Models Of "Center - Regions" Relations In The Russian Socio-Economic Development Strategy
Abstract
The author argues that Russia during the entire post-Soviet period has not undergone several discrete crises. It has been and remains in a state of one permanent crisis. This approach predetermines a cardinal assessment of the results of systemic transformations in the country in a single time space, which is the basis for reliability characterizing and assessing the author's performance of the goal and objectives of the study, namely, determining the role of relations between the center and regions as the focus of systemic transformations and justifying approaches to their improvement. Based on the statistical approach and the use of the scientific apparatus reflected in the publications of the research results of scientists, the author characterizes and compares two models “regions-center” and “center-regions”. The models differ in the priorities of the political and economic status of their components in the strategies of post-Soviet development, respectively, in the first and in the next two decades. It is revealed that due to the insufficient development of the democracy culture, the first version of the strategy leads to an accelerated loss of the country's territorial integrity. The development according to the second option led to restoring the institution of economic management centralization in the worst version in comparison with the Soviet one. The author draws conclusions and justifies approaches to overcoming the negative aspects of the “center-region” model of relations transforming the relations between the center and the regions to a qualitatively different level, involving the coordination of interests on a market basis.
Keywords: Political and economic democratization, self-development of regions, scenarios of transformation of priorities in the center-regions relations
Introduction
Thirty years have passed since the overthrow of the Soviet formation and the end of the world's colossus - the USSR. Initially, the constitutionalist foundations of systemic transformations in relation to the former Soviet republics, including in Russia, were declared as the slogan of the political and economic democratization of society. According to the passionate adherents of this slogan (who later became the backbone of the reformers), the democratic arrangement should have helped to bring the country out of the state of stagnation and put it on the path of technological progress and achieving a high level of social arrangement. Many countries of the world in different periods of history were subjected to cataclysms and fell into a state of collapse: Russia - after the revolution of 1917, the United States - during the Great Depression with an acute phase in 1929-1933 and the complete end of the crisis in 1939, Germany-after the complete defeat in the First and Second World Wars, Japan - after the Second World War, etc. All of these countries emerged from the crisis and restored social and economic well-being within a period of no more than 10 to 20 years. Russia, after thirty years of systemic transformations, continues to be in a state of permanent crisis, which is due to the reproduction of a number of previous and the revival of new political and economic institutions of an extractive nature.
Problem Statement
Thirty years is a long time. It was necessary to make timely adjustments to the strategy of systemic transformations in order to avoid the permanent nature of the reproduction of the crisis. One of the problems, the solution of which determines the direction of the change of formation, is to determine the ratio in the statuses of the federal center and the regions in their competencies, powers and responsibilities in the socio-economic development of the country and the regions. The desired form and nature of the system of political and economic arrangement, which will ensure the effectiveness of the socio-economic development of the country and the regions, depends on the relationship between the status and powers, as well as the mechanism of relations between the center and the regions.
Research Questions
The article examines two models of relations “center-regions”, each of which differs in the priorities of the role and status of the center and regions in the organization and management of the national economy as a whole and the self-government of the regions in the restrictive framework defined by the relations “system-subsystem”. Questions are raised:
- reflecting the reasons for restoring the system of centralization of power and resources in the post-Soviet period, which prevents the regions from showing their own initiative in development;
- identifying threats to the national security of the country associated with the choice of the current model of the “center – regions” relationship;
- outlining approaches to the definition of threat prevention measures.
Purpose of the Study
As an object of research, the relations that have developed in Russia between the federal center and the regions represent scientific and practical interests, since the results of the transformations turned out to be clearly inconsistent and contradicting the original plot of the systemic restructuring of the Soviet formation. Namely, after dissolution of the Soviet authoritarian system, the country again found itself under conditions of authoritarianism. The centralized system has been restored in a more negative version, which is due to the replacement of the Soviet planned system of encouraging development with a quasi-market system with the disabled responsibility of management bodies for the effectiveness of development. The intention for political and economic democratization has been dropped.
The aim of the theoretical substantiation of the need to transform the currently imputed model of relations “strong center-weak regions” into the relations of the model “strong regions-the basis of a strong center and the power of the country” with the definition of methodological approaches to the development of measures for the transition from one model to another, more appropriate to the implementation of the strategy of catch-up development with the prospect of transition from the state of developing to developed countries.
