KONDRATIEV, NIKOLAY DMITRIEVICH(18921938) Soviet economist, creator of the concept of long waves of economic conditions (“Kondratieff cycles”).
N.D. Kondratyev was born into a peasant family in the village of Galuevskaya, Kostroma province. While a student at the Church Teachers' Seminary, he joined the Socialist Revolutionary Party in 1905. For his revolutionary activities he was expelled from the seminary and spent several months in prison. In 1911, having passed the matriculation exams as an external student, he entered the economics department of the Faculty of Law of St. Petersburg University. Among his teachers was M.I. Tugan-Baranovsky, who passed on to his student an interest in the problems of economic development. During his studies, Kondratiev continued to participate in the revolutionary movement; in 1913 he was arrested again and spent a month in prison. After graduating from the university in 1915, he remained at the university in the department of political economy to prepare for a professorship.
In 1917, Kondratiev actively participated in political life; he worked as A.F. Kerensky’s secretary for agricultural affairs, and was a member of the last Provisional Government as Deputy Minister of Food. After the Bolsheviks came to power, he first sought to fight them, but then began to cooperate with the new authorities, believing that an honest and qualified economist could serve his country under any regime. In 1919, Kondratiev left the Socialist Revolutionary Party, completely abandoned politics and focused on purely scientific activities.
In 1920, Professor Kondratiev became director of the Moscow Market Research Institute under the People's Commissariat of Finance. At the same time, he taught at the Timiryazev Agricultural Academy, and also worked at the People's Commissariat of Agriculture as head of the department of economics and agricultural planning. The years of the NEP saw the heyday of his scientific activity. In 1925 Kondratiev published his work Large market cycles, which immediately sparked discussions, first in the USSR and then abroad.
The works of the Institute of Market Studies, which he headed, quickly gained worldwide fame. He was elected a member of many foreign economic and statistical societies, he was personally acquainted or corresponded with the greatest economists of his time - W. Mitchell, A. S. Kuznets, I. Fisher, J. M. Keynes.
In 1920 and 1922, Kondratiev was arrested twice on political charges. With the end of the NEP, the “peaceful coexistence” of non-Marxist economists with the Soviet regime also ended. In 1928, “Kondratievism” was declared the ideology of the restoration of capitalism. In 1929, Kondratiev was fired from the Market Research Institute, and in 1930 he was arrested, declaring him the head of the non-existent underground “Labor Peasant Party”. In 1931 he was sentenced to 8 years in prison; he wrote his last scientific works in the Butyrka prison and the Suzdal political isolation ward. In 1938, when his term of imprisonment was ending, a new trial was organized over the seriously ill scientist, which ended in a sentence of death. Only in 1987 was he posthumously rehabilitated.
In world economic science, he is known primarily as the author of the concept of “long waves,” in which he developed the idea of a plurality of economic cycles.
In a market economy, Kondratiev believed, in addition to the well-known medium-term cycles (8-12 years), there are also long-term cycles (50-55 years) - “big waves of market conditions.” He processed statistical materials (price dynamics, loan interest, wages, foreign trade indicators, production volumes of the main types of industrial products) for the 1780-1920s for countries such as England, France, Germany, the USA, as well as for the world as a whole farm. During the analyzed period of time, Kondratiev identified two complete large cycles (from the 1780s to the 1840s and from the 1850s to the 1890s) and the beginning of the third (from the 1900s). Since each cycle consisted of boom and bust phases, he was able to essentially predict the Great Depression of 1929-1933 several years before it began.
The concept of “long waves” became especially popular in the second half of the 20th century, when economists began to pay special attention to global and long-term trends in economic life. The half-century cycles he studied are called “Kondratiev cycles” in modern science.
Kondratiev’s works on the problems of the Soviet economy are known today much less than his studies on “long waves,” although their scientific significance is also very great.
According to Kondratiev, the state can and should influence the national economy through planning. Kondratiev should be considered the founder of the theory and practice of indicative (recommendatory) planning, introduced in the post-war decades at the insistence of Keynesians in almost all developed Western countries.
Under his leadership, a long-term plan for the development of agriculture and forestry in the RSFSR for 1923–1928 (“Kondratieff’s agricultural five-year plan”) was developed, based on the principle of combining planned and market principles. Kondratiev believed that an effective agricultural sector could ensure the growth of the entire economy, including industry. Therefore, the planning concept he proposed assumed a balanced and simultaneous rise in both the industrial and agricultural sectors.
