Global Problems Of The World Economy And Strategic Directions Of Russia’s Development

Abstract

Global problems of a worldwide scale influence the quality of the entire population of the Earth, affecting the interests of all countries of the world, all peoples and all social strata of the population. Global problems of world importance lead to various economic losses. To weaken their influence or to solve them requires the cooperation of a group of developed states on a global scale, as well as the joint action of all mankind. Ensuring the sustainability of the development of the global economy, as well as problems associated with natural disasters of the environmental and energy character, limited raw materials, lack of food, the use of the global ocean space and others are also aggravated, and their solution becomes particularly relevant. In accordance with the new classification, mixed problems which can result in massive losses of part of the world population, such as local military conflicts, crime, man-made situations, natural disasters and others, are singled out. An ambitious task has been set in Russia to ensure that at least five of the Russian universities would enter the top 200 leading universities in the world. The most important task is expanding international cooperation, deepening the degree of integration of Russian science in the world economic processes. During the implementation of the concept, it was recommended to form the research and development sector in higher educational institutions, to increase their effectiveness and efficiency, and by 2024 to create a program for the development of socio-economic sphere in the country’s regions.

Keywords: Ecological safetyenvironmentglobal civilizationinternational economypeoplepeople’s life

Introduction

Global world problems affect the interests not only of individual consumers or territories but also the development of almost all 195 states of the world. The distinctive feature of new global problems of a worldwide scale, such as the danger of space wars, disturbances in the noospheric equilibrium and others, is that they are not solved by themselves (Akindinova & Yasin, 2015). Their solution in many cases requires the general purposeful efforts of many countries and the entire world community. The complex, protracted nature of many unsolved and poorly resolved global problems and their exacerbation can lead to irreversible environmental consequences and other disruptions of the entire ecosystem for the world. Therefore, the development of strategic program activities ensuring the prevention of nuclear war, the sustainability of the development of the world community, as well as problems associated with natural and economic development such as ecology, energy, raw materials, food, oceans and others are relevant and of practical importance.

Problem Statement

Studies have shown that all global problems are interconnected with each other and in many cases it is difficult to single out the main ones and systematize them; various difficulties arise in the development of systematic strategic program measures to eliminate them. Global problems of the world level include environmental pollution, the use of non-renewable raw materials, the use of nuclear energy and weapons, the heterogeneity of the population and others. To develop productive approaches for solving global problems, a new direction of science - the theory of global problems - appeared, a new field of knowledge has been formed, designed to give practical advice on solving or mitigating negative actions for the world community.

Research Questions

When developing recommendations for solving global world scale problems, the influence of political, economic, social and other factors is taken into account. Since the listed areas of science conduct research that identifies negative changes associated with human activity in the noosphere, their results become especially relevant when developing global programs and recommendations for solving these problems. Studies claim that over the past 400 years almost 94 species of various birds, about 63 species of various mammals, and unique objects of nature have disappeared from the face of Earth, which inflicts enormous damage to the noosphere and violates the most important conditions for the functioning of biosphere systems.

Purpose of the Study

The purpose is to determine the impact of global problems on the development of the world economy, taking into account changes in the quality of life of the entire population of the Earth. The Russian education system should be aimed at the formation of the necessary competencies and skills with continuous self-improvement, the development of the necessary incentives and conditions for advanced training with constant retraining and the creation of a new type of person - an innovative person, taking into account the latest global changes on Earth.

Research Methods

Global modeling as a scientific method explores global problems of a worldwide scale, necessary to determine global problems and ways to solve them. The essence of the global modeling method is to develop realistic scenarios for the development of global processes. The use of information and computer technology, economic and mathematical models is necessary given the influence of a large number of parameters and all the possible factors affecting world development. Existing trends with structural changes provide source materials for predicting the consequences and possible scenarios of future development. The presented method in theory was called “Limits of Growth”.

