Abstract
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Sustainable development is a priority concept for the future in the 21st century. This provision is reflected in the conceptual documents of the United Nations: “The future we want” (2012), “Transforming Our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” (2015), Paris Climate Agreement (2015). From the point of view of policy practice, we can single out the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for the period 2016–2030, which are formulated in the “Transforming Our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”. They not only reflect the ideology of sustainable development and balance social, economic, and environmental priorities in a balanced way, but also stand out in terms of practical public administration, instrumentality, and quantitative assessments.
The 17 SDGs are formulated in the form of recommendations of a global nature, with each government setting its own national objectives, guided by global wishes, but taking into account national conditions. Each government decides how to ensure that these global objectives are taken into account in the form of recommendations in national planning processes, measures and strategies. Currently, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Norway can serve as examples of advanced adaptation of the SDGs.
To abandon a raw export-based model and switch to a new development paradigm of the Russian economy, it is necessary to include the concept of sustainability in the strategic documents that underpin the country’s long-term development. Any strategy, concept, or program involves a set of clearly identified goals and objectives reflected in quantitative targets, which enables administration, monitoring and management of the progress towards these goals in the medium and long run. In this context, the experience of adapting UN SDGs can be used for Russia. Based on the Russian official statistics, key sustainable development indicators that reflect the economic, social, and environmental aspects of sustainability can be identified for Russia. The author suggests 14 such key indicators. However, this list can be significantly expanded and adapted to the medium and long-term goals and objectives, as well as adjusted to the forward-looking nature of the documents. In this case, the choice of methodology is important. Indicators are tied to the goals. A specific indicator can correspond to several goals depending on the focus of the goals.
The author also offers the Integrated Sustainability Index (ISU). The development of the ISU and the design approach are similar to those applied for highly aggregated indices that are currently used worldwide to reflect the main aspects of sustainability. The proposed index integrates basic economic, social, and environmental indicators for Russia. The use of this index makes it possible to compare the economic growth and social and environmental factors, as well as to evaluate the outcomes of socioeconomic and environmental policies.
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