Research Methods
On the basis of the author's generalization and synthesis of research of scientific schools and individual researchers, as well as the study of research results in publications on the topic in central publishing houses, a holistic scientific apparatus of theoretical foundations and methodological approaches to improving the relationship between the center and the regions according to the criteria for achieving political and economic democratization and the effectiveness of development was determined. Special attention was paid to the research on the problem of the correlation of the status of the center and the regions, conducted by the scientific school under the leadership of Academician Tatarkin (2016) and studies of like-minded people in the field of political economy of institutions and development Asemoglu and Robinson (2012) and Natkhov and Polishchuk (2018). Statistical and analog comparisons were made when analyzing the results of socio-economic development according to strategies corresponding to a particular model of relations. Together, all this allowed the author to develop his own positions in the vision of solving the problem and determine how the reforms carried out in Russia corresponded to the original plot of the transformations.
Findings
Drift towards extractive institutionalization
It can be assumed that at the beginning of the post-Soviet period, political and economic bifurcations were aimed at increasing the priority role of regions through the dismantling of the Soviet centralized system of state administration, empowering the regions with powers and functions of managing economic development. To achieve the independence of the regions, it was envisaged to increase their political and economic status as an alternative to the Soviet centralized system. Thus, part of the remaining financial savings intended for investment purposes, as well as borrowed foreign funds by the center, were transferred to the disposal of the regions. Many regions began to develop their own constitutions with the declaration of sovereignty. The interaction of the center of the Federation with the regions was envisaged on the basis of contractual relations, and until 1993 some of the regions managed to conclude such contracts. The electoral system has become widespread. Councils of rural and urban settlements, heads of enterprises and heads of regions, deputies of the State Duma and even members of the Federation Council were elected by the people. The elected heads of regions were approved by the President of the Russian Federation. Democratic freedoms were not prohibited: the admissibility of oppositions, demonstrations, meetings, the press, etc.
All described transformations corresponded to the “strong regions and weak center” model. However, the Russian society, which for centuries had been in a state of paternalistic patronage and got used to it, turned out to be insufficiently prepared for a full perception of the culture of democracy. The weakening of the center led to an economic collapse. In the first five years of the new period, the countries proved to be sufficient for colossal losses in the country's industry. The southern border regions suffered especially tangible losses. The geographical remoteness of the enterprises of these regions, which are in organizational ties with the parent enterprises of the central regions, turned out to be a factor in the economic unprofitability of the ties, the subsequent bankruptcies and the disastrous reduction in production. Only in the region where the author lives, the Republic of Dagestan, out of 32 large industrial enterprises went bankrupt and ceased to exist 18. The rest of the enterprises reduced their production volumes by 6-10 times. The crisis in the country's industry led to a chain reaction in other sectors of the country's economy. This led to a number of negatives: an increased differentiation of regions in terms of development level, unemployment, galloping inflation, a decrease in the standard of living of the population, a breakdown in interregional ties and the emergence of regional cordons for the promotion of goods. All this was the result of the loss of control over political and economic life in the country, which led to the extinction of the frenzy of euphoria of destruction. An aggravating factor was the fact that at the initial stage of the transformations, a pronounced institution of extractive (from the English to extract – “extract”, “squeeze”) character was introduced, which led to the disappointment of the overwhelming part of the population.
The apotheosis was the appearance of signs of separatist intentions in some regions, and at the same time, a demand for strong power began to mature among the public.
Thus, an attempt at transformations according to the model of “strong regions and a weak center” led to both the weakening of the center and the weakening of the regions, as well as the loss of controllability of the country's economy and its economic power. One can agree with George and Robert (2012) as well as Lapina (2016) that the results of the destruction of the first years of systemic transformations in Russia did not have a creative direction and were due to the lack of experience and culture of political and economic democracy.
The central authorities have revised their position of the original intentions to give the regions as many freedoms as they want. In October 1993, the Congress of People's Deputies and the Supreme Soviet of the Russian Federation, the first and only systemic opposition to the President and the Government of the Russian Federation, was dispersed with the use of military operations by the armed forces. From that moment on, Russians' inspiration and faith in the possibility of a democratic arrangement was largely undermined, and from that moment a return to the revival of extractive institutions began. The center saw its weakening as a threat, and not without reason; first Chechen war 1994-1996 reflected the real danger of losing the territorial integrity of the country.
