of the current economy of the country you take - the Tax Code, the Customs Code, the Budget Code, technical regulation, etc. - each of them is either spelled out from beginning to end by Gaidar and his institute, or he participated to a significant extent in their development.” .
Yegor Gaidar in the book “The Death of an Empire” about the collapse of the USSR:“In order to make the economy and politics of a world superpower dependent on the decisions of potential adversaries (the United States) and the main competitor in the oil market (Saudi Arabia) and wait for them to agree, it takes a long time to recruit particularly incompetent people to the country’s leadership.”
Yegor Gaidar in the book “Days of Defeats and Victories” about the reasons for the painful reforms:“I went from being an advisor to being a decision maker. Discussions about “soft”, “socially painless” reforms, in which problems can be solved overnight so that everyone will feel good, and it will not cost anyone anything, reproaches against us, which soon filled the pages of newspapers and sounded from scientific platforms, even didn't offend. We saw: another two or three months of passivity, and we will get an economic and political catastrophe, the collapse of the country and civil war.”
8 facts about Yegor Gaidar:
- He spoke English, Serbo-Croatian and Spanish. He was a good chess player and also played football.
- Colleagues at the Democratic Choice of Russia jokingly called him Iron Winnie the Pooh - the nickname was given for his characteristic appearance, unbending character and enormous capacity for work.
- Gaidar was married twice. I got married for the first time in my fifth year at Moscow State University. In his marriage to Irina Smirnova, two children were born - Peter and (just before the divorce) Maria. In 2004, Gaidar admitted that he was Maria’s father, and she took his last name. Subsequently, Maria Gaidar worked at the Institute for the Economy in Transition and actively participated in political life. For the second time, Yegor Gaidar married the daughter of the writer Arkady Strugatsky, Marianna, and the couple had a son, Pavel.
- According to human rights activists Yuli Rybakov and Sergei Kovalev, Gaidar played an important role in rescuing hostages during Shamil Basayev's siege of a hospital in Budennovsk in 1995. Sergei Kovalev was able to get through to Gaidar, who had already contacted the Prime Minister. According to Kovalev, Viktor Chernomyrdin only learned from Gaidar that there were not a hundred people in the hospital, but two thousand hostages. Gaidar convinced the prime minister to entrust Sergei Kovalev with the formation of a commission of negotiators, thanks to which the hostages were saved.
- For a long time, the phrase “there is nothing terrible in the fact that some pensioners will die out, but society will become more mobile” was attributed to Gaidar. In 2000, the Kuntsevo Intermunicipal Court of Moscow recognized that the quote was deliberately disseminated by politician Viktor Ilyukhin in order to denigrate Gaidar.
- The Institute of Economic Policy named after Gaidar and Maria Strugatskaya was founded