Findings

The research showed that as the world economy develops, a large number of natural raw materials go into the non-renewable category. The evidence base for the exhaustibility of natural raw materials is gaining importance for global science (Lapina, 2016). It is scientifically proven that raw materials and individual elements of minerals have their own limitations. The limit of depletion may be the maximum reduction in world reserves or restrictions associated with the environmental safety of the global ecosystem. Further uncontrolled use of limited raw materials, natural and other resources can lead to disruption of the noosphere balance. In cases of ecological balance, you have to pay for too expensive resources, and then you need to attract developed countries of the world community to participate, to develop systemic measures to prevent these threats.

In the study of global problems, it was revealed that the irrational use of natural resources directly affects the possibility of human existence on the Earth. The emergence of nuclear weapons in some aggressively-minded countries that allow their local or global use is a significant factor with possible consequences on a global scale. Before the advent of atomic weapons, it was assumed that there was no threat to the development of the world’s population, but now there are limitations with a certain time frame since the accumulated stock of nuclear weapons is huge enough to destroy the population of our planet. In world practice, the development and application of global modeling is carried out by the organization of international scientists Club of Rome, established in 1968. Scientists, businessmen, politicians and public figures interested in developing large-scale measures to prevent global threats conduct serious research on world problems and model forecasts with moral and material support.

At the level of the world states, the most important task is to identify the maximum possible limits for the growth of the global economy due to the capabilities of the global economy and the provision of rare technological resources. During the study, the use of non-renewable resources and such critical parameters as investments, food security, global population growth and environmental pollution are especially important. The dynamics of changes in the most important parameters, taking into account the influence of global trends on them, have different effects on the economic growth of states.

Given the current trends in the use of non-renewable natural resources in the first half of the third millennium, humanity may find itself in difficult conditions. Thus, there is an urgent need to look for new alternative renewable resources and to limit harmful production. To preserve humanity, the following trends have been identified to solve the threat problem: classification of global problems, generalization of the experience of many Russian and international scientists, the proposal of various options for the classification of global problems.

The generalization of research works on global problems shows that they can be divided into the following groups.

The first group of Russian and international research includes problems related to the national interests of various states and their groups, to the level of resource support and the growth rate of strategic development. A significant part of this research is devoted to the study of relations between the social layers of the world population and their social, political, economic interests. The problems of trade wars are international in nature, the research is dedicated to the prevention of local military conflicts and the observance of international law and a fair economic order, taking into account the influence and nature of the solution to these problems.

Firstly, at the global level, many local conflicts periodically arise that can be eliminated with difficulties, but at the same time, the threat of a global world war does not disappear but rather more and more increases. As a result of a clash of opposing national interests of world economic leaders, despite its locality, the ruin probability appears, since any local conflict affects the energy, raw materials and other interests of states of influence groups ready to enter into conflict at various levels and even interests of those groups have nothing to do with the occurrence of the conflict. At the same time, the universal threat of military catastrophe to the world civilization, including the use of nuclear weapons, is not completely excluded.

Secondly, in terms of development speed, more than 70 out of 195 countries of the world with a total population of 7.5 billion people have a low level of welfare and economic development. If in the 20th century the confrontation of opposing views of socio-political systems stood in the foreground, in the 21st century the problems of the economic order came to the fore. Additional problems arose due to the lack of established rules for a fair world order and the uneven development of various countries of the world.

The generalization of the research results shows that the countries lagging behind and the countries occupying the middle positions in their economic development have more than 5 billion of world population. A small group of states in the structure of the world economy is developing at a high speed: the group of developed countries includes countries with a population of about 2.5 billion people. The development of the world economy shows that the gap between the rich and poor people in the world is widening. Since about 70 countries are considered economically underdeveloped with low quality of living standards and low incomes, the economy of these states is based on the extraction of coal, ore and other minerals which are mainly sold for export. These countries are characterized by severity of environmental problems and a huge number of other socio-economic problems.