Kondratiev criticized directive (command-order) planning, which was advocated not only by “Marxist-orthodox” Soviet economists, but also by the top party leadership. His critical forecasts were justified: the first five-year plan became a policy of plundering agriculture for the sake of the rise of heavy industry, but the original plans were never fully implemented. It was the criticism of directive planning that became the pretext for political reprisals against Kondratiev.
Kondratiev is deservedly considered the most outstanding Russian economist of the Soviet period. By decision of UNESCO, 1992 was celebrated throughout the world as the year of his memory.
Proceedings: Problems of economic dynamics. M.: Economics, 1989; Basic problems of economic statics and dynamics: Preliminary sketch. M.: Nauka, 1991; The grain market and its regulation during war and revolution. M.: Nauka, 1991; Selected Works. M.: Economics, 1993; Dissenting opinion: Selected works in 2 books. M.: Nauka, 1993.
Materials on the Internet: http://russcience.euro.ru/papers/mak89nk.htm;
http://www.marketing.cfin.ru/read/article/a45.htm.
The notorious Kommunarka testing ground became the site of death for many disgraced Soviet scientists. One of them was economist Nikolai Dmitrievich Kondratiev. In the early years of the USSR, he led the country's agrarian planning. The main part of Kondratiev’s theoretical heritage was the book “Great Cycles of Conjuncture.” The scientist also substantiated the NEP policy, which made it possible to restore the Soviet economy after the devastating Civil War.
Childhood and youth
Economist Nikolai Kondratyev was born on March 16, 1892 in the village of Galuevskaya. From the age of 13 he went to a church-teacher seminary. During the first Russian revolution, the student became a Socialist Revolutionary and helped the work of the textile workers' strike committee. For this he was expelled from the seminary and even sent to prison.
A year later, Nikolai Kondratyev was released and entered the school of horticulture and agriculture in the Ukrainian city of Uman. In 1908 he left for St. Petersburg. In the capital, Kondratiev shared a room with culturologist and sociologist Pitirim Sorokin, the future founder of the theory of social mobility.
Beginning of scientific activity
In 1911, Nikolai Kondratiev entered St. Petersburg University. After graduation, he chose the department of political economy and statistics and decided to prepare for a professorship.
At this time, Kondratiev was engaged in vigorous literary and scientific activity. He collaborated with Vestnik Evropy, Zavety and other magazines, and also gave numerous lectures. The young intellectual was a member of the scientific circles of Mikhail Tugan-Baranovsky and Lev Petrazhitsky. Professor Maxim Kovalevsky made him his secretary. In 1915, Nikolai Dmitrievich Kondratiev published his first monograph on the economy of his native Kostroma province.
Participation in revolutionary events
Even being part of the scientific community of St. Petersburg, Kondratiev remained a member. For a long time, he was under secret surveillance by the secret police. In 1913, when Russia celebrated the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty, Kondratiev spent a month in prison.
The economist's political activity intensified after the sudden events of the February Revolution. The young scientist was a delegate to the III Congress of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, held in Moscow in May - June 1917. There he made a speech in support of the Provisional Government. The economist then became Kerensky's adviser on agricultural issues. Nikolai Kondratiev participated in the creation of the Council of Peasant Deputies and in September was delegated to them at the All-Russian Democratic Conference. The economist was elected to the Provisional Council of the Republic. In addition, he managed to participate in the activities of the Main Land Committee and the League of Agrarian Reforms.
Helping the Kerensky government, Kondratiev worked to overcome the food problem that arose due to the long war against Germany and its allies. The lack of food affected the mood of society. Creating a system of stable supply would smooth out many social contradictions and avoid a political crisis. At that time, Kondratiev was a supporter of the idea of a state grain monopoly. He also pinned his hopes on requisitioning, although in 1917 it did not solve the food problem - the threat of a large-scale famine continued to loom before the Provisional Government.
Retreat from politics
The October Revolution transferred Kondratiev to the opposition camp. He became a deputy of the Constituent Assembly from the Social Revolutionaries. When this body was dispersed, the scientist moved to the Union for the Revival of Russia, which opposed the Bolsheviks. In 1919, the Socialist Revolutionary Party suffered a final defeat. Kondratyev Nikolai Dmitrievich moved away from politics and devoted himself entirely to science.
