Неэргодическая экономика

The purpose of imposing an unprecedented number of sanctions on Russia was not only to disrupt its economy, but also to create internal division through growing citizen discontent and internal unrest. However, the authority’s rapid response, who reacted to both economic destabilization and the society’s aggravated needs, made it possible to counteract the emerging threat and led to the society’s consolidation and the increase of its civic consciousness. The aim of the study is to understand the phenomenon of the social contract, which originated in the era of statehood formation and is the basis for the stable existence of the state. The study of the evolution of this phenomenon from antiquity to our days allowed us to define the principle of justice as a key principle in the formation of social contract. This principle, formulated in ancient times and later reflected in the teachings of J.–J. Rousseau, I. Kant, D. Rawls, etc., manifested itself most clearly in the ideological concepts of Russian philosophers of the 19th century. Historical analysis of the phenomenon of social contract allowed us to define it as an informal agreement between society and sovereign power, based on the consolidation of the former and the responsibility of the latter. The study of the need to rethink the social contract in Russia after 2022 has shown that the requests for the elaboration of the country’s ideology and the introduction of responsibility for anti–Russian propaganda (the request for justice) are the most acute in the public discourse. They are already reflected in the emerging new social contract, the basis of which is the agreement based on unity, justice, freedom, patriotism and sovereignty. Geopolitics, trust, ideology, narrow corridor concept, model of deliberative democracy, social contract, Russophobia, Russian world, justice, sovereignty.

The article presents a structural rethinking of P. Turchin’s theory of passionarity, operating not only with ruling elites, but also with counter–elites, which have all the attributes of elitists, except for access to power. To deepen the understanding of the process of political instability, we propose a graphical scheme of the political cycle, revealing the logic of interaction between elites, counterelites and masses. This scheme forms the core of the new theory of passionarity and demonstrates the action of the systemic driver of political conflicts. It is complemented by structural balances that take into account the factors concerning cyclical dynamics of political instability: family pattern, migration of counter–elites, and the resonance effect (coercion effect + contagion effect). In the development of the ideas of the theory of elites, a simple macroeconomic model linking the political struggle between elites and economic growth is considered; the research shows that exceeding a certain critical size of counter–elites leads to a slowdown in economic growth and the probability of a production recession. We have revealed the contribution of the new concept of elites to the theories of chaos, passionarity and erosion of institutions; we present the mechanism of complementarity of the theory of inclusive institutions and the theory of counter–elites. The paper presents the typology of sources of power and ruling classes (plutocracy, theocracy, militocracy, and bureaucracy); we make the comparison of these forms of government on the development of statehood. The article considers important additions to the theory of elites. In particular, we formulate the property of political ambivalence of plutocracy, when this form of government is effective in countries that are geopolitical hegemon or in the mode of economic expansion, and extremely ineffective in other cases; we reveal the connection between plutocracy and the phenomenon of supranational elites. The theory of elites and counter–elites is projected onto the entire geopolitical system of the world.

The article investigates issues concerning the development of countries amid geopolitical turbulence. In particular, it is shown that the development of the world economic system has two phases: monocentricity, with a leader country and the world order it has established; and multipolarity with an increasing chaos and the struggle of many countries for the reconstruction of the world. These processes are based on scale effect, which at the stage of multipolarity operates in the external sphere in the form of territorial expansion, and at the stage of monocentricity – in the internal sphere in the form of technological innovations within the corporate sector of individual countries. The paper considers the restoration of the phenomenon of strategic advantages, which barely manifested itself in the geopolitical space for a long time. To explain the cyclical rising of this effect, we introduce the concepts of independent (natural) and controlled (artificial) development instead of the concepts of outstripping development and catching–up development that are fading into the background; we show that artificial development exists in the form of acceleration and containment. This made it possible to put forward a political model of sovereignty “leader – satellites/opponents – neutral zone” instead of I. Walierstein’s technological model “core – semi–periphery – periphery”. We propose and substantiate a quantitative criterion for strategic advantages, according to which they are observed under multiple differences (twofold or more) in the economic indicators of the compared countries. The framework study uses five indicators: area, GDP, population, technology level (GDP per capita), availability of nuclear weapons; the first four parameters are assessed quantitatively with the help of strategic advantages index; the fifth parameter is assessed qualitatively. We consider examples of the phenomenon of strategic advantages for bilateral relations: Azerbaijan/Armenia; Russia/Ukraine; South Korea/North Korea; India/Pakistan, etc. We also reveal the significance of this effect for Russia’s long–term foreign policy strategy.

