Sociocultural Factors in Economic Development: Problems of History and Theory

Abstract

The article is an attempt to answer the question: “How does culture manifest itself in the economy?” For this purpose, the authors analyzed approaches of various schools of economic theory in regard to the assessment of the role of sociocultural factors in the economic development. Reference to scientific primary sources allowed the authors to point out seemingly insignificant examples of manifestation of the cultural factor in the economy in the works of Russian and foreign authors, which, at the same time, possess important conceptual meaning for the study of the problem in question. The paper proposes to consider the study of the place and role of culture in the economy as a step-by-step process: from the description of examples of the manifestation of culture in the economic space of the historical school to the conceptual model of the cultural factor in the sociocultural economy. Using the works of representatives of German Historical School, of institutional economists and researchers of sociocultural economics school, the authors try to present the regularities of culture functioning in the form of verbal formulae or synopses, for example about the significance of cultural factor in the economy, about the durability and reproductive nature of the culture, about culture as a frame through which economic decisions are made, etc. At the end of the article, the authors make a conclusion that it is necessary to take into account sociocultural factors in the implementation of the operational, tactical and strategic economic policy of the state.