After the revolution, Kondratiev moved to Moscow. There he began teaching at several higher educational institutions - Shanyavsky University, the Cooperative Institute, and the Petrovsky Agricultural Academy. For some time the location was the Moscow People's Bank. In 1920, Kondratiev was arrested and became a defendant in the case of the Union for the Revival of Russia. The former Socialist Revolutionary was saved by the intercession of the utopian Alexander Chayanov and the prominent Bolshevik Ivan Teodorovich.
Work in the State Planning Committee
Through the efforts of Kondratiev, the Market Research Institute was founded under the People's Commissariat of Finance. The Soviet economist headed it in 1920-1928. He also worked for three years at the People's Commissariat of Agriculture. In the State Planning Committee of the USSR, Kondratiev was part of the agricultural department. The scientist led the development of a strategy for the development of the agricultural industry.
In 1922, Nikolai Kondratiev, whose contribution to the economy of the young Soviet state was already significant, again became a target of repression. He was included in the list of undesirable citizens preparing for deportation from the USSR. Kondratyev was defended by the People's Commissariat of Agriculture. Since the specialist controlled several important processes, his name was crossed off the blacklist.
Abroad
In 1924, Kondratiev went on a scientific trip abroad. He visited Germany, Canada, Great Britain and the USA. The economist had to become familiar with the market mechanisms of Western countries. This experience was useful to him when developing the principles of the NEP. It was Nikolai Kondratiev (1892-1938) who was one of the main adherents of the new economic policy, which the Bolsheviks came to after several years of ruinous war communism. Also, the Soviet specialist had to assess the prospects for USSR exports.
Kondratiev’s friend Pitirim Sorokin was already living in the States at that time. He suggested that Nikolai Dmitrievich stay in America, head a university department there and protect himself and his family, who went abroad with him. However, Kondratiev refused to leave his homeland. He was fascinated by the new opportunities that the NEP opened up for him.
Homecoming
It had not yet begun in 1924. No one could even imagine that the horrors that shook the USSR in the 1930s would occur. From Stalin’s declassified correspondence with one of the organizers of the terror, Yakov Agranov, it is known today that while in custody, Kondratyev was tortured on the personal orders of the leader. While in the United States, the economist could hardly have imagined something like this.
Returning from abroad, Kondratiev continued active work in the field of economic planning - he proposed and worked out the so-called agricultural five-year plan of 1923-1928.
Contribution to the economy
In 1925, Kondratiev’s most important theoretical work, “Large Cycles of Conjuncture,” was published. It caused a wide discussion both in the USSR and abroad. A new term has appeared, which was proposed by Nikolai Kondratiev - “cycles of economic development”.
According to the scientist’s theory, the world economy is developing in a spiral. Ups are cyclically followed by downs, and vice versa. The researcher believed that the length of one such period was about 50 years. In the USSR, many did not like the ideas that Kondratiev put forward. “Kondratieff Cycles” were considered the author’s retreat from Marxism.
It is interesting that the economist put forward his hypothesis without any theoretical basis. Kondratiev used only his own empirical observations. He analyzed in detail the performance of the economies of the United States and Western Europe from the end of the 18th to the beginning of the 20th century. Having done this work, the scientist built graphs and discovered repeating synchronicity. Kondratiev identified the following phases of development of any economy: growth, peak, decline, depression.
If the bold theory never found application in the Soviet Union, it was appreciated abroad by many world-famous economists. The Kondratiev concept was defended by the Austrian and American scientist Joseph Schumpeter. In Russia, research into the heritage of a compatriot resumed only after Perestroika. Among other things, Kondratiev left behind fundamental research on the dynamics of prices for agricultural and industrial goods.
Conflict with the authorities
“Large cycles of economic conditions” aroused rejection among the Soviet leadership. Soon after the publication of the monograph, the magazine persecution of Kondratiev began, the organizer of which was There was no scientific controversy in it. Criticism felt like denunciation. Although the Soviet leadership after Lenin's death consisted of a dozen Bolsheviks squabbling for power, it almost entirely did not tolerate Kondratiev.
