Problems of Ensuring Balanced Socio-Economic Development of Regions Under Sanctions

The purpose of the study is to identify and analyze problems and develop recommendations to ensure a balance of social, economic, budgetary, credit and other aspects of the integrated development of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation under sanctions. The relevance of the study is due to the need to resolve issues of a rational relationship between ensuring social stability in society and the dynamism of investment and technological renewal of the territory’s economy as the basis for its sustainable long-term development in the current conditions of sanctions pressure from unfriendly countries on the economy of Russia and its regions. In accordance with the results obtained of this study, the following conclusions were formulated: 1) based on the results of a review of scientific publications of domestic and foreign authors on the issues of balanced development of territories, the differences and interrelationships between balanced and sustainable development were highlighted, and the use of an approach to assessing balance based on criteria of economic security was justified; 2) a system of 26 indicators of economic security is proposed, characterizing the development of constituent entities of the Russian Federation in terms of social, economic, innovative and environmental components. Based on the use of methods of statistical analysis, standardization, spectrum-score and expert methods, an assessment and grouping of the regions of the Volga Federal District was carried out according to the level of balance, which made it possible to identify the presence of significant heterogeneity when comparing individual components of development and their distinctive features (problem areas) in different periods (pre-pandemic, pandemic, post-pandemic, sanctions); 3) based on the results of the study, the main problems of balanced regional development were identified and recommendations were proposed to improve it based on the principle of complementarity (mutual complementarity) of components as the basis for ensuring sustainable socio-economic development of territories and improving the quality of life of the population.