Not all Belarus officials read The Economics

Aliaksandr Davydau, a deputy economy minister of Belarus, unexpectedly cited The Economics when explaining to the Belaruskia Naviny newspaper why it was not possible to liberalize foodstuff prices. “I don’t know about you, but I studied the economies in transition and read attentively the American books like The Economics which proposed to destroy everything at once. But as the practice shows together with the collective wisdom of the Belarusian people and the government, our policy of curbing the price growth produces an additional long-term effect. We would like to have certain market mechanisms. But if we introduce the market mechanisms overnight, we will face very unpleasant social consequences”, says the deputy minister.

The European Radio for Belarus decided to find out which economics manuals our officials read.

Maryia Barsuk, the chief of foreign economic planning at the Ministry of Economy, was first surprised with our question but later said:

“We read The Economics. We also read The Economy of Our Country, the book published by our institute and many other books associated with economy. Why are you posing this question? Perhaps, you want to compare a deputy minister with the chief of department? I don’t know if we read more or less”.

When asked what the best book on economics is, Maryia Barsuk thought for several minutes and after having consulted with her colleagues, she said that it was impossible to single out one book.

“We have many books. I can name a dozen of them, but what will that give you? For instance, the table book at my department is International Economic Relations.

ERB: Who is the author?

Barsuk: “There are five or six authors.

Stanislau Bahdankevich, the former chairman of Belarus’s Central Bank, confessed sincerely to the European Radio for Belarus that he currently enjoys reading detective stories and sometimes looks through economic magazines. A more serious literature remained in his past. The European Radio asked Bahdankevich to take a look at the names of the books that are currently on his desk.

“I have The Life for the Motherland by Stolypin; the encyclopedia dictionary for the top managers titled The Right Economy. It is very thick. It contains a lot of materials. Frankly speaking, I like reading detective stories”, he said.

Valiantsina Dudal, the chief of trade and market relations department at the Ministry of Economy gave a very surprising answer. She could not figure out what an economics book was all about.

“I don’t know such books. What is an economic book in your understanding? The Economics is a popular manual. What do economic books look like?” she asked.

Mikhail Kavalyou, the dean of the economics faculty at the Belarus State University, sees no problem that officials read The Economics. In his view, those who did not study it in college should definitely read this manual.

“I read all the books The Economics, including the one by Samuelson, when I was young. I think that officials should have studied it when at university. But if they did not study it, they read it now, of course”.

Mikhail Kavalyou has recommended our listeners to read The Future of Capitalism by Lester Turow and The Tasks of Management in the 21st Century by Peter Drucker.

The most unexpected answer came from Aliaksandr Kalinouski, who is in charge of the entrepreneurship department at the Minsk City Hall. He doesn’t read books on economics.

“I was trained as a mechanical engineer without any economic education”.

This fact does not prevent the official from handling such sensitive issues like the registration of sole entrepreneurs into legal entities or the abolition of kiosks from the streets of Minsk.