IGF CultureWatch

The debate over whether Moscow will witness a Gay Pride parade in May carries important implications for Russia's future.

How the Moscow authorities respond to the threats of violence issued by Talgat Tajuddin of Russia's Central Spiritual Governance for Muslims is important in its own right. According to Mr. Tajuddin, "The parade should not be allowed, and if they still come out into the streets, then they should be bashed."

Such threats have no place in a society governed by law. No one should be subjected to violence for holding hands in the street or walking peacefully in a parade. That much should be clear.

But the question of whether the parade should be allowed also raises a bigger question about whether Russia will be a leader in industry, technology, art, culture and science, or will retreat to insularity and backwardness. It is a question of whether to be an open society or a closed one.

And how it is answered has implications that go far beyond whether someone likes or dislikes gay people.

Studies of American and Canadian cities have demonstrated quite effectively that the more open and welcoming a city or region is to peaceful diversity, the more economically productive, prosperous and commercially and technologically advanced it is likely to be.

In a pioneering study of urban life in America published by the Urban Institute in 2001, Richard Florida of George Mason University and Gary Gates of the Urban Institute created a measure of homosexual presence in an urban population and then correlated it with the presence of high-tech industries and economic growth.

They concluded that:

gays not only predict the concentration of high-tech industry, they are also a predictor of its growth. Five of the cities that rank in the top 10 for high-technology growth from 1990 to 1998 rank in the top 10 for the "Gay Index."

They also found a strong correlation between the presence of artistic and creative people-writers, photographers, sculptors, actors-and high-tech industries. Of especially great importance to Russia, which faces a long-term demographic crisis, they discovered a robust correlation between the percentage who are foreign born and the success of high-tech industries.

It seems that it's not a case of the old cliche that "those people" are creative, but instead it turns out that places that exhibit lots of creativity are places that are open to creativity.

How does toleration of gay people figure into economic success? It is a good proxy of the openness and toleration of a society generally. And such openness and toleration is conducive to the flourishing of a society.

As Gary Gates put it during an Urban Institute conference on "The Demographics of Diversity," the presence of a gay population is important because

They add to a social climate of tolerance toward diversity in cities, and that has specific positive economic outcomes for various regions and cities. The argument here is that a vibrant gay and lesbian community provides one of the strongest signals of diversity and tolerance, both within neighborhoods and cities.

It's rather obvious that welcoming talent is an essential condition for attracting it.

This is not a new issue. The relationship between toleration and prosperity has been known for a long time. The Netherlands emerged in Europe as a leader in commerce, the arts, technology and industry many years ago because of the greater degree of toleration it afforded minorities.

The decision about whether to allow a Gay Pride parade down Tverskaya Street in Moscow is not merely approval or disapproval of seeing gay people in public. It is much more a decision about Russia's future.

Thirteen years ago, Russia's democratically elected leaders made the right choice by decriminalizing homosexual love. In doing so, they advanced into the front ranks of modern, progressive, open societies.

The debate over whether to allow a Gay Pride parade in Moscow is a proxy for the much wider debate about whether Russia will choose to be counted among the nations known for creativity in technology, science, art, culture and wealth, or among those known for insularity, prejudice, poverty, and backwardness.