The proposed version of macroeconomic theory of capital reproduction is related to thethesis that the dynamics of the economy are caused by the change in generations of capital and there is a problem of coordination between these generations. This paper discusses the so-called “switchover mode of reproduction”. As shown by the mathematical model, a coordinated growth is possible when the social and economic interests are agreed between the labor and the capital, as well as under a monetary policy that stimulates such growth. An uncoordinated growth poses a threat of economic crisis.

This paper analyzes the opposition between the «liberals» and «statists» in the Russian political and economic thought. It demonstrates that the economic liberalization is an absolute prerequisite for the transition to sustainable socio-economic development. Such development must rely on investment activities of the state, which in the current circumstances is a necessary but not sufficient measure for reversing the negative trends. The negative developments can be prevented only through implementation, along with the institutional changes in the economic area that form a strata of economically independent entrepreneurs-innovators, of no less profound transformation in political institutions aimed at democratization of public life.

The paper proposes to reconsider the methodology and history of economics radically, whether present day mainstream or heterodox versions of it. The profession of economists must definitely abandon Cartesian dualism and adopt Vygotskian constructivism. In fact constructivist economics already existed in the past and was cognitively very successful and socially very useful. It was the economics of Gustav Schmoller’s historico-ethical school and the institutionalist economics of John R. Commons, traditions of which are totally ignored by the contemporary community of economists. The former tradition was based on Dilthey’s hermeneutics and the latter on Peirce’s pragmatism. It is worth to underline that hermeneutics and pragmatism are both predecessors of Vygotskian constructivism. During the last two decades a lot was written by economists on pragmatist, constructivist and discursive approaches to the methodology and history of economics, but those who wrote on these topics viewed them from the dualistic point of view. My paper is an appeal to economists to reconsider Methodenstreit. The dispute of methods between Schmoller and Menger can be considered as a repetition of a similar dispute taking place more than two hundred years earlier between Robert Boyle and Thomas Hobbes. Schmoller-Menger dispute started soon after the beginning of the institutionalisation of experimentally-oriented economics which happened with the creation in 1873 of the Vereinfür Sozialpolitik. Boyle-Hobbes dispute started in 1660, when the Royal Society of London had been founded, the cradle of the institution of science. Schmoller was one of the creators of the Verein, and Boyle was one of the founders of the Royal Society. The activities of both societies were similar in several respects: they represented efforts to collect data, working out of detailed reports and collective evaluation of obtained results. For Hobbes, as for Menger, the model of ‘science’ was geometry. Boyle and Schmoller privileged collecting and analysing data. Boyle did win the dispute, Schmoller did loose. It happened because of different attitudes of powerful groups in societies towards natural scientific experimental research and experimental social research. They were interested in the former, and they saw much more danger than benefit for them in the latter. On the contrary, they were interested in abstract theoretical constructions justifying the market vision of society and laissez-faire. This kind of constructions corresponded to deeply enrooted scholastic traditions of European universities to teach theology and linked with it philosophy. In the framework of these traditions, mathematics was considered as a summit of the scientific approach. On the one hand, the adoption of constructivism by economists would turn their discipline into a science functionally close to natural sciences. On the other hand the Vygotskian constructivism, as a social and political philosophy, once accepted by economists, may lead them to become preachers of the communitarian liberalism with its emphasis on social responsibility, deliberative democracy, and discourse ethics.

In the article, the hypothesis that the modern industrial-technological process causes complication of socio-economic space and conducts to amplification its integrity, which, in turn, causes the need for the coordinated and balanced development, is proved. The process of complication of economic space is revealed as a result of number growth of communications caused by creation of the enterprises and organizations, by the change of structure of manufacture and increase of an educational level of the population. The characteristics of a new quality of economic space are given. The factors of the coordinated and balanced development of territories are allocated. The contents «a commercial combination» is shown. The necessity of transition to the system innovation thinking in conditions of becoming complicated economic space is proved. The idea of use «rebalancing of the economy « as a new vision of equation in conditions of crisis situations is offered. The conclusion is made that the result of theoretical and practical searches should become formation vital stability of development of territories, which is provided with intelligence — technological and moral — ethical level of the population, living on it.