The exception was Mikhail Kalinin. Stalin later blackmailed him with his long-standing connections with Kondratiev. Nikolai Bukharin supported the theoretical ideas of the scientist (when Bukharin was also tried and sentenced to capital punishment, the Bolshevik was also accused of having a political alliance with the disgraced economist).
Opal
Although Kondratieff himself, the Kondratiev Cycles and all his other economic initiatives were attacked at the highest level, the scientist was not going to give up his position without a fight. He defended his own innocence both in journals and at meetings. His speech at the Communist Academy, which took place in November 1926, was especially striking. In addition, Kondratiev wrote reports and memos to the Central Committee.
In 1927, another article by Zinoviev appeared in the Bolshevik magazine under the loud title “Manifesto of the Kulak Party”. It was she who set the tone in which the final fatal blows were subsequently dealt to Kondratiev. Accusations of sympathizing with the kulaks and undermining socialism were no longer just threats, they were followed by real actions by the security officers.
Request for help
Nikolai Kondratieff's theoretical proposals and books were based on the idea that the economy should develop gradually. This principle contradicted the Stalinist haste with which the flywheel of Soviet industrialization was spun. Largely for this, in 1928, Kondratiev was removed from the leadership of his brainchild, the Institute of Market Studies, and thrown out of scientific life.
In 1930, Nikolai Dmitrievich wrote a letter to his friend Sorokin, which was illegally delivered to the United States through Finland. In the message, the scientist briefly described the growing horrors of Soviet reality: dispossession in the countryside, pressure on the intelligentsia. Without work, Kondratiev found himself on the brink of starvation. He asked Sorokin for help. He turned to Samuel Harper, a professor at the University of Chicago, who often visited the USSR.
Arrest and imprisonment
During another trip to the Soviet Union, Harper met with Kondratiev several times. One day, the two of them arrived at the apartment agreed upon in advance, where GPU agents were waiting for them. Kondratiev was arrested. The year was 1930.
While in prison, the economist continued his scientific work. While in prison, he wrote several works. Formally, Nikolai Kondratyev, whose biography is connected with the Social Revolutionaries and even Kerensky, was tried in the case of the Labor Peasant Party. In 1932 he was sentenced to eight years in prison. Kondratyev went to the Suzdal political isolation ward. There he continued to write.
Only one work from the Suzdal period, devoted to the macromodel of economic dynamics, has survived to this day. While in prison, the scientist watched as his monographs became world famous and economic forecasts came true. It was all the more bitter for him to experience the forced separation from full-fledged scientific activity.
Execution and rehabilitation
Although the required eight years had passed, Kondratyev never received his release. In 1938, at the height of the Great Terror, he was tried by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR. On September 17, the scientist was shot. The place of massacre was the Kommunarka training ground. The repressed person was buried there.
In 1963, after the 20th Congress of the CPSU, Kondratiev was rehabilitated, although this fact was not made public. The economist's scientific heritage remained the object of defamation and criticism of official Soviet science for many years. Kondratiev’s good name was finally restored during Perestroika, in 1987, when he was rehabilitated for the second time (this time together with his murdered colleague Alexander Chayanov).
Nikolai Dmitrievich Kondratyev was born into a large peasant family on March 4, 1892. He grew up in the village of Galuevskaya, which is located in the Kostroma Province. As a child, he studied at a parochial school, and then continued his studies by entering the church-teachers seminary in 1905. That same year, Nikolai joined the Socialist Revolutionary Party.
A year later, he was expelled from the church-teacher seminary for revolutionary ideas and propaganda, and Kondratiev spent several months in prison for his political views and lack of trustworthiness.
In 1911, Nikolai Dmitrievich was given a certificate confirming his maturity; for this he passed an exam as an external student. After that, he entered the economics department of the law faculty at St. Petersburg University.
Kondratiev participates in the February Revolution of 1917, after which his political career rises sharply. At the All-Russian Democratic Conference in September 1917, Kondratiev was elected to Parliament. Shortly before the October Revolution, Nikolai Dmitrievich was appointed Comrade Minister of Food of the Provisional Government. After the establishment of Soviet power, he held various positions in the economic sphere.
In 1918, Kondratiev moved to Moscow, he completely abandoned his former political activities, left the essays and focused only on scientific activities. In 1920, Professor Kondratiev became director of the Moscow Institute of Market Studies.