The second group of Russian and international research studies a number of world states that have system problems associated with environmental problems of clean drinking water, energy, fuel, raw materials, as well as problems of interaction of society and nature. The second group of enumerated global problems is associated with the interaction of society and nature; according to the classification, they are divided into several subgroups:

• environmental problems which are understood as problems of environmental pollution and problems of conservation of the gene pool of flora and fauna;

• problems of rational use of energy raw materials and other natural resources used by the society;

• the emergence of new problems associated with the use of new goods in economic activity and the use of new projects in space and the oceans, the use of nuclear energy in various industries, etc. that can create conditions for various disasters.

Currently, a significant part of a country’s budget is generated by the extraction of gas, oil and other natural resources which does not allow the use of environmentally friendly technologies. In the future, the following strategies are planned to be applied in world practice Development Strategy of the Russian Federation until 2020, 2014).

1. The strategy for the prevention of global environmental disasters provides for the restriction of harmful industries. In practice, the growth of production capacities on a global scale increases the burden on the natural environment and also creates environmental tensions on the Earth, the practical trends for continuous growth of the global economy increase environmental safety (Tulin, 2014). The developers of the restrictive strategy prove the need to maintain zero consumption growth at the global level, demand the closure of environmentally harmful industries.

2. The strategy of optimizing the use of natural resources involves determining a rational level of interaction between society and nature, maintaining a level that does not exceed critical pollution, which ensures the exchange of substances between society and nature without negative impact on the environment.

3. The closed cycle production organization strategy proposes the organization of production with complete environmental impact isolation (Glazyev, 2014). The development of closed production cycles is possible with a radical change in technologies that ensure the processing of production waste into organic and other substances and that also can be used to create products useful for humanity.

The above-mentioned strategies that can be applied in a given situation or a situation depending on the specific production and territorial conditions are not alternative. The development strategy of closed cycles is highly dependent on the technological level of production processes development; due to the low level of production and consumption, a restrictive strategy cannot always be applied in practice as well.

The third group includes the problems of education and health care, as well as the problem of control over the growth of the population on the planet, that is, these are problems associated with a person and the individual way of living. From the second half of the 1970s, special attention was given to the following problems of the human qualities development: moral, intellectual and other human capabilities, a healthy lifestyle, and adequate mental development. The increase in the growth rate of global problems and the emergence of new ones is largely due to the peculiarities of the economic development of the influence groups of the states of the world economy. For the first time economists began to talk about global problems of politics in the 1960s and 1970s.

The need to monitor global problems and make concrete decisions to reduce their negative impact at the beginning of the 21st century is becoming more relevant, as these problems increasingly affect the life of the world community and, in general, the world economy. At the same time, the local problems of individual countries or groups can develop into a global catastrophe if a timely solution is not looked for.

Research has shown that all global problems have many common features and characteristics with the following problem aspects to highlight:

1. World-wide problems affect the interests of most countries and the world population;

2. Global problems hinder the economic development of many states and violate the usual world order;

3. Global world problems require an urgent solution to their regulation in relevant areas of various levels;

4. Global problems having different levels of interconnection and creating different levels of risks contribute to the growth of conflicts and are not always predictable;

5. Global problems leading to conflict situations and requiring coordination between groups of countries or the entire world community.

In practice, it is difficult to prioritize the solution of global problems, which depend not only on the severity and magnitude of the problems, but also on the millions of people, including those living in third world countries, where living standards are growing at a slow pace and even decline in some of these countries.

The cause of the global problems that the humanity faces now is the accumulation of production capacities which puts pressure on the noosphere with the gradual depletion of non-renewable natural resources. Since the end of the 19th century, the world’s population has grown more than 3 times, and production volumes have increased more than 20 times. Moreover, the intensive development of world production was notable for the uneven nature of development and structural crises and the growth of local conflicts. The emergence of global problems was also facilitated by the leap in military development which threatened the whole of humanity.

Among global problems of world scale, the central place is occupied by scientific and technological progress; its impact on the nature is increasing significantly. The noosphere is polluted not only by industrial waste, but also by new materials that slowly decompose. At the beginning of the 21st century, the global scientific and technological progress led to the emergence of a number of new previously non-existent problems affecting the interests of the entire planetary civilization associated with racing arms. These problems appeared with the development of near and deep space, penetration into the northern territories and the depths of the oceans.