The Regions located in the Arctic zone of the Russian Federation implement an important function in the development of an export potential of the country. The richest nature-resource potential of the land and the sea should be considered as the favorable factors of manufacture development in the Arctic zone. The negative factors constraining the development of the Arctic zone are as follows: severe nature-climatic conditions; considerable remoteness of the region from the subjects of the Russian Federation being socially and economically more developed; weak economic (including infrastructural) mastering of this territory; a low demographic potential of the population. The goal of the studies is to reveal the existing spatial differentiation of the economic activities in the northern latitude areas of the country. The authors have compiled several diagrams and maps to estimate the differences in the branch structure of gross value added of the subjects of the Arctic zone of Russia. Besides that, a variance of the areas’ shares in comparison with the average value of the Russian Federation as a whole has been estimated. The analysis of the features of spatial differentiation of the economic activities of the Arctic regions allows us to determine the certain tendencies of the development of economic structures for the future. The article is intended for those experts and students who are interested in the problems of the development of the northern regions of the Russian Federation.

In the article, the results of the research of correlation of welfare and public health of the population of Russia in the conditions of economic instability are presented. The review of performance indicators of development of public sentiments of society applied both in Russian and foreign practice is submitted. The concept content of the “social and psychological potential of a region” as an indicator of public health of the population is opened. On the basis of this concept, the potential pattern is created. The evaluation method of social and psychological potential of a region is developed, its main idea is an integrated assessment of both the potential of a region in general and its separate components. The assessment of the condition of potential in territorial subjects of the Russian Federation is given. Character and power of correlation between indicators of welfare and level of social and psychological potential of territorial subjects of the Russian Federation on the basis of development of correlation matrixes are revealed, also, the regional consistent patterns and tendencies are determined.

The paper presents a theoretical framework of industrial parks effectiveness as an element of economic policy to accelerate economy development in regions or municipalities. The article studies how historically such instruments were used in modern Russia. The paper states the necessity of extensive development of the industrial park concept and how it affects the chances of project realization and potential economic effectiveness. The main parts and blocks that should be taken into account during concept preparations are highlighted, and proposals for their content are made.

The subject of the article is to analyze the changes in the grid of municipalities in the Russian Federation during the reform of local government under the influence of demographic factors. The research based on a systems approach to the investigation of the regions where there is interaction between demographic and government subsystem. The main research method was to analyze the legislation and regional statistics. Detailed analysis of the demographic situation in the Kirov Oblast, the impact of natural and the migration decrease on change in the territorial organization of local self-government in the region are analyzed. The prospects of development of the municipal division under the influence of population are defined. It is concluded that in the present time, the grid municipalities in depopulated regions of Russia are not stable and will continue to vary according to the dynamics of population.

Managing of using and developing the Russian regions potential under the terms of economic sanctions from foreign countries require prior modeling of the results of decisions made to identify the most significant areas of management actions. The main aim of the paper is to study the possibilities of cognitive modeling methods in the process of assessing the consequences of external threats to regional economies and the subsequent generation of solutions that are foreground in the terms of regions total potential increasing. On the basis of developed cognitive model, the analysis of interconnected impulsive processes in managing the region’s economic potential was made, which demonstrates the possibilities of using this model to predict the possible trends of development of the situation within the implementation of the specific management decisions. Sequence of the procedures conducted in the framework of the model allows to define the priority and the importance of the impacts on the development of the region’s internal potential under the external threats. As well as to assess the necessity and adequacy of the stimulating and regulatory management measures application, due to the changes of the key factor of the model in order to prevent undesirable changes of the target factors and, in contrary, to improve them. Presented tool is universal and can be adapted to the specific regional conditions and specific “threats.”

The purpose of this article is to piece together a picture of Portuguese regions at the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century. In particular, the authors tried to group NUT III regions according to the location of productive activities bearing in mind employment and other economic and social indicators, namely productivity and purchasing power, as well as competitiveness and environmental quality indicators. Using clusters, it was possible to obtain a map of Portugal containing 6 cluster typologies. Clearly, at one end of these typologies are the regions where tertiary activities are predominant and where there is more purchasing power, productivity and competitiveness, causing, however, more damages to the environment, whereas at the other end are the rural less competitive regions with a lower purchasing power but environmentally more attractive. In between, there are other situations which are also looked into.

The paper presents the research of current small and medium-sized business development in Sverdlovsk region. It includes analysis of enterprise development statistics, Russian and international experience, sociological survey of entrepreneurs’ satisfaction of doing business conditions in Sverdlovsk region. The aim of the research was to develop proposals for business support system development in the long run for inclusion in the SME Development Strategy in Sverdlovsk region up to 2030. As a result, a set of strategic SME development directions was formulated. It includes measures aimed at business problems solving through the development of SME support tools and at addressing institutional problems of business support. The paper includes proposals for improvement of regional support system and implementation the priority SME development direction.

