Home – Home – Jornals – ECO journal (ECOnomics and industrial Engineering) 2018 number 6

The concept of spatial development of the Russian Federation until 2025 (approved in May 2017) proposes a partition of national territory on some macro-region’s. For the new areas will be identified priorities of economic development and industry specialization and eventually an appropriate place in the national and global division of labor. The author examines one of the proposed approaches to the allocation of macro-regions based on social-economic principles. The views of participants of the Krasnoyarsk Economic Forum 2018 are given. They criticized the proposed concept, outlined the fundamental points that need to be addressed. The discussion continues.

The article highlights the project of creation of the macro-region “Yenisei Siberia”, which was presented at the Krasnoyarsk economic forum of 2018. The leaders of the Krasnoyarsk region, the republics of Tuva and Khakassia have initiated the coordinated development of infrastructure and joint promotion of large investment projects of interregional character. The author briefly introduces the three regions-participants, presents investment projects included in the pool of “Yenisei Siberia”, suggests that a strategic hierarchy of the investment program would be useful, cites the opinion of experts-participants of the KEF on the macroregion’s prospects.

Issues of state policy in the sphere of spatial development are raised in an interview with Eugenia Buharova, Siberian Federal University. Professor Buharova is engaged for a long time in a study of spatial development and regional security. She discuss the advantages and disadvantages of Soviet-administrative and market-oriented approaches to the development of territories, examines the prospects of the project for the creation of the macro-region «Yenisei Siberia» comments on the new strategy of spatial development of Russia.

The article presents the results of the analysis of the implementation of projects of the Lower Angara region, the idea of the development of which has been discussed since 1935.it is Revealed that the difficulties in the implementation of many recent decades are associated with the orientation to market criteria for the effectiveness of many projects, the lack of economic approach to the evaluation of infrastructure projects. It is shown that the value of competitiveness of the resources of this region in the absence of modern transport communications is greatly exaggerated. The authors suggest that the emphasis in the new strategy of development of such territories is not on finding competitive advantages with other regions, but on their interaction, complementarity with the mandatory integration of their projects into the long-term development strategy of the whole country. Unfortunately, today more attention is paid to the commercial interests of companies - investors, but not to the interests of the country.

Institute of Economics and industrial Engineering SB RAS celebrates its 60th anniversary this year. Director of IEIE Prof. Dr. Valery A. Kryukov during his interview talks about the fate of scientific schools that have contributed to institute’s fame around the world in the Soviet period, reflects on IEIE’s place in the history of modern economic science, formulates his position with regard to competition and collaboration with national and foreign scientific organizations, tells about the most promising modern developments of the institute.

The article is devoted to the analysis of the population’s adaptation behavior appeared in the period of 2015-2017. The author studies the population’s ideas about economic growth perspectives; the level of resources development; current adaptation strategies. The informational base of the study is monitoring research “Subjective well-being”, conducted annually by INSAP Ranepa in the form of 8 waves of representative surveys with a sample of 1,640 respondents. It is shown that the population perceives the current economic situation without alarmism, but does not see the prospects for its improvement. In such a situation adaptation means getting used to new conditions by reducing consumption standards for the majority of people. Only one fifth of the population has a high resource potential, allowing to create a variety of adaptation strategies, while twice higher number of those who is characterized by the low resource potential. The main adaptation strategy for the group with low resource potential has become the use of a private subsidiary farm. Active forms of adaptation dealt with the implementation of various resources characterize the behavior of the third of the population.

The article is devoted to the problem of evaluation of efficiency of municipal investment policies and perspectives of investment development of the municipalities in the North and the Arctic. Objectives of the study included issues of budget security and investment opportunities of municipalities in crisis, as well as assessment of effectiveness of measures undertaken by state and municipal authorities in creating an enabling investment environment. It is concluded that the growth of investments and the intensification of investment activities on the territory of the municipality largely depends on the commitment of the Federal and regional authorities, as well as the position of core enterprises, so the main prospects for development and investment in the Northern regions are connected, primarily, with the stable operation of oil-and-gas and single-industry settlements.

To obtain a retrospective aggregated estimates of greenhouse gas emissions in the Russian regions, it is possible to use the Fuel and Energy Balance, which includes data on the final consumption of fuel and energy. Retrospective assessments allow to analyze the influence of various socio-economic factors on the dynamics of emissions through correlation regression analysis. In Yakutia, there is a direct correlation between anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases and economic growth, as well as the quality and standard of living of the population. It is recommended to use cautiously the Russian statistics before 1995, because at that time the economy was strongly influenced by multidirectional processes, which affects the comparability of data. The indicators of carbon intensity and energy intensity of GRP are closely interrelated. At the same time, carbon intensity is more sensitive to changes in the volumes and structure of fuel and energy resources consumed in the region, i.q. energy intensity to socio-economic dynamics. Northern specificity and severe climate determine a higher level of greenhouse gas emissions in Yakutia compared with the world average. However, the region and Russia as a whole have quite large reserves in reducing emissions. Data from other northern countries can be used as targets of regional programs.

The article deals with the establishment of the Russian National Payment Card System (NPCS), which is demands special care. The purpose of this article is studying implementation stages of the first independent payment system in Russia. The key indicators of the NPCS contemporary development have been thoroughly investigated. It is concluded that to ensure the fair competition in the market of payment cards it is vital to pay attention on improving the payment infrastructure and implementation the economic insentives for the «Mir» payment system participants. The authors consider that in the long-term period the Russian NPCS would be able to compete with international payment systems in case it got ready to implement innovations and offer price and functional advantages of the pruposed products. It is expected that the results revealed can be used by economists-researchers, credit institutes and national regulating authorities for improvement of the NSPC development in the conditions of economic sanctions and also for stimulation of cashless payments growth in the country.

Historical conceptualizations of one of the biggest Soviet trials (Shakhty, 1928) transitioned from “well founded” to “fabricated”, which demands careful rethinking of its reasons, purposes, means and results. Shakhty trial formally was stacked against “specialists-wreckers” but in reality it was a way out of deep systemic crisis: legitimacy decline, growth of negativity towards the government institutions, social unrest. Taking the model of conflict mobilization («us - they») as a basis for show trials, Stalin government not only sacrificed interests and status of the engineers, but also pragmatically used disaffection of the working class with the «delay» of privileges promised for them. Retargeting remonstrative energy of workers towards “spetseyedstvo” (bashing non-party engineers) and encouraging public mood of social revenge of «lower classes» against intelligentsia, the regime evoked new crisis situations (deformation of social and labor relations, extending repressive measures over management and economy).

The paper discuss the concept of the system of socio-economic relations derived from the relations of power (domination - subordination). The author of the reviewed book develops a system of categories of political economy, based on the methodology of Marx, bringing in a number of new elements and removing from it those elements that, in his assessment, are not significant. Critical review of the book shows its strengths and weaknesses. The author’s concept is evaluated from the point of view of correctness of methodological requirements, as well as by comparison with alternative approaches. The activity approach, which is the basis of the study, leads the author to original results, different from the generally recognized ones. The review discusses the explanatory power of the concept proposed by the author, its completeness and consistency.