A different choice was made - the transition to the implementation of the “strong center and weak regions” model. In 1998, the material basis for the choice was laid: the State Duma adopted the Budget Code of the Russian Federation, which determined the division of the federal budget between the center and the constituent entities of the Federation in equal 50 percent ratios. This law, which actually infringed on the ability of the regions to switch to a self-development regime, was later also ignored; the center has monopolized at its disposal the use of more than 90% of the extracted natural resources, centralizes more than 65% of tax revenues and maintains a steady tendency to invent more and more new types of burden of extortion. The RF budget code initially infringed upon both the economic and political status of the regions. It was and remains one of the main extractive institutions, which hinders the formation of inclusive institutions, defined by Arslanov (2016) primary elements of growth.
The Budget Code was the basis for the construction of the so-called vertical of power in the second decade of the 2000s. The regions were obliged to unify their Constitutions in full compliance with the Constitution of the Russian Federation. The administrative management structure was changed; in order to strengthen control over the activities of the regions, they were included in the territorial Federal Districts headed by representatives of the President of the Russian Federation. No agreements were concluded on the relationship between the center and the regions.
In the practical implementation of the model, there is a clear departure from political and economic democratization. In the Constitution of the Russian Federation, the President of the Russian Federation is assigned an unduly dominant role in the formation of the staff of the dominant power structures, including the heads of the regions. The President himself, in the practical implementation of the constitutional provisions of impeachment, cannot be removed from power. The revival of authoritarianism was almost expected and, as a result, violations of even the positive attitudes of the same Constitution became commonplace. The most important violation is the one that alienates the citizens of the country from exercising control over the activities of government bodies, achieved by countering the development of civil society institutions and suppressing civil activity. By distorting the system of general elections, the power turned out to be usurped by irreplaceable elite headed by an authoritarian personality and not responsible for the results of socio-economic development (Sagidov, 2013). The U.R. Law is violated. Ashby (1959), whose main thesis states that the irremovability of power minimizes the competition of ideas, which leads to subjectivity and voluntarism in making managerial decisions.
As a summary, it can be noted that in the post-Soviet period, at the initial stage of systemic transformations, the institution of central planning and management of the country's economy was dismantled (the stage of the “strong regions-weak center” model). Subsequently, centralization undergoes a revival on a new basis - over-centralization by the federal center of powers, funds and resources with the rejection of the planning system and the continuation of the drift of a number of old and reproduction of new extractive institutions, which together led to the construction of a quasi-market economy.
Result of choosing the “strong center and weak regions” model is weak economic growth and non-awakening economic development
Characterizing the thirty-year period of the formation of a new social formation in Russia, in the literature, as a rule, various types of crises that have taken place at different periods of time are noted as notable milestones. So, Kleiner (2015) notes the following crises: 1990-1992 associated with transformational restructuring; 1998-2000 associated with debt; 2008-2009 under the influence of the global financial crisis; since 2013 economic and political sanctions. It can be added that the latest crisis is currently considered to be an overlapping crisis associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. This range of characteristics does not correspond to the classical understanding of the essence of the crisis. Overcoming the crisis should result in the economic system reaching a higher level of development. In Russia, in none of these periods, there was economic growth based on economic development, and according to the World Bank and the IMF, the unenviable rating of the efficiency of the economy in terms of GDP per capita remained: from 50 to 53 places among 88 countries of the world.
From 1990 to 1918, Russia's GDP grew by 241%. But, firstly, if we consider this growth at the level of world economies, then it is very modest. Outstripping economic growth was, for example, in China - 9 times more intense, Vietnam - 4.2, India - 3.6, Indonesia - 2.2 respectively. In terms of the intensity of economic growth, Russia was inferior to a number of developing countries of Latin America and Africa, some states of the former socialist camp and even the near abroad. UN statistics reflect the downward trend in Russia's ranking in the world economy: in 1990 it was ranked 7th, in 1999 - 9th, in 2018 - 11th.