The article is devoted to the identification of the characteristics and priorities of innovation and technological development in the industrial regions of the Russian Federation in the context of the ongoing global crisis. The authors come from the hypothesis that, in these circumstances, the strategy of innovative development of industrial regions, in order to ensure their sustainability and the creation of conditions for further growth, should be an integral part of their industrial policies and focus primarily on the modernization and improvement of technical and technological level of basic units. On the basis of the analysis of statistical data about the status of the innovation capacity in the Russian Federation, the authors have identified the root causes of the continuing backlog of advanced foreign countries by the level of innovative development (raw-material orientation of the Russian economy that enhances the technological dependence of the developed countries; insufficient financial support for innovation activities by the state; the orientation of innovation in imitation and borrowing). The necessity to take into account in the development and implementation of the socio-economic strategic regions of the Russian Federation and the close relationship between the industrial-technological and innovation component of social development is proved. In order to improve the effectiveness of regional development policies, the classification of Russian regions considering their industrial and technological specialization is proposed, the required elements and characteristics of effective innovation systems for each type of region are allocated. In the article, the proposals on measures of the state support for innovation development of industrial regions, with the aim of improving their sustainability and competitiveness in the face of geopolitical and economic uncertainty are determined. The article is addressed to professionals in the field of theory and practice in the management of innovative processes.

The article deals with the basic theoretical questions of the company competitiveness assessment. The state of modern economic thought on this issue is shown. The main factors of the company competitiveness are specified. A specific role of staff of an enterprise is revealed: on the one hand, it is a resource, on the other is a subject, resulting in productive movement all factors of competitiveness, i.e. the staff is a critical factor in the company competitiveness. The criterion of company competitiveness is proposed, on its basis, the concept of “competitive enterprise” is defined. The most well-known approaches for assessing the company competitiveness are analyzed. The author’s method of the company competitiveness assessment based on the dynamics of the integral index of competitiveness is provided. For those cases, when it is impossible to determine the proportion of products on the market, it is proposed to evaluate the company competitiveness on the profitability of its production. The article shows the experience in calculating of the company competitiveness on the proposed author’s methods.

In the article, the results of the research, which purpose is to ground and assess the factors of economic growth of regional integration communities and national economies of member countries that develop them, are presented. The foreign trade, mutual trade turnover, and domestic demand are allocated as such factors. The authors has applied the novelty in their methodology which in contrast to the traditional assessment method of growth factors of integration communities and their participants, is based on comparison of two components — external and domestic demand, based on dividing the external demand on two components: the first one is pure export (the difference between export and import is a component of cumulative demand) of goods in integration community, i.e. the pure export of mutual trade; the second one is a pure export of foreign trade of goods outside of the integration association. Scope of the research is seven most known regional integrated units arose at different times and being at different stages of development — the European Union, North American Free Trade Area, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Southern American Common Market, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, and also member countries of the Eurasian integration — the Customs Union and Common Free Market Zone developed into the Eurasian Economic Union in January 1, 2015. In conclusion, it is noted that the integration develops successfully only in the conditions of the rise in national economies of the participating countries. Crisis economies have to deal more with internal problems than to resolve integration issues.

Russia and Germany are traditionally reputed as countries with socially oriented economies. Namely, these countries are also close by the index of the share of real sector of economy at GDP. And however, Germany is a founder of social market household largely defined its leadership in world economy, in current conditions of crisis of “the state of general welfare” the search of a new model of development for Germany is also important as for Russia stood on the way of modernization and neo-industrialization. In the article, the hypothesis about forming of the new model of development uniting the social orientation of economy, processes of neoindustrialization, and globalization is made. At the same time, the social orientation is the main aim of socio-economic development, neo-industrialization is a way to achieve it, and globalization is a criterion presupposing more effective use of resources. Theoretical backgrounds of development of “social state” are generalized in the works of German and Russian classics put the backgrounds of economic humanism, it has allowed to prove the fatality of modernization process without considering of deep mental backgrounds and civilization codes of the nation development. The methodological approaches to development of a new model of neo-industrial social state with emphasizing different levels: global, national, local, individual are worked out; and the technique for estimation of factors and conditions of its development is proposed. The technique is tested on the example of Russia and Germany. The comparative analysis conducted has allowed to make the conclusion about similarity of target guidelines, initial conditions, problems and ways of their solving in these countries, that is to be considered both in a strategy and a policy of socio-economic development of these countries and by their international partnership.

