Articles

The subject of this research is a set of ideas on improving public administration in the Russian Empire, put forward by one of the most significant statesmen of the second half of the 19th century, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich. The objectives of this article are to identify and systematize the views of Konstantin Nikolaevich on management. The basic method in solving these problems is a textual analysis of the document, conventionally designated by the publishers as a note "On the project of public administration reforms." The result was the selection of a set of management principles on which the Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich relied when preparing proposals for improving public administration in Russia; characteristics of the goals and directions of the transformation in the system of public administration, which he proposed in the mid-1860s and late 1870s.

With the COVID-19 pandemic beginning in 2020, the digital economy, based on the Internet of Things, big data, artificial intelligence and other next-generation information technologies, plays an indispensable role in stabilizing economic growth, boosting consumption, preserving living standards and enhancing government capacity. China has now made remarkable progress in combating the socio-economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and is gradually entering a "post-pandemic period". This paper focuses on the post-pandemic period, analyzing the future trend of China's digital economy with the implementation of the "Outline of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) for National Economic and Social Development and Vision 2035 of the People's Republic of China". In addition, this paper also provides recommendations for optimizing the national economy using the tools of economic cybernetics. The study presents the author's position determining the direction of China's national digital economy as well as a new theoretical perspective on the development of the national digital economy in the post-pandemic period.

The article discusses the current state of the public administration system in the Russian Federation, which began to take shape in the early 90s of the last century. The evolution of domestic public authorities is analyzed, the stages of formation of its system are singled out, the constitutional and legal assessment of the organizational features of the activities of the highest bodies of state power is given. The conclusion about the specifics of the constitutional and legal status of the President of the Russian Federation is substantiated, which predetermines the special role and place of the head of state in public administration.

It is noted that among the principles of organizing public power, the concept of separation of powers is important, which has not received its proper implementation in the organization and activities of public authorities due to the lack of a “system of balancing and mutual control”. Considering the constitutional foundations of the organization of public power, the author of the article comes to the conclusion that it is necessary to develop and adopt a federal constitutional law that would regulate the organizational activities of the State Duma, the Federation Council and the President. The possibility of adopting a federal constitutional law on public authority in connection with the constitutional amendments of 2020 is also substantiated.

The author identifies a number of problems in the development of domestic public authorities, substantiates their influence on the further development of state building. The problems of public administration are considered in two planes - "horizontal" (relations between the highest bodies of state power) and "vertical" (relations between the Russian Federation and its subjects). At the “horizontal” level, one of the important aspects of public administration is the excessive concentration of power in the hands of the head of state, which makes it difficult to implement the principle of separation of powers, the underdevelopment of political and party pluralism, the lack of implementation of the institutions of constitutional and legal responsibility. To the "vertical" - excessive regulation by the federal legislator of the powers of the subjects of the Federation, which is reflected in the restriction of the legal independence of the subjects of the Russian Federation.

In conclusion, conclusions are drawn, and some recommendations are proposed aimed at resolving the identified problems of domestic public administration.

The article analyzes the process of expanding of state control in a modern society, especially intensified at the period of COVID pandemic. The concepts of state and political control are specified, the insufficient scientific development of the problems of transformation of state control in a digital society is declared, the real and possible negative consequences of state regulation and control of private life, behavior and consciousness of people for personal freedom and democratic social structure are discussed. Two main groups of reasons for the expansion of state control in a digital society and its methods are identified and analyzed: the scientific and technical and social ones. It is shown that the dominance of the interests of the ruling elite in a state policy encourages it to use the expansion of state control not only for increasing the efficiency of public administration, but first of all for the purpose of neo-totalitarian transformation of the management system and society on the whole. By means of the examples of the United States and the other states, the specific forms of growing regulation and control of people's privacy, behavior and consciousness are revealed. The general mechanism of the destructive impact of total control on society and the individual is demonstrated. It is shown that this impact leads to elimination of civil society, freedom and democracy and in the future, if consistently implemented, may cause anthropological degeneration of the human race itself, a person as a rational being with freedom of thought and will. The conducted analysis results in conclusions and recommendations on optimization and democratization of the process of transformation of state control in the digital society.

