The Gaidar Forum will not take place in 2023

This is the first time that an authoritative economic conference has been canceled since its inception.

In 2023, the authoritative international scientific and practical conference on economics, known in the world as the Gaidar Forum, will not take place. This will happen for the first time in thirteen years – for the entire existence of the event. This was reported to MK at the reception of the rector of the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration under the President of the Russian Federation (RANEPA), which has been a permanent and one of the main organizers of the forum since its establishment in 2010, along with the Institute for Economic Policy. E.T. Gaidar and the Association of Innovative Regions of Russia (AIRR).

Earlier, the media drew attention to the fact that the hosting of the Gaidar Forum website was temporarily suspended, technical work is being carried out on it, as reported on the main page of the resource. Considering that the event was traditionally held in January, immediately after the end of the long holiday week, and was intended to set the economic agenda of the year in the country, this fact also indicates the lack of organizational events for the forum.

The reasons for the cancellation of the well-known international conference in the reception room of the rector of the RANEPA were advised to clarify in the press service of the academy. However, it was not possible to get through to her, no one answers the phone number indicated on the website, and the official request of MK by mail with a request to comment on the situation with the Gaidar Forum remained unanswered.

Recall that before this, no events interrupted the annual tradition of the event. Even during the height of the pandemic in 2021 and the subsequent recovery in 2022, only the format of organizing an authoritative economic conference was changed, with more emphasis on online broadcasts than on traditional meetings in the halls of the RANEPA.

However, this year there have been many unexpected events related to the founders and traditional guests of the Gaidar Forum. In particular, on June 30, the rector of the RANEPA Vladimir Mau, who had opened the panel discussion and was the main host of the event, was detained on June 30. The Ministry of Internal Affairs accused him of embezzling the funds of the academy, he is being accused in a criminal case of fraud initiated against the former Deputy Minister of Education Marina Rakova, the rector of the Moscow Higher School of Social and Economic Sciences (Shaninka) Sergei Zuev and others. Mau did not admit his guilt then and stated that he did not intend to hide from the investigation. The defense asked the court to release him on bail of 21 million rubles, but was refused, the court chose house arrest as a preventive measure. As a result, on August 10, the RANEPA rector returned to work in his previous status. He was reinstated, although the investigation into his case continued.

Mau is not the only forum member whose status has undergone major changes. Thus, many of the traditional guests, apologists for the ideas of Yegor Gaidar, after whom the forum got its name, including those who were once personally acquainted with the ideologist of economic changes during the reign of President Boris Yeltsin, for various reasons ended up either abroad or in the new status. For example, the ex-head of Rosnano, Anatoly Chubais, who last year spoke at the site criticizing Russia’s economic strategy, left our country in March of this year. Alexei Kudrin, a private guest of the event and the former head of the Accounts Chamber, has retired from public service and now holds a high position in Yandex, a large commercial IT company.

The Gaidar Forum has always brought together leading economists, politicians, scientists and public figures from Russia and other countries. At the event, the participants sought to discuss the strategic issues of the future development of the state, which is reflected in the names of the form in different years. Practically all ministers of the economic bloc and their immediate deputies spoke at the site. Most often, the event was opened by the chairman of the government of our country. Over the years, the forum was attended by the current First Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev, the current Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov, Chairman of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation Elvira Nabiullina, Deputy Prime Ministers Alexander Novak and Denis Manturov and many others. However, as MK pointed out a source close to the organizers of the event and who wished to remain anonymous, the absence of a forum in 2023 may indirectly indicate a change in the economic course of the government and a departure from the ideas of a liberal economy, the implementation of which was once launched in Russia by Yegor Gaidar.