The research is devoted to the problems of food supply of the population of the region. Subject matter of the research is the relations developed in the conditions of economic reforms in the field of agrarian land use in the Republic of Bashkortostan. Purpose of the work is to develop recommendations on improvement of a situation of the food self-sufficiency and effective land use in Bashkortostan. The research is based on the dialectic approach and economic-mathematical method of the research. The results of the research testify the need of revision of such land features as an indispensability and not susceptibility to obsolescence in the conditions of further growth and development of scientific and technical progress to prevent a lag between our country and developed foreign countries in the theory of rural economics and practice of the food supply. At the differentiation of subsidies for 1 liter of milk and on 1 head of uterine livestock of breeding cattle (on 1 cow, an ewe, a goat) as a correcting indicator, it is expedient to use the cadastral cost of the farmland as an integrated indicator reflecting fertility of arable and fodder grounds, an spareness, rockiness, a slope corner, transport availability or remoteness. Results of the research are applicable in the scientific and educational sphere, connected with the rural economics theory, and also in state bodies agriculture at the distribution of subsidies between market participants. Land is replaceable and worn-out means of production in agriculture, and also a basis for the enterprise placement. Ignoring of the remoteness of lands, the soil qualities, and technological properties leads to the state regulation of agriculture without including the nature efficiency of agrarian landscapes.

In the article, the problem of the methodological process support of regional tax benefits is reviewed. The method of tax benefits assessment, accepted in Perm Region, was chosen as an analysis object because the relatively long period of application of benefits has allowed to build enough statistics base. In the article, the reliability of budget, economic, investment, and social effectiveness assessments of application benefits, based on the Method, is investigated. The suggestions of its perfection are formulated.

The article is devoted to the assessment of influence of budgetary restrictions and economic sanctions on investment policy of a region. The paper studies the bilateral negative effect on socio-economic development of regions from both the external sanctions and braking mechanism of economic development within the country. On the basis of the comparative and statistical analysis, the need to change focus of investment policy from the growth in volumes to qualitative perfecting is proved. The new direction of investment policy connected with the import substitution process realization, its combination with acceleration of innovative development on the certain example of Sverdlovsk region is analyzed. The conclusions and offers stated in the article are applicable to the public authorities of subjects of the Russian Federation, experts in the sphere of regional investment policy and improvement of investment climate, and also the specialized organizations specialized in attracting investment and work with investors in regions of Russia.

Life insurance is the economic tool allowing to accumulate large monetary funds at the level of the country, regions and certain insurers, and also providing growth of a standard of living of citizens and social stability in society. Subject matter of the research is the economic aspects of development of life insurance in regions of Russia. The purpose of the work — to carry out the comparative analysis of functioning of the markets for life insurance in territorial subjects of the Russian Federation, to reveal regularities and distinctive features of development of the markets and to define further prospects of branch. Methods of research: analysis, comparison, induction, analogy, mathematical modeling were used. The main results of research: life insurance — a demanded financial product in Moscow, but in regions of Russia demand for it is extremely limited; economic indicators of the market have low values and vary on territorial subjects of the Russian Federation; statistics of a variation confirm heterogeneity of functioning of the life insurance marketin comparison with the insurance market in general; life insurance volumes in regions of Russia significantly depend on activity of real sector of economy, thus have practically no close interrelation with the income of the population. Collaboration of authorities of all levels and insurance community is necessary for effective development of the life insurance marketing regions. The special attention has to be paid to price policy of insurers, increase of transparency of the movement of their financial streams and guarantees of recoverability of means of insurers.

The external destabilizing factor — financial crisis — has significantly influenced on the level increase of riskiness of the banking credit operations. Taking into account that the increased level of risk follows long-term credits, these operations has been influenced the most, that can be as one of the constraining conditions for the provision of bank long-term credit resources. It, in turn, causes the need to develop the risk assessment technique of long-term credits in regulation of banks’ long-term credit operations. As the risk assessment of credit operations in banking practice is generally limited to the calculation of credit risk, it is efficient to consider the scientifically reasonable approach to a risks assessment of long-term crediting including influence of private risks for the purpose of carrying out the generalized assessment of riskiness both separate types of long-term credits, and a long-term credit portfolio in general. The offered method is based on the calculation of aggregate risk coefficient of the long-term credits, calculated by means of mathematical method of principal component. In the work, it is offered to perform an assessment of private risks by means of statistics: the expectation value, mean square deviation, and the coefficient of a variation. The use of the principal components’ method at the risk assessment of longterm crediting meets such requirements as a lack of value judgment, accounting of specific features of private risks of long-term credits, mathematical validity. It gives the chance to apply the offered risk assessment method of long-term credits in banking. The conclusion is made that the application of an aggregative risk indicator of a long-term crediting will allow banks to trace more accurately the level of riskiness of a long-term credit portfolio and separate types of long-term credits that will strengthen the bank information and analytical base on risk regulation in the field and will expand tools of bank management.

