Sputnik International — Why Russia's Sketchy 90s-Style Privatization Will Never Be Repeated

Independent Russian journalist Dmitri Pskezin explains why the Russian government's plans to privatize several major state assets have absolutely nothing in common with the robber baron privatization of the 1990s. In the early- to mid-1990s, immediately after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian government began a vast campaign to privatize state-owned assets. The fire sale included major industrial, energy and financial enterprises, and resulted in massive economic turmoil, a dramatic growth in poverty and inequality, and the political rise of Russia's oligarchs. In the 2000s, after succeeding Boris Yeltsin, Vladimir Putin managed to partially reverse the results of the privatization, regaining several strategic assets, including in the defense and energy sectors, and to reign in the oligarchs, virtually eliminating their open attempts to influence Russian politics.

Still clueless, but not as clueless as when they were being advised by the US. They still think that they need to get money and apparently buy in to the neoliberal scam of "efficiency."

Sputnik International
Why Russia's Sketchy 90s-Style Privatization Will Never Be Repeated