Формування фінансової архітектоніки забезпечення національного добробуту

Abstract

Scientific perception of the processes taking place in contemporary society requires a continuous improvement of the methodology of economic theory and the development of its categorical apparatus. The thesis is aimed at proving the validity and verifying the applicability of the scientific approach “Beyond GDP” for the study of national well-being. It determines the effect the transformations of financial architectonics have on the sustainable development of the society and considers institutional and functional changes of the components of financial architectonics that provide financing for national well-being. Chapter 1 provides an outline of relevant theoretical framework and current methodological approaches to understanding the category “financial architectonics” of the national well-being as a derivative from institutional architectonics. An important scientific result of the first stage of the study was to determine the relationship between reciprocal and equivalent forms of exchange and trust. Historically, reciprocal exchange was preceded by an equivalent one. In the process of reciprocal exchange there was a transfer of products of labour without specified norms to their number and the need for a reverse transaction that played a symbolic role and embodied an act of establishing, strengthening and consolidating the relationship of trust between the members of the society. The treatment of the relationships of trust in this perspective allows us to rethink the role of financial institutions in creating national well-being and build up the author’s perception of financial architectonics. The financial architectonics of national well-being is the ratio of hierarchical and network components. In terms of institutional design, public finances create hierarchical relationships, decentralized finances generate network relationships, and financial infrastructure institutes mediate the relationships between them. Fiscal and monetary transmission mechanisms transmit the driving impulses of state policy to economic agents. Transmission mechanisms are analysed in terms of mechanism design. Transmission mechanism of the economic system is a way of interaction of the corresponding state institute (impulse moderator) with economic agents. The purpose of this interaction is to create a driving impulse that has to affect economic agents. Being subject to the impulse, economic agents choose the behavioural strategies envisaged by the moderator, which, in turn, leads to projected changes in certain macroeconomic indicators. Chapter 2 examines national welfare as a category of economic theory and financial architectonics of national well-being. A modified definition of the term “well-being” based on the scientific approach to measuring human development “Beyond GDP” is introduced for scientific treatment. Well-being is interpreted as the level of satisfaction of the human needs, community and society contributing to their material, spiritual, social and physical development harmonized with moral and ethical standards and human needs for environmental protection. Development of the method of estimating financial resources directed by society to achieve well-being bypassing GDP as a relative value indicator becomes an essential element for the logic of the study. The thesis determines the objective boundaries and content of the category “well- being funding”. The latter, being a theoretical reflection of a particular financial entity, performs the functions of accumulation, distribution, redistribution and use of funds. These resources are aimed at achieving a higher level of satisfaction of the needs for sustainable development. The methodical approach to estimate the financial resources of the well-being funding is proposed. It involves estimating the amount of funds directed at human development from state and local budgets, corporations and households, weighted inequality and the inflation index. The application of the developed methodological approach allows us to determine the amount of funding aimed at financing the components of the well-being fund.

245 Chapter 3 addresses the issue of the financial architectonics of national well-being in public finances. An important scientific result of the study is the development of the theoretical basis to differentiate the notions “public finance” and “public finances”. The essence of public finances is defined as a special historical form of state finances. Such a transformation takes place provided there are proper institutional arrangements for possibility and necessity to exercise a social choice at both formal and informal levels. The exercise of the social choice is carried out through delegating powers and authority regarding financial resources for the national, local and specific use from the public to the state institutions. There were determined the channels of financial flows in the fiscal transmission mechanism when analyzing the features of the financial architectonics of public finances. The classification criterion is the division of participation in the formation of the resource base of the well-being funding on tax, expenditure, transfer, actuarial, debt and channels of transformation of state property. In the thesis considerable attention is paid to defining classification signs of the insecurity level of debt burden of public finances. On the basis of the ratio between the amount of debt attraction and the cost of servicing available borrowings there were identified the following levels: acceptable, acceptable critical, critical unacceptable and a state of debt trap, in which the amount of attracted financial resources is less than the cost of servicing available borrowings. Chapter 4 explores the institutions of financial infrastructure and their role in shaping the financial architectonics of national well-being provision. The methodical approach for assessing the state of the financial infrastructure of the financial services market was developed. This result was obtained on the basis of a comprehensive review of the system of financial institutions, their assets, the number of institutional units and areas of influence of state regulators, as well as the Financial Depth index. The content of the concept “financial system fragility” underwent further development in the theoretical discourse. The notional field of the original concept was expanded by including the generalized consequences of domination by speculative and Ponzi-financing as a result of diminishing secured borrowing funds. The growing fragility of the financial system results in the distortion of financial architectonics. We have disclosed the content and consequences of the institutional recourse of the deposit- taking corporations sector in Ukraine caused by massive loss of trust, a decrease in their functional specialization and fuzzy market positioning. The analysis of channels of the monetary transmission mechanism of Ukraine showed the destructive consequences of opportunistic violations, as well as the presence of dysfunctions and deformations. They are manifested in the domination of the channels of the exchange rate and the inflation channel, which provides the remaining channels of the monetary transmission mechanism with the signs of speculation. The identified tendency has a negative effect on the financial architectonics of national well-being, distorting its structure and reducing its funding base. Chapter 5 focuses on validating feasibility of the methodological approach to downward and upward Foresight-forecasting changes in the financial architectonics of the national well-being by applying accelerator tools for sustainable development. The proposed methodological approach enables to qualitatively enhance the strategies for the development of systems with complex operational logic and hierarchical network design. The description of the system of social and economic dimensions of the foresight space of the financial architectonics of national well-being finalises the study. When exercising the foresight of national well-being, it is necessary to take into account the information dimension, i.e. the amount and the accuracy of the information, which determines economic behaviour by economic agents. The results of the study showed that application of the Beyond GDP approach to determining the level of national well-being and developing the necessary changes in the financial architectonics of national well-being illustrated by an example of Ukraine proved to be feasible. The results also proved the effectiveness of using the categorical apparatus of sustainable development when analysing the operation of financial systems and institutions. Keywords: well-being, financial architectonics, Beyond GDP, sustainable development, economic theory.