Secondly, economic growth was unstable. Its bursts were not the result of development based on modernization. They were driven by speculative factors. Namely, Russia was focused not on the development of the production of material goods based on the activities of people, which, according to Adam Smith (1993), is a source of national wealth, but on the extraction of resources from the treasures of the earth, which are a creation of nature, and their sale under conditions of changing world prices. The resource orientation of the country's economy has been preserved for the entire period of the last 30 years. According to Rosstat, the export of natural resources predominated in exports, and the import of finished products prevailed in imports. In 2019, 64.9% of exports were mineral products, and imports of machinery, equipment and vehicles prevailed in imports - 47.3%. The export of high-tech products from the country is 11.0%, and the import is 67.2%. Even visually, there is a disappearance of domestic industrial products that form the industrial base of the country's economy - electronics, machines, mechanisms, technological equipment, etc. But the import products of the same name appeared. Academician Glazyev (2018) in his fundamental research reflects that Russia not only did not take the path of the 6th technological order, mastered by developed countries, but also significantly lost its position of the 5th, which was formed in the country in the late 80s of the last century.
Third, resource orientation led to losses in the sectoral diversification of the economy, continued destruction of interregional vertical and horizontal integration ties, ruin of many enterprises in the sphere of material production, erosion of the complexity and territorial balance of the economy, and a dangerous increase in differences in the levels of development of regions. All this counteracts the foundations of the implementation of the effects of synergy and emergence in the organization of the economy of the country and the regions, creates conditions for forcing social and political tension and instability in society.
It cannot be recognized otherwise than as nonsense that measures to centralize power, means and resources were combined with the directive often voiced by the center about the need to “leave the state from the economy”. This attitude, in the actual conditions of the absence of public control over the activities of state administration bodies, turned into a departure of the authorities from responsibility for the effectiveness of managing the country's socio-economic development (Sagidov, 2019).
Unfortunately, the authorities remain deaf and ignore scientifically grounded warnings from scientists about the prospect of economic development, fraught with approaching the country's national security limit. As noted by Academician Tatarkin (2016), with excessive centralization of powers, funds and resources at the federal level and excessive regulation of the activities of regional and municipal authorities, an ineffective wasteful attitude towards centralized funds is inevitably manifested. The author argues about the need to display the political will of the top leadership of the Russian Federation to decentralize the organization of management of the country's economy and expand the capabilities of lower-level authorities, to master the institution of self-development more systematically and on market principles (Tatarkin, 2016).
Academician Aganbegyan (2015) is in the same positions. It reflects the ineffective wasteful use of budget funds by the center, a significant overstatement of funds for the salaries of heads of state-owned companies in the branches of natural monopolies, as well as employees of representative and executive authorities at all levels. The author proposes "to stop the annual compulsory state increase in prices in favor of state monopolies and oligarchs, shifting the difficulties of state organization onto the population and other consumers." He focuses on the fact that all components of macroeconomic policy (especially price, tax, credit policy, loan interest) pursue mainly fiscal goals.
The statement of both scientists shows an algorithm for preserving the process of Russia's economic dystrophy. That is, in order to maintain a steady level of income for the center, the mechanism of their withdrawal from the regions is activated by, firstly, increasing prices for the products of natural monopolies, which leads to a general increase in prices and an increase in tax deductions, and, secondly, through a systematic increase the burden of different types of payments in the regions. At the same time, the growth in the aggregate of all regional payments to the center is ahead of the growth in the base of their generation. Most regions, as generators of the aggregate reproduction of the country's economic potential, do not have the opportunity not only for its diversified growth, but also for ensuring simple reproduction of the economic potential. This is especially typical for regions with a peripheral economy, such as, for example, 6 regions of the North Caucasus lagging behind in economic development, the Jewish A. O., the Republics of Kalmykia, Altai and Tyva. It is a consequence of the growing withdrawal of resources by the center that the number of donor regions has decreased and the number of regions that receive subsidies has increased. It should be noted that the restoration of centralization not only did not solve the problem of reducing differences in the levels of development of regions, but even exacerbated it, the territorial imbalance of the country's economy increased (Volkov, 2015).
