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RUSSIA vs. GLOBALIZATION
- Part 2
Author and correspondence:
AVEL V. KASYANOV,
Doctor of Science in Economics,
Deputy Chairman of the Centre for Change
in the Third Millennium
Moscow, Russian Federation,
Tel: 8-916-112-0598, Email: p.kasyanov@frecom.ru
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to Part 1...
Russian civilization,
without any doubt, is characterized by a
number of distinguishing attributes (that
have been only briefly outlined in the previous
paragraphs):
- World outlook
and world perception essentially different
from those of the "West", greater
spirituality, heartiness ("Innerlichkeit"),
long-sufferance and forbearance, lesser
concentration on or preoccupation with
the material, on "benefit" because
of different content of the spiritual
sphere (not entirely rejected and forgotten
"pre-Christian" world perception,
rooted, evidently in Vedic religion or
Vedism; Christian Orthodoxy, which had
absorbed important attributes of the Vedic
Orthodoxy; co-existence of a number of
native religions; communist ideology with
its orientation towards creation/ construction
of equitable society), general cultural
background, level of education and erudition,
thirst for knowledge and creativity;
- Geographical
background and challenging natural-climatic
and spatial conditions (prohibitive for
the west-driven globalization process)
on the one hand, and abundance in natural
resources on the other (these are the
hard and ineradicable factors, which will
prevent incorporation of the people of
Russia into OC family, although the territory
of Russia, if duly (i.e. in due time)
freed from the population, may well pretend
for being incorporated into OC);
- The history
of land exploration dominated by the struggle
with adverse natural conditions in contrast
to Europe, where of yore people had been
competing with each other for possession
of fertile and plentiful but spatially
limited lands;
- Language: the
role of the Russian language in formation
and life of the Russian civilization is
far by far more significant than that
of the English language with regard to
OC.
The past 20 years
have been characterized by active and continuous
inculcation of the idea that the "soviet
period" of Russian history was a "national
disgrace and humiliation", a terrible
error, and hence it is our task and objective
to learn from the forward "West"
and exert every effort in order to catch
up with it (this time with regard to liberalism,
"democracy" and "freedoms").
It is remarkable that both our liberals
and "democrats" on the one part
and ultra-patriots or "jingoists"
on the other part have been unanimous in
the open criticism of the USSR trying to
outdo each other in ostentatious demonstration
of their hatred of the soviet regime. Apart
from being absolutely groundless from the
economic viewpoint, such treatment of historical
events suffers from complete lack of dialectal
approach and crippling spiritual primitivism.
Groaning and lamentation about best sons
and daughters of Russia having been exiled
from their motherland (represented chiefly
by aristocracy and bourgeoisie who left
Russia immediately or shortly after 1917)
would be not so loud, if there existed understanding
of the obvious fact, that the so-called
Russian elite, though varying greatly in
its qualitative composition at different
time phases (and evidently having ultimately
degraded by the turn of the 21st century),
has been always characterized by one common
and most essential property, i.e. dissociation
from the Russian civilization and voluntary
joining/ affiliation with OC while physically
remaining in Russia and, owing to its VIP-status
and corresponding authority, significantly
influencing (and determining) socio-economic
conditions in Russia. Thus, physical transference
of this elite beyond the Russian borders
denotes nothing but logical finale of the
long-lasting (for centuries) process of
break-up with the Russian civilization.
The Russian civilization
under USSR proceeded laboriously along its
own challenging and unique road of progress
and, despite heavy odds regarding economic
resources and conditions, imperfection and
flaws of the leaders and rank and file builders
of this civilization, it managed not only
to survive but was actively and successfully
developing for a considerable period of
time. Preservation and development of Russian
civilization in the 20th century was made
possible exclusively through its revolutionary
and further evolutionary transformation.
