‘His Concern for the Country, City, and University at His Doorstep Was Yasin’s Unique Feature’
On September 28, the HSE Cultural Centre hosted a memorial service for Evgeny Yasin, an outstanding Russian economist, one of the founders of HSE University, and its academic supervisor for many years. His family, friends, colleagues and students came to say farewell and bring flowers.
‘Every new generation of HSE University alumni are Evgeny Yasin’s pupils. We will always remember him as a person who was creating the future and saw an opportunity, a potential in everyone. He always supported lots of people,’ said HSE Rector Nikita Anisimov.
Alexander Shokhin, HSE President, remembered that he had a chance to meet Evgeny Yasin over 50 years ago. ‘This is a huge loss not only to our university, but to the country at large,’ he believes. ‘For decades, Evgeny was a symbol of change, a symbol of reforms’.
Yaroslav Kuzminov, HSE Academic Supervisor, said that Evgeny Yasin lived a long and eventful life: ‘He took part in everything, he was very involved. Truly, he was not just interested, he was not just willing to participate and come close—he looked at how he could make things better, and talked to people who were able to make things better. And this concern about the public good, the concern for the country, city, and university at his doorstep was Yasin’s unique feature’.
Russian Minister of Finance Anton Siluanov said that he and Evgeny Yasin were like-minded friends. ‘When Evgeny Yasin was Minister of Finance, I perfectly remember how he solved complex questions in an easy and friendly manner. This meant a lot to me. Evgeny Grigorievich was a very generous and warm-hearted person, and this is how he will remain in my memory,’ he said.
Maxim Oreshkin, Aide to the President of the Russian Federation and HSE University graduate, thanked Evgeny Yasin, ‘because without what he did in his life, I would not be the person I am today… His memory will stay in many hearts.’
Alexey Kudrin, former Minister of Finance and former Head of the Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation, believes that Evgeny Yasin was as large a figure as the era he lived in: ‘It was the transition from the Soviet economy to the market one. And this transition happened thanks to people like Evgeny Grigorievich. Everyone had to live through extremely hard years, to make a huge effort in order to make it work.’
Alexander Auzan, Dean of the MSU Faculty of Economics, shared his memory of how Evgeny Yasin did not think of everyone as his students, ‘but all of us wanted to think of ourselves as such.’ ‘Russia has a lot of smart people who cannot agree with each other, and a lot of kind people who don’t know how to apply this kindness. Evgeny Yasin combined intelligence with kindness. Sometimes it even seemed like innocence, but he was very wise,’ he said.
Vladimir Avtonomov, Professor at the HSE Faculty of Economic Sciences, remembered that people had called Evgeny Yasin an ‘economist with human touch’ and ‘a reformer with human touch’, but that ‘I would like to say that he was a human with a human touch: it is a rare thing, and the beams of friendly sympathy he radiated touched a lot of people.’
The memorial service was also attended by Elvira Nabiullina, Evgeny Yasin’s student and Governor of the Bank of Russia; Andrey Fursenko, Aide to the President of Russia; Olga Golodets, Deputy Chair of the Board at Sberbank; as well as other prominent public and political figures, university staff and students. Evgeny Yasin’s daughter Irina and other family members accepted the condolences.