Between crises and sanctions: economic policy of the Russian Federation

This paper examines the root causes and features of crises of the Russian economy in 2014–2015 as a combination of structural and institutional problems, as well as cyclical and external shocks. The demand-side model of economic growth based on massive windfall revenue from oil and gas exports from the 2000s is now exhausted, and the country needs to shift to a new, supply-side model of growth. Mobilization and liberalization are discussed as two key economic policy alternatives. The analysis includes historical retrospection, which provides some important lessons from economic developments in the twentieth century: the Great Depression and the period of stagflation, the Soviet industrialization debate and perestroika, and the New Economic Policy in the USSR and the contemporary modernization of China. Special attention is paid to the mechanisms of economic growth acceleration in present-day Russia. They include macroeconomic stabilization, structural and institutional reforms based on liberalization of economic activity, and guarantees of property rights.