Abstract:  
This article is dedicated to the analysis of foreign experience of managing academic development applicable to augmenting of social focus of the national science-innovation policy. Particular attention is turned to the conceptual approaches underlying the modern system of government administration over the scientific sector in the economically developed countries, primarily the idea of justification of the existence of science by the social importance of its results. The goal of this work consists in critical examination of the key achievements and issues associated with the attempts of establishing the “feedback” systems between science, government, and society for increasing the social focus of scientific research. The authors demonstrate the essentiality of increasing the social focus of scientific policy due to the fact that an objectively limited amount of resources aimed at scientific development, can be considered as a certain critical level of social agreement with the development rates of specific academic disciplines and projects. The article also underlines the problems that emerge due to the utilitarian understanding of the idea of social responsibility of scientific research and expansion of neo- managerialism into the academic sphere. This particularly concerns the disparity between the accountability and freedom of the scientific inquiry. Moreover, the increase in bureaucratic objections to the role of the “sole representative” of public interests (moral agent) in relations with science can lead to distortion of the quality of feedback, and as a result, decrease in efficiency of control over the academic development for achieving the socially important goals.
 

Abstract: This article is dedicated to the results of the regular stage of monitoring (2016-2017) of the newest changes in the strategy of managing science, innovations, and higher education in the United Kingdom due to the referendum consequences on the country’s exit from the European Union. Special attention is given to the examination of strategic documents and decisions of the British government, including the new law on higher education and science (April of 2017). The authors analyze the content and meaning of the current conceptual and organizational changes, as well as predict the possible consequences. A conclusion is made that intensification of the course towards centralization of management system, restriction of academic freedoms, and methods of dirigisme in the development of science, innovations, and higher education are associated with the escalation of crisis phenomena in the country and unaccounted “Brexit” effects. It is noted that at the present moment, the growing financial responsibilities of the British government before the academic community is a way of defusing the political tension, rather than the circumspect development strategy. Further monitoring of the British experience will allow assessing the efficiency of the new course from the perspective of its productivity and correspondence of the selected methods with the set goals and tasks.

Abstract: The research subject is the peculiarities of innovative development of the rocket and space industry in the Russian Federation. Based on the complex analysis of external and internal challenges and the institutional and legal context of this sector reforming, the authors detect the obstacles to quantitative changes in the development of one of the key sectors of Russia’s economics. The study shows that in the context of the new challenges, the improvement of adaptive capacities of the rocket and space industry of Russia and its capacity for internal changes and transparency is of a prime importance. To accomplish the research tasks, the authors apply the system, structural-functional, comparative-historical, comparative-legal, formal-logical and other research methods. The authors conclude that in terms of the peculiarities of the goals and tasks of the “Roscosmos” company, it is becoming a unique institution, according to its scale and complexity, working in the sphere of development of a specific sector of Russia’s economics, though its institutional status and the related functions haven’t been formally legalized in the federal legislation. The authors note that the successful modernization of the rocket and space industry determines the possibility for Russia to remain the leader in the field of space exploration.  

Abstract:  
The subject of this research is the current changes in the system of state administration for science in the United Kingdom. The article provided the results of the analysis of the main directions of changed in organization of administration for scientific development, strategic documents, and general ideas of the new British government regarding the principles and methods of state management in this sphere after the referendum on the United Kingdom's withdrawal from the European Union. The modern British experience represents interest for Russia from the perspective of the assessment of efficiency of the vector for expansion of the government’s “presence” in science, selected by T. May’s government as a risk prevention took associated with the consequences of Brexit. The conclusion is made about the negative impact of Brexit upon the international projects of British Scholars, prospects of development of the global competitiveness of British science, as well as the rates of implementation of UK’s plans on achieving the status of the leader of innovations (currently the country is in the “second echelon” on the level of innovation development). In situation of the large-scale external and domestic changes, the efficiency of the course towards further centralization of the system of state administration for science and innovations is not quite evident.
 

Abstract: This article presents the results of analysis of the modern scientific policy of Poland, which is one of the key instruments of the development strategy implementation on the innovational basis. Poland’s experience attracts Russian scholars not just because of the presence of similar features in the national systems of organization of science, but also because the contours of the Russian scientific reform in many ways resemble the Polish model, started in 2010. Special attention is given to the examination of the mechanism of development and realization of Poland’s scientific policy, as well to the assessment of the interval results of the Polish radical scientific reform (2010-2015). The authors make a conclusion that the radical scientific reform in Poland did not lead to significant changes in indexes of the innovational development of the country, which remain some of the lowest in the EU, and the possibility of meeting the planned by 2020 volumes of scientific budget (1.7% from GDP) is justifiably questionable. Despite the active absorption of general European recommendations, Poland’s scientific policy in fact develops by trial and error.  The scientific reform has not yet become an organic part of the complex development policy; and a successful utilization of financial support from the EU funds did not produce synergetic effects, which contribute into the establishment of a sustainable scientific-innovation ecosystem.

