MOSCOW. Dec 22 (Interfax) - Anatoly Chubais, the head of the Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies (RUSNANO), has estimated the chance of the Russian economic and political system to endure the global economic crisis as fifty-fifty.

"If we talk particularly about Russia and try to analyze the risks, I would say it's fifty-fifty. Fifty percent for the forecast that the current political and economic system, which has formed in the past eight years, will endure them and fifty percent that we are facing serious economic, social, and perhaps even political turmoil," Chubais said in an interview published in the Monday issue of The New Times weekly.

Chubais basically praised the government's steps amid the global crisis. "We have avoided the risk that is called a banking system collapse," Chubais said. If the government had not pumped money into the financial system, "we would not have had it by now."

"What does mass bankruptcy of banks mean? First, the total suspension of payments in the economy, second, the total suspension of payments of salaries to all employees, and then third, and fourth, and fifth, and so on," he said.

"Was it possible to spend 1 trillion (rubles) rather than 1.5 trillion if the policy had been more sophisticated and balanced? Probably, yes. But the risks were too high, and therefore the measures that were taken can be described as very professional," he said.

Chubais declined to predict whether a second wave of instability in the banking sector is possible. "I don't know the answer. I know that, in terms of its (the problem in the financial sector) acuteness and the scale of its implications, it was more serious than all the rest in that period, in September and October. I know that today the situation has improved. It's absolutely impossible to forecast anything," he said.

As regards the spring of 2009, Chubais said the logic of such crises in the world is that a financial crisis is usually followed by an economic, then a social, and then a political one.

"It looks like the financial crisis is over. The banking system has withstood. Although we might have a second tide as well. If this happens, then it's the end of the ball game. An economic crisis is unfolding. We can't avoid an economic one. It's inevitable," he said.

"The economic (crisis) will develop into a social one exactly in spring. Whether the social crisis turns into a political one is a question of stability of the system that has been built in the past eight years," he said.