The business community turns to its people and country
At the end of the 80s of the last century, the economy of the USSR was experiencing a crisis. Soviet citizens, not without the efforts of Western and domestic propagandists, were fascinated by capitalism. Then many people suddenly suddenly wanted to become entrepreneurs, to start “working for themselves, not for their uncle,” driving Mercedes rather than second-hand Zhigulis, eating at McDonald’s and not at the factory canteen. However, after the dramatic events of August 1991, illusions and euphoria began to quickly evaporate. As it turned out, there are not enough Mercedes for everyone, as well as warm seats on the boards of oil and gas corporations and large banks.
At the end of the 80s of the last century, the USSR economy was experiencing a crisis. Soviet citizens, not without the efforts of Western and domestic propagandists, were fascinated by capitalism. Then many people suddenly suddenly wanted to become entrepreneurs, to start “working for themselves, not for their uncle,” driving Mercedes rather than second-hand Zhigulis, eating at McDonald’s and not at the factory canteen. However, after the dramatic events of August 1991, illusions and euphoria began to quickly evaporate. As it turns out, there are not enough Mercs for everyone, as well as warm seats on the boards of oil and gas corporations and large banks.
Becoming an “owner” and opening your own business for most turned out to be like flying into space — just as overwhelming. This required start-up capital, administrative resources, special abilities, skills and strength, including physical strength. The lucky ones who grabbed luck by the tail turned out to be a minority, often ferocious, cruel, greedy, ambitious, instantly depriving ordinary workers of even those rights that the disgusted Soviet system had recently granted them. For the majority, hopes for a better life were replaced by deep disappointment, mass despondency, and even hatred of the new “masters of life.” At least bring about a new October Revolution!
History repeated itself in a new round. Just as it was at the beginning of the century, when capitalism was already trying to take Russian heights, but it never took root. V.I. Lenin’s fundamental work “The Development of Capitalism in Russia,” which Soviet students studied and took exams at universities, but did not think about what was written there, turned out to be not so superfluous for the new time. But Lenin was removed from libraries and university programs. But everyone eagerly studied a thick volume from America called “Economics”, passionately studying the magical “Phillips curve”, which explains that the higher the unemployment, the lower the inflation. By the way, by that time in the USA they had already abandoned this “curve” as an untenable hypothesis. The Western world actively exported such economic “masterpieces” to “developing” countries, among which we were pushed.
Over time, the Achilles heel of Russian business emerged and began to manifest itself. It consisted in the fact that our corporate sector was formed not by an evolutionary market path, but mechanically, “from hand to hand,” as a result of accelerated privatization, carried out with numerous abuses. Greetings to Chubais, his associates and comrades. The core of the privatization program was the political goal: to abolish the socialist system of industrial relations, creating a critical mass of owners in the shortest possible time. The result of privatization “Russian style” was the predatory seizure of state assets, the destruction of the monopoly of state property, the export of capital, the criminalization of the economy, and the collapse of the state control system.
The emergence of large Russian businesses was strikingly different from the American and European ones, where the largest corporations usually arose as a result of the latest scientific, engineering and organizational achievements that brought large profits. The formation of these giants was associated with the rise of the entire economy as a whole, and not with its decline, as in our case. In the West, for centuries, organizational and legal forms of entrepreneurship have been built, transforming from small to large, based on overcoming the shortcomings of earlier forms. They organically got along and interacted with each other, which supported the competitiveness of the economies of Western countries. In Russia, both large business and individual entrepreneurship arose simultaneously from state, national property. The public sector began to shake and shrank. After all, it’s the same as letting lions into the rabbits’ enclosure, inviting them to be friends and share food. Russian small business, which was the target of the majority of those who dreamed of “working for themselves,” in the 90s simply became a fiction, unable not only to be the support of the state, but also to stay afloat.
