Bremmer and Roubini are wrong about Russia
This is a typical example of irrational demagogy (which becomes clear if you spend half an hour reading materials about Russia on the Internet), which is disguised as scientific analysis.
Bremmer and Roubini should be ashamed of themselves, as they engaged in blatant juggling of facts and exaggerations, the purpose of which is to reinforce the old dogma: "Russia is evil." In this article, the highly respected political scientists there is nothing scientific, but there is one continuous policy.
Former Chief Economist of Renaissance Capital and ING Charlie Robertson (Charlie Robertson) presented a brief and accurate rebuke to this blatant distortion of facts. The article ignores corruption in India, the political system of China, the disgusting position of Brazil in the index of ease of doing business, as well as the increasing life expectancy and birth rate in Russia, he writes. There is not a word that the country's GDP in just ten years has increased tenfold. Putin has pretty good reasons for “boasting,” notes Robertson. Apparently, this person has some secret motives for advertising Russia.
Further, Robertson notes that, of all the BRIC countries, Russia is the only one with accelerated growth in the first quarter, and that this country's main macroeconomic indicators are among the best in the world.
Goldman Sachs Asset Management CEO Jim O'Neill talked about the same thing in his May interview with Business New Europe. According to research by his company, India is the weakest country in the BRIC, and Russia is one of the strongest.
But let me go over some of the arguments that Bremmer and Roubini have put forward against Russia.
Syria. All the commotion and hype around Russia is connected with its rejection of the UN position regarding this country. That's a very difficult question. Russia is bending its line, which it has not done about the steps of the UN against Libya. However, Europe and the United States have transgressed the powers granted to them by the UN resolution, and in fact conducted a military operation to change the government in Libya. Let us leave aside the question of the correctness or inaccuracy of these actions. Russia's position is that the sovereignty of Syria is most important for it, and in recent years it has repeatedly witnessed how the United States and its allies are invading countries that they do not like and change their regimes there. The position of Russia is fundamental - neither the United States, nor Europe, nor the UN have the right to change the power in the countries. And Libya has shown: whatever is said in the UN resolution, the end result of actions within its resolution always becomes a regime change.
The problem is even more complicated due to the fact that the Soviet Union traditionally maintained close ties with the Arab world, and especially with Damascus. Syria was one of the main non-communist trade partners of the USSR — and Russia inherited these relations. Who remembers today that former Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov was an Arabist and personal friend of Saddam Hussein?
How will the United States behave if Russia starts telling them who it should be and who should not be friends? What about the American bases in Uzbekistan, where the president cooks people in boiling water? Does Washington not be embarrassed by the fact that he has supported the Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak for decades? And what will he say about how the CIA funded Osama bin Laden when he fought in Afghanistan with the Soviets? This is just stinking hypocrisy.
And Roubini with Bremmer in his article blissfully ignore all these complex issues. They did not even write in brackets that everything is not as simple as it may seem. Their message is the most primitive of all logical constructions - the syllogism, which says: Russia creates problems in the UN; The UN is good, and consequently, Russia is evil.
Their next argument is that Russia cannot be a member of the international community if it does not "begin to act as a mature democracy with a free market." I hope they don’t refer here to the United States as a role model after America’s caricatures in Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. Or after its shameful inaction in Yugoslavia, where thousands of people were killed, and all that Bill Clinton decided on was a few bombings. To represent the United States as a kind of bastion of authoritative international actions and a role model to be followed by Russia is the insolence and arrogance generated by decades of a unipolar foreign policy.
The paradox of the situation is as follows. The US is rapidly losing power and influence as the American economy weakens as a result of catastrophic mismanagement and poor governance. And they find themselves in a position where they begin to need Russian support in the UN and on the ground in order to solve problems such as Syria — and this is one of the countries where Russia has significant leverage and where it can give something positive. But no, it is much better to belittle and trample Russia, Roubini and Bremmer say.
What about Putin’s refusal to go to the G8 meeting, instead of which he went to Beijing and Belarus? Russia has real business relations with these countries, unlike America, which does not play a significant role in the Russian economy, except for the oil bought there and the transnational companies operating there. Why should Russia be interested in “Western clubs” when the emerging markets provide 70% growth in the world (and 50% BRIC)?
The next passage of the article is especially annoying, given the estimates that Russia receives and the results it shows.
“Can we place Russia in the category of countries with a dynamic emerging market?” In no case, ”the authors write.
But Russia's GDP over the past decade has increased tenfold. And if we take into account the fact that the per capita income there is about 15000 dollars (estimated by Phoenix Capital), then it turns out that Russians are the richest of all emerging market countries. And in general, according to the latest UN Human Development Report, Russia is officially a “developed market” and a middle-income country, unlike the rest of the BRIC countries.
Let's go further. According to the annual report “Global Wealth”, which is beloved by America and very reputable Boston Consulting Group, Russians have the highest growth rates of personal wealth in the world, which over the past year grew by 21,4%. According to this indicator, Russia is not only a country with a dynamic emerging market, it is generally a country with one of the most dynamic markets in the world - emerging and long-established. And it is clearly more dynamic than America, where the standard of living of the average family in the period from 1990 to 2000 decreased year, as evidenced by data from the US Department of Labor.
