On June 4, 2017, the annual festival ‘The Whole World at HSE’ took place in the courtyard of the HSE building on Shabolovka Street. In our photo report, we present lectures, workshops, Armenian dances, Mongolian sweets, the nardi game from Azerbaijan, and many other things that people saw at the festival.

Do public councils matter for development of civil society? Or their activity is just window dressing? Actually, according to research, these state agencies play a rather important role. For instance, the council attached to MVD takes part in sponsor programs aimed at development of the region as well as controls police activity. On the presentation of the article «Managed Civil Society and the Realities of Police Oversight in Russia» the professor of University of Massachusetts Amherst Lauren A. McCarthy spoke about this in more detail.

Every year, the HSE family welcomes representatives of new countries and becomes more interesting and diverse. On June 4, 2017, international students will talk to visitors about their home countries and introduce them to their cultures at The Whole World at HSE festival. To give you a quick pre-festival snapshot of how international HSE is, we’ve brought together ten facts about the university international life for you.

From May 29 to June 18 students can vote for HSE’s best teachers of the academic year. This year there is no need to come to the university to vote. Students can submit their scores online via LMS. 

The relationships between the government and operators are regulated by a contract. In theory such contracts offer a choice among a continuum of options, but due to the complexity, it is impossible to realize them. Therefore the government usually offers a contract with just two alternatives, for instance, a fixed-price or a cost-plus one. However, using such binary contracts instead of the ones obtained in theory leads to a sufficient decrease in social welfare. On the presentation of the article «Full versus binary menus: What are the welfare gains?» the professor of Paris School of Economics David Martimort told us how, actually, big the loss of the society is.

After the collapse of the Communist system left parties found themselves in a difficult situation. Some of them preferred to adapt to the reality and changed radical views to more democratic ones, while others remained faithful to their ideology. According to research, the last managed to retain support of workers and lower middle class. However, those left parties that had become more democratic lost their traditional constituency, most of which turned to radical right parties. On the presentation of the article «The Left Parties Choices and The Emergence of The Radical Right» the postgraduate student of Columbia University Maria Snegovaya explained why that happened.

Topic: "Do institutions cause social trust? Evidence from an institutional reform"

Interpersonal trust has a great impact on life quality and economic development. What are its origins? Why are people in some countries inclined to trust each other while in others they are not? In his work "Do institutions cause social trust? Evidence from an institutional reform» NRU HSE research fellow Denis Ivanov told us how police reform and control of corruption can influence the level of social trust.

From April 11 to 14, HSE is holding its XVIII April International Academic Conference on Economic and Social Development. Conference Programme Committee members Fuad Alekserov and Andrei Yakovlev discuss the key themes and main reports that will be presented at the conference. This conference will draw around 2,000 people, including 200 international participants.