System effects and risks of the digital economy: An analysis from the perspective of system economic theory

Abstract

The article considers the concept of “digital economy” and its relationship with the concept of “knowledge economy”. It is concluded that the digital economy is officially considered the previous stage before the development of the knowledge society (knowledge economy). A review of the opinions of specialists from different fields of knowledge about the positive and negative effects, as well as the possible risks of the development of the digital economy, is presented. It is proved that despite the objectiveness of the process of moving towards the information society, and further towards the knowledge society, humanity must make efforts that this path will not be destructive for its previous achievements in various fields. From the perspective of system economic theory, an analysis of the system effects and risks of the development of the digital economy in Russia is made. For this purpose, an assessment of the system balance of the distribution of funds in the national project “National Program “Digital Economy of the Russian Federation” is performed. The results of federal projects are classified by system types and the system balance indices are calculated for assessment the financing volumes of the four basic types of economic systems (object, environment, process, and project). The obtained values of the indices of system balance of distribution of funds of the national project “National Program “Digital Economy of the Russian Federation” showed the presence of significant imbalances in the volume of financing between systems of various types. It was revealed that priority support was given to the systems of environment and process types responsible for the development of infrastructure and protocols for collecting, processing, storing and disseminating data. This circumstance should be taken into account in the formation of the country’s economic policy since both the economic systems of the four basic types and the conditions and factors of economic growth should develop proportionally. Application of the presented approach to the development of the digital economy in Russia will make it possible to efficiently distribute financial resources between subsystems, to avoid both duplication of functions by systems of various levels and excessive strengthening or weakening of one or several types of systems.