The article analyses the new Eastern foreign policy of Russia, which has been developing since 2011, and the realization of various projects within this policy. The author posits that world is undergoing profound and dynamic changes, which boil down to two interconnected processes: 1) economic power shift towards Asia-Pacific region, which will define in the near future the shape of the world system; 2) shift of the main political, economic and military contradictions in world politics to this region. These core changes in world politics are also effected by trends in development of Russia and its near abroad. For more than a quarter of the century Russia has been pursuing a regional leadership in building among post-soviet states a mutual space for common interests open for other members of international community. This policy became known as "new Russian Eastern policy" or a policy of Eurasian integration. Its main goal is to establish Eurasian economic union by 2015 which will open boarders of the member states for unrestricted movement of goods, services, capital and workers within the emerging regional market with the total volume of 170-180 million people. Russian leaders look forward to discussing with their European partners prospects for merging Eurasian and European unions into a single economic space stretching from Lisbon to Vladivostok. Conceptually the strategy of Eurasian integration stems from a belief in unity of economic, cultural, civilizational interests of the Eurasian member states with state interests in Asia and Asia-Pacific. Realization of the new Eastern policy will be accompanied by the long awaited development of the Russian Eastern regions.

The third summit of EU's Eastern Partnership held in Vilnius in November 2013 became a real turning point in the development of this organization. And it didn't happen due to signing of the first EU Association Agreement of its kind with the partner states but due to a sudden turn of the largest and most important of them - Ukraine - to the Russia's rival integration project. By doing so Ukraine at least temporarily joined two of the other participating countries: Armenia and Belarus, the latter of which is already in the Custom Union. At the other pole of the Eastern Partnership there are Georgia and Moldavia which initialed the Association and Free Trade agreements with the EU in Vilnius. This widening gap within the Eastern Partnership attracted everybody's attention to the EU - Russia rivalry in the post-Soviet countries which is increasingly interpreted in terms of the clash of civilizations. In this article we'd rather touch upon some of the peculiarities of the Eastern Partnership itself and its participating countries which to a large extent predetermined such an outcome. Among them is the ambiguous legacy of the European Neighbourhood Policy, lack of membership perspective in the EU as well as the nature of societies and elites in these post-Soviet states.

The article is an attempt to comprehend the changes in the Russian approach to the post-Soviet space. The analysis, based on the official government documents and speeches of Russian officials, reveals the stages of foreign policy in accordance with the current situation unfolding in the international arena. The Russian policy towards the nearest international environment shows changes in tactics, semantics and its focus on certain spheres of cooperation for the realization of its own interests. At the same time, the goal of foreign policy and the importance of "post-soviet space" remained the same. Although the postsoviet space in not a geographical region, Russian foreign policy refers to it as a whole. Russian leaders looked at the CIS as for it to become the "new confederation", with time, it turned out to be a platform to share common interests. The CIS has become a Forum for the elaboration of improvised automatisms and solutions among the interested countries. The CIS is not only a direction of foreign policy, but also the key element of success in Russia's policy towards international major powers. Over time, Russian foreign policy became more influenced by the external environment than the internal political and economic situation. The post-Soviet space in Russian foreign policy has evolved from the space of problems and threats into the arena of potential cooperation and integration processes.

The article studies the problems of foreign policy orientations of the Republic of Armenia, first of all those concerning "Russian" and "European" integration processes. Particularly, the main stages and peculiarities of Armenia's cooperation with the EU are presented. The author reflects upon the issue of the essence of the status and perspectives of associated membership in the EU. Revealing the difficulties within the EU and on the CIS territory, the author analyzes the capabilities of Armenia to combine, on the one hand, economic integration with the West and, on the other, military-political integration with the East. The article identifies the reasons of "freezing" Armenian-Russian relations in early 2013. Examining the perspectives of the Association Agreement with the EU and of membership in the Customs Union and taking into account the complex geopolitical situation in the region, analyzing all the facets of Armenia's economic and political collaboration both with the EU and RF, the author comes to the conclusion that Yerevan's choice of September 35 3,2013 is expedient and justified. Deepened strategic cooperation with Moscow, first of all, provides military and energy security of Armenia, although the economic factor shouldn't be underestimated. The author draws attention to the fact that Armenia's involvement in the Customs Union avails it the opportunity to keep collaborating with the European Union, however, from a more powerful position, which we have already witnessed through the alterations in the tone of some European officials.

