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Case of Privatization in Veliky Novgorod Russia Review of European and Russian Affairs vol. 1 no. 1 December 2005 © RERA 2005 all rights reserved ………………………………………………………………… Elites in Transition: Case of Privatization in Veliky Novgorod Russia Irina Aervitz Abstract This paper is an attempt to develop a critical reflection on the social, political, and economic transformation that Russia experienced in the last couple of decades. I argue that the continuity of elites in Russia is one of the major features of its transition. This paper attempts to illuminate the continuity of elites as a general trend by using the case study of the privatization process in Veliky Novgord, Russia. This project looks at privatization as an avenue or means of resource allocation by elites during the transition. The data were obtained from 16 structured and unstructured interviews conducted in Veliky Novgorod in the summer 2004 among the representatives of the business and political elites. This paper deals with one group of the nomenklatura elite – top enterprise managers. Review of European and Russian Affairs vol. 1 no. 1 December 2005 © RERA 2005 all rights reserved Features of the Russian Transition There is a recognized trend to call the Russian transition from the Soviet regime to the post-Soviet era a revolution. Strobe Talbott, referring to the Russian transition from the Soviet past to the new system, wrote: “The most recent Russian Revolution…was actually three in one: the Russians were trying to transform their country from a totalitarian system to democracy; from a command economy to a market one; and from a multinational empire to a nation-state” (Strobe Talbott, 2002, 53). Mau and Staradubrovskaya examine the “Russian Revolution” in the broad historical context, drawing comparisons between the recent transition in Russia, the Russian Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, the English Civil war, and the Great French Revolution (V. Mau and I. Starodubrovskaya 2001). However, there might be alternative perspectives on the nature of transition in Russia. One of these perspectives is the elite theory thesis of elites’ continuity. Though the question whether Russia experienced a revolution or not is beyond the scope of this paper, I would argue that some aspects of the Russian transition from the Soviet regime to the post-Soviet era can be better perceived through the prisms of the elite continuity rather than a revolutionary change. The nomenklaura1 was a vast network of connections, personal relationships, and clans. After privatization the new elite officially acquired the ownership over means of production. Sakwa claims that 75 percent of the new political elite and 61 percent of the new business elite came from the old nomenklatura elite (Richard Sakwa 2002, 451).2 Even the so-called liberal reformers who conducted the economic reforms in the 90s did not believe that they would create 1 The Nomenklatura consisted of the Party members, Komsomol members, and managers of enterprises. 2 Sakwa grounds these numbers on the survey conducted by Olga Kryshanovskaya in 1994, 1995 and 1996. 2 Review of European and Russian Affairs vol. 1 no. 1 December 2005 © RERA 2005 all rights reserved a class of genuine entrepreneurs because corporatization or managers’ privatization was a significant part of the privatization reform. Kryshtanovskaya and White argue: “Formerly the privileges of the nomenklatura had been largely in kind, reflected in the granting of state property for private use, or in money and special services; now they began to acquire an increasingly ‘monetary’ character, with its members allowed to engage in activities that were prohibited for others and to make profits from such activities” (Olga Kryshtanovskaya and Stephen White 1998, 88). Privatization of the state by the elite was one of the major avenues of resource allocation by the former Soviet elite. State enterprises were turned into commercial enterprises, joint-stock companies, or concerns. The major element of the Russian privatization reform included corporatization. The goal of this strategy was to let managers allocate the control rights of enterprises that they had managed during the Soviet times. The Russian privatization program divided firms into those that could be privatized and those whose privatization was prohibited like, for example, railroad transport, space exploration, health, and education. Then firms open to corporatization had to re- register as joint stock companies with 100 percent of equity owned by the government, a corporate charter, and a board of directors. The board consisted of the firm’s general manager (with two votes), the workers, and federal and local government representation. To privatize a company, the management had to assess its value in order to determine its charter capital (Maxim Boycko, Andrei Shleifer and Robert Vishny 1995, 75). The process of evaluation was an unfathomable source of corruption: managers strove to minimize the value of enterprises in the hope to purchase the