Agglomeration effects in spatial development of Russia’s regions

Abstract

The article addresses the issue of the twofold role of territorial agglomeration entities in the spatial development of Russian regions. The authors look at the possibilities of both stimulating and dissimulating effects of expansion of urban agglomerations on the socioeconomic status and innovation development of Russia’s regions, which cause the economic growth on the national level to speed up or slow down. On the one hand, urban agglomerations become “growth poles” that help spread business activity from the centre to the periphery and stimulate the diffusion of innovations. On the other hand, agglomeration trends in spatial development create centripetal economic effects that lead to greater inter-and intraregional socioeconomic disparity. The authors pay special attention to the forming of urban agglomerations as a socioeconomic phenomenon that preconditions economic disparity between territories. This becomes a problem from the viewpoint of state management, as Russia’s federative model of government grants priority to regulative influence in the economic space of regions. As a result, the socioeconomic development gap grows quite large, making national economic and innovation policies less effective in general. Based on the conducted studies, the authors demonstrate that it is necessary to transfer to a balanced combination of interregional cooperation aimed at eradication of regional disparity.