At the beginning of the 2000s, Russian corporate legislation had not yet really taken shape, adapting with great delay to the new practice of economic relations between various organizational and legal forms of entrepreneurship. The law could not keep up with the insidious flight of thought of cunning businessmen, who, in the Western style, began to proudly be called managers with the prefix “effective”. The place of Stakhanovites, leaders of production, heroes of labor was taken by fashionably dressed, shod, and speaking English-Russian gobbledygook managers. Having studied abroad, they took to the water like fish in water and became involved in the process of legal seizure of people's property, skillfully circumventing the law, like an experienced racer negotiating turns.
Over time, the legislative gaps were patched, but, as is known, the law does not have retroactive force. What fell was lost. Later, domestic corporate governance began to be actively adjusted to “advanced” Western standards, as the “effective managers” themselves put it. At the same time, “civilized” foreigners had the opportunity, through the mechanism of corporatization, to buy our subsoil for next to nothing and scoop up natural resources.
The specifics of the domestic, far from market, initial accumulation of capital gave rise to many of the vices of Russian entrepreneurship. The wealth of the oligarchs and the new Russian bourgeoisie arose out of nowhere and was a product of the collapse of Soviet society. On this platform, criminal elements, corrupt officials, and just random but clever people have found a business calling.
I remember one such “top manager” was hysterical — he was wildly offended by a trash can in his office, unworthy of his status, for which he fired his assistant. At one time, there was a fashion in some financial structures when management walked along the corridor, and employees who did not have time to hide in their offices had to line up along the wall. It’s also a pleasure to work for such private owners. One thing is clear: such foolishness and excesses are not born in the minds of creators. Those have other concerns.
Not having time to gain strength, domestic business began to degenerate. For many, thoughts about the development and modernization of their business gave way to dreams of getting rich quickly and, heading to the exotic shore of the ocean, “sitting there in a sun lounger and looking at the waves.” The quote is not made up, it is from life. For those with “tight wallets,” patriotism and connections with the Motherland faded, but irrepressible consumerism flared up, admiration and groveling before the Western world and its “city on a hill,” the desire to chew, swallow and run away from everything around them. And a similar picture was observed in many post-Soviet countries.
In 2020, I witnessed a failed attempt at a “color revolution” in Belarus. The driving force behind the Polish and other Western organizers and inspirers of the ongoing processes was that same insatiable petty-bourgeois environment, which passionately desired against the backdrop of the future, as they dreamed, of the collapse of the country, to increase their wealth and strengthen their position. The Belarusian “zmagars” were inspired by August 1991 in Moscow with the subsequent collapse of the USSR and predatory privatization. Thanks to the active resistance of the security forces, patriots from all walks of life, including, I emphasize, socially responsible business, the unbending will of leader Alexander Lukashenko, the undoubted support of Russia, the next “color revolution”, bringing exclusively devastation to the country and troubles to the population, was nipped in the bud.
Now Russia has set a course for a mixed economy, a combination of state planning institutions and market self-organization, free enterprise. Let all flowers bloom: both the public sector and business, let the ideology of the common good and private initiative be combined. Only in equal competition. After all, when a business thrives due to corrupt connections, nepotism, and kickbacks for profitable projects, this is not business, but fraud. And such “entrepreneurship” will never earn respect in society. Nothing will come of it if Russian business does not step on its own throat and get rid of its birth defects. The process is not easy, difficult, sometimes tragic, if we recall some of the characters who have already received the punishing sword of Russian justice.
Society and the authorities, with the aggravation of the situation in the international arena, appreciated the benefits and necessity of small, medium and large businesses . This is especially noticeable recently. A certain class of active, patriotic, enterprising people is being formed in the economy. One thing is absolutely clear: without business itself realizing social responsibility and the benefits of serving national goals, nothing will happen. The mixed economy will turn into a parody of itself, and again in Russia even a hint of capitalist forms will be completely rejected. But there is a feeling that the business community has begun to listen more and more carefully to public opinion, draws conclusions from mistakes and turns its face to its people — not to “this” country, but to “ours.” The state supports this impulse in every possible way, persistently and effectively helps. And this is seen as the key to our common future success and prosperity.