In the face of large–scale international sanctions imposed by the collective West against Russia, it becomes imperative to reevaluate the conventional framework for guiding the Russian economy amid the emerging challenges and limitations. The article explores a multilevel system for managing Russian economy in the context of the global confrontation. The methodological foundation resides in the selective “incremental changes ideology” emphasising the necessity for disaggregation and decentralisation of economic policies to maximise the timeliness of managerial decisions. This approach contrasts with the holistic “total regulation ideology”, which focuses on the national development strategy on planning and reaching aggregate economic indicators. The paper applies the methods of traditional structural cybernetic and graphical modelling of social systems allowing for the specificities of the external environment. The evidence comes from a cluster of the most recent studies approaching the role of the international sanctions phenomenon in building an efficient national economy from different angles. The author presents an original graphical four–circuit concentric model complemented by a functional description of its constituent circuits (the core, priority industries, new production, and supporting industries) and management methods. The article provides examples of the management measures (massive centralised lending for new microchip production, creation of the state corporation Rospharma, etc.) that can be implemented within the four circuits of the model. These measures can be both soft (‘weak’) and hard (‘strong’) depending on whether they reject or take on administrative enforcement. It is noteworthy that the selective governance model will gradually evolve into a holistic model over time.

The article considers the influence of the elites on the evolutionary process and the current global upheavals that have evolved into a confrontation between two megacivilizations (West and Non–West), which threatens humanity with extinction. The aim of the study is to try and answer the questions whether these processes were to be expected; whether they correspond to the general principles of social development or are a coincidence. The research on the elites in the context of a civilizational approach and combining it with the concept of democracy allowed D. Zolo to build an elite model of civilization development, linking three components: stages of civilization development, type of elite, and form of government. It has been established that as civilization develops (from its inception to its demise), the elite moves from power forces to its supranational form, and this movement is accompanied by the transformation of forms of government from anarchy to tyranny. It is shown that the period of the heyday of a civilization coincides with the period of the rule of national elites; as soon as the elite loses the quality of national power and becomes supranational, the civilization starts declining. The source of the evolutionary development of a civilization is the creative potential of the elite, the vital energy of which is found in the passionarity of the ethnic group, “triggered” by the action of the hypercompensation mechanism based on A. Toynbee’s “Challenge–and–Response” principle, which may not work in the case of the rule of the supranational elite. An assessment of the current state of the Western elite has shown its supranational nature and the worsening process of degradation accompanying the decline of Western civilization. This corresponds to the paradox of lagging behind, according to which a civilization that is more advanced in terms of technological development finds itself in a state of spiritual crisis and disintegration earlier. From this point of view, the unfolding confrontation is a clash between the supranational elite and its national opponents, who defend the traditional values and interests of their own countries. The novelty of the research lies in the construction of an elite model of the development of civilization, and in the consideration of a structural model of an evolutionary leap in the case of the rule of supranational elites.

The article puts forward a new version of elite theory based on the use of a macroeconomic production function depending on the number of the elites and the masses. At the same time, the production function of the elites is complemented with the distribution function, which determines the income structure of social groups and the level of inequality. Combining the two sides of the activity of the elites allows us to design a simple typology of political situations in the country and highlight the regime of revolutionary situation. A formal analysis of the model of production activity of the elites has shown that the phenomenon of over–accumulation of the ruling class has a noticeable destructive impact on economic growth only after a severe drop in its functioning effectiveness. The very deterioration of the quality of the political elite allows an unjustified increase in its size to manifest itself. We consider generalizations of elite model in relation to the case of the middle class and show the invariance of the previously obtained conclusions. We provide an interpretation of the macro–theory of the elites for the mega–level, when studying the world economic system as a combination of the center, periphery and semi–periphery. We consider four dimensions of the elite, with system paradigms being a new element within these dimensions. The influence of external historical events on the worldview of the elites and their actions is revealed using the examples of the transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire, the collapse of the USSR and the beginning of the fall of the U.S. hegemony. For the center – periphery system, we test the production model of the elites with the help of statistical data from the World Bank; we build econometric dependencies that show a decrease in the effectiveness of the United States in managing global production.

