Architect of the 500 Days programme, radical reform economist who tried to convert the Soviet planned economy to the market in one leap
It is not a question now of saving socialism, communism or any other -ism, it is a question of saving our country, our people — at a Party Central Committee plenum, 1990
Born near Leningrad. A student of Kantorovich, he advanced input-output modelling and optimal planning theory, became a full academician (1987), and Academician-Secretary of the Economics Department (1989). In 1990, under Gorbachev and Yeltsin's joint mandate, he led the working group that drafted the '500 Days' programme for market transition, a radical plan directly opposing Abalkin's gradualism. Not adopted at Union level but partially implemented in Russia, it became the intellectual foundation for his student Gaidar's 1992 shock therapy. After the collapse he headed the 'Reforma' foundation, helped found the United Democratic Party, and served as honorary president of Spartak Moscow.
Career Timeline
- 1958–1959Economist at the Research Financial Institute, USSR Ministry of Finance
- 1959–1965Researcher at the Research Economic Institute (NIEI) under Gosplan
- 1965–1976Deputy director and department head at TsEMI, USSR Academy of Sciences
- 1970–1983Chair of Mathematical Methods of Economic Analysis, Economics Faculty, Moscow State University
- 1974 / 1987Corresponding member, then full academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences
- 1976–1986Senior researcher at All-Union Institute for Systems Studies; taught economics at MIPT
- 1986–1989Researcher at the Institute of Economics and Forecasting of Scientific-Technical Progress
- 1989.12Member of the State Commission on Economic Reform
- 1989–1996Academician-Secretary of Economics Department, USSR Academy of Sciences / RAS
- 1990Head of the 500 Days working group; member of the USSR Presidential Council
- 1990–1991Member of the CPSU Central Committee
- 1991Chair of organizing committee for United Democratic Party; head of 'Reforma' International Foundation
- 1991.6Yeltsin's confidant in the RSFSR presidential election
Related historical events
The 500 Days Programme: A Watershed in Soviet Market Transition
In the summer of 1990, Gorbachev and Yeltsin jointly mandated a working group led by Shatalin. After a month of intensive work, the 400-page report 'Transition to the Market' was completed, with its full text published in Izvestiya on 4 September. The '500 Days Programme', as it became known, was the first official Soviet document to explicitly acknowledge capitalism and propose private property, price liberalisation, and comprehensive privatisation. Its core proposition was to 'take everything possible away from the state and give it to the people.'
The programme unfolded in four phases. First 100 days: privatisation of housing, land, and small enterprises; corporatisation of large firms; creation of a reserve banking system. Next 150 days: price liberalisation and opening to foreign trade. Following 150 days: market stabilisation after the initial shock. Final 100 days: resumption of economic growth. The working group included 13 of the era's leading reform economists: Yavlinsky, Yasin, Petrakov, Fyodorov, Zadornov among them.
At the same time, Prime Minister Ryzhkov and Deputy PM Abalkin prepared a rival, more gradualist 'Basic Guidelines,' setting the stage for an open confrontation. At a Central Committee plenum earlier that year, Shatalin had declared: 'It is not a question now of saving socialism, communism, or any other -ism; it is a question of saving our country, our people.' On 11 September, the RSFSR Supreme Soviet overwhelmingly adopted the 500 Days Programme, but at Union level, facing resistance from the military-industrial complex and Party conservatives, Gorbachev opted for a compromise, effectively shelving it.
Though never adopted, the programme was a decisive turning point: it made radical market transition an official agenda item within the Soviet system. After the USSR's collapse, Yeltsin's Russia pursued reform, most notably Gaidar's 1992 shock therapy, on the intellectual and political foundations laid by the 500 Days Programme.