There was no other alternative ofor survival
in the 20th century. The matter is that
at the turn of the 20th century the West
was actively conducting an economic expansion
in Russia, which can be compared, though
with certain reservations, with indiscriminate
buying-up of industries and other assets
in the former socialist countries in Eastern
Europe. But even if Russian assets had not
been bought by foreign men of property,
the capitalist road would have led Russia
to diffusion in OC without the slightest
hint or chance of playing the leading role
there. Apropos: the term "transition
period" that came in use during the
last two decades (e.g. "countries/economy
in transition") when applied to Russia
manifests extinction of RC and transition
of Russia to the status of a backward and
dying-out periphery of OC.
I believe in eventual
acceptance of the view on the Soviet epoch[9]
as a heroic exploit of the Russian peoples
to defend the Russian Civilization against
another attack and onslaught on the part
of the West, i.e. OC. Although at the cost
of immense losses and sacrifice, Russian
civilization was saved. It was saved not
only for its own good; the salvation enables
Russia to take an active part in prevention
of a global catastrophe.
One cannot leave aside
or otherwise ignore such a serious point
as accusation of "communism" and
"the soviet regime" of mass repressions
that swept Russia reaching the peak in the
'30s of the last century. It has never occurred
to anybody (at least I, personally, have
never read or heard of it) that all the
atrocities of the Civil War and repressions
were committed by the people who had been
brought up and who had matured in the depths
of an absolutely different state with a
quite different institutional structure
and ideology, one where religion and the
church had not only never been oppressed
but had played a very important role. Is
it not the atmosphere of that society with
its religious institutes (primarily the
Russian Orthodox Church and the Judaic institutions)
that should be made responsible for the
appalling deficit of the people (then and
now) who, with great reserve or at a stretch,
could be referred to as Christians or true
believers in God? Nevertheless,
as already mentioned in the foreword, one
cannot blame exclusively "external
causes" for any mishap that might occur
but, on the contrary, the decisive factor
consists in the combination of internal
properties and causes that create for a
person (country) particular external situations
and circumstances wherein he (it) becomes
a subject to repressions…
The soviet epoch[10] provides an invaluable,
though thoughtlessly rejected experience
of universal importance, which demonstrated
to the world the following:
- It is theoretically
and practically possible to successfully
control and manage a large and complex
socio-economic system;
- Economy and other
spheres of social life may develop and
progress in a purposeful manner (in spite
of counteraction, resistance and opposition,
to the extent of military aggressions,
"cold wars" and "arms races");
- One can achieve great
success in a short period of time and
on a carefully scheduled date (timed exactly
to the needed moment) owing to "directional
vector" of development, when all
energy and resources are entirely focused
on achieving clearly formulated objectives
and goals (this, incidentally, is extremely
important in the face of the looming global
catastrophe);
- Creative work unconstrained
by acquisitiveness (e.g. of producers)
allows genuinely talented artists to create
truly spiritual works (for example, feature
films, cartoons, theatrical performances,
scientific research projects, etc.), which
bore a mark of the Divine allowing/ offering
wide opportunities of self-development,
improvement and self-perfection both for
the author and the "target audience"
("the consumer");
It
was shown that there exists possibility
of purposeful creation of conditions
for the qualitative growth of education
standards, professional and social self-actualization
of citizens, for intellectual and spiritual
development, conflict-free co-existence
and cooperation of people representing different
national, cultural and religious communities
sharing the same territory and living and
working in the same collectives (this also
may serve as a model for the future integration
of peoples to be based on the principles
that are fundamentally different from exploitation,
total lies and aggression proposed to peoples
of the world by OC that is primarily represented
by the United States and Great Britain).
The main "minus"
(deficiency) of the soviet period, in my
opinion, is its performance in the last
25 years preceding perestroika, when there
were created preconditions and the basis
for successful introduction of the values
of consumerism and of the "consumption
society":
- Old religious values
had long been basically forgotten and
gotten rid of;
- New communist spiritual
values had become devalued (however, they
were initially based on vulgar materialism,
though it was claimed that they had nothing
to do with it; therefore in absence of
a new scientific paradigm the communist
ideology was built on by then outdated
theoretical, philosophical and world-outlook
knowledge stock).
