Мне кажется все отчаяние русских почвенников и марксистов ( мол, народ всё отберет у не учитывает появление новго слоя молодых и энергичных людей, живущих по -новому и переустраивающих жизнь в соответствии со своим видением.
За пять лет многие из них совершили гигантский жизненный рывок,. научившись чем-то новому, и они не пожелают менять свой стиль жизни, тем более что ворюгами они не являются. Четыре с половиной года назад , когда покидал Россию, 24-х летний сын моей приятельницы из русского провинциального города молодым Растиньяком отправился покорять в Москву. Когда зимой двухтысячного года я вновь оказался в Москве, то он был уже предстал предо мной как зам. директора по международным делам и совладелец солидной фирмы, поставлющей деловым людям Москвы офисные перегородки из-за кордона.В общем, реальное , нужное дело. Пришлось кстати его знание двух языков , к котрым у парня был очевидный талант.
А ведь такая скорая и успешная карьера для молодого человека были немыслима в советские времена. Теперь "рассекает" по Москве на "мерседесе", отдыхает в Индонезии и соибрается повышать, а не понижать свой жизненный стандарт.
Появилось множество барышень, зарабатывающих хорошие деньги и вовсе не в секторе "досуга", куда были рады их были бы определить некоторые мужики. Рекламые агенты на радио и в других СМИ, например, соврешенно новая, доселе невиданная, страта успешных молодых женщин, делающих карьеру и зарабатывающих приличные деньги , не завися при этом ни от мужчины, ни от родителей... И таким примером несть числа.
13 июля "Москоу таймс" рассказало о последнем иследование КОМКОН московского среднего класса. RUSSIAN MIDDLE CLASS SAID CREATING ITSELF. "The Moscow Times"reported on 13 July
the results of a Comcon study showing that "themiddle-class Muscovite works
hard, eats out, owns a car, and has amonthly income of $500." All of this puts
him far above most Russians,the paper noted, but Comcon Director Yelena Koneva
said that "thedistinguishing characteristic of this middle class is its inner
drive.The middle class has not formed because they have money, they have
moneybecause they are middle class."
Характерен именно вывод социолога о вопроизодстве среднего класса именно за счет желания быть таковым, и , видим, из-за структуры потребностей, которую полагает импортированной Сергей Кара-Мурза.
Откуда бы они не взялись, эти потребности, не считаться с социальным слоем активных деятельных, и, в общем, трудолюбивых людей в своих построениях моделей будущего общества уже не удаться не кому. Это не оценка, а констатация некоей реальности.
В заключение , привожу частное письмо одного француза, живущего в России, корреспонденту "Экономиста" Эдварду Лукасу, который персла его мне. там - об этом же слое. Предлагаю для осмысления. Надо делать выводы по поводу этого слоя, в том числе и русским солидаристам.
Dear Edward,
My name is [anonymised], I am a French citizen living in permanently
in Moscow since 1999 after having being working in Eastern Europe and
Russia since 1996. I am married with a Russian lady and I created my
business in the beginning of this year 2001.
I read your "Survey of Russia" with a lot of attention as I saw it
advertised in Moscow Times July 19th 2001. I am not a regular reader
of "The Economist" although I consider it as a professional and
reliable weekly. The issue was really interesting for me as I
considered the time of publishing (July 21st 2001) quite appropriate
after the impressive package of reform minded bills passed in the
Duma and after V. Putin's first large scale press conference on July
19th 2001 in front of 500 journalists, hall of them being foreigners.
A country survey is an extensive investigation reporting not only the
state of a nation but also revealing in which direction the country
is moving forward, the trends that can be felt. This job need to
spend a lot of time in the country, meeting people from as various
background as possible: workers, students, trade unions, teachers,
entrepreneurs, managers, ministers, opposition leaders, the
president's advisors, local journalists, intellectuals…in short
words, the living forces of the country.
To be honest with you Edward, I really doubt that you have spent (if
any) substantial time doing that in Russia.
Your survey reveal many facts that were true not so long time ago,
but it looks like you are completely missing the point about the way
the reforms are (at last !) taking shape here in Russia after 10
years of stagnation, decay and/or stand still. Your report ignore the
strong will of the Russian people to get out from the situation they
were stuck into for decades. It ignores their intelligence, their
ambitions; it ignores the new consensus within the society. It also
underestimates the new political will of V. Putin's team to build a
strong, modern, wealthy and Europe oriented country. Of course I can
understand how difficult is your task: seeing how Russia is changing
from the outside: so many decades of bad reputation, so many
exaggeration, so many entrenched interests from the European mass
media to sell "Russia's hell and decay" (very few readers would
believe in success stories happening in Russia: dramas are selling so
much better !!!); also one has to replace himself into the context of
the final months of the Yeltsin era to measure the importance of
today's dramatic changes in the country.
