The article analyzes the state of France's economic relations from 2017 to 2025 under the presidency of Emmanuel Macron with all 54 African countries. The African states to which France assigns the highest priority for economic cooperation are identified by relying on both the officially defined foreign policy interests of the Fifth Republic and also on the results of a k-means cluster analysis of the indicators that Paris employs to assess the effectiveness of cooperation with African countries (foreign trade, foreign direct investment, official development assistance, and the size of the French diaspora). The cluster analysis method results in a list of the countries most suitable for cooperation and also points to a gap in the difference in values of the indicators. Back in November 2017, Macron proclaimed that France would cooperate with all African countries regardless of any common historical and linguistic past. Because they have previously been part of the French zone of influence, it is important to analyze the place of Francophone countries in France’s economic priorities in Africa by examining both the official priorities of the Fifth Republic and the interests of French multinational corporations. Although France cooperates most with Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia, the results of analysis indicate that the non-Francophone countries outside the Maghreb increasingly correspond to the official economic interests of the Fifth Republic in the region. Nevertheless, Paris retains its influence on former colonies in sub-Saharan Africa through traditional means even as this group of states is becoming less attractive to the former metropolis in terms of France’s officially proclaimed goals and objectives.

The challenges in the Russian economy due to the labor market can have multidirectional effects on investment. A stimulus to investment might come from the adoption of labor-saving technologies and the resulting substitution of capital for labor. However, a constraint might be imposed by inability to hire labor to operate the newly acquired equipment. This paper presents a study of the impact of labor shortages on the investments made by enterprises in Russia as revealed in regular surveys of non-financial organizations conducted by the Central Bank of Russia. This analysis indicates that a diminishing labor supply is a factor that is increasing investment in the Russian economy. That this result is robust across different equations, evaluation methods, and initial datasets suggests that the investments are labor-saving in nature and supports the conclusion that capital is being substituted for labor. This effect is observed across all federal administrative districts and is most prevalent at industrial and trade enterprises, as well as at large and medium-sized businesses. The importance of labor shortages for investment in Russian businesses trended upward from 2019 to 2023. The need to compensate for lack of additional labor by increasing capital intensity in order to boost production volumes largely explains the low sensitivity of business investment to foreign exchange and monetary policy shocks and even to risk in general. The article’s findings suggest that inflationary pressure from the labor market will potentially subside in the medium and long term even as demographic trends continue to be negative.

The program adopted at the 22nd Party Congress in October 1961 stated that prices must reflect socially necessary labor costs. Soviet economics held that it is these costs that form value. Meanwhile, Robert Campbell published an article under the title “Marx, Kantorovich, Novozhilov: Stoimost’ Versus Reality” supporting the view that Kantorovich and Novozhilov had revived Soviet economics. However, they had to reject the Marxist theory of value. In the opinion of many Soviet scholars, these economists withdrew from Marxism, which was not a positive contribution to economics. This article analyzes problems concerned with the content of the theory of value, whether it was adequately understood by Soviet economists and whether Kantorovich’s and Novozhilov’s approaches were compatible with Marxism. In fact, they developed interesting concepts of objectively determined valuations and differential costs. These indicators were to be used in the process of setting prices. Both Kantorovich and Novozhilov sincerely believed that their approaches were in line with Marxism. In his works, Novozhilov criticized Campbell’s article. This article attempts to prove that Marx did not complete the theory of value and, in fact, came to a dead end. With this in view, it would be incorrect to blame scholars for withdrawing from such an incomplete theory. The article studies the questions of correlation between Kantorovich’s and Novozhilov’s approaches and of their mutual estimation of each other’s thinking. In addition, the article demonstrates differences and similarities in the concepts of these outstanding economists. Although in correspondence with Canadian historian Vsevolod Holubnychy, Novozhilov tried to prove that his theory of differential costs was developed independently of Kantorovich’s works, this statement seems to be incorrect. The article also marks the influence of Kantorovich’s and Novozhilov’s ideas on the development of the concept of economic reform. The Appendix includes fragments from correspondence between Novozhilov and Holubnychy and excerpts from Campbell’s letter addressed to the author of this article. These excerpts contain quite a just rejoinder to critical remarks by Novozhilov concerning Campbell’s article.

