'Our University Is Growing Together with the April Conference'
April 19th marks the official start of the XVII April International Academic Conference on Economic and Social Development. Below, HSE Academic Supervisor Evgeny Yasin, who is also the Chairman of the Conference’s Programme Committee, discusses what participants can expect from this year’s conference.
In a certain sense, the April Conference is a type of business card for the Higher School of Economics. Most of the conferences that international universities hold typically focus on either classical or applied science, but such conferences have practically no agenda for large-scale reforms. This is what makes the HSE’s April Conference unique; it plays an active role in the transformations that are taking place in our country. Our university has grown together with the April Conference – starting with the fairly narrow spectrum of problems that had to be overcome throughout the process of reform and ending with the point at which we could consider ourselves to be equal participants in the global academic process as concerns economics and its related disciplines.
Our conference, like our university, is a living organism in that we’re constantly growing and changing. This year, the conference’s plenary sessions, of which there are many, will take place in a new format. It truly is a great thing to see HSE alumni participate in the academic discussions, and there are more and more of them every year. Some key alumni taking part in this year’s plenary session on macroeconomics are Maxim Oreshkin, Russian Deputy Finance Minister, and Konstantin Noskov, the Head of the Analytical Centre for the Government of Russia.
This year we’ve decided to take an important step in the evolution of the Conference
This session will open the conference and be of particular interest not only because of its participants, who include the Deputy Chairman and Chief Economist of Vnesheconombank, Andrei Klepach, but also because of the papers being presented. Key presenters include Evsei Gurvich, who is the Head of the Economic Expert Group, and First Deputy Governor of the Russian Central Bank, Ksenia Yudaeva.
Overall, all of the plenary sessions feature intriguing papers that, I hope, inspire substantive discussions. The conference will include papers by researchers from outside the Higher School of Economics as well. I am personally looking forward to the paper Lev Gudkov, Director of the Levada Center, is presenting at the session on Wealth and the Dynamics of Social Structure. And, of course, we can all look forward to the paper Victor Polterovich, Mathematical Economics Laboratory Chief at the RAS Central Economics and Mathematics Institute (CEMI), is planning to present at the session on Values, Institutions, and Trust. This session will also feature talks by the Dean of Moscow State University’s Economics Faculty, Alexander Auzan; HSE Professor Alexander Arkhangelsky; and, we are hoping, Alexei Kudrin, who is the Dean of the Faculty of Liberal Arts and Sciences at St. Petersburg State University.
In addition, I would like to propose a topic for discussion: how institutional reform programmes should depend on civil culture
Victor Polterovich
Mathematical Economics Laboratory Chief at CEMI
And of course, I’d also like to invite everyone to attend the session featuring the paper, “The Russian Economy: Problems, Solutions, Consequences,” authored by Natalia Akindinova, Yaroslav Kuzminov, and myself. In this paper, we have come up with four possible trajectories for our economy, and we discuss the likelihood of these scenarios based on a survey of various experts.
I also consider Lilia Ovcharova’s paper on investing in human capital to be very important. She’ll present the paper at the plenary session on social policy.
All political parties can consider this paper to be our view on entering a growth trajectory
Lilia Ovcharova
HSE Director for Social Studies
This year’s sessions cover practically all economic disciplines studied at HSE: economics, macroeconomics, microeconomics, industrial markets, etc. New sessions are arising as well, and we are not just pulling them out of thin air. The April Conference’s programme is developed in two stages. In the first stage, we collect all of the proposals that researchers send us, and we group them into blocks. In the second stage, with the opinions of our researchers in mind, we identify the most important topics and reach out to the experts we’d like to see at the conference. Such a combinatory approach yields the most interesting results.
See also:
25th Yasin (April) International Academic Conference Now Accepting Proposals
Reports on new research results will be presented and discussed as part of the conference’s sections. These reports will be selected based on reviews of proposals. As always, the conference programme features expert discussions of the most pressing economic, social, internal and external issues in the format of roundtables and associated events.
