The article written by the director of VolRC RAS, Doctor of Sciences (Economics) Alexandra A. Shabunova and Deputy Head of Department, Leading Researcher, Candidate of Sciences Sergey A. Kozhevnikov discusses the relevance of the problem for modern Russia, the main stages of development, and key research areas of employees of the Vologda Research Center RAS on the issues of evaluating and ensuring public administration efficiency.
The paper demonstrates the formation of the agenda and subject of the work, and presents the achieved results, their scientific and practical significance, and promising areas for further studies on this topic.
The authors prove that the variety of the studied issues, as well as the used methods, has been constantly developing. The subject of the scientific research has always met the challenges of the time, and it was devoted to the search for the root causes and possible consequences of certain phenomena and the development of appropriate mechanisms for improving public administration efficiency at all levels. Active usage of the results of their own field work also promoted it. In fact, a comprehensive mechanism for evaluating public administration efficiency was developed within the framework of the research area in the Vologda Research Center of RAS, based on official statistics, expert and sociological surveys of business and population.
The researchers of the Center reveal low public administration efficiency in Russia during the period of market reforms in the 1990s, which led to the crisis consequences in the economy and society. That situation required increasing state’s role in regulating socio-economic processes, which was recognized at the highest government level.
The article explores the key issues of public and municipal administration in the 2000s and at the current stage, limiting the implication of modernization processes in the country, priority directions of improving administration efficiency at the federal, regional and municipal levels.
The authors express the opinion that a research of the ways of the administration system transformation at all levels should be among promising areas for studies on this issue in order to find the answers to the challenges and threats of development associated with deep processes in the world economy (for example, the transition to a new technological way) and the agenda which became especially relevant only in 2020 (the outbreak of the new coronavirus infection, etc.).
The article makes it possible to evaluate the contribution of Vologda scientists to the development of theory, methodology, and tools for evaluating and improving the efficiency of public and municipal administration in Russia.
The paper was prepared in accordance with FSBIS VolRС RAS state assignment, research work no. 0168-2019-0004 “Improving the mechanisms of development and efficient usage of the potential of the socio-economic system”.
Read the article.