All the above resulted
in a "spiritual vacuum" or spiritual
disorientation, which was aggravated by
serious problems in satisfying daily wants
and elementary material needs of people,
whom it became possible to turn towards
"western values".
On the other hand, such
a situation may offer quite favorable conditions
for the acceptance and adoption by the society
of the New scientific and civilization paradigm,
since there obviously exists an urgent need
in food for reflection, food for thought,
spiritual repast and spiritual development
and self-perfection, while people show no
signs of strengthening religious fanaticism,
which could be an option under the circumstances.
Why did the USSR
cease to exist? Russia lost the battle
with the USA and their associates represented
by an alliance of the economically developed
western countries. In this connection I
would like to draw the reader's attention
to a number of "myths", which,
when used individually or, even more so,
when applied as a whole, distort the
understanding and interpretation of the
situation by many critics and observers
(including ordinary people). "Russia
lost because the socialist economy is
less efficient in comparison with the capitalist
economy". This statement alone contains
a whole number of erroneous assumptions,
and each of them, when analyzed individually,
will undermine the truth and correctness
of the above quoted statement.
In the first place,
the economic structure of the former USSR
can be defined, as/to a first approximation,
as state capitalism, some elements of
state feudalism and state slave-owning system.
It means that there are no grounds for comparison
of "capitalism" with "socialism",
the more so with "communism" as
it is commonly termed in the West whenever
they discuss anything related to the soviet
period. My second argument is even more
serious, or rather fundamental. It is a
well-known fact that the starting conditions
for this competition of the two different
economic systems were far from being equal,
or, plainly speaking the West initially
had a tremendous handicap. There exists,
however, still another, no less important
and also well known factor. To maintain
parity of weapons between the USSR and the
Western Block the USSR had to build a
much more militarized economy, which,
apart from production of weapons proper,
actually meant that the economy was characterized
by a much greater share of various heavy
industry sectors: iron and steel production,
machine building, production of mineral/
natural resources and raw materials, power
generation. However, all in all it added
to a huge share of withdrawn or "dead"
resources and goods/ commodities, i.e. resources
and goods that were not consumed either
by people (articles of consumption) or by
production (investment goods, means of production);
their cost was not added or transferred
to any other goods, they just kept falling
out of the circulation or, in fact, were
not included in the reproduction cycle.
A higher share of deadened resources is
naturally disrupting and undermining potential
possibilities of economic development. It
is very likely that the USA military-industrial
establishment had been working towards achieving
a double objective: to build up American
military power and ensure military superiority
as such, and, at the same time, to contribute
to inevitable strain and potential collapse
of the global competitor and political opponent.
Another important, if
not the most critical, though more-often-than-not
ignored factor, consists in fundamentally
and essentially different style of relations
with allies among the third world or developing
countries. While the former USSR always
provided assistance to those countries and
spent considerable material and monetary
resources, the USA always robbed their vassals.
And these are positions of principle of
the two "Empires of Evil". Needless
to say, the US methods are as simple as
everything that is based on the vice: the
United States brings to power chosen people
who are ready to sacrifice their country
by putting it at the mercy of TNC to be
ransacked and plundered in order to take
part in this process and get a handsome
share of the loot for themselves. When
activated the mechanism further works by
itself: there appears a totally corrupted
state system of administration and authority
characterized by greed, treachery, deceit
and other as "commendable' attributes
and properties. If the people for some reason
express dissatisfaction and organize themselves
in a kind of active opposition, then the
rulers and their masters have a choice of
options: well-structured and tested PR-campaign,
bribery and corruption of the opposition
leaders, or last but not least (and even
a more effective instrument) deliberate
formation of artificial opposition ("pocket"
and fictitious oppositionists). In the past
20 years of the USSR existence the latter
had spent about 80 billion US dollars on
assistance to developing countries, while
the USA had pumped out 800 billion US dollars
from the Latin America alone.