In contradistinction to the book and the other typographic products, the electronic media operates on a 24-hour-a-day basis evoking simultaneity as the guiding mode of perception and thinking for all those under its influence. The discovery of this fact manifested itself in the formation and development of the managerial technologies operating by means of the electronic information environment and following the principle of simultaneity in the first place. Thus, at the end of the 1960s already the election campaigns in the U.S.A. began to operate on the basis of the final cause as the guiding principle of the country's mass consciousness motivating to carry out each particular event as if already rejoicing at the victory. With this in mind, there emerged a problem of applying this approach with its enormous managerial potential elsewhere. To add, simultaneity as a norm of perception and thinking turned out to be increasingly important with the advent of the electrical telegraph and the press relying on its short disconnected messages instantaneously arriving from all parts of the world. All the other media, which emerged in the wake of this development, has served to fortify this mode of thought as governing in the electronic information environment. The potential of the electronically operating global managerial technologies is quickly growing. The article also deals with the information overload and pattern recognition problem understood in managerial terms as well as mythologization and demythologization processes as they are necessitated by the electronic media coverage worldwide.

The article analyzes different aspects of the "soft power" of Russia. The author affirms that in this field the country doesn't have well defined strategies policy. To Russia has the excellent potential for the promotion of its positive image. This potential is primarily due to the famous Russian science, literature, music and art. But this "natural"potential has to be used in the national interests abroad. In recent years the Russian government has made some important steps in cultural diplomacy, in particular for the promotion of Russian language and supporting Russian Diaspora. However, much more has to be done not only in these directions, but also in propaganda and counterpropaganda to meet information pressure against Russia. In this connection, to form properly all directions of the policy of "soft power", is desirable to use the experience of other countries. The states who pretend to have an important place in the world, consider "soft power" as a strategic policy aiming to strengthen their geopolitical positions. In this context the author offers some suggestions concerning different organizational aspects. Special attention is given to the coordination of the activities of all structures involved in the policy of "soft power ".

The article analyses the political and military aspects of progress in the dialogue between Russia and the U.S./NATO on cooperation in missile defense; investigates the past experiences and current state of cooperation between Russia and the Alliance on missile defense issues; examines the technical features of American missile defence systems today; finds a solution to question whether or not the European Missile Defence Program actually threatens Russia's nuclear deterrent and strategic stability in general; identifies both potential benefits and possible losses for Russia stemming from the development of cooperation with the United States and NATO in countering ballistic missile threats, or from refusal to have such cooperation. Evidently, the initiative of creation of a missile defense in Europe surely belongs to the USA. Washington has enormous technological, financial, economic, military and institutional capabilities in the field of a missile defense, exceeding by far other NATO member-states. In February 2010, the President of the United States B. Obama adopted a project "European Phased Adaptive Approach" (EPAA) as an alternative to G. Bush's global strategic missile defense plan. The first two stages of the Phased Adaptive Approach are focused on creating a system capable of intercepting small, medium and intermediate-range ballistic missiles. The possibility of intercepting long-range missiles is postponed to the third (2018) and forth phases (2020). Moscow finds especially troublesome the third and the fourth phases of Washington's project of creating a European segment of the global antiballistic missile system, considering prospective capabilities of the U.S. interceptor missiles 61 and the envisioned areas of their deployment. The U.S. counter-evidence is that phase four interceptors do not exist yet. Russia insists on getting the political and legal guarantees from the U.S. and NATO that their missile defense systems will not slash the efficiency of Russian nuclear deterrence forces.

