Home – Home – Jornals – Region: Economics and Sociology 2026 number 1

The present article complements and completes the article “State Regulation of Spatial Development in China (with Reference to the North-Eastern and Western Macroregions)”, Region: Economics and Sociology, 2025, No. 4. Drawing on the example of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of the PRC, it examines the experience of development and state support of a typical resource-based region, similar in its natural, climatic, and resource conditions to the regions of southern Asian Russia, but which, unlike the latter, has managed to implement an effective program of modernization and diversification of production. We look at the ideology and nature of economic reforms in China and how they have affected spatial development processes. We highlight the common features of the spatial structure of Russia and China as the world’s largest countries in terms of territory, with very large differences between their regions in terms of natural and climatic conditions, resource availability, and transport accessibility. The study shows that they are united by the common problem of a significant spatial “gap” in the levels of economic and social development of their regions, and examines the main differences between Russia and China in addressing this problem. This study demonstrates that China is effectively shaping a new quality of its space, purposefully increasing its connectivity through the implementation of major infrastructure projects. We look at the main parts of China’s positive experience with state regulation of spatial development and see how it could be used in Russia. We point out that institutional factors and conditions are the weakest link in modernizing the Chinese and Russian development models and their spatial segments.