• E. Yasin, G. Andryushchak, A. Ivanter, N. Kosareva, L. Ovcharova, A. Ponomarenko, V. Fadeev — Social Results of Transformation, or Twenty Years after
• V. Tambovtsev — Financial Crisis and the Prospects of Global Regulation
• Yu. Shvetsov — The Theory and Methodology of Budget as Public Property

• L. Polishchuk — On the New Book in Microeconomics by S. Bowles
• D. Raskov — Institutional Turn in Microeconomics?
• L. Grebnev — On Samuel Bowles Paradigm

• Bulatov A. S. National Economy: Teaching Aid
• The History of Economy and Economic Thought of Russia: A Textbook / G. G. Bogomazov, I. A. Blagikh; Econom. faculty, SPbSU; G. G. Bogomazov (ed.)

• Problems of Political Economy (On the Scientific Conference «Is There Room for Political Economy in Modern Economics»)

Abstracts

The journal version of Chapter 1.1 of «The Russia Competitiveness Report 2011: Laying the Foundation for Sustainable Prosperity» prepared by the World Economic Forum and Eurasia Competitiveness Institute analyzes major problems Russia is faced with in this field. Three advantages and five systemic weaknesses of the country are considered. The analysis on the basis of the Global Competitiveness Index shows that real improvements along these five directions could lead to significant increase in competitiveness and growth of welfare in Russia.

The primary goal of this paper is to confirm the existence of the links and receive the quantitative measurement of the correlation between the quality of institutions and dynamics of their development, on the one hand, and GDP growth, on the other. For this analysis the extended database consisting of basic macroeconomic indicators and indices of quality of institutions for 51 countries for the period 2001—2009 was used. This study provides quantitative support to the common notion that economic growth in the long run is affected by the quality of institutions. Though this numeric effect may be viewed as relatively small, in the medium run the accumulated gap in the growth rate caused by permanently lower quality of institutions can be substantial. Moreover, the radical improvement in the quality of institutions provides more significant, though not lasting, addition to the growth rate.

The article tries to reveal specific features of Russia’s participation in international capital movement in comparison with other emerging markets. Peculiarities of outflow and inflow of capital in Russia are considered as consequences of specifics of its economic model. Proposals on using international capital movement for the increase of accumulation rate in Russia are put forward.

The article contains generalized calculations of Russian citizens’ level of prosperity during 1989–2009. Particularly, the authors consider Russian citizens’ income and expenses change, shifts in physical indicators of consumption (including non-market services) and estimate the availability of housing stock. The authors also try to construct certain level of prosperity index generalizing all those factors. Despite the complexity of intertemporal comparison (during the last 20 years the life has simply become different) the authors come to the conclusion: the living standard of Russian citizens raised (ca. 50%), but because of the increased stratification of the society during this period it has affected not all population strata.

Challenges in the sphere of financial regulation created by the global crisis of 2008—2009 are discussed. Advantages of the mechanism based on strict liability rules for deterring economic agents’ negligent behavior on financial markets are validated. The possibilities for applying the mechanism in the sphere of state regulation are analyzed.

The article examines the vital problems of the theory of budget connected with development of this important economic category. The functions of budget and principles of the construction of budgetary system are characterized. Deficiencies in the normative base for the regulation of budgetary juridical relationships are noted as well as the flaws in the realization of budgetary process. The need for reorientation of budget for financing priority public needs is grounded.

The paper discusses advantages and shortcomings of the Bowles’ book, with the emphasis on the community ownership, altruism, and cooperative behavior. The author claims that the book while being surely valuable as an academic contribution, can not, however, substitute standard textbooks in microeconomics.

The article that is devoted to the appearance of the Russian edition of Samuel Bowles’ Microeconomics. Behavior, Institutions, and Evolution considers possible changes that may be brought by the new research program outlined in the book. The author analyzes the main arguments and rhetorical strategies applied by Bowles and shows that the major shift that this book may entail can be the merger of microeconomics and institutional economics that may lead to vanishing of the latter as a distinct discipline and its integration into the vast field of microeconomic analysis.

The paper briefly characterizes the content of S. Bowles’ advanced textbook in microeconomics and comments on the key themes that constitute the book: on the relationship between uncertainty and optimization, technologies and production function, altruism and self-interest, cooperation and competition. The main attention is paid to the temporal dimension of the economics processes.