The article considers the history of establishing and developing specialized education of diplomats in the pre-revolutionary Russia that was perfected along with the professionalization and growth of the diplomatic service, while the country's international contacts expanded and grew more complicated. The author points out that specialized offices for foreign affairs and permanent diplomatic missions brought about the necessity of training personnel, which meant, in particular, developing specific skills and abilities. Perfecting the training of diplomats implied the growing role of higher education for the personnel in the diplomatic service and making entrance examinations to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs more and more difficult, which meant that the applicants had to possess specific knowledge in history, economics, law, regional studies, etc. The article analyzes the role of universities, lyceums and the Oriental Institute at the Asian Department of the 70 Ministry of Foreign Affairs in professional training of diplomats. The author gives a detailed analysis of the evolution of approaches of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Empire towards raising the standards of training diplomats, the role of the educational qualification and entrance examinations to the diplomatic service. It finally led the Ministry to the idea of creating a specialized education centre.

The article provides the tax systems of the countries of the customs union of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia, reveals the differences and identifies the need for harmonization and convergence of the structures and principles of taxation, the general tax reforms and harmonization of fiscal policies of member countries in order to increase the investment attractiveness and competitiveness of the national economies in the process of development and integration. The comparison of the existing tax systems of the three countries revealed differences affecting the implementation and development of the foreign economic activity of companies in terms of the common market, in particular, the main obstacles to doing business are high tax rates as well as different rates of value added tax (further - VAT) regarding indirect taxation, because this tax is the major budget revenue generating tax involved in the pricing and resulted in decreasing in the export potential of the country. One of the major exporters' obstacles of CU, revealed in the paper, is a VAT refund in export transactions, preventing the development of export activity, which reduces the competitiveness of CU on the foreign markets. The harmonization success of fiscal policy depends on the government, and the institution body taking the harmonization, - this paper looks at the necessity of such harmonization among the three countries of customs union, which at present has interstate form while supranational regulation of Eurasian Economic Commission is absent, since it does not have such empowerment. The paper finds the main tax policy directions of harmonization of customs union countries focused on eliminating of the barriers and for easy the implementation of a process for foreign trade enterprises, the development of the participating countries investment attractiveness, the enhancing the products competitiveness, the development of the export activities efficiency on the whole for the formation of the common customs area. In addition, the practicality of the tax ratio and customs legislation is revealed in this paper. It is important in order to fuel the growth of the integration economic performances and equal competitive conditions for participating countries to give consideration to the harmonization of the taxation of the three countries as one of the main directions of development of integration within the framework of the common economic space (further - CES).

This article is devoted to the process of reforming the global financial system and world economic organizations since the foundation of the International Monetary Fund at the Bretton Woods Conference in 1944 to present time. Special attention is given to results of cooperation of the IMF and the "Group of Twenty"in the context of the world financial crisis 2008-2009. This article mentions the key benchmarks of the historical development of world economy: foundation of the Bretton Woods financial system, rejection of the gold standard at the Jamaica Conference, transition to the floating exchange rates, the wave of crises in the 1990-s, the world financial crisis of 2008-2009. The process of evolution of the IMF within the framework of these global events is considered here. The cooperation of EU, IMF and "Group of Twenty" is considered. The reforms of the IMF and their results are analyzed. The policy of the IMF at different historical stages of its evolution is estimated. As well as it results, the article also deals with the formation and development of the "Group of Twenty". The increasing role of the "Group of Twenty" in the global economic governance and reforming the IMF is considered. Especially is marked the necessity of the further reforms of the IMF and increasing of participation of the "G-20" in the world economic and politic system.

The article examines the FATF specific approach to the problem of terrorism financing. The FATF essence, content of the activity and influence levers are also analyzed within the article. It is shown that the FATF has reviewed the problem of terrorism financing in the broadest perspective, having engaged simultaneously and consistently mechanisms for combating money laundering and terrorism financing. The Task Force has greatly contributed to building of the world counter-terrorism financing system through forming the legal and institutional basis as well as through interaction with all the possible participants and actors of world politics in this area. Moreover, the FATF has succeeded in geographical expansion of the FATF influence from the original 16 to187 jurisdictions by promotion of FATF-style regional bodies establishment. Particular attention is drawn to the unique features of the FATF Recommendations in comparison with the earlier issued sources of international law, which define the international counter-terrorism financing regime. The author believes that one of the advantages of the FATF as an institute within the counter-terrorism financing system among others is the informal status of the FATF, which provides its flexibility and high ability to respond quickly and in a timely manner to evolving nature of money laundering and terrorism financing as well as emerging threats.

