Anatoly Chubais

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Anatoly Borisovich Chubais
Born	June 16, 1955 (1955-06-16) (age 54) Barysaw, Belorussian SSR, Soviet Union

Anatoly Borisovich Chubais (Russian: Анато́лий Бори́сович Чуба́йс; born June 16, 1955) is a Russian politician and business manager who was responsible for privatization in Russia as an influential member of Boris Yeltsin's administration.^[1] From 1998 to 2008 he was the head of the state owned electrical power monopoly Unified Energy System. The 2004 survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers and Financial Times named him the world's 54th most respected business leader^[2] Currently he is the head of the Russian Nanotechnology Corporation (since 22 September 2008)^[3] and a member of the Advisory Council for JPMorgan Chase (since 26 September 2008).^[4]

Early life

Chubais was born on June 16, 1955 in the town of Borisov, Belarus, then part of the Soviet Union. His father Boris Matveyevich Chubais, a retired colonel, veteran of the World War II worked as a lecturer of Philosophy and Scientific Communism. His mother, Raisa Efimovna Sagal, was a university-educated economist but never had a job as she mostly lived at military bases with her husband.^[5] Anatoly Chubais has an older brother Igor Chubais (born 1947), who is also an economist.^[5]

In 1977, Chubais graduated from the Leningrad Economic Engineering Institute and joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He continued to work at Leningrad Economic Engineering Institute. In 1982 he became an Associate Professor (доцент) there. In 1983 he got his Candidate of Sciences (Ph.D.) degree in economics for the dissertation "Исследование и разработка методов планирования совершенствования управления в отраслевых научно-технических организациях" (Research and development of methods for planning improvement of management in the industrial research and development organizations).^[5]

Dissident economist

In the 1980s Chubais became a leader of an informal market-oriented circle of economists. In 1982 Chubais together with economists Yury Yarmagayev and Grigory Glazkov published an article "Вопросы расширения хозяйственной самостоятельности предприятий в условиях научно-технического прогресса" (Questions of extending of business autonomy of enterprises in the conditions of the progress in science and technology) there they argued that no amount of planning can predict the paying demand. In 1982 Chubais became acquainted with future Prime Minister of Russia Yegor Gaidar who was invited to Chubais seminars.^[5]

In 1987 Chubais became the organizer of Leningrad club Perestroyka with the goal to promote the democratic ideas among intelligentsia. Among the people involved was the founder of Moscow "Perestroyka" and "Perestroyka-88" clubs, Igor Chubais (Anatoly's brother), future Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Kudrin, future Chubais associates Pyotr Mostovoy, Alexander Kazakov, future President of Saint Petersburg bank Vladimir Kogan, future minister Ilya Yuzhanov, and future assassinated Deputy Governor of Saint Petersburg Mikhail Manevich.^[5]

For financing their seminars, dissident economists organized a tulip farm. In the four days before the International Women's Day (March 8) they managed to get income equivalent to the price of several Lada cars. The tulip money was used to finance the elections of Anatoly Sobchak, Yury Boldyrev and many other democratic candidates. As a result, 2/3 of the deputies winning the partially free^{[citation needed]} 1990 elections to Leningrad Soviet were from the opposition. Chubais himself later stated that he personally did not participate in growing or selling of the flowers.^[5]

In the end of 1980 economist Vitaly Nayshul proposed to use voucher privatization for the transformation to market economy in Soviet Union. The scheme was strongly criticized by Chubais as inevitably producing gross unfairness and social tensions. Ironically, Chubais later became the leader of implementation of such a scheme.^[5]

Privatization Chief

In 1990, after Anatoly Sobchak being elected as the Chairman of Leningrad Soviet, Chubais became his deputy. He was trying to implement Sobchak's idea of creating a Free Economic Zone in Leningrad. In 1991 Chubais refused to accept the position of the Chairman of Leningrad Ispolkom and became an advisor to Anatoly Sobchak's Mayoral Administration in St Petersburg. Simultaneously he worked as the president of newly created Wassily Leontief Center for research in economics.

In November 1991 Chubais became a minister in the Yeltsin Cabinet handling the portfolio of the Chief of Rosimushchestvo (Committee on the State Properties) that had the task of the Privatization in Russia.^[5]

Chubais originally advocated quick privatization for money, similar to the model used for Privatization in Hungary but that model was unacceptable for the Congress of Soviets of RSFSR. Eventually a compromise form of a voucher privatization similar to used in Czech Republic was proposed and adopted on 11 June 1991 by the Supreme Soviet of Russia. The program was started by the decree of President Boris Yeltsin on 19 August 1991.^[5]

Personal life

Chubais is married to Maria, his second wife. She is also an economist. Chubais has two children from his first marriage, a son and a daughter.

In July 15, 1996 – March 7, 1997, Chubais was the Chief of the Russian presidential administration. It is during his term that this office became very influential.

On March 17, 2005, he survived an assassination attempt. Vladimir Kvachkov was charged in the attempt, but was acquitted by a jury. Kvachkov's case is back in court as of September 2008.

Involvement in political parties

Most recently, Chubais served as one of the co-leaders of the Union of Right Forces, which controlled 29 seats in the Russian Parliament from 1999 until 2003. On January 24, 2003 he resigned as co-chairman of the Union of Right Forces party. In the late 1990s, he also won a seat in the Russian Parliament as a candidate of the Russia's Choice party.

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Anatoly Chubais

• Commanding Heights : Anatoly Chubais on PBS
• Father to the Oligarchs by Arkady Ostrovsky, Financial Times, November 13, 2004
• Rusnet Encyclopedia
• Russia Profile Who's Who
• Russia's Regent by Paul Quinn-Judge, Time, December 9, 1996.