Finally, we come
down to the most significant and important
consideration (factor). The western type
of economy had no chance of successful development
in Russia even in the 20th century, leave
alone the 21st century, when capitals
have a freedom of worldwide movement. The
western model could have possibly worked
on the territory of Kaliningrad, Greater
Rostov, Krasnodar and Stavropol regions
(the exact borders of the area are subject
to calculation). The economy of other regions
(it means the rest of the Russian territory)
could have existed exclusively in the form
of development of fields/deposits of crude
hydrocarbons, certain metals, precious stones,
while at the outskirts it would have been
confined to wood harvesting and fisheries
in the surrounding seas. Comparison of the
Russian climate with other northern countries,
particularly European, based on the latitude
similarity is absolutely incorrect. One
can choose Canada as analogue for such comparison
although with great reserves (considerable
reserves and allowances are necessary because
North America is much smaller compared to
Eurasia and are characterized by a much
lesser climatic continentality, i.e. severity
and aridity). The populated areas are situated
along the US border, and even then not continuously
but with gaps, practically never extending
beyond 51st degree NL in the central and
western regions and 46th degree in the east.
Exception is Edmonton that has "climbed
up" to 53.3o NL. However this "anomaly"
can be easily explained by the "hydrocarbon"
orientation/ specialization of the economy
in the Province of Alberta. The very presence
of such "demarcation line of settlement"
proves the obvious, though stubbornly disputed
and rejected by certain economists, fact,
which consists in (i) indisputable impact
of climate on the effectiveness and efficiency
of production, and (ii) existence of maximum
permissible levels of climatic severity
for the development of certain sectors of
the economy.
And here comes the
very last observation regarding competition
of the economies and nations. Even assuming
that the capitalist system is more efficient
and effective, there still remains a critical
and worrying question: What is an ultimate
objective of the competing economies? Is
it just a kind of race where only speed
of development and GDP multiplication matter?
With the present character of development
this would mean the speed of approaching
the end, acceleration towards disaster.
Even the imperfect economic system of the
former USSR under unfavorable climatic conditions
was quite capable of satisfying natural
needs of the people, the more so in absence
of the necessity to arm (i.e. taking part
in the arms race). Is this not a sound
argument for transfer to the economy that
would be managed and driven by reason, with
a clear vision of strategic objectives?
Development prospects
of the Russian Civilization
The Russian Civilization has two basic options
of future development.
Preservation or destruction,
which, in its turn, can be accomplished
either gradually, by peaceful means
(development and completion of the "reforms"
of the nineties), or through a military
intervention ("blitzkrieg")
at a convenient moment. The latter will
be done under a false pretext in order to
make it seem "legitimate" ("violation
of democracy" or "human rights").
On the one hand, availability
of hydrocarbons and other natural resources
capable of producing considerable or just
decent rental incomes is definitely a potential
"plus" for Russia. On the other
hand, however, severe global competition
for one's "place in the sun",
superior forces of the enemy (competitors),
existing political and economic subordination
and dependence on the key players of OC,
inflicted delusion about the binding necessity
of openness, of total liberalization of
the economy, and "vacuuming" (see
the next paragraph) exchange rate - all
that makes natural resources both the ultimate
objective and the means of enslaving Russia
and other third-world countries.