An entire generation of American politicians were concerned about the growing U.S. dependence on imported oil and natural gas. However, in the last few years the situation has changed dramatically: there was started the development of not only the resources of shale gas, but shale oil. As a result in political and economic circles they began to talk about it as the most significant breakthrough in the energy resources development since the oil boom in Texas in the late 1920s. How large are these resources? What problems have to be overcome if the available potential will be realized? How will this problems affect the U.S. energy policy? Concerns about the adequacy of regulation, in particular the environmental issues associated with the non-conventional hydrocarbons production, have led to the internal public debate on the impact of unconventional oil and gas resources mining boom. One thing is clear: significant amounts of additional oil and gas supplies in the U.S. will have far-reaching political consequences for the world. The article presents the different points of view on the prospects for oil and gas production in North America, as well as on the political issues related to it.

A bstract: Our magazine publishes a series of articles on shale gas in different countries. This article is about Germany, a main importer of Russian natural gas, so a perspective of exploitation of local shale gas resources is of a clear practical importance for Russia. We discuss external and internal factors which determine position of the German government concerning the shale gas excavation: policy of the USA and the EU, positions of German political parties, influence of the lobbying communities and civic associations. The article contains rich information on vast variety of interests of actors in the domestic discussion. Taking into account the importance of civil society for political decisions, the author rests upon public relations of big companies, their methodic and results. The article summarizes data on reserve estimation and current geological projects, as well all the officially published reports concerning environmental threats cased by fracking technology. On the base of the above analyze, the author predicts possible evolution of the federal government policy.

Analysis of the present condition and prospects of development of the monetary sector of the Russian economy. Quantitative parameters of aggregate turnover, including the value of cash and non-cash it. Researched issues restricting cash advance industry in Russia and other countries; the problems encountered by foreign States in imposing administrative limits on cash payments; provides specific recommendations and identified risks imposing such restrictions in Russia. The article deals with topical issues of optimization of structure of aggregate turnover. Analyzing the development of money turnover, the role and the place of cash in the economy, the author explored the basic approaches to the determination and regulation of money turnover, proposed a new approach to ensure transparency in money flows. Particularly promising cash flow optimization are: a) measures aimed at improving the cash turnover (including maintaining the stability of the national currency, improving the procedures for issuing and withdrawing money from circulation, determine the optimal structure of monetary aggregates, etc.) and b) development of cashless money turnover. The author's position is presented on the future of the scientific basis and practical realization of the optimal ratio of cash and cashless money turnover in Russia and other countries. In particular, felt the need to increase information transparency, openness international information exchange in order to improve monetary policy by countries at the national and international level. To develop common approaches (models) of the analysis and forecasting of financial markets, as well as the establishment of an international coordination centre responsible for the collection, verification and access to public information databases for the cross-country studies of banking and financial and monetary sphere.

In this article, the modern system of regulation of the national banking sector is viewed, which, according to the author, needs theoretical judgment, structuring, disclosure of the maintenance of efficiency of functioning is considered. The system of regulation reveals on a system basis, it is offered to consider it as set of elements and the mechanism of their interaction which are formed taking into account target reference points of regulation. Thus it is emphasized that for regulation the contradiction is concluded: achievement of financial stability of functioning of the banking sector, as a rule, contains economic growth. The need for development of theoretical ideas of efficiency of regulation of the banking sector gains special relevance taking into account the latest events connected with revocation of licenses of commercial banks on implementation of bank activity, the high cost of credit resources for managing subjects, an insignificant contribution of the banking sector to ensuring rates of economic growth. The author offered criteria of efficiency of regulation of the banking sector to which are referred: functional, operational, social, and economic efficiency. Functional efficiency opens ability of each subsystem of regulation to carry out the functions ordered by the law. Operational efficiency describes correctness suffered by the regulator and commercial banks of the expenses connected with regulating influence. At last, social and economic efficiency is connected with degree of compliance of a field of activity of the banking sector to requirements of national economy, and responsibility of banking business before society. For each criterion of efficiency of regulation of the banking sector the set of the quantitative and quality indicators, allowing to give the corresponding assessment of the working model of crediting is offered. The aggregated expert assessment of the Russian system of regulation of the banking sector which is characterized as compensatory and satisfactory is given in article.

