To the 25th anniversary of the International “Person of the Year” Prize, established in 1993 by the Russian Biographical Institute and having occupied its worthy place among the most authoritative national awards of public recognition, as well as in social and spiritual life of the country.

The review presents strategic trends of 2017. The annual research is conducted through methodology of Russia’s strategic matrix developed by experts of the Institute for Economic Strategies, which analyzes the main aspects of Russia’s internal development in nine areas: governance, territory, natural resources, population, economy, culture and religion, science and education, armed forces, geopolitical environment.

The paper examines the condition, problems and prospects of development of Russian pharmaceutical industry. The majority of medicines (82%) produced in Russia are generics. The share of innovative drugs is small — only 18%. The Ministry of health of the Russian Federation plans by the year 2025 to improve this ratio to 35:65. Therefore, the main challenge facing the pharmaceutical industry lies in the active development of innovative medicines and development of the technology of their production. The article studies three major industry issues and solutions to them: shortage of domestic pharmaceutical substances, lack of qualified specialists with modern skills and lack of development of medical products’ domestic production. The article shows that thanks to the timely adoption of the state development strategy “Pharma-2020” (2009) and the Federal target program “Development of pharmaceutical and medical industry for 2013–2020” and their practical implementation, the above-mentioned problems are being successfully resolved. The main conclusion of this paper is that the expansion and technological modernization of the domestic pharmaceutical industry and medical devices’ production is a task of utmost national importance. The contribution of the industry to national GDP today is 1%. However, the potential of the industry is that its share in GDP could grow to 3-5% in the next 10-15 years. In addition, the industry plays an extremely important role in solving social and demographic problems, as well as improving the quality of human capital.

In the article the author addresses the problem of assessing effectiveness of innovation strategies of socially responsible businesses and provides an overview of the most promising and relevant approaches to evaluation. In the author’s field of view there are such approaches as evaluation of stock exchange indices, the status of socially responsible projects in business organizations, non-financial reporting, introduction of KPI indicators in implementation of innovative strategies, monitoring, rational and ethical approaches, as well as the evaluation methods described in the manual by G.F. Ostapenko “Corporate Social Responsibility” and in the article by O.А. Leshchenko “Modern methods of assessing effectiveness of companies activities in the CSR field”.

Opening address of editor-in-chief.

The article analyzes three periods of the Russian economy: the transformation crisis of 1990–1998, characterized by depth and duration, the period of regenerative economic recovery in 1999–2008, during which a shift into nationalization and monopolization of the economy took place, as well as the period of 2009–2017, called the “lost decade” by the author, the period of deep financial and socio-economic crisis as part of the global world crisis. Possible prospects for development and ways of entrance into high-quality significant socio-economic growth are described.

The purpose of this report is to initiate a wide-ranging discussion (both on open platforms, and in corporate and state-public closed mode), and to help organizations and individuals affected by extrajudicial sanctions and persecutions to work out a strategy and tactics of confrontation, both for their own benefit and for the benefit of the public. The authors give scenarios of financial and economic dynamics in 2018 and identify probable parameters of collapse or “controlled demolition”, analyze the consequences of external influence on Russia and its political and economic elite.

Russian liberals again propose to pull the Russian economy out of stagnation by freezing the money supply as a tool for inflation targeting under the precepts of the Washington Consensus. However, the practice of overcoming the past crisis situations shows us a different lesson. The policy of money pumping through the efforts of reasonable practitioners. E.M. Primakov and V.V. Gerashchenko allowed quickly to overcome the 1998 default, but from the crisis of 2008 Russia was coming out much heavier and with huge economic losses, as the country leaders consistently adhered to liberal dogmas. In Russia, when the money supply grew significantly, inflation contracted, and vice versa, when the growth rate of the money supply fell sharply, inflation grew. The money growth always precedes the growth of GDP, and vice versa, when the money supply shrinks, GDP decreases. And there is a theoretical justification for this, but it does not coinside with the fundamental liberalism dogmas.

Introduction of sanctions, contrary to the statements of Russian politicians, has an impact on the Russian economy, and the impact is quite negative. The crisis in the Russian economy is confirmed by macro-indicators. Despite this, distortion of statistical data allows to demonstrate the illusion of economic growth, although it is seen only in certain sectors of economy. Real incomes of the population have also decreased and continue to fall down. The article proposes a number of strategic measures that will allow to minimize the damage caused by the imposed sanctions and even partially to benefit from them for the Russian economy.

The article analyzes the financial system of Russia, which is a key element in regulating a market economy and the perfection of which determines the pace of economic development. Federal Law No. 172-FZ “On Strategic Planning in the Russian Federation” adopted by the State Duma of the Russian Federation on June 28, 2014 was supposed to help the government, but any planning is possible only if there are a plenipotentiary body, models and regulatory framework. The author offers a number of steps to create a quality regulatory framework for planning.