Legal and institutional problems of setting the practice of municipal strategic planning in Russia

Sub-regional level of the organization of economy and public administration takes an important place within the development strategy of the Russian economy. This is reflected in the strategic planning implementation as a vertical of management actions and planning documents, mutually coordinated and based on a common methodological basis. In addition, a significant contribution of the sub-regional management link to the achievement of economic and social priorities of the Russian economy is possible only in case of effective functioning of local self-government institutions. Such effective operation of local self-government institutions needs a system of preconditions of economic, legal and institutional nature. At present these preconditions are not formed to the extent necessary for successful development and implementation of development strategies in the municipal management. This makes the transition to strategic planning one of the most important goal-setting guidelines for identification and implementation of further steps in the course of municipal reform in the Russian Federation. We should note that it is not the vector of changes itself that is important but the procedure by which these changes are introduced. Recently, the situation has obviously evolved towards separating the population from solving the key questions of functioning and reorganization of local government. Everything, including transformations in local government institutes, is decided by representative bodies of municipalities, and sometimes at the level of the government of sub-federal entities. At the same time, the idea of developing local government as a result of an initiative and responsibility of the population is only growing weaker instead of stronger. The study we have conducted allows to allocate two main conditions allowing to eliminate the formalism in implementation of municipal strategizing. The first one is legislative adoption of a practice in which this strategizing means the highest and most significant form of direct implementation of functions of local government by the population. The second one is legislative confirmation and developed methodological support of flexible forms of municipal strategizing coordinated both with the operating types of municipalities, and with a variety of social and economic conditions of development of territories in various territorial subjects of the Federation.