Anders Åslund

Official Russia boasts about economic progress, although the Russian economy has been nearly stagnant for the last decade as the Kremlin focuses on solid macroeconomic stability. But people do not eat macroeconomic stability. Far more important is the real income of the population, which has fallen for five years without signs of improvement. How long […]

Today’s Russia is an “organized crime” state intent on “playing the spoiler” to U.S. interests around the world. So agreed a panel of Russia experts at a Jewish Policy Center luncheon in Washington, D.C. on December 7. It is important for American policy makers “not to project our own values and thinking” onto the Russian […]

For the last 18 years, Vladimir Putin has ruled Russia. The overt impression is one of stability. Since 2003, Putin has not pursued any market economic reforms, while he has systematically eliminated political and civil liberties. In reality, however, Russia has gone through a tectonic change. On the surface, the state sector has expanded, but […]