The authors consider the economic motivations when individuals choose an educational path. This line of research is relevant from both, the point of view of science — research of economic behavior of an individual, and the point of view of practice — allows to increase efficiency of investments in a human capital. The authors have developed the economic and mathematical model of choice of optimum educational paths by individuals. The model is realized in the software and approved on real data on more than 5,5 thousand students. For the analysis of the importance of rational economic expectations when an educational path has to be chosen, the paths chosen by students is compared and the educational paths optimum from the point of view of economic rationality are calculated. The analysis of the results has showed that mainly, the choice of educational paths happens according to the economic motivations. On the considered selection, 66 % of prospective students have chosen an optimum path from the point of view of economic preferences. The most significant factor providing development of optimum educational paths is an expectation of higher income upon completion of education — 22 % of all educational paths, and a possibility of cost-cutting of educating or state-subsidized education — 12 %. In our opinion, one of the most important practical results of the research of optimum educational path is the need to consider expectations of students and prospective student when developing a state policy of investment in human capital.

The article discussed the integration process from the perspective of three dimensions that characterize the corresponding increase in the number and appearance of new relationships; strength, character, and stability of emerging communications; dynamics and the appropriate form of the process. In the article, trends of development of integration processes in metallurgy are identified, identification of five stages of development in Russian metal trading are justified. We propose a step by step way to implement the integration process, developed a methodical approach to assessing the feasibility of economic integration processes steel producers and steel traders, including three consecutive stages of its implementing respectively, the principles of reflexive control, entropy approach, the traditional assessment of mergers and acquisitions. The algorithm for the practical realization of the author’s approach, which allows to identify the optimal trajectory of the integration process as a series of horizontal and vertical integration steps is developed.

The present paper investigates the impact of the current economic crisis on the process of sustainability transitions by exploring the case of a green niche, namely the biofuel sector. From a methodological point of view, we employ a social network analysis aimed at comparing the Italian biofuel niche in two different time periods, specifically before and during the crisis. Our findings provide evidence that biofuel actors are responding to the economic crisis by raising the degree of their knowledge exchange. At the same time, they are exhibiting a general scepticism about the future development of the niche, showing a lower level of expectations compared to that of 2007 (i.e. before the crisis). These results suggest that the economic crisis is concretely hindering the transition towards a biofuel-based regime by affecting the degree of maturity of the niche.

In the present paper, we consider the organizational and economic mechanism of relations between the participants of the transportation process for the efficient use of infrastructure of inactive rail lines JSC “ Russian Railways “ (the lines). The purpose of the work is to develop tools to support the cost-effective use of infrastructure lines. One of the productive directions in solving the problem of inefficient use of infrastructure lines in modern conditions of the restructuring of “Russian Railways” is an integral criterion of the lines based on the theory of active systems. Using a model of relations between members of the transportation process will enable to ground the expediency of the use of infrastructure lines and consolidate joint efforts in the region, businesses, and JSC “Russian Railways” for the goal.

The aim of the work is the analysis of the problems of regional tourism statistics. The subject of the research is the tourism expenditure, the specificity of their recording and modeling. The methods of statistical observation and factor analysis are used. The article shows the features and directions of statistical methodology of tourism. A brief review of international publications on statistical studies of tourist expenditure is made. It summarizes the data from different statistical forms and shows the positive and negative trends in the development of tourism in Russia. It is concluded that the tourist industry in Russia is focused on outbound tourism rather than on inbound or internal. The features of statistical accounting and statistical analysis of tourism expenditure in Russian and international statistics are described. To assess the level of development of regional tourism the necessity of use the coefficient of efficiency of tourism. The reasons of the prevalence of imports over exports of tourism services are revealed using the data of the balance of payments. This is due to the raw material orientation of Russian exports and low specific weight of the account “Services” in the structure of the balance of payments. The additive model is also proposed in the paper. It describes the influence of three factors on the changes in tourist expenditure. These factors are the number of trips, the cost of a trip and structural changes in destinations and travel purposes. On the basis of the data from 2012–2013 we estimate the force and the direction of the influence of each factor. Testing of the modelshowed that the increase in tourism exports caused by the combined positive impact of all three factors, chief of which is the growing number of foreigners who visited Russia during the concerned period.