Both natural capital
(resources) and human resources of Russia
become subjects of exploitation, or rather
expropriation by certain OC forces and domestic
champions of globalization in the form that
is destructive for Russia. They are not
only pumping out resources along with the
natural resource rent but erect "intensifiers"
in the form of the exchange rate several
times higher than the parity value/rate
(based on purchasing power) in order to
improve effectiveness of the process. As
a result the natural resource rent is supplemented
with the "currency" or exchange
rate, which sometimes is in place despite
the absence or even negative value of the
natural resource rent proper. In this case
undermining of the natural resource potential
is accompanied by intensive exploitation
of the human resource and labor potential,
as the latter is priced several times (on
the average, not less than three times)
lower than exported products that overwhelmingly
consist of various raw materials. The exporters
not only enjoy unfair receipts and profits
several times higher than the normal earnings
should be, not only are they exporting the
lion's share of the profits abroad, but
they dictate domestic prices (in rubles
devalued three-times) on the basis of the
world prices in hard currency, i.e. overcharge
Russian consumers by three times against
the real market value. Needless to say all
products not intended for export, e.g. labor,
foodstuffs, machines or airplanes, turn
out to be practically non-remunerative and
unprofitable because of inevitable use of
hydrocarbons sold at the world or higher
prices. This mechanism has been
tested and perfected in the third world
countries. The currency (exchange) rent
is far less affected by price fluctuations
than the natural resource rent proper. The
natural resource and currency rents add
to from 50 to 90 billion dollars per year.
Fluctuations are caused by the world market
prices of oil and other material resources.
Even
if the issue of natural resource and currency
rent distribution is resolved in a reasonable
and fair manner, there will remain a negative
natural-climatic rent that would primarily
consist of the following:
- Negative ground rent
found in the agricultural sector (except
the greater part of the lands in the Chernozems
Zone, Kransnodarskiy Krai, and a handful
of other regions)
- Negative temperature-climatic
rent (found in practically every sector
of the economy and in every region of
the country)
- Negative distance-transport
rent (generally reciprocally proportional
to the density of population and industries).
In other words, there exist such prohibitive
climatic conditions, which, in economic
terms, determine maximum acceptable (and,
accordingly, excessive/unacceptable) production
costs other things being equal. There
is a striking difference in the limits
of this range for the economy of the former
USSR and the economy of modern Russia
that is open for the world market. (This
is primarily due to the fact that the
USSR used huge positive rent derived from
oil and other natural resources to compensate
the negative (in terms of the world market)
climatic and distance-transport rent).
THE
SO-CALLED REFORMS RESULTED IN THE SEPARATION
OF THE STREAMS OF POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE
RENTS: POSITIVE RENT IS DIVIDED BETWEEN
THE FEW INDIVIDUALS AND LARGELY EXPORTED
OUT OF THE COUNTRY WHEREAS THE NEGATIVE
RENT IS LEFT FOR RUSSIA AND ITS PEOPLE.
Other actively promoted reforms of the Russian
Energy Systems (RAO EES) and of the housing
and utility services, WTO membership serve
the same objectives as well. It would seem
only natural for the adherent of liberalization
to support nationalization of resource producing
industries: otherwise competition is substituted
for capture and redistribution of resource-bearing
assets instead of improvement of effectiveness
and efficiency of production and management.
Preservation
and development of RC can be provided through
two modes of behavior: simple survival
in the course of a considerably long period
(a decade), and winning the leading
positions in perspective. Simple survival
and creation of prerequisites for future
development require that certain practical
steps and actions in various directions
be made and taken, based on profound comparative
analysis of historical, natural/environmental,
economic, political and other essential
aspects of the Western and Russian as well
as other civilizations. These steps include
the following:
- Exclusion of private
appropriation of the rental income from
production of oil, gas and use of other
resources[12] ; minimization of destructive
currency rent (generated through the difference
between the exchange rate and the parity
rate based on purchasing power), concentration
of the rental revenues from natural resource
and currency rents in the hands of the
state (as a matter of urgency) to be used
for strategic purposes and in the interests
of the people; termination of the economic
reforms of the '90s (in particular, termination
of subsidizing natural resource exporters
through maintaining at least triple difference
between the established exchange rate
and the parity rate based on the purchasing
power), suspension and ultimate termination
of the reforms of RAO EES and of the housing
and utility services, procedures aimed
at the WTO membership;
- Detailed assessment
of the rental factors (both positive,
i.e. produced by natural resources, and
negative, i.e. climatic and transport-distance
components) in order to understand in
what regions, and what production, is
economically acceptable and to ensure
availability, if necessary, of clearly
and soundly substantiated instruments
for improving efficiency of particular
types of economic activity (by way of
redistribution of the rental revenues).