As a result of the interaction of various states on international markets, the world economy has emerged as a single mechanism by the 1980s. By this time, the world economic ties of most countries had significantly strengthened and the territorial division of the world into two opposite poles had been completed. Currently, like in previous centuries, industrialized countries are trying to dictate colonial conditions and use other countries as raw material sites. Former colonial territories, which are now backward countries, appeared before the formation of world and national markets, and now the international division of labor has become an instrument for the expansion of industrialized states. The accession of these states to the world market was determined by external conditions and not by the needs of society at a particular stage of its development. Due to such social foundations, previous relations have been preserved with adjustments. As a result of adjusting actions, a large financial flow is required as well as the efforts of social groups and a lot of activities.

Global and local world problems embrace the interests of humanity and groups of world states. At the present stage of development of the world economy, the following problems are considered to be global (Sidorenko & Marchak, 2016):

• problems of the Northern and Southern territories;

• the problem of poverty of a part of the world’s population;

• problems of insufficient food security in a part of the world;

• problems of energy insecurity in large areas of the world;

• the problem of ecology and sustainable development of territories;

• demographic problems;

• problems of the development of human potential and the accumulation of human capital;

• the problem of ensuring the safety of the world population;

• problems of using the oceans and other growing global problems.

According to the international classification, global world problems by origin and methods of solution are divided into three main groups (Osipov & Skryl, 2016).

The first group of problems includes the main socio-economic and political problems of humanity. A number of measures need to be specified separately: preserving peace, demilitarizing and limiting offensive weapons, demilitarizing outer space, and the sustainable development program for the world’s poorest countries.

The second group includes a set of problems that grow out of the interaction of man, society and technology, taking into account the effectiveness of the use of scientific and technical products in the interests of the social development of the world population and the elimination of the negative impact of technical means on humans. The problems of population growth on a global scale, the observance of human rights at the state level, the excessive strengthening of state institutions control over a personal freedom acquire special relevance as the most important components of human rights.

The third group includes problems associated with global socio-economic processes and environmental imbalances (Glazyev, Batchikov, & Kobyakov, 2019). Interactions between society and nature include solving energy, raw materials and food problems, as well as measures to overcome environmental crisis which also embraces new areas with floods, fires and other natural disasters that can destroy the lives of part of the world population.

Conclusion

The following strategic goals have been identified in Russia: promoting the development of the applied science of modern entrepreneurship, increasing funding and supporting the most important sectors of the economy. The concept of innovative development of Russia until 2020 defines the tasks of increasing human potential, as well as introducing a new concept of “innovative person”. The main criteria for the competence of an innovative person should be the ability to study and retrain constantly, to develop critical thinking, to be prepared for risk, to develop initiative, to be able to work alone and in a team in a tough competitive environment. An innovative person must be fluent in foreign languages and be able to conduct business communication in English.

To solve the above-mentioned tasks, the Russian education system should be aimed at the formation of the necessary competencies and skills of continuous self-improvement, the development of the necessary incentives and conditions for advanced training with constant professional growth. An innovative person should be able to change several types of production activities and professions during one’s life. Providing state support for entrepreneurship, increasing the activity level of existing enterprises and creating new innovative business enterprises, stimulating innovative activities, holding forums, contests, and rallies are also important components of the concept of innovative development of Russia.

Restoring the prestige of innovative activities and interest in scientific activity, as well as the introduction of modern technologies and e-government to create an innovative climate are becoming elements of the development of an innovative management system mechanism. The mechanism for implementing the proposed measures is the state program “Education and Initiative” “Our New School” which is also part of the concept of innovative development of Russia.

An ambitious goal has been set for at least five of the Russian universities - to be among the top 200 universities in the world. Expanding international cooperation, deepening the degree of integration of Russian science in world economic processes remain the most important task. During the implementation of the concept, it was recommended to form the research and development sector in higher education institutions, increase their effectiveness and efficiency, and by 2024 create a program for the development of socio-economic sphere in the country’s regions.

References

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