Another Kremlin appointment at Moscow’s once-famed independent university

Vladimir Putin’s notorious former economic advisor Sergei Glazyev is now a research fellow at Moscow’s Higher School of Economics — the latest sign of the Kremlin’s control over what used to be Russia’s leading liberal university.

• Economist Sergei Glazyev was appointed chief researcher at the Higher School of Economics (HSE). It is not an executive role, but his rank is higher than a traditional senior research fellow. He will work in the Centre for the Study of Stability and Risk in the social sciences faculty. 
• A professional economist, Glazyev started his career in the Ministry of Foreign Economic Relations under the liberal Yegor Gaidar government of the mid 1990s. By the 2000s, he became a statist-nationalist with a taste for anti-American conspiracy theories. He sat as a Communist Duma Deputy, then led the nationalist Rodina party. In 2004, he ran against Putin in the presidential election where he finished third with 4.1% of the vote. He then became Putin’s economic advisor between 2012-19, where he was remembered for eye-catching anti-liberal ideas, such as ditching the dollar and fixing the ruble exchange rate. However, none were implemented and Glazyev had no real influence on economic policy.
• In the years before Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea, Glazyev was one of the leading enthusiasts for a confrontation with Ukraine. Glazyev drew up plans to absorb Ukraine into a Russian-led Eurasian Union. And in the weeks and days before the annexation, Glazyev was in touchwith pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, promising Kremlin support and providing finance.
• The appointment of Glazyev, who Russian economists generally regard as a charlatan and a conspiracy theorist, to an honorary position at HSE represents another slap in the face for what was once Russia’s leading liberal university, second only to Moscow State University in overall prominence. Not long before the war, HSE’s founder and rector Yaroslav Kuzminov resigned. His replacement, a little-known education official, was one of several university rectors to support the invasion of Ukraine. After this, HSE steadily fired lecturers with anti-war positions, censored “foreign agents” and ran training camps for military drone operators.
• A similar process is underway at Russia’s second main liberal university, the Russian State Humanitarian University (RGGU). This summer, a former deputy justice minister was appointed rector and the college opened a “Higher School of Politics” named after philosopher Ivan Ilyin under the direction of nationalist Alexander Dugin. Ilyin was a mid-20th century philosopher who was accused of collaborating with Nazis in exile. Putin has often quoted Ilyin and describes him as one of his favorite philosophers.

Why the world should care

Like any dictatorship, Vladimir Putin’s regime places great emphasis on loyalty and patriotism in education. The authorities are successfully destroying Russia’s leading universities. After Putin goes, the country will have to rebuild its education system from scratch for the second time in a few decades.