In August 1920, he was arrested on political charges, but a month later he was released thanks to the joint efforts of A.V. Chayanov and I.A. Teodorovich. From 1920 to 1923, Kondratyev was head of the department of agricultural economics and policy.
In Russia, the professor was little known, however, among the foreign circle of specialists, he was known and respected. The scientist subjected him to severe criticism. The senior party leadership reacted negatively to Kondratiev's disapproval and, in 1928, he was removed from his post as director of the institute.
In 1930 he was arrested, and two years later he was sentenced to eight years in prison. During Stalin's pre-war repressions, Nikolai Dmitrievich was sentenced to death. On September 17, 1938, the sentence was carried out. Kondratiev was buried in Kommunar (Moscow region).
Kondratieff cycles
Kondratiev created the theory of large cycles, which was as follows: all war revolutions begin due to certain economic conditions in the state.
Shocks in the social sphere occur most easily under the pressure of new economic forces.
The main life achievement of Nikolai Dmitrievich, his theory about economic cycles, is expressed as follows:
There are four types of economic cycles:
- Seasonal (duration less than one year).
- Short (lasting about three years).
- Middle (from seven to eleven years old).
- Large (from forty-eight to fifty-five years).
Periods of “lowering” during the wave are characterized by a sharp depression in agriculture. During the “upward” wave of each major cycle, the most active social upheavals occur.
Kondratieff's theory of large cycles
Kondratiev cycles (also known as “Kondratiev’s theory of large cycles”) are patterns of development of the world economy in the long term. The cycle is based on a period of 50 years, while deviations of an average of 10 years are acceptable; the average Kondratiev cycle lasts 45-60 years.
Kondratieff's large cycles correlate with cyclical systems developed by other economists, most notably with the medium-term cycles of Juglar and Kuznets.
The Kondratieff cycle can be conditionally divided into two large phases of increase and decrease, a more accurate forecast of the duration of which is given when combined with the above-mentioned medium-term cyclical forecasts.
During a cycle change, profound changes in economic activity are noted; this may be due to the emergence of new technologies, changes in geopolitical zones of influence, revolutions that have occurred or deep crises, after which the gradual construction of a new economic model begins. There is also a pattern in the occurrence of major wars of global significance during changing cycles.
The increasing phase of the cycle marks a gradual increase in production, the development of labor productivity, the world market; crises during this period are short-term and insignificant for the economic system.
When the wave decreases, the opposite is observed - frequent instability arises with the risk of collapse of the global economy.
There are also 4 patterns of the cycle:
First, before the start of the upward wave of each major cycle, significant changes are observed in the conditions of the economic life of society: technical inventions and discoveries, changes in the conditions of monetary circulation, the strengthening of the role of new countries in world economic life.
The second is that periods of upward waves in large cycles are, as a rule, much richer in major social upheavals and upheavals in the life of society (revolutions, wars) than periods of downward waves.
Third, the downward waves of these large cycles are accompanied by long-term depression in agriculture.
Fourth - large cycles of economic conditions are revealed in the same unified process of economic development dynamics, in which medium cycles with their phases of recovery, crisis and depression are also identified.
Kondratiev's 1st cycle begins after the final victory of the industrial revolution and the formation of bourgeois society and represents the period 1803-1843. According to this dating, in the first decades of the 21st century we live at the junction of the 5th and 6th cycles, the latter, according to forecast, begins in the mid-2010s (opinion: 5th cycle - from 1981-1983 to ~2018). These cycles appeared after the final establishment of mass production, they are characterized by the deployment, development of technology, electronics, computer and nanotechnologies, the gradual introduction of robotics with the subsequent convergence of the latest technologies (4th industrial revolution?).
With each new cycle, the financial system acquires a more complex structure. The 4th and 5th cycles were characterized by the gradual globalization of markets, that is, the ability to quickly move assets between countries, as well as the lack of demand for cash on a large scale (new technologies make it possible to switch to electronic payment methods, ATMs and plastic cards appear).
The 5th cycle also saw the collapse of the established political system of the superpowers (USSR and the USA), followed by the involvement of the former socialist camp in a single world economy. The expected change of cycles entails a systemic crisis in the world economy, and a revision of the economic system is possible.