Let me elaborate:
Intelligence of Russian people: As you know, the only positive
heritage from the soviet time is the very high level of education of
the population. Yes may be yesterday this intelligence was badly
used, but today, multinational's top managers praise the quality of
their Russian staff. Those managers have a strong credit in their
valuation as they usually worked before in many other countries and
they often quote Russian as their best human resources. Moreover,
foreign languages are very well spoken in Russia.
Ambition of Russian people: Young Russian people want to reach the
highest lifestyle standards as fast as possible: they consider that
they already lost 70 years and that their intelligence, their ability
to travel, learn and/or work abroad will give them the necessary
assets to achieve their goals. I can see in my business that many
Russian companies really want to work at the highest level of
professionalism and that they can compete with foreign companies even
with less financial resources: that is really the best evidence that
this nation refuse the decay: yes it is a difficult country, yes
there is Vodka, corruption, red tape,…BUT THIS IS NOT A FATALITY.
Consensus in the society: Vladimir Putin has make a large
breakthrough in the Yeltsin view of a divided society: take the time
he spend to discuss with M. Gorbatchev, Solzhenitsyn, communist
opposition, …even his meeting with the Kursk `s sailors ` families
was a new step toward accountability of power in Russia: he promised
them to raise the submarine and return the bodies to the families and
that what's happening today. Look at the last press conference: no
questions were eluded, even the hardest one; the president was open
and straighforward: he looked his interviewers in the eyes, with the
confidence of somebody proud of his achievements and having nothing
to hide or to be ashamed of. Take Putin's positions regarding death
penalty, regarding Lenin's mausoleum, regarding demilitarization of
the country, regarding Russia joining Europe, WTO and NATO: all these
are evidence that we have here a modern leader with the strong will
to build a civil society were the opposition of one half of the
population against the other must be buried once for all.
Let's just have a quick view of Russia's evolution since 2000:
· Russia reached stability;
· Russia is no more a "begging country": it has a balanced
budget, repay all its debts on time and refuse new IMF credit.
· State Duma signed Start II arm reduction treaty a few days
after Putin's election and is actively preparing Start III;
· The will power is here to make the country work under one
Federal Law more than an addition of "States in the State".
· Russia took radical steps to insure future growth and to
reduce reliance on Oil and Gas business: (results of the Duma's
spring 2001 cession)
1. Tax reform; (income tax: 13% flat rate; profit tax: 24% with
deductibility of interest charge, advertising and training expenses);
2. Monopoly reform: removing Viakharev from his job was
considered as a harder task than to change of Prime Minister !
3. Debureacratization procedures;
4. Judicial reforms;
5. New labor code;
6. Utilities reform;
7. Army downsizing and reform;
8. Currency exchange reform;
9. New Land code;
10. Law against money laundering;
11. Laws on electronic trade and electronic digital signature;
12. Pensions reform.
You see, Edward, Russia is a new country today. You might say that
this is all paper and all this must be enforced, practiced, accepted
by the population…You would be right, but don't underestimate the
capacity of Russia and Russian to endorse changes.
I spent a fair amount of my time (which was difficult to find in my
15 hours-busy-entrepreneur's days !) to analyze your survey and my
first idea was to prove how flawed is your report, but I though it
would be more productive to explain you in 2 pages how people living
in the country feel the new situation.
Your report (like many other articles regarding Russia):
1. Doesn't reflect the fast changing situation happening today
in Russia
2. Doesn't take into account the human factor;
3. Lacks of vision (if you had investigated the United States of
America in the 1930's you would have described it as a lawless and
futureless country !).
I welcome you to visit Russia and meet people who invest there their
life, time, energy, money, faith and talent. I will help you to meet
people building the "New Russia" day by day and you will see by
yourself that there are much more success stories to report from
Russian or foreign companies, associations that you can imagine !
· Meet Ministers: Mr Gref, Kudrin, Illionarov, Potchinok…
· Meet Mr Yavlinsky, Mrs Irina Khakamada, Mr Yevgeni Yasin,…
· Meet ambassadors,
· Meet European business club, American Chamber of Commerce,
Russian – British Chamber of Commerce…
· Meet Russian companies: MTS, Bee Line, Roverbook, Wim Bill
Dann, Perekrestok, Yukos, Lukoil, Alpha Bank, Formaza, Aeroflot,
Nikoil, Troika
· Meet Foreign companies: SHH, General Motors, Nestle, Ikea,
Accord Group, Caterpillar, Microsoft, Boeing,…
· Meet journalists from Russia Journal, NTV, Echo Moscow, …
Let them speak about their Russian staff, their families, the way
they see the country's evolution, their desires,…Let also them speak
about the market, the potential, its forces, its assets…
To conclude, I would like to give you 5 reasons why Russia all plenty
of assets to be a successful country:
1. Human potential;
2. Economic Reforms;
3. The Country huge natural resources;
4. Huge amount of Russian capital abroad likely to return in
Russia and to be turned into investments in the real economy;
5. Power in place has the desire to be create a civil society
and a strong middle class.