shares later. The privatization program worked out three packages of benefits for managers and workers of the enterprise under privatization. These packages came to be called Options. Option 1 was 3 Review of European and Russian Affairs vol. 1 no. 1 December 2005 © RERA 2005 all rights reserved the most popular in the Parliament. It presupposed that managers and employees would buy out 51 percent of the voting equity at a nominal price of 1.7 times the July 1992 book value of assets. In the end, a workers’ collective guided by its manager had the right under the privatization program to select its benefits option. “Taking the workers’ selection into account, the managers then had to submit to their local GKI office (State Committee on the Management of State Property) a privatization plan that described how the rest of the shares were to be sold” (Maxim Boycko, Andrei Shleifer and Robert Vishny 1995, 80). The principal forms of sale were voucher auctions and investment tenders. Thus, the management of the privatized firms had complete control over the strategy of privatization. Privatization in Veliky Novgorod Choice of Case Veliky Novgorod provides an excellent opportunity for the study of regional elites in Russia. It is the capital of the Novgorod region. It hosts both a municipal and a regional administration. Veliky Novgorod is a city in the North-West of Russia, located between Moscow in the south and St. Petersburg in the north. Veliky Novgorod is a city with rich historical heritage. In the Middle Ages Lord Novgorod the Great was a trade center in the North-West of Russia, member of the Hanseatic League (a north European alliance of trading cities), and a republic with a popular assembly. Today Veliky Novgorod is the center of Novgporod region or oblast, which is the region with conducive investment climate that attracts investors with local tax incentives and authorities’ support. Usually scholars of democratization talk about institutional design at the central level. That is why the book of Nicolai Petro on the study of democratization process in Novgorod region 4 Review of European and Russian Affairs vol. 1 no. 1 December 2005 © RERA 2005 all rights reserved stands out. One of his contributions is that he shifts analytical attention from the study of the structure and efficiency of government at the national level to the regional level (Petro, Nicolai 2004, 3). Petro claims that the local government used local myths, references to the historical background of political independence and economic development to manage rapid social change in Novgorod region. Officials of both administrations and local businessmen were the target of this research. They provided their insights on how privatization was implemented in Veliky Novgorod. The interviews were conducted off the record. Thus, the respondents’ names and positions are kept confidential. The way privatization was held in Veliky Novgorod, though with some specific features characteristic of this city only, reflects the general trend – privatization was often used by the former Soviet managers and other nomenklatura members as a means of resource allocation. The specific contextual features are important, however, for the purposes of the future cross-regional comparative studies. The enterprises in Veliky Novgorod can be divided into two broad categories: profitable industries like food industry, forest-processing industry, etc. and the so-called defense industry. In the first case of more profitable and efficient industries, the top management usually appropriated the enterprises. The defense enterprises became less efficient due to the collapse of the military industry with its network of demand and supply controlled by the state in the Soviet times. The directors of the defense enterprises hesitated to become owners. Food Industry and other Profitable Industries At the beginning of the 90s, the top management of financially viable enterprises usually announced the first or the second models of privatization and then bought shares from the 5 Review of European and Russian Affairs vol. 1 no. 1 December 2005 © RERA 2005 all rights reserved employees. One of the respondents noted that the top management adjusted better than the rest of the employees: They were the managers. They had a better vision and they could foresee the outcome. An employee who had the voucher did not know what to do with it. So, they just sold it. To buy an enterprise one has to buy the control package of shares. This trick has been widely used. You have to buy the control package: 30-40%, then you become the member of the Board of Directors. The Chubais’ model that everyone would manage an enterprise is a lie. Look at Novobank: it had about 600 shareholders. Were they going to influence the management of the enterprise? No. They had to vote for some decision. All 600 voted negatively, but the tableaux showed that 99% voted ‘yes”. How? 600 shareholders represent just 1% of the shares. It is a classic example how these enterprises became to be managed.
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