The effectiveness of Kondratieff cycles in forecasting economic development is not recognized by all economists. Long-term Kondratieff cycles are focused primarily on the modern economy, formed after the victory of the industrial revolution, and may be interrupted in the future with a possible transition to other economic, technological and geopolitical models.
He carried out circle work until 1917. In 1913 he was arrested again and was imprisoned for a month. Studied at general education. courses. In 1911 he passed the matriculation exam and entered law. Faculty of Petersburg university: Kondratiev’s teachers were economist M.I. Tugan-Baranovsky, historian A.S. Lappo-Danilevsky, sociologist M.M. Kovalevsky, his closest friend is sociologist Pitirim Sorokin. In 1915 he graduated from the university, remained at the department of politics, saving for preparation for a professorship. He combined academic studies with practical studies. activities - since 1916 head. statistical-econ. department of the Zemsky Union of Petrograd. In Jan. 1917 published art. “Continued crisis and the task of organizing the economy” (Monthly Magazine, 1917, No. 1), where he developed the idea of a systematic state. regulation of economics life in order to overcome cont. crisis.
Feb. Kondratyev greeted the revolution of 1917 as an active participant: “From the first hours of it, he was in the Tauride Palace and was appointed by the Council of the Republic of Dagestan comrade representative of the State Production Committee “officially due to the sharp deepening of disagreements with the Central Committee” (Autobiography). This made Kondratiev’s direct cooperation with the Soviet government possible.
Since 1918 Kondratiev has been in Moscow. Headed by Econ. department of the Council of Agriculture cooperation, worked on the board of the Center, flax growers, Higher Seminary of Agricultural Sciences. economy and policy of Petrovskaya agricultural. Academy, taught at universities. From 1920 in the People's Commissariat of Land. agricultural management savings, led the development of the 1st long-term development plan for the village. of the RSFSR for 1923/24 - 1927/28 (“Kondratiev’s five-year plan”). Prof. K - organizer and director of the Market Research Institute (1920-28), author of the theory of large economic cycles. conditions.
In Aug. 1920 was carried out in the case of the “Renaissance Union”, he was imprisoned in a concentration camp “until the end of the Civil War,” but a month later, through the efforts of I.A. Teodorovich and A.V. Chayanov was released; was arrested for the second time in August 1922 with the aim of deportation abroad, but at the insistence of the Narkomfin (here read the Petition of V.V. Obolensky (N. Osinsky) to the Politburo of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) with a request to exempt N.D. Kondratiev from deportation) and released from prison. In 1928, “Kondratievism” was declared “the ideology of the kulaks,” “the restoration of capitalism.” He was removed from the leadership of the institute, which was closed in 1929. In 1930 Kondratiev was arrested, in 1931 on a fabricated case about the so-called. "Labor Cross, Party" was sentenced to 8 years in prison. 17 Sep. 1938 executed. Rehabilitated posthumously in 1987.
Nikolai Dmitrievich Kondratiev(1892-1938) was a universal researcher. Living in a country where the overwhelming majority of the population were peasants, he, like many Russian economists, early became interested in agricultural issues. Already Kondratiev’s first works, “Development of the economy of the Kineshma zemstvo of the Kostroma province” (1915), “The grain market and its regulation during war and revolution” (1922), were devoted to the agricultural sector of the Russian economy.
The focus of the monograph on the bread market was on the placement, development and regulation of agricultural production.
Analyzing the relationship between fixed and free (market) prices for the period 1914-1918, Kondratiev points to the growing gap between them and comes to the conclusion that “the policy of fixed prices was powerless to control the movement of prices, to eliminate free illegal prices,
N.D. Kondratiev, even in the most difficult conditions of war and revolution, put forward the demand for “market verification” of state policy methods.
When developing this plan, Kondratiev proceeded “from the need to combine planning and market principles on the basis of the NEP” and put forward the central idea of “close connection” and “balance” of the agricultural and industrial sectors. In the mid-20s. these provisions were finally formed in the form concepts of parallel equilibrium development of agriculture and industry. Kondratiev wrote that only “healthy growth of agriculture presupposes... powerful development of industry.” An effective agricultural sector can ensure the recovery of the entire economy and become a guarantee of the sustainability of the entire national economy, including the industrialization process.