The article analyzes the behavior of economic agents with bounded rationality in a multiregional New Keynesian model in which the technological sovereignty of the national economy (macroregion) entails that resources imported from individual regions along with labor resources are factors of production. Evolutionary selection among relatively simple forecasting heuristics determines how agents’ expectations are formed. Adjustment in expectations provides an explanation for the coordination of individual behavior, which brings about different aggregate results. Under this model, individuals adapt their strategies over time in response to the relative effectiveness of forecasting heuristics. The weighted shares of agents applying these rules change endogenously. Simulation experiments that applied such heuristic switching showed that the stability of the model’s dynamics exhibits considerable dependence on the share of imports in the volume of output and on nominal price rigidity, as well as on the parameters of monetary policy. That stability also depends on the number of regions included in the macroregion, which affects their degree of integration. Nominal rigidity of regional prices favors the substitution of labor by imported products from other regions and contributes to stability in inflation dynamics and to the output gap. Price rigidity also reduces the volatility of inflation and therefore diminishes the inflation reaction coefficient under the Taylor rule. The article demonstrates and explains the stabilizing value of regional integration. The stability of the equilibrium between trajectories of the variables examined is also analyzed in relation to the evolutionary mechanism for selecting among various predictive heuristics. One important practical conclusion that emerges from this study is that the Central Bank can actually achieve convergence toward a stable equilibrium by managing the share of economic agents that subscribe to the expectation rules that are preferable at a certain point. In particular, the Central Bank can influence the behavior of agents derived from their expectations about adapting and about extrapolation of trends.

The article examines the ideas behind the 1965 economic reform in the USSR and the way in which it was implemented. That reform is still central to discussions about whether it would have been feasible, at least in theory, to adjust the Soviet economic model in the post-war period without breaking it. The article sets proposals by well-known economists (such as those in an article by E. G. Liberman) against the economic debate that ran from 1962 to 1965. This facilitates reconstruction of an alternative model for a planned economy which was developed jointly at that time by mathematical economists, cyberneticists, and practical business operators. In contrast with the prevailing view, the author maintains that the struggle between proponents of economic liberalism and of improving planning through computerization arose later and that contemporaries of the reform, including V. S. Nemchinov, put forward a set of reform proposals that combined computerization, economic and mathematical methods, and the use of economic incentives (material interest), which were compatible with Liberman’s proposals. Several important elements of the proposed economic system were not implemented: pricing reform was carried out belatedly and only once; a way to collect economic information that would permit prompt price adjustments was not created; and stability of economic guidelines was not sustained. Guidelines were instead subject to change through annual approvals by ministries and industries. The Interdepartmental Commission (IDC), which was nominally empowered to advance reform, resorted largely to mere jockeying for “favorable” guidelines. No wholesale market for the means of production was created, and therefore the increased demand of enterprises for capital investment could not be satisified. The state arbitration mechanism, which was meant to ensure consistency in deliveries by economic means, worked only to a limited extent. The reform reduced government revenues and increased the population’s effective demand, which exceeded the ability to deliver commodities and exacerbated the deficit in the market for consumer goods. These negative outcomes might have been averted either by ratcheting up reform until a market economy was created, or else by reinstating administrative control over production quotas. But it proved impossible to refrain from choosing one of the two options. The administrative path was chosen even before the Prague Spring because the state bureaucracy was unwilling to give up its role in the economic and social development of the country. The inconsistency in the implementation of the reform led to contradictory results. Although a number of financial indicators improved, the transition to an intensive type of development did not occur.

Abstract How can societies escape the conflict trap of violence and distrust between social outgroups? Existing research offers a plethora of tools for reducing conflict through peacemaking, peacebuilding, and reconstruction efforts. Peacemaking tools are often international efforts aimed at reducing violence in the short term by changing the immediate behavior of organized actors. Once violence has been stymied, additional peacebuilding efforts are necessary to foster intergroup trust, tolerance, and a shared national identity, thereby reducing incentives for violence and building resilience against future “shocks” to tolerance in the long term. Such efforts typically occur at the grassroots level, seeking to change the attitudes of individuals in post-conflict societies. We provide an overview of the evidence base on peacemaking and peacebuilding—identifying promising policies and programs, limitations, and shared mechanisms driving positive effects. We integrate these literatures into a framework tracing the path from immediate violence reduction to durable peace, pinpointing critical empirical and theoretical gaps in our knowledge of how to break the conflict trap.