The downside of investment's addition rate in Russia, lack of capital investments result from "poor investment attractiveness". As a result, the companies' financial imbalance together with high investments risks lead to capital outflow from the country by virtue of offshores. Along with negative aspects connected with "financial oases" many advantages are given to the business community: lessening of tax payments, monetary privacy and confidentiality of operations. Taking in consideration the above and also the existence of specific international agreements concerning the avoidance of double taxation and offshore zones, the banner of the latter appears to be quite difficult and would divest the global economy of an important segment of global economic growth. The author performed a SWOT analysis of the role and the importance of offshores in international economy. Tolerant coexistence of local and global economic interests seems to be achievable by implementing a distinct circumspect and complex plan of measures aimed at the raise of the investment attractiveness of a country, for which the creation of "Skolkovo" and new Institutes for market development would not be sufficient. Transparent and oriented on business stability and safety provision of monitor and regulatory system, data interflow, improvement of prudential control on financial markets operations - are parts of measures that have to be accomplished in order to solve and exclude the problems associated with offshores. But the author also appeals to not forgetting that besides the offshores exists a number of such issues directly related to the outflow of capital as lowering of inflationary pace, enlargement of direct investment flow-in, support of social peace, which have to be handled for the purposes of improvement of domestic investment climate of countries with developing economy.

The article deals with topical issues in international relations of the Russian Federation on the basis of the increased use of the ruble as the currency contracts and payments. The work shows the coordinated support of economic actors, public institutions of countries-partners. Collaborate with international teams, according to the author of the article, the implementation of economic programs of mutual interest and reinforces the trend of creating a multipolar world. The analysis of problems of development cooperation partners countries in the monetary sphere and shows that the main causes hindering greater use of domestic currencies are: hard currency regulation; a rare use of letters of credit and guarantees, which increases the financial risk operations; significant transaction costs; asymmetrical measures, currency regulation, burdening the mutual interests of the parties. To expand the use of the ruble in international relations author offers take into account a number of factors, including the need for a priority international currency contracts to perform the basic functions of money abroad is a measure of the value, means of payment and means of hoarding. The author's position is presented about the prospects of State institutional policy. In particular, the conclusion: the experience of Bulgaria, Romania, Albania has shown that the main task of the departments responsible for implementing the monetary policy should be the containment of inflationary pressures associated, including overdue contributions to the budget. A key priority in such circumstances is to support solvent and transparent banking systems, which are the basis for international cooperation.

The article deals with actual problems of modern state and development prospects of cash circulation in Russia and abroad; the comparative analysis of monetization of the economy of Russia and foreign countries; quantitative parameters of aggregate money turnover, including the value of cash and non-cash spheres; the correlations of macroeconomic variables and indicators of cash circulation in Russia. Special attention is given by the authors to the limitations of cash payments and settlements in the fight against shadow economy. In particular, researched the level of shadow economy; the relationship between cash money circulation and shadow economy; the problems encountered by foreign states in imposing administrative limits on the amount of payments in cash; provides specific recommendations and outlines the required steps to introduce such restrictions in Russia. It is concluded that the limitation of the maximum size of payments in cash can lead to simultaneous reduce the underground economy because revenues derived from the hidden and informal economic activities can be translated in non-cash form. However, in the long run, when adopting legislative restrictions on the payment of funds by individuals on their own bank accounts or, for example, need to prove the lawful origin of money if you make them into a bank account to limit payments in cash will be the first step towards the goal of reducing shadow economy in Russia. In general, limiting the cash circulation - multi-factor task - that requires the solution of economic, political, social, administrative, psychological problems. The overall decrease in cash money (up to the optimum, economically justified level), it will lead to lower inflation rates, the level of corruption, will improve the investment climate and the liberalization of the credit market in our country.

