Putin's Privatisation Talk: U-Turn Or Mirage?

How do we make sense of Vladimir Putin's statement that 'we will step up the privatisation process'? If we look at it from a general perspective, privatisation stands for the Russian government's commitment to neo-liberal economics. This commitment achieves two things: 1) it facilitates Russia's bid for WTO membership (note that after First Deputy Minister Shuvalov met the US trade representative this week, he said that American companies could 'invest wherever they want' in Russia); 2) it meets with the market's approval. As far as market approval is concerned, we think that the privatisation programme would give further support to

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