Grigory Yavlinsky presents report at the Vatican on the end of an era and the prospect of Europe from Lisbon to Vladivostok
Press Release, 24.04.2026
Photo: Mario Draghi, Jeffrey Sachs and Grigory Yavlinsky / Photo by Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences
From 14 to 16 April, Grigory Yavlinsky attended the plenary session of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences (Casina Pio IV, Vatican City) at its personal invitation. The session was held on the theme of “The Use of Power: Legitimacy, Democracy and the Revision of the International Order”.
The Academy was founded in 1994 on the initiative of Pope John Paul II. Its members — leading scholars from around the world — number approximately 40 academics and professors in the fields of economics, sociology, political science, history, theology and other humanities, some of whom combine academic work with Church ministry. The session was also attended by prominent former politicians and public intellectuals, among them Mario Draghi, leading economist and former Prime Minister of Italy.
The Academy’s mission is not only scholarly research, but above all the application of intellectual and humanitarian expertise to developing proposals for addressing the key challenges of our time — the preservation of peace, social development and the improvement of human life.
In his address, Grigory Yavlinsky presented an analysis of developments in the world, characterising them as “the end of an era and the world’s descent into chaos”. He argued that the use of force by contemporary politicians was being treated as the decisive factor in international relations, and that the danger of “a real large-scale war, which would almost immediately acquire a nuclear character, is being irresponsibly ignored and concealed behind short-term political interests”.
In Yavlinsky’s view, the situation is being seriously compounded by the explosive development of artificial intelligence and digital technologies. A new reality is taking shape, in which the future is determined by technology, Big Data and the actors behind them who seek political influence. In these conditions, the prevailing principle is that only those communities which achieve supremacy in advanced technologies will survive and flourish.
Politics, in this context, is being transformed into populism, which rapidly turns into what Yavlinsky termed “ochlo-populism” — a combination of responsiveness to the fleeting moods of social media and the servicing of narrow elite interests. Under these conditions, democratic procedures are being used to produce regimes that rely to a significant degree on the manipulation of public opinion through digital technologies.
All of this, Yavlinsky emphasised, leads to the central problem: “the devaluation of the significance of human life, freedom and dignity”.
People’s desire to escape chaos and restore order carries the risk of a “Führer” coming to power, as has already occurred in history, Yavlinsky argued. Finding a different way out depends, in his view, on defining a long-term strategy and developing a positive vision — an understanding of what kind of future is desirable: “where we want to go and how”.
In his report, the politician and economist Grigory Yavlinsky set out two central propositions.
First, “the human being, the individual, must become the cornerstone of economics, politics and international relations”. In his view, “the second half of the twenty-first century must be the century of the individual, of freedom and the soul, and not an era of digital technologies and artificial intelligence”.
Second, Grigory Yavlinsky defined the strategic vision for Europe as the creation of a unified economic and political space and a common security architecture from Lisbon to Vladivostok. He estimated that achieving this goal could take twenty to thirty years. Nevertheless, this is precisely the path that is necessary, he argued, for the preservation of Europe’s historically established nations, Russia, and the new states formed over the past thirty-five years, and for the development of a future Europe as an independent economic and political actor at the global level, capable of competing with the United States and China.
Yavlinsky characterised the present moment as a historical juncture at which the collapse of the former world order “will require the conscious construction of the foundations of a new world”, and expressed his conviction that “the countries, statesmen and politicians who recognise this fact… will be in a position to play a leading role in the new world… by virtue of their capacity to think strategically and to understand a future in which human values come to the fore”.
The speaker thanked Pope Leo XIV for convening the conference and expressed his solidarity with and support for the Pope’s position on a number of important global developments.
Participants in the plenary session also discussed with Grigory Yavlinsky the current key challenges facing the world economy and global politics.
Full text of Grigory Yavlinsky’s address to the plenary session of the Academy
https://www.yavlinsky.ru/article/moralnyj-dolg/
Full text of the report “Participation in Contemporary Political Life and Institutional Reform”
Posted: April 27th, 2026 under Foreign policy, Human Rights, Russia-Eu relations, Без рубрики.