Abstract: This article is dedicated to the methodological approaches and assessment of possibilities of establishment of the national system of monitoring Russian society based on the qualitative data. Within the framework of interdisciplinary studies, the authors conduct an analysis of the modern foreign and Russian experience of using the qualitative data for the monitoring of social development. The article examines the barriers that impede the knowledge content of the existing mechanisms of management of social development associated with achievement of the public consensus on the models of the desired future, choice of the targeted indexes of development, and principles of assessment of success. Special attention is given to the approaches of structural functionalism, as well as to the ideas about the society as a self-developing system, the key characteristics of which are stability and adaptivity. The conclusion is made that the new global challenges led to the change in conceptual ideas about the essence and goals of social development and the corresponding modification of the metrics of progress, in which an ever bigger role is being played by the quantitative data and the subjective assessments of people. The conducted analysis demonstrates the in modern Russia there are all necessary structural elements for establishment of the system of coordination and realization of the targeted model of society, as well as the constantly acting national system of social monitoring (using the qualitative data on the status of society) as an essential element of the system of state strategic administration.

Abstract: The article is dedicated to the analysis of the archival database of news agency "Interfax" as the source of the reliable facts which describe the key events of the political and economic history of the USSR and Russia of the late XX – early XXI centuries. The authors give and external and internal criticism of the source, as well as examine the circumstances of its emergence and existence, authorship, peculiarities of the structure and content, quality of the presented information, as well as the prospects of its implementation in researches of the history of modern Russia. Special attention is given to the information standards of “Interfax”, which influenced the formation of the source and its distinctive characteristics. This work is first to demonstrate and examine the digital archive of the “Interfax” news as the historical source. It is noted that just over the period of 1989-1999, the database contains more than 1.6 million messages on the key events of the sociopolitical and economic history of USSR and Russia. Thanks to the information standards of the agency, all news messages are notable for its trustworthiness, practical accuracy, and preserve the live reaction of the contemporaries upon the changes that take place in the country. The authors make a conclusion on the value of the “Interfax” archive as the source of the adequate and precise information on the history of USSR and modern Russia.

Abstract: This article introduces the results of the analysis of peculiarities of state control over the scientific development in the Federative Republic of Germany. The contemporary German experience represents interest for Russia due to the fact that both countries are federations, which leads to the emergence of more complex mechanisms of development and realization of the scientific policy, rather than in the countries with Unitarian form of government structure. The work carefully examines the fundamental elements of the system of strategic planning in the area of scientific development and innovations, including the key legal acts. The conclusion is made that the main specificities of the German management model for scientific development (absence of strict hierarchy; use of communicational mechanisms for the formation of “agreement platform” between all the political actors and groups of interest; delimitation of responsibilities, authority, and finances between the level of federation, level of lands, and others) are the result of implementation of the principles of cooperative federalism (“maximum agreement, minimum force”)  into all the spheres of social life. The effectively operating on all levels mechanisms of achieving political consensus, as well as extensive use of high-tech support of decision-making, help the government to provide the successiveness of the general strategic line in combination with the adaptiveness of the current scientific policy.

Abstract: The article is devoted to the analysis of modern systems of tax incentives for research and innovation in the four European countries – the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany and France. According to international rankings, all of these countries have a comparable high level of innovation development, but differ greatly in the structure and principles of public sector support for science and innovation. The authors of the article have considered current changes in tax incentive policy that were introduced in connection with the adoption by the national governments of new strategic documents in the field of innovative development. To achieve the research objectives, the authors have applied general logical methods of scientific research, comparative legal and comparative historical analysis, systems approach and the structural and functional approach. It is concluded that the policy of European countries in promoting science and innovation is mixed: along with direct state support governments also use various methods of "soft compulsion" to innovation of the economic agents through the use of various tax instruments. Currently designing efficient tax regimes in the field of innovation promotion is at the stage of "trial and error", however, this activity objectively contributes to the emergence of self-developing innovation ecosystems at the national and general European levels. Analysis of current changes in the policy of tax incentives for scientific research and innovation in the most innovative of the developed countries of Europe is of particular interest to the Russian tax theory and practice as well as management of processes of economic modernization of the country.

Abstract: The subject of this study are positive and negative factors influencing prospects of becoming a nationwide independent system of social monitoring as an integral part of the strategic management of socio-economic development in the Russian Federation. Special attention is paid to the analysis of the current legal and institutional landscape within which there is a formation of different tools and technologies to enable the flow of social data in the process of making strategic and tactical decisions at all levels of government.To solve the set tasks were applied the general logical methods of scientific research, comparative legal and comparative historical analysis, system and structurally functional approaches.On the basis of the conducted analysis it is concluded that created by the bodies of state power mechanisms of feedback with society (in their present forms) were designed in the interests of a narrow departmental tasks, whereas for efficient functioning of the strategic management of social development requires the construction of the external contour of the independent social monitor. Formally, in Russia there are all necessary elements to build such a mechanism, but in practice there are a large number of objective and subjective barriers to the full implementation of this decision.