It is becoming increasingly clear that the way of rigid centralized economic and political governance that the federal authorities have put the country on is hopeless. In Russia, increased centralization of power usually leads to authoritarianism, in which, as a rule, subjectivism and voluntarism are manifested in the manifestation of political will. As a result, the operation of economic laws is largely violated, which applies primarily to the disposal of economic resources. The main goals and objectives of the central government of Russia, the solution of which requires a constant build-up of significant funds, were and continue to be geopolitical interests in the near and far abroad. It is difficult to explain the feasibility of financing (in the vast majority - irrevocable) adventurous projects such as “Nord Stream-2”, participation in armed conflicts in Latin America, Africa, Asia, support for totalitarian regimes and, so-called in UN terms, “failed states” such as the CAR. This also includes the appropriation of significant funds and resources in various ways by the oligarchy-the mainstay of the entire hierarchy of the power elite. The vast majority of costs for the implementation of these goals are carried out in the order of subjective non-system decisions, which neither in the current periods, nor in the visible future do not give economic returns, nor create an investment deficit in domestic sectors of material production.
Due to the growing severity of the shortage of investment funds, the center is showing diktat in the direction of limited investment funds to finance individual federal target programs in the regions, mainly related to the development of social facilities. This situation, coupled with the financial insolvency of the overwhelming majority of regions, significantly limits the regional management and business structures in the manifestation of the sovereign initiative of the regions in solving the problems of economic development. For example, during the development of the draft Strategy of the Socio-Economic Development of the Republic of Dagestan for the period up to 2035, at the final stage of its development, there was disappointment in expediency, since it became clear that the allocation of funds by the center for economic development is limited only by the goals provided by the May decrees of the President of the Russian Federation. The same disappointment befell other regions of the North Caucasus Federal District. In these conditions, the aspirations of regional authorities are focused on the competitive struggle for transfer assistance. This struggle is given importance overshadowing efforts to ensure economic development.
Excessive centralization of economic management leads the country not only into an economic, but also into a political trap. It is not difficult to understand that the center does not want to reduce the framework of centralization, considering it one of the bonds of preserving the country's territorial integrity. One even gets the impression that the federal center has a positive attitude to the growth in the number of subsidized regions, since subsidies turn out to be the umbilical cord that binds the regions to it and is an obstacle to centrifugal aspirations. The authoritative economist-geographer Zubarevich (2018) believes that the center speculates with the threat of the risk of losing territorial integrity in order to justify the preservation of the existing system of political and economic development, which is ineffective in its essence. In the meantime, she believes, in the visible future, Russia is sentenced to prolonged stagnation, which is pushing it to the countries of the Third World”.
Conclusion
So, the beginning of systemic transformational transformations in Russia according to the model “strong regions-weak center” was destructive. Such a result was predetermined by the fact that society emerged from the preceding formation, in which there was deep-rooted paternalism, and there were no developed civil institutions or, in general, the culture of democracy inherent in the market arrangement. These features were largely preserved in subsequent periods up to the present time. Therefore, the relationship “strong regions-weak center” seems to be unambiguously contraindicated for Russia.
As for the development strategy based on the “strong center-weak regions” model, the judgment about its expediency cannot be unambiguous. Indeed, excessive centralization by the federal center of powers, funds and resources, coupled with the resetting of the original plot of building a new social formation on the principles of political and economic democratization, keep the country in a state of permanent crisis with a number of negative signs. The foundations for unlocking the potential of people's creative activity have not been created. The process of decreasing the economic viability of the regions continues, which does not contribute to their transition to a self-development regime. The federal center, by virtue of the adopted form of government, is not interested in the transition of regions to self-development.
It would seem that the strategy “strong center-weak regions” should be abandoned. But history shows that it was precisely this strategy that led developing countries to advanced development. Striking examples can be the Soviet Union during the industrialization period and today's China. But in the performance of this model, which is described above and is preserved in Russia at the present time, there can be no talk of advanced development. On the contrary, Russia is, as noted by Gaber et al. (2016), in a state of clear rejection of the democratic arrangement.
The logic of further thinking is simple. If we see that an acceptable development strategy is failing, then it must be improved in order to reduce the factors of inhibition and stimulate the factors of active development. Such improvement can be carried out by transforming the current model to a qualitatively different level and, ultimately, into a different form. Scientists and economists remember that in the entire post-Soviet thirties, there was only one short period of time when there was a successful attempt to stimulate the development of the economy. This is the period of time when the government was headed by Academician E. N. Primakov. The talent he showed allowed then and now allows us to take into account his vision of the necessary arrangement of the country. His works on this aspect, Primakov (2015) focused on the need to pay serious attention to raising the status of territorial socio-economic systems in socio-economic and social development. He argued that decentralization of management is an important condition for realizing the urgent need to assign the role of locomotives of the spatial arrangement of Russia to regions and municipalities, taking into account the peculiarities of the structure of their economy, socio-cultural and national traditions.