Abstract This paper synthesizes the quantitative literature on the relationship between gender and armed conflict, focusing on two key perspectives: women as victims and women as agents. It first reviews research on the consequences of conflict for women and girls, highlighting both direct effects — such as gender-based violence and forced displacement — and indirect effects in post-conflict settings, including declines in personal security, education, economic outcomes, and health. The paper then shifts to examine women’s political roles in conflict, whether as participants in resistance movements or as peace-builders and agents of post-conflict reconstruction. While there is a growing body of innovative research on these critical issues, significant opportunities remain for further empirical and experimental work, particularly studies that seek to establish causal mechanisms and expand our understanding of gendered dynamics in settings damaged by conflict.

The paper explores how the focus of Russian startups on investment in sustainable development technologies affects their attractiveness to venture capital investors. Venture capital plays a significant role in financing rapidly growing companies as they develop new technologies and thereby supports industries that drive economic growth. However, venture capital activity in recent years has been flagging both globally and in Russia. Sustainable development technologies mitigate environmental and social risks in the economy and in society and have been increasingly attractive to investors since the mid-2000s. The article analyzes to what extent sustainable development technologies may appeal to venture capital investors in the Russian market despite the current turbulent environment. The study used panel regression analysis of 850 venture capital deals concluded between 2018 and 2024 and found a significant relationship between a company’s focus on sustainable technologies and the amount of venture capital it raised. There was also a positive correlation with the probability of securing subsequent rounds of funding, which was also influenced by the age of the portfolio company. These findings show that mature companies can better integrate ESG principles and therefore become more attractive investments for venture capital. The study also indicated that syndicated investor participation in deals and the degree of innovation in the technology developed by a company had a positive impact on attractiveness to venture capital. The article is one of the first quantitative studies to explore the relationship between a company’s concentration on sustainable development technologies and the attention it receives from venture capital investors. As such, its findings may be of interest to researchers studying both sustainable development and venture capital, and they can also be utilized to enhance Russia’s venture capital market.

This article elucidates the impact that various forms of government support have on the financial efficiency of small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs) in Russia. The empirical literature on this topic is inadequate to date even though the SME sector is extremely important for the socioeconomic development of Russia. Seven key types of this government support are examined, including initiatives in finance, credits and loans, education, consulting, information, innovation, and property issues. The sample studied employs data on 165,000 Russian SMEs from 2019 to 2022. Performance indicators such as return on equity, return on assets, and employee count are utilized to analyze the effects of government support. The analysis relies on the difference-in-differences method applied to a panel data model which is responsive to effects on individual companies and also on a dynamic model. This study finds that financial, informational, and, to a lesser extent, consulting support have a positive effect on profitability that begins in the year following assistance; the impact of the other four types is much less obvious. The negligible impact of some kinds of support may mean that they are focused on particular aspects of a company’s activities and will have an economic effect only indirectly and over a longer term. These results deepen understanding of ways to provide stimulus to SMEs in the short term and thus enable the managers and owners of the companies themselves to understand the main types of government support that, on average, facilitate rapid growth in business efficiency. The results also suggest the following economic policy recommendations: optimizing the support structure, developing information platforms, expanding non-financial support instruments, reducing bureaucratic barriers, and implementing a comprehensive system for monitoring and evaluating support outcomes.

The poles in a multipolar world are formed and function stably when a state devotes due attention to the development and implementation of structural policy. This involves using suitable tools for solving a wide range of problems: from setting up monitoring and technological modernization of the economy to changes in institutional systems. When structural reforms are applied to any country’s economy, the primary concern should be how to establish dynamic characteristics that will ensure the intended responsiveness to controls while also dampening the reaction to negative shocks. Therefore, the search for new methods and tools for developing and implementing structural policy and also for assessing its effectiveness becomes a crucial undertaking. Organizing such efforts is one of the primary tasks of government. However, one should keep in mind that there is a high probability of miscalculations and errors when arriving at seemingly justified decisions. This susceptibility to error obliges those in charge of economic management to ensure that there are formalized and continuously employed means for identifying errors and deciding on necessary changes in economic behavior. Experience in analyzing all kinds of dynamic systems, including especially economic ones, shows clearly that such studies will be most comprehensive and meaningful when their objects can be formalized in a model using differential equations. This article addresses precisely that kind of dynamic input-output balance (IOB). The study also presupposes that official statistical data should fully confirm the model’s solutions to problems. The purpose of this research is to improve the toolkit for analyzing structural policy, and its output is a computable model of dynamic IOB, which enables quantitative analysis of the structural dynamics for reaching a stated goal and which solves a set of related problems typical of input-output analysis. The model used for the study employed information from the Rosstat base tables for 2011 and 2016.