Yegor Gaidar

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search
 This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (December 2007)
(Find sources: Yegor Gaidar – news, books, scholar)
Yegor Gaidar
Его́р Гайда́р

In office
15 June 1992 – 14 December 1992
President Boris Yeltsin
Preceded by Oleg Lobov
Succeeded by Viktor Chernomyrdin
Born 19 March 1956 (1956-03-19) (age 53)
Moscow, RSFSR, Soviet Union
Political party Union of Right Forces

Yegor Timurovich Gaidar (Russian: Его́р Тиму́рович Гайда́р; Russian pronunciation: [jɪˈɡor tʲɪˈmurəvʲɪtɕ ɡɐjˈdar]; born March 19, 1956) is a Soviet and Russian economist and politician, and was the Acting Prime Minister of Russia from June 15, 1992 to December 14, 1992.

Contents

[edit] Background

Gaidar was born in Moscow. He is the grandson of famous Soviet writer Arkady Gaidar, on the side of his father, Pravda military correspondent Timur Gaidar, who fought in the Bay of Pigs Invasion and was a friend of Raúl Castro. On his mother's side, he is the grandson of Pavel Bazhov. His daughter, Maria Gaidar is a leader of the political youth movement "Yes!" in Russia.

[edit] Professional life

Gaidar graduated with honors from the Moscow State University, Department of Economics, in 1978 and worked as a researcher in several academic institutes. A long-time member of the Communist Party and an editor of the CPSU ideological journal Communist during the perestroika, he turned a liberal during the time of Yeltsin's reforms. In 1991 he quit the Communist Party and joined Yeltsin's government.

While in government, Gaidar advocated liberal economic reforms according to the principle of shock therapy. His most well-known decision was to abolish price regulation by the state, which immediately resulted in a major increase of prices and amounted to officially authorizing a market economy in Russia. He also cut military procurement and industrial subsidies, and reduced the budget deficit. Gaidar was the First Vice-Premier of the Russian Government and Minister of Economics from 1991 until 1992, and Minister of Finance from February 1992 until April 1992.

He was appointed Acting Prime Minister under President Boris Yeltsin in 1992 from June 15 until December 14, when the anti-Yeltsin Russian Congress of People's Deputies refused to confirm Gaidar in this position and Viktor Chernomyrdin was eventually chosen as a compromise figure. Gaidar continued to advise the new government. On September 18, 1993, he was again appointed the First Vice-Premier under Chernomyrdin as a deliberate snub to the opposition. He had active role in the Russian constitutional crisis of 1993: on October 3, he famously spoke on live television, calling on common Muscovites to defend Yeltsin's regime. In 1993 Duma elections, in the aftermath of the crisis, Gaidar was the leader of the pro-government, liberal bloc Russia's Choice and was seen by some as a possible future Prime Minister. However, due to the bloc's failure to win the plurality of votes in the election, Gaidar's role in the government diminished and he finally resigned on January 20, 1994.

[edit] Positions held

[edit] Honorary positions

[edit] 2006 illness and alleged poisoning

On November 28, 2006, Yegor Gaidar was found unconscious in County Kildare, Ireland where he had been presenting his new book Lasting Time: Russia in the World. He was taken to a Dublin hospital but doctors said there was no serious threat to his health. There have been suspicions of a poisoning but Gaidar and his close ally Anatoly Chubais have refrained from accusing the Russian Security Service.[1] On December 6, 2006, Gaidar did claim in an op-ed published in both Russian-language and English-language publications, that he was poisoned by adversaries of the Russian authorities. He did not elaborate on who these adversaries may be.[citation needed] He repeated his claim on the BBC programme Hardtalk.[2]

[edit] Talks and interviews

At a talk show with Yevgenia Albats on June 17, 2007, Gaidar predicted a probable sequence of future political events in Russia based on his personal sources and expertise. In response to one-sided recognition of Kosovo by Western powers, Russia will recognize independence of Abkhazia and South Osetia. This will lead to a military conflict of Russia and Georgia, and urgent changes in Russian Constitution.

[edit] His books

  • Collapse of an Empire: Lessons for Modern Russia, by Yegor Gaidar, Brookings Institution Press (October 17, 2007), ISBN 0-815-73114-0.
  • Russian Reform / International Money (Lionel Robbins Lectures) by Yegor Gaidar and Karl Otto Pöhl (Hardcover - Jul 6, 1995)
  • Days of Defeat and Victory (Jackson School Publications in International Studies) by E. T. Gaidar, Yegor Gaidar, Michael McFaul, and Jane Ann Miller (Dec 1999)
  • State and Evolution: Russia's Search for a Free Market by E. T. Gaidar, Yegor Gaidar, and Jane Ann Miller (Hardcover - Aug 2003)
  • The Economics of Russian Transition by Yegor Gaidar (Aug 15, 2002)
  • Ten Years of Russian Economic Reform by Sergei Vasiliev and Yegor Gaidar (Mar 25, 1999)

[edit] References

  1. ^ Second Russian in poison mystery, November 29, 2006
  2. ^ Shown on BBC World 19 February 2008

[edit] External links

Political offices
Preceded by
Oleg Lobov		 Acting
Prime Minister of Russia
15 June 1992–14 December 1992		 Succeeded by
Viktor Chernomyrdin
v • d • e
Prime Ministers of Russia
Russian Empire
Provisional Government
Russian SFSR/
Soviet Union
Russia as a part
of the Soviet Union
Russian Federation
Yeltsin · Gaidar* · Chernomyrdin · Kiriyenko · Chernomyrdin* · Primakov · Stepashin · Putin · Kasyanov · Khristenko* · Fradkov · Zubkov · Putin
* denotes acting.
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yegor_Gaidar"