Press Release, 27.01.2017

Mikhail Gorny, Bureau member of St.Petersburg YABLOKO and professor of the Higher School of Economics, launched the book Fighting Corruption: Modern Technologies, published under his editorship.

According to Gorny, corruption has become disastrous in Russia: it has turned into a systemic problem and a threat to national security.

Gorny noted that corruption in its classical form occurs in the situation of interaction of an official controlling public resources and a citizen applying for the use of public resources. “However, in Russia we observe corruptive extortion when an official may uncontrollably take away money, property and even a business from a businessman. A businessman does not need anything from the official and does not apply to him, but the official simply comes and takes [everything] away,” Gorny said.

“In such a situation, classic anti-corruption instruments – tenders, criminal prosecution for a bribe, codes of ethics – do not work,” he stressed. “First we have to convince people that corruption is bad! So far, judging by the polls, over 50 per cent of our fellow citizens recognise corruption as the most efficient method to solve their problems,” Gorsky said.

“When convince people that corruption is bad, then we will be able to eradicate its sources and eliminate the effects. The most important thing is that the authorities should be transparent, that is, open and accessible, and admit influence [on behalf of citizens], so that public participation of citizens and their associations in the anti-corruption process would be efficient,” Gorsky noted.

The next meeting of the School of Modern Politics will be held on 14 February. Galina Shirshina, ex-Mayor of Petrozavodsk (the “people’s Mayor”), will be the guest of St. Petersburg YABLOKO then.