The Institute of Economics of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences: Past and Present Research

Abstract

The article describes the contribution made by the Institute of Economics of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) (Ekaterinburg, Russia) to the development of economic theory. It is shown how the Institute’s history of research fits into the long-standing tradition of economic thought, which studied the role of people both as agents of economic activity and as its objects. The article traces back the development of economic thought from Antiquity, through the modern period and the heyday of political economy in the nineteenth century, to the contemporary stage. Throughout its history, economic research dealt with such problems as human behaviour within the system of economic relationships, social policies as a form of public support of the manufacturing sector, labour as a way of realizing people’s full potential, and so on. The history of the Institute of Economics of the Ural Branch of the RAS started in the 1970s. The research was conducted in a number of areas, in particular the development of social infrastructure, methods of evaluation of living and materialized labour, the evolution of ownership during economic reforms, institutional support of economic transformations and the role of human agents in economy in twenty-first century Russia. Moreover, as the study makes clear, on researchers’ own initiative, a number of other projects were realized, covering a wide range of topics, from political economy of socialism to cliometrics.