For the economy is very important to have the amount of money in circulation, sufficient to serve the movement of goods and services without generating inflation, indicating an excess of money, so matching the growth rate of monetary and commodity weight control is an important task of the monetary system in all countries. During the time of the gold standard and bimetallism regulation of the economy as a whole was not considered as an important macroeconomic problem. But the economic crisis of 1929 - 1933 forced to reconsider these views and problems of regulation of financial and credit sphere began to be perceived as a function of a stable level of production and employment. The article describes the monetary factors of inflation in the economy and describes the causes, which can lead to programming of monetary growth in the Russian Federation. As the first group of factors impact on the volume of money in circulation in the national economy, the author defined low value added products produced in the country, based on the external market, and the absence, so the room for maneuver of financial resources to stabilize budget revenues with a deterioration in global market conditions. The weakening of the national currency provides large ruble revenues from exports, which reduces the growth of the budget deficit. But the decline of import revenues, which can compensate for the devaluation of the national currency, leads to higher prices in the domestic market due to the prevalence it offers imported goods. The second group of factors linked to the credit activity of banks, which consists in increasing primary issue in lending importers and secondary, which occurs during the formation of foreign exchange reserves by the Bank of Russia. Result of credit activity of banks is to increase money supply growth and the discrepancy between the higher growth of money in circulation and lower growth rates actually created in the production of value added, which leads to the weakening purchasing power of money and rising prices. Each reason has a direct impact on money supply growth and inflation initiates.

In this article the topical issues connected with changes are considered, occurring in the banking sector of Russia, the number of the operating credit organizations caused by essential reduction, intensive revocation of licenses on bank activity at the credit organizations Bank of Russia. According to the author, in this regard there is a number of the problems connected with sufficiency of a network of the operating credit organizations of requirement of ensuring economic growth, formation of the healthy competitive environment, sufficiency of Fund of insurance of deposits for providing guarantees to investors in case of bankruptcy of banks. In article, recent trends of insurance of deposits in the countries of EEC and the USA are considered. Taking into account the revealed tendencies problems of functioning of system of insurance of deposits of citizens in the Russian commercial banks are analyzed. To number of such problems are carried: insufficient volume of an insurance covering; concentration of deposits mainly in the large banks which are on the one hand, carriers of system risk, with another, - in which capitals participates the state, having thus subsidiary responsibility; limited set of functions of Agency and some other. Taking into account the carried-out analysis and an assessment of operating system of insurance of deposits it is offered: to develop the mechanism of overcoming of "moral" risk; increase of financial literacy of the population, in view of activity of some banks on advance in a segment of private investors of the products which aren't covered by system of guaranteeing; to define introduction of the mechanism of differentiation of contributions to the ASV insurance Fund depending on degree of riskiness of activity of participating bank of system, system modernization risk - the focused supervision as bases of stable functioning of the banking sector and its hotel institutes.

The article analyzes the characteristics of the program of Assistance to Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) in the United States. This program is aimed at support and subsequent commercialization of high technology developed by small firms. The government agencies involved in the implementation of the program determine the research areas manage the allocated funds themselves. The program has been in operation for over 30 years and has proven to be effective. It provides business with funds necessary at the primary, the most risky phase of production of innovative goods and services, and also gives signals to the market about popular areas of innovation development. Participation in the program is a guarantee of a high level for innovative product or service produced by the firm and allows companies to raise additional funds. Conclusions drawn from the analysis of the SBIR may be useful for the policy support of science and technology in Russia. The implementation of programs similar to SBIR in Russia will solve the actual problem of innovation development, to reduce information asymmetry in the market of innovative products and services and help in attracting venture capital in high-technology projects.

The modern system of international relations more often faces the conflicts of different tension which appear in different regions of the world. Conflicts of the beginning of XXI century are determined by different political, economic, national and confessional reasons. The system of international relations faced the crisis. This system had existed for many centuries and was adopted in the Westphalia Peace. The ending of the Cold War made the world see the new conditions whose distinctive feature was an increasing quantitative index of clashes. A number of political changes at the beginning of the current decade have resulted in changes of political regimes in these countries. On the whole, the process of peaceful political transformation was characteristic of the events of the so-called «Arabic spring». However, similar changes in Libya proved to have a different character causing military changes and NATO's military intervention. If the process of social uprising turned into protest-street disturbances in Egypt and Tunis, in Libya there was an armed overthrow of the authorities by the opposition supported by foreign states. The author touches upon the events of the Arabic spring which resulted in overthrowing Gaddafi's regime. NATO' policy was criticized in the course of military actions in Libya. The author considers NATO's views, particularly, that of the USA, France and Great Britain in terms of the Libyan crisis and its solutions. The study of the conflict mechanism, its nature will allow to estimate taken by the world measures influencing the modern system of international relations.