The article is devoted to the concept of history of management thought of professor V.I. Marshev. The article analyzes in detail Marshev's book "History of Management Thought. Genesis and Development from Ancient Origins to the Present Day». The article highlights the philosophical, methodological, epistemological and genre features of this book. The article analyzes in detail the problem of demarcation of the history of managerial thought. The article reveals the relationship of various management disciplines: management, public administration, cybernetics, operations research, etc. The article proposes and substantiates a network model of general management science.

The article analyzes the evolution of the soft power concept that was developed at the turn of the XX-XXI centuries by the American political scientist J. S. Nye Jr. The authors consider the transformation of the soft power concept in accordance with global shifts in the system of international relations, changes in the balance of forces between the main actors and the rapid development of digital technologies. The analysis of soft power and smart power concept as well as their relationship with various manifestations of hard power is provided. Furthermore, possibilities of using hard power instruments in order to generate an effect comparable to the one of soft power are regarded. The authors separately consider the concept of legitimacy in the successful application of soft power technologies as well as the possibilities of manipulative application of strategies aimed at forming attractive images through propaganda. The authors place special emphasis on the fact that the policy of D. Trump forced by J. Nye to adjust his concept of the main soft power resources and to strengthen the role of the public as the main carrier of norms and values attractive to other countries in times of crisis. At the same time, the main practical purpose of the concept of J. Nye is still to preserve the role of the global hegemon for the United States of America.

The testimony of a participant of the international commission of forensic medical experts, Bulgarian doctor A.M. Markov, about his business trip to the Smolensk region, to the place of mass graves in the Katyn forest, where the German special services exhumed and identified the corpses of Polish officers shot, allegedly in the spring of 1940. The purpose that the German authorities set before this commission was to confirm the validity of the conclusions of German experts about the three-year-old execution and burial of prisoners of war, as well as the results of the identification of corpses.

Markov records the fact that he was forced to take part in the work of this commission. Informs about the personal composition of the commission and its relocation to the place of work in Smolensk, familiarization with the site of excavation of graves, the examination of corpses by German specialists and the working conditions of the commission.

At the site of the excavation of the graves, the German forensic expert Butz was in charge of everything. The exhumation and identification work carried out in the Katyn forest and the results of the inspection of the graves are described, the members of the commission are familiarized with the stories of a group of local residents presented as witnesses to the executions by the NKVD of the USSR, a visit to the premises where work was carried out with documents found with corpses that served as evidence of 3-year-old burials, which seemed doubtful to Markov. At the second visit to the graves, the members of the commission carried out studies of the corpses. At this time, doubts about the German version of the execution of Markov intensified, which was facilitated by Dr. Orzos' attempt to back up the conclusions of German experts with his own experience. The condition of the young trees presented to the commission from the burial site further reinforced these doubts. Czech forensic expert Gayek had similar doubts. As a result, A.M. Markov did not sign the protocol prepared by the German side and participate in propaganda events designed to confirm the German version of the Katyn graves.

The article focuses on the main trends in the formation of the institution of local self-government in the Rostov region in the early 1990s. The growing role of local administration in solving important issues of socio-economic development of the country and its regions at the present stage determines the relevance of the topic. Effective improvement of local self-government is possible only on the basis of the study historical experience of reforms and transformations. Using existing scientific researches the author develop own “stageization” of the process of transforming the system of government departments into local self-government authorities in the considered period. As a result of using an historical-comparative, historical-dynamic and retrospective research methods it was possible to determine the key characteristics of each stage and the main problems solved at each of them. The author installed the process of the formation of federal legislation on local self-government and its impact on the creation of a regional legislation in the Rostov region. It is concluded that the system of local self-government built in the Rostov region was organizationally consistent with constitutional principles. It is necessary to further study the problem with the expansion of the range of sources, which will highlight the most promising  directions for the development of local self-government and, possibly, will be of practical interest for modern public authorities.