Determinants and Priorities of Regional Economic Systems Cohesion Goals Realization in the Conditions of Ukraine Post-War Recovery

Abstract

Topicality. Cohesion policy is an actual direction of the development of regional economic systems in Europe and during the last decades is recognized as the main investment policy of the EU. However, in Ukraine, this direction became officially recognized in regulatory documents from 2020, when the State Strategy for Regional Development of Ukraine for the period 2021-2027 was adopted and cohesion was declared as the main strategic goal. The modern challenges of the military aggression of the russian federation and of the COVID-19 pandemia, which struck the Ukrainian society, have extremely increased the relevance of the scientific justification of strategic directions and specific mechanisms and tools for the implementation of cohesion policy in Ukraine. The existing experience of long-term implementation of the cohesion policy in the EU countries is useful, but it requires substantial adaptation to national realities, and strategic priorities for its implementation in Ukraine should be defined and scientifically substantiated, taking into account the modern requirements for resisting military aggression, post-war recovery, building a stable economic systems of regions and local communities on self-governance basis.Aim and tasks. The purpose of this article is the development of scientifically based decisions regarding the determination of strategic priorities of regional policy formation in the context of increasing the level of social cohesion in communities and regions, strengthening the economic capacity of administrative units, resistance to negative influences and military aggression, ensuring post-war recovery and building effective, capable regional economic systems on the way to European integration.Materials and Methods. In order to assess the essence and evolution of the goals and components of the cohesion policy in regional economic systems, methods of systemic, logical, structural, and semantic analysis are used in the research. In order to provide an up-to-date definition and reveal the essence of the concept of cohesion for the modern realities of the development of national regional economic systems, the methods of synthesis, theoretical generalization, and dialectical methods are applied. The assessment of the essence, content and structure of the main documents in the field of regional development and cohesion for EU countries and Ukraine was carried out using the methods of institutional analysis.Research results. The paper examines the essence and strategic directions of the implementation of one of the main principles of modern European and national policy for the development of regional systems - the principle of cohesion. It is substantiated that one of the main components of the modern cohesion policy is the primary provision of economic development of regions and communities, which should form a powerful functional and resource base for the implementation of other components of cohesion in social, humanitarian and other dimensions. According to results of the study of analytical statements of the OECD, of the European Commission, works of foreign and domestic scientists, the priority of cohesion provision in economic sphere is justified. In many studies on the topic, the term of cohesion is often identified as convergence, which, in our opinion, is not entirely true, since convergence can appear between depressed regions with weak communication, which is the opposite state of cohesion. Using the approaches to the semantic analysis of economic categories initiated at the State Organization "Institute of Market and Economic-Ecological Research of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine", the study provides a definition of the essence of the category "cohesion" as a state of interconnectedness and interaction of communities of administrative, territorial and economic units, in sphere of economic goods production process, which is characterized by the properties of balance, capacity, striving for self-preservation, self-development, self-renewal, coordination of management decisions and stable identity of stakeholders in relation to belonging to the territorial economic system at the local, district, and regional levels.Focusing on the modern needs of military aggression resisting, post-war recovery, and according to the terms of strategic documents aimed on ensuring the sustainable development of the country and regions, the article formulates the following main determining components (determinants) of the implementation of the cohesion policy for regional systems in the economic dimension, which include: effective governance and distribution of powers, strategizing of sectoral-spatial development and deployment of productive forces, innovative-oriented industrialization and the formation of investment concentration points, ensuring the budgetary capacity of communities, creating jobs and added value, stimulating self-employment and the growth of human and social capital, activation of inter-municipal and cross-border cooperation of communities and institutional provision of cohesion in the process of restoring the development of regions based on the formation of an effective system of governance at the national, regional and local levels, in accordance with the goals of sustainable development of cities and communities on an investment-innovative and industrial basis (namely: SDGs 9 and 11), the requirements of programs No. 1-10 of the Recovery Plan of Ukraine and the tasks of integration into the European framework of economic cohesion.Conclusion. As a result of the study of the essence and components of cohesion policy in the regional economic systems of Ukraine, the mechanisms and tools for the implementation of its strategic directions have been determined, which include measures of of investments attraction in communities’ cooperation projects, improvement of the budget equalization system, measures of information and communication support for economic cooperation of communities and regions, which should contribute to the formation of a functional economic basis for post-war recovery and sustainable development of the national economy.