The article considers the opportunities and limitations of the so-called “People’s capitalism model” (PCM). For this purpose, the authors systematize the historical practice of implementation of PCM in different countries and available empirical assessments of the effectiveness of such initiatives. In addition, the authors undertake a theoretical analysis of PCM features, for which the interests of the company and its employees are modeled. The analysis of the model allowed us to determine the conditions of effectiveness of the people’s capitalism model, based on description which we formulate proposals for the introduction of a new initiative for Russian strategic enterprises in order to ensure Russia’s technological sovereignty.

The paper assesses the effectiveness of the Russian pharmaceutical industry so as to determine the prospects for achieving self–sufficiency in drug provision and pharmaceutical leadership in the domestic market, more than half of which is occupied by foreign drugs. Effectiveness is considered in terms of achievements in import substitution (catching–up scenario), and in the development of domestic drugs (outstripping scenario). A comparison of the main economic indicators for leading foreign and Russian pharmaceutical companies reflects a disadvantaged position of the latter. The governmental target setting for domestic pharmaceutical production is compromised by interdepartmental inconsistency in the lists of essential drugs. A selective analysis of the implementation of the import substitution plan by the Ministry of Industry and Trade of Russia since 2015 has revealed that, even on formal grounds, Russia still has not established a full–fledged production of many drugs (in particular, the dependence on foreign active pharmaceutical substances still remains, and there are very few domestic manufacturing companies). The premise concerning fundamental impossibility to implement the outstripping scenario is substantiated by the fact that there is an insignificant number of original drugs for which Russian developers initiated clinical trials in 2020–2022. The results obtained show that the current situation in the Russian pharmaceutical industry does not promote the achievement of drug self–sufficiency. A proposal to consolidate assets, coordinate production programs and research agendas for accelerated and full–fledged import substitution was put forward. Prospects for research in the field of import substitution are related to deepening the analysis of production indicators, increasing sales, as well as enhancing clinical characteristics of reproduced drugs compared to foreign analogues. In the sphere of analyzing the innovativeness of pharmaceutical production, it seems advisable to methodologically elaborate on identifying original drugs and include this indicator in the industry management.

Within the framework of the article, we assess regions and countries that in the future may become new foci of economic and civilizational activity. This issue is relevant because many countries are now witnessing the exhaustion of demographic growth opportunities, which in turn will hinder intensive economic growth in them. To address the issue, we propose a two–stage econometric modeling procedure. The first econometric dependence links population growth rate with total fertility rate, and the second dependence reveals the impact of economic, institutional and cultural factors on fertility rate. Empirical testing of models was performed for a sample of 15 countries (Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, France, Germany, Iran, Japan, China, Mexico, Egypt, Great Britain, USA, Canada and Australia) and showed high productivity and invariance of the proposed model scheme. Based on the constructed models, we put forward several quantitative characteristics of national demographic regimes. The most important of them is the long–term demographic effect of scale, taking into account the reaction of the population to the growth of per capita welfare. Applied calculations show that the U.S. still has the potential to maintain its growth regime for quite a long time, while China, Japan and Germany have almost exhausted this resource. The most likely foci of a new round of development of human civilization may be Russia, Kazakhstan and Iran, which, taking into account neighboring countries, form a kind of regional cluster in the center of Eurasia. It is in this area of the planet that we should expect the greatest economic and political activity in the next two to three decades.

The paper discusses the capabilities of the Russian monetary system for massive lending to new industries that are of strategic importance to the country and contribute to its technological sovereignty. The key provisions of monetary theory and the concept of multiplier constitute the theoretical basis of the study. Modelling transient processes was used as the main research method. Empirical evidence is official data from the Bank of Russia and the Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat), as well as industry reports on the global semiconductor market. The authors propose their own model of the transition process, which allows assessing the possible inflation rate and economic growth generated by massive credit investments. Testing the model in the microelectronics industry showed that assumptions about the Bank of Russia possibly losing its control over inflation due to a large–scale lending are unfounded. Even during the first two years, when the construction of a new enterprise is underway and there is an obvious imbalance between the product and money supply, the additional inflation rate caused by this initiative does not exceed 0.5 % per year. We conclude that the regulator has enough reserves to open credit lines for establishing new high–tech enterprises simultaneously in several industries. The proposed model can be used to optimize the public administration system when designing the country’s technological development strategy focused on domestic import substitution.