- Fundamental
and radical revision of the taxation system,
abolition of destructive taxes.
- Radical
revision of the views (both at the level
of government and the critical mass of
the citizens) on causes of the global
threat, prospects of the development of
mankind, history, state/conditions and
the role of Russian and other civilizations.
- Elaboration
of a strategy of development for Russia
(home and foreign policy, socio-economic
development, science, culture, education,
mass media, defense, etc.).
- Overcoming
an inferiority complex in relations with
the West.
Priorities in the
spiritual and informational sphere are as
follows[13]:
- ESCAPE FROM THE
IDEOLOGICAL CAPTIVITY OF DESTRUCTIVE SPIRITUAL
VALUES OF THE SO-CALLED "CIVILIZED
WORLD", FROM THE MYTHS ("ON
WESTERN DEMOCRACY", "ON FREEDOM"[14]
, "ON EMPIRE OF EVIL", "ON
HUMAN RIGHTS"[15] , "ON CIVILIZED
WORLD", ETC)
- REBUILDING OF SCIENCE
ON THE BASIS OF THE NEW SCIENTIFIC PARADIGM
(THAT HAS COME TO REPLACE THE HITHERTO
DOMINANT NEWTONIAN-CARTESIAN PARADIGM[16]
), TRANSITION TO INTEGRAL, CONSISTENT
COGNITION AND KNOWLEDGE, MERGING OF SCIENCE
AND SPIRITUALITY
- RECOVERY BY SCIENCE
OF THE KEY POSITIONS AND FURTHER STRENGTHENING
THEREOF TOWARDS TRANSITION TO THE "RULE
OF REASON"/; NOOSPHERIC (ANTHROPOSPHERIC)
SOCIETY
- DEVELOPMENT OF NATIONAL
INFORMATIONAL AND EDUCATIONAL STRATEGIES.
REFORM OF EDUCATION PRIMARILY AND ABOVE
ALL AIMED AT FORMATION OF HARMONIOUS PERSONALITY,
REALIZING ITS DIVINE CREATIVE MAKING AND
MANIFESTATION OF DIVINE LOVE, AWARE OF
ITS HIGHEST RESPONSIBILITY FOR THOUGHTS,
FEELINGS AND DEEDS.
Spiritual and
informational sphere takes precedence
over all other aspects with the following
priorities: priority of spirituality in
education, science, mass media, government,
with a new scientific paradigm serving as
a conceptual basis for the development of
spirituality, humanism or, in plain words,
of kindness and love of fellow-men as taught
by Jesus Christ and other Gurus of mankind.
The priority
of the spiritual and informational components
in prevention of the global catastrophe
is illustrated in the indicative block chart
of development and solution of the global
environmental problem (see Figure 1 below).
(The diagram is rather simplified, e.g.
it does not indicate feedback relations
between manufacturers of commodities and
services and consumers, or in other words
- undisguised influence of producers on
consumers to create required needs and demand
for their goods and services; besides it
should be noted that the author interprets
and applies the term "market"
in a broader sense that includes in the
given case the budgetary sphere as well,
e.g. satisfaction of the needs of the military-industrial
complex through growing demand for its products
by the government, when weapons are purchased
at the expense of the budget).
If the "National
Idea" for Russia is formulated as "transition
to the new level of the civilization development",
then it may eventually be used as the core
element and the meaning of the "Planetary
Idea" as well. The strategy of its
implementation may be developed on the basis
of or in line with, the ten priorities (theses)
outlined above. I don't see any other option
that would allow Russia not just a chance
of physical survival in the process of globalization,
but also an opportunity to change the very
nature of this process from destructive
to harmonious.
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