That is, we are talking about a higher-level model “strong regions and a strong center are the basis of the country's power”, which determines the mutual strengthening of the regions and the center and is the basis of a strong state. This model is not a novelty in world practice. All developed countries of the world build relations between the center and the regions not on the basis of subordination of interests and statuses, but on the basis of mutual coordination of interests along vertical and horizontal ties, regardless of the form of government – federal (for example, the USA, Germany) or unitary centralized or decentralized (France, Taiwan, UK, Japan). We are talking about such relations in which the center provides the regions with services of a certain quality that regulate their economic activities in exchange for funds and resources provided to the center by the regions.
To implement the “strong center - strong regions” model, significant measures are required to improve political and economic transformations. This article does not set the goal of solving the problem of their detailed justification and development. This is the subject of a separate in-depth study. However, it still seems necessary to outline in separate strokes a sketch of the necessary political and economic reorganization in Russian society as the basis for solving problems similar to the one under consideration.
The starting position for the coordination of interests is the need to have the doctrine of the Idea of the society arrangement, which would allow a vision of its desired state and would determine the general orientation and motivational goals of people's creative activity. The main requirement for the doctrine - the Idea must be acceptable to the overwhelming majority of members of society.
But this is not enough. The doctrine of the Idea is, as a rule, a set of plot-slogans that determine long-range motivational goals. One can believe in the possibility of fulfilling these slogans, but one can lose faith in them, as was the case, for example, with the goals of building communism in the USSR by the beginning of the 80s of the last century. The unreality of these slogans led people to disbelief not only in the ideas of communism, but also to disillusionment with the existing socialism, which led to subsequent collisions. The feasibility of the goals of long-term motivation should be confirmed by measures implemented in the current periods, which would allow maintaining confidence in public thinking that corresponds to the formula that today living conditions are better than yesterday, and tomorrow they will be better than today (Sagidov, 2019).
The foregoing determines the need for both the improvement of the installations of the Constitution of the Russian Federation and the real observance of these installations in the processes of state administration. At present, they are largely violated. Society does not participate in public administration. It is excluded from participation by the formed elite community, which maintains a long-term monopoly of power. The irremovability of power is ensured by anti-constitutional measures to counteract the manifestation of civic activism and slow down the development of civil society institutions. This determined the inconsistency of the existing electoral system as an institution for ensuring the advancement of social elevators to the governing bodies of members of society of high professional competence, as well as the ability to assess, control and prosecute state authorities, which is of particular importance in harmonizing interests.
According to the author, in Russia, the historically formed form of the unitary territorial-state system in the visible future is hardly appropriate to change. But this does not mean that such a degree of authoritarianism is permissible, in which the authorities are outside the evaluation and control of their activities according to the criteria of the effectiveness of the social and economic development of the country and regions. Therefore, all measures of political adjustment should be aimed at achieving an effective system of this assessment and control. What measures should be taken, it is necessary to decide taking into account historical factors in the order of an interdisciplinary approach – by political scientists, economists, historians, sociologists and other specialists. But one of the measures that is of fundamental importance in the political arrangement should be given special attention. We are talking about the development of civil society as the basis for political and economic democratization, in which the management class will be "sentenced" to effective activity and responsibility for its results.
In ensuring the reality of the development of civil society institutions, it is important to understand that the course of this process should be independent of the political ambitions of the authorities. It will be successful if the principle is observed - simply not to interfere with the development process. And today this process is artificially hampered by such shock actions as dispersal of demonstrations, arrests of demonstrators, kidnapping, etc. But, nevertheless, the state's assistance to the development of civil society is necessary, since history shows that only those reforms that were initiated were successful in Russia. were carried out "from above" - by the state. And this realization should be expressed as follows.
The parliaments of the Russian Federation and regions need:
- to amend the legal acts concerning the rights, freedoms and duties of citizens and to minimize the deviations from the institutions of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted in 1948 in the current norms;
- to develop a clear code of differentiation between the signs of constructive opposition and extremism.
