Sustainability of social and economic development of municipalities in the Voronezh Region, Russia

Aim. The aim is to assess the sustainability of the social and economic development of the municipalities in the Voronezh Region.

Material and Methods. A systematic approach to an integrated, structured and dynamic study of the level of social and economic sustainability of municipalities in the region. This approach uses the classification method, which defines and restricts existing conceptual approaches to the interpretation of conflict as an economic category, and the comparative analysis method, which compares the selected approaches with each other. The statistical database covers the period from 2014 to 2018. The integral index of social and economic sustainability of the municipalities in the region has been calculated.

Discussion. The results of calculations of the integral sustainability index allowed us to identify 5 groups of municipalities, characterized by a certain degree of social and economic sustainability: a group with a high level of socio‐economic sustainability, a group with an above‐average level of socio‐economic sustainability, a group with an average level of socio‐economic sustainability, a group with a low level of socio‐economic sustainability and a group with a crisis level of socio‐economic sustainability. A crisis situation in a number of municipalities necessitates the development of certain anti‐crisis recommendations that contribute to the effective use of existing potential and directly develop the internal resources of the municipalities.

Conclusion. The work resolves an actual practice‐oriented issue in the field of socio‐economic and geographical research ‐ the calculation of the sustainability of the social and economic development of municipalities in the region. Assessment of the sustainability indicators of the regional municipalities made it possible to comprehensively and adequately reveal the "strengths and weaknesses" of the regional social and economic system of the Voronezh Region and to identify the principal strategic tasks in moving towards a single strategic aim – improving the population level and life quality. 

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