Academic Council: HSE University’s Contribution to Achieving National Goals and Development Priorities to Increase
HSE University’s Development Programme until 2030 will be improved in order to increase the university’s contribution to achieving national goals and implementing the priorities of the country’s scientific and technological development. This decision was made by the university’s Academic Council on April 26. The meeting also addressed the principles for the development of HSE University’s external communications, one of which is the creation of a high-quality information field around the university.
Keeping Up with the Neighbours: Envy as a Driver of Economic Growth
Classical economic theory assumes that economic agents are entirely self-interested and rational in their pursuit of material well-being, and that they are not affected by external factors. As a result, externalities are not considered in any way when constructing economic models. Nevertheless, some sociologists argue for a revision of modern economic theory to incorporate the ethical dimensions of economic agents' behaviour. Kirill Borissov, Professor of the Faculty of Economics at the European University in St Petersburg, spoke at the XXIV Yasin (April) International Academic Conference and shared his observations from creating his own economic model incorporating the factor of envy.
Structural Transformation and Drivers of Sustainable Growth in Russian Economy Discussed at HSE University
The Russian economy has demonstrated high resilience to unprecedented external pressure and has managed to largely adapt to new conditions. As early as this year, it can go from recession to growth. The issue of where to find drivers and resources for this was discussed at a plenary session titled ‘Russian Economy under Sanctions: From Adaptation to Sustainable Growth’ at the XXIV Yasin (April) International Academic Conference held at HSE University as part of the Decade of Science and Technology. Minister of Economic Development of the Russian Federation Maksim Reshetnikov took part in the discussion.
‘People Want to Receive Only Useful Content’
Experts say that interest in news has sharply increased among the Russian audience. At the same time, part of the audience deliberately avoids it. What kind of content is in demand and will people continue to watch TV? These and other issues were discussed at the plenary session ‘ Info-hygiene and Information Elitism: How to Consume Media Properly’ at the XXIV Yasin (April) International Academic Conference.
'The Emerging Trends in Africa Will Shape the World Order, and We Need to Be Prepared for That'
Africa has the potential to become a new economic giant. Today, African countries are interested in comprehensive cooperation and strengthening their positions in the global arena, and they look forward to receiving assistance from Russia and China in developing their technology, economy, and social sphere. Effective engagement with Africa requires training a greater number of professional African studies specialists. The XXIV Yasin (April) International Academic Conference at HSE University featured a plenary session on 'Africa in a Changing World'.
Learning a Foreign Language Can Delay the Onset of Dementia
Dementia, a debilitating form of cognitive impairment, can be preventable. According to Professor Jubin Abutalebi of the University Vita Salute San Raffaele, Italy, and the Arctic University of Tromsoe, Norway, the easiest way to prevent cognitive decline after the age of 60 is to learn and practice foreign languages – the more languages, the better, suggests Professor Abutalebi in his presentation 'Preventing dementia through bilingualism' at the XXIV Yasin (April) International Academic Conference.
‘The BRICS Strategic Partnership Offers the World Creative, Unifying, Forward-Looking Initiatives’
Today, BRICS has become an influential factor in modern international relations and is perceived as one of the pillars of a more just world order. This association is not based on one party’s dominance, but instead, is built on a sound balance of interests. The role of the association was discussed by the participants of the plenary session ‘BRICS Development Strategy: Equal Opportunities in an Unequal World’at the XXIV Yasin (April) International Academic Conference.
Sanctions Create New Opportunities for Russian Companies
Like any crisis, the sanctions of 2022, besides problems, have created new opportunities for Russian companies. This is the conclusion that HSE University’s experts have come to. Their study results are presented in the report ‘Adaptation of Russian Industrial Companies to Sanctions: First Steps and Expectations’, prepared by HSE University for the XXIV Yasin (April) International Academic Conference.
Search Query: How to Study Migration with Google Trends
Experts have calculated that the number of international students in Russia has grown six times over the last decade, and researchers say that many of those who are studying today would like to stay in the country. This, alongside issues such as why Google Trends are worth looking into, were covered at the HSE XXIV Yasin International Academic Conference on Economic and Social Development section on demography and labour markets.
Lev Jakobson
HSE First Vice Rector