The executive authorities should not:
- take any measures to sponsor civil society institutions;
- hinder the emergence and self-development of civil structures and movements;
- suppress oppositional civic activity. This formula does not apply to extremism.
The first important sign of the revival of Civil Society will be the free turnout of at least 60 percent of voters, as it was before October 1993.
Thus, without destroying the existing type of relations between the center and the regions with one-time shock measures, it is necessary, through the implementation of a targeted system of measures, to ensure a smooth transformation of the relationship “strong region - weak regions” into relations of the type “strong regions - the basis of a strong center and power of the country”.
It remains to be noted that the proposed approaches are, as it were, the technological side of the transformations. They must be spiritualized and motivated by some incentive for their realization. Unfortunately, the historically established paternalism and mentality of the Russian society do not allow a different vision of incentives except as a manifestation of two interrelated factors: a general awareness of the need to restructure the current unhealthy state of the social environment and the emergence of demand for leaders - State Figures of Patriotic Mood. This, as Academician Bogomolov (2010) calls it, are “non-economic facets of the economy”.
References
Aganbegyan, A. (2015). Reflections on financial afterburner (based on the book Financial Strategies for Modernizing the Economy: World Practice). Money and credit, 8, 5-10.
Arslanov, V. (2016). Inclusive Institutions − Key to Sustainable Growth? Article 1. Social sciences and modernity, 4, 36-47.
Asemoglu, D., & Robinson, J. (2012). Why Nations Fail. The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty. Grown Business.
Ashby, W. (1959). Introduction to сybernetics. Foreign Literature Publ.
Bogomolov, O. (2010). Non-economic facets of the economy: unknown mutual influence. INES Publ.
Gaber, E., Polishchuk, L., & Stukal, D. (2016). Chronicles of a Democracy Postponed: Cultural Legacy of Russian Transition. The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 27(1), 99-137.
George, A., & Robert, J. (2012). Animal Spirits: How Human Psychology Drives the economy? and Why it Matters for Global Capitalism. Princeton University Press.
Glazyev, S. (2018). Leap into the future. Russia in new technological and world economic structures. Book World Publ.
Kleiner, G. (2015). The stability of the Russian economy in the mirror of systemic economic theory (Part 1). Economic issues, 12, 107-123.
Lapina, N. (2016). Relations «center-regions» in modern Russia: the limits of centralization». http://www.perspektivy.info/print.php?ID=36290
Natkhov, T., & Polishchuk, D. (2018). The political economy of institutions and development: the importance of being inclusive. Journal of the New Economic Association, 3, 12-32.
Primakov, E. (2015). Don't just work, but know for what. official website https://mamlas.livejournal.com/3113122.html
Sagidov, Yu. (2013). «Leaving the state from the economy» − a methodological message for collisions in the foundations of transformations in Russia». National interests: priorities and security, 9(198), 12-18.
Sagidov, Yu. (2019). Enhancing the development of regions from the economically peripheral part of Russia. Pero Publ.
Smith, A. (1993). Research on the nature and causes of the wealth of peoples (books I-III). Nauka Publ.
Tatarkin, A. (2016). Regional orientation of the economic policy of the Russian Federation as an institution of spatial development of territories. Economy of the region, 12, 1, 9-27.
Volkov, S. (2015). Social and Economic Disproportion of Development of Russian Territories. Regional and Sectoral Economic Studies, 15, 2, 137-144.
Zubarevich, N. (2018). Federal schizophrenia. Retrieved from: http://afterempire.info/2018/02/16/ zubarevich/
Copyright information
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
About this article
Publication Date
25 September 2021
Article Doi
eBook ISBN
978-1-80296-115-7
Publisher
European Publisher
Volume
116
Print ISBN (optional)
-
Edition Number
1st Edition
Pages
1-2895
Subjects
Economics, social trends, sustainability, modern society, behavioural sciences, education
Cite this article as:
Sagidov, Y. N. (2021). Models Of "Center - Regions" Relations In The Russian Socio-Economic Development Strategy. In I. V. Kovalev, A. A. Voroshilova, & A. S. Budagov (Eds.), Economic and Social Trends for Sustainability of Modern Society (ICEST-II 2021), vol 116. European Proceedings of Social and Behavioural Sciences (pp. 150-161). European Publisher. https://doi.org/10.15405/epsbs.2021.09.02.16