Economic reforms in Russia in the 90s: forming a team and ideology of reformers

The Russian economic reforms in the end of XX-th century were conceived and implemented by a wide group of young economists with similar social background and education. They shared common views on the structure and dynamics of the Soviet economy and could well imagine potential pathways to economic reforms. During the nineties the majority of this group joined the Russian government and secured the reform momentum at least until the middle of the next decade. Among the factors which influenced the creation of the group were the mathematical revolution in economics and rapid transfer of these ideas into soviet academic circles. Mathematical economics was widely taught in the universities, supported by the creation of specialized mathematical and language schools. The generation of young economists of the seventies was quite skeptical towards general equilibrium theories and was more institutionally oriented. They perceived the Soviet economy not as a command-administrative monster, but rather as a system of multiple horizontal and vertical informational and informal interactions which would facilitate the preparation and implementation of economic plans. The members of the group got acquainted early in the eighties, when the necessity of reforms became obvious. By the middle of the eighties, the group had a clear vision of the directions and techniques of the future reforms, which was very important for cohesion and efficiency of their activity in the first Russian government.