Kondratiev protested against the indiscriminate inclusion of all “strong strata of the village” in the kulaks. His program focused on the primary support of strong family working farms that could become the basis for economic recovery in the country.
Most of the decade of the 20s. was also filled with Kondratiev’s intense work on developing theories of national economic plans. The scientist has repeatedly emphasized that in post-revolutionary conditions the state, using nationalized property (land, the predominant part of industry, transport, the credit system and a significant part of trade), is capable of exerting a much stronger impact not only on the public, but also on the private sector, people's the economy as a whole. He considered planning to be the main method of such influence.
For a number of years, he headed the Department of Agricultural Economics and Planning Works of the People's Commissariat of Agriculture of the RSFSR, and was director of the Market Research Institute under the People's Commissariat of Finance of the USSR.) Here he set the institute the task of creating a macroeconomic theory of planning and forecasting. In resolving issues of market research (price dynamics, indices of production volumes in industry, agriculture, etc.), Kondratiev and his collaborators stood at the forefront of world science.
Merit of N.D. Kondratiev was that he developed a rather coherent concept of scientific planning, a conscious impact on the economy, and under the conditions of the NEP, while maintaining the mechanisms of market regulation and market balance. It is not surprising that this concept was “not to the taste” of the Stalinist leadership, which planned a forced, but without taking into account real conditions, transition to administrative state socialism. In his speech at the conference of Marxist agrarians, Stalin harshly criticized the theory of equilibrium (equilibrium development) developed by Kondratiev and his associates, calling it one of the “bourgeois prejudices.”
World economic science Kondratiev is known primarily as the author theories of large cycles of economic conditions. In a number of his works - “The world economy and its conditions during and after the war” (1922), the report “Large cycles of economic conditions” (1925) - the scientist developed the idea of multiplicity of cycles, highlighting various models of cyclical fluctuations:
E seasonal (duration less than a year),
E short (duration 3-3.5 years),
E commercial and industrial (medium) cycles (7-11 years),
These are large cycles lasting 48-55 years.
The concept of large cycles fell into three main parts:
- 1) empirical evidence of the existence of a “large cycle model”;
- 2) some empirically established patterns that accompany long-term fluctuations in the market situation;
- 3) an attempt at their theoretical explanation, or the actual theory of large cycles of the environment.
To establish whether large cycles exist, Kondratiev processed significant factual material. He studied statistical data for four leading capitalist countries - England, France, Germany and the USA. Kondratiev analyzed the time series of prices, interest on capital, wages, the volume of foreign trade, as well as the production of main types of industrial products. The dynamics of coal and iron production were also taken into account according to the “global production indices”.
Most of the data taken revealed the presence of cyclical waves lasting 48-55 years. The period of statistical observations and analysis was a maximum of 140 years (according to some sources, less). For this period of time - by the mid-20s. - there were only two and a half completed large cycles.
According to Kondratiev’s estimates, periods of large cycles from the end of the 18th century. turned out to be approximately the following.
- 1. Upward wave: from the late 80s - early 90s. XVIII century until 1810--1817
- 2. Downward wave: from 1810-1817. until 1844--1851.
- 3. Upward wave: from 1844--1851. until 1870--1875
- 4. Downward wave: from 1870-1875. until 1890-1896
- 5. Upward wave: from 1890-1896. until 1914--1920
- 6. Probable downward wave: from 1914-1920.
Thus, despite the rather high market conditions observed in the main capitalist countries in the 1920s, N.D. Kondratiev attributed this decade to the beginning of the next downward wave, which was soon confirmed in the dramatic events of the global economic crisis of 1929-1933. and subsequent long-term depressive phase.
In general, N.D.’s prediction Kondratiev’s analysis of the dynamics of long-term market fluctuations turned out to be quite accurate. It is no coincidence that interest in the “large cycles” model has increased sharply since the mid-70s, when, almost half a century after the “Great Depression,” another general economic decline was observed everywhere in the West.
Kondratiev also identified a number of empirical patterns that accompanied long-term fluctuations in the economic situation. Thus, he believed that “before the beginning and at the beginning of the upward wave of each major cycle, profound changes are observed in the conditions of the economic life of society. These changes are expressed in significant changes in technology (which are, in turn, preceded by significant technical discoveries and inventions), in the involvement of new countries in world economic relations, in changes in gold mining and monetary circulation.”