Guys, all this can be found on the Internet. And it's easy to find. This is called “search and analysis.”
I do not know whether to continue. Okay, a little more.
“In China, the Communist Party created a complex and powerful economic system that brought the country out of terrible poverty, turning it into the second economy in the world,” the authors write.
Well, yes - artificially lowering the rate of its currency. And you, of course, understand that China is no democracy at all, in any form or form. And there still exists the death penalty. What about the attitude to the Uighurs? To the Tibetans? What about women's rights?
“India has formed one of the world's most innovative innovation sectors with private companies,” they write.
But it is the weakest country of all the BRIC members, where more than 500 million people live on less than a 1,25 dollar a day. This is UN data. And 500 million is, by the way, almost half of the population of India. In Russia, the number of poor today is 12,5%. Less than ... in the USA.
“Brazil is now turning into a democracy with a diversified economy and is strengthening its position on the world stage,” they write. Aha Here it is right! Brazil is really cool, and its performance is very good.
“Russia, unlike them, has become an authoritarian state built on the foundation of Putin’s reputation as a tough guy, as well as on the export of oil, gas and other minerals. In addition, she can boast almost nothing ... "
This is simply not true. The share of oil and gas accounts for from 14 to 17% of GDP (depending on oil prices). And the consumer sector and retail trade in the first quarter amounted to 52%. Revenues increased from 50 dollars per month under Yeltsin to 800 dollars at the present time - this is the 16-fold increase. Now there are complex discussions about the structural problems of the Russian economy. But why do we need all this? No worries. Russia is evil and it has oil.
“There is a general corruption there. Transparency International places 61 in Turkey, 73 in Brazil, and 75 in China in its corruption index. Russia is much lower - in the 143-th place. " This is true, but in general this index is called the “corruption perception index”, and it does not measure corruption as such, but only shows what businessmen believe in.
Moreover, Bremmer and Roubini somehow forgot to mention that after Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev started the anti-corruption campaign, Russia had risen from its record low 154 position to 143. Of course, the fact of reducing corruption in Russia is worthy of mention. Or am I mistaken when I try to rationally assess what is wrong with Russia?
"In addition, a significant part of the Russian business elite still sees its country as a source of enrichment, and not as a long-term investment rate."
Who exactly are they talking about? Of course, such companies exist (anyone can name them). But there are other rapidly developing companies, for example, the chain of supermarkets Magnit, which in the middle of the 2008-2009 crisis increased its capital investments. There are other firms providing services to the consumer. And this is not to mention the appearance of foreigners, such as PepsiCo, which invested billion dollars in 3,8 by purchasing the leading Russian manufacturer of dairy products. Or Burger King, which literally this week entered into a partnership to open several hundred restaurants in Russia. What, famous American brands came here for a while?
"The outflow of capital, which turned into a chronic problem, after the re-election of Putin in March, greatly accelerated," - write Bremmer and Roubini.
Not true and not true again! It was a chronic problem of 90's, but now, if we measure everything in proportion, capital outflow is not a macroeconomic problem. Moreover, the authors want to show that Russians take their money abroad, although in fact, more than half of the money leaving Russia is the money of foreign banks with branches in Russia. And they bring them out to save their parent companies in the West, because they are in trouble because of the crisis created by America and Europe.
"The country's population is declining because the health care there is weak, socially caused diseases such as alcoholism are rampant, and educated Russians leave the country in search of a better share in other states."
Again, undisguised lies, although it’s more like a complete and presumptuous disregard for analysis. The birth rate in Russia in 2008 began to grow again (thanks to material well-being!), And now the situation is close to stable. Those UN figures that lead Bremmer and Roubini today are being questioned and disputed, for demographic trends are changing significantly. Jim O'Neill from Goldman told BNE that he is now waiting for “big surprises upward” in Russian demographic figures.
Everything, here I will stop. And without that he wrote too much. But I was just shocked by how respected and sort of intelligent and intelligent people, such as Bremmer and Roubini, can write such clearly distorted crap.
Almost all the issues about which they write, really, there are serious problems. But their article is thoughtless incitement of hatred, and it is not only meaningless, but also dangerous. The world is in an unstable state, both politically and economically. We need the cohesion of the world community if we intend to eliminate economic fears and reassure countries that are experiencing a democratic awakening, as well as minimize violence and murder.
The article by Bremmer and Roubini is the personification of arrogance and carelessness of thinking, because of which we all found ourselves in this confusion. This is an abuse of one’s position by leading commentators that people listen to.
I am tired of writing denials, because it is a waste of time and effort. Look around, look around. Think about what is happening in the world today. Can we afford this meaningless debate that kills our time? Hardly. And the situation continues to deteriorate.
- Ben Aris for The Moscow Times, Russia
- http://www.themoscowtimes.com/blogs/434424/post/bremmer-and-roubini-are-wrong-about-russia/460112.html
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