RETRACTED

The political paradigm shift after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the economic crisis, and the provision of religious freedom were all conducive to the aspirations of a vast majority of the population. They yearn, on one hand, to determine new value guidelines and, on the other, to compensate for the stress, fear, and uncertainty caused by reforms and crisis by means of religion. This can be clearly seen in the unprecedented surge of the levels of religiosity in the country and is directly influenced the dynamic of the diversity of religious organizations. In the last 20 years, a confessional distribution of believers typical of a mosaic cultural tradition and the composition of nationality in Russia has been formed. The overwhelming majority are orthodox, followed by (in descending order) Muslims, Protestants, Catholics, Buddhists, Judaists, and others. At the same time, religiosity in Russia is quite discordant. It is commonplace to consider it to be very spiritual and orthodox-orientated. But research often points at the opposite. For example, the level or religious practice amongst Orthodox Russians is fairly low. In this context, Protestant religious denominations in Russia feature a high level of commitment to all kinds of religious practice within its congregation, extensive involvement in religious dogmas, and a drive towards consolidation and every-day cooperation. Protestants are the most pluralistic and dynamically developing segment of the Russian religious field. Research shows that in the last 20 years, in conditions of the dominant influence of the Orthodox Church on Russian society, a protestant community has been formed, which is economically independent, socially organized, and is one of the most dynamic religious movements. According to expert opinion, even though the number of Protestants is relatively low, the protestant religious denomination can function as a socially and economically active minority, capable of exerting positive influence on the country's development and the overcoming of crises, provided that they will be successful in creating an effective model of internal consolidation.

The impact of interest groups on foreign policy of the state up until today has not received substantial attention in the theory of international relations. In particular, activities of the entities shaped by the common religious affiliation of their members lack assessment in the academic literature. Meanwhile, their mobilization in the recent decades became significant aspect of political life both in developing and developed countries. The activity of religious groups in the United States forced deep transformation of the national political landscape, as they desire to affect not only internal debate, but external policies as well. Among other issues attention of such social and political bodies is also focused on the situation in the middle East. Their proactive standing facilitated advancement of the partnership between the United States and Israel, including growth of American diplomatic and military aid to Tel-Aviv. The supporters of such policy include not only small, but well organized Jewish community, but also representatives of the conservative Evangelical Protestants, which constitute the most numerous religious group in the U.S. Despite the fact that leaders of both group often use theological reasons to justify their support for Israel, the real motivation of the most regular members is primarily humanitarian and pragmatic. The diversity of the Pro-Israeli groups promotes bipartisan support of cooperation between the two countries, and enabled creation of both Democratic and Republican lobby on this issue. However the growing criticism of the current policy of Tel-Aviv on behalf of some of the adherents of American-Israeli cooperation leads to the erosion of impact of these groups.

Russia-EU customs cooperation legal base in force has been outdated and is hardly able to meet demands of trade-economic cooperation between Russia and EU. In particular, structure and substance of Russia-EU customs cooperation regulation do not allow to successfully respond to the challenges of bilateral trade. This is stipulated by legal changes at international level for Russia including ratification of International convention on harmonization and simplification of customs procedures of May 18, 1973, forming of Customs union, WTO accession) and following reforms of custom procedures in Russia. Besides, legal base of Russia-EU customs cooperation does not take into consideration the following measures of modernization of customs regulation in the EU: active use of preliminary information change, electronic methods of fulfilment of customs formalities as well as implementation of modern customs techniques, targeted at simplification and securing of customs formalities. Due to the above-mentioned facts and keeping in mind the high role of mutual trade for well-being of both Russia and EU, improvement of customs cooperation legal base becomes the urgent task. The author of the article points out the Initiative Russia-EU «Partnership for modernization» is able to be one the most crucial instruments of development of Russia-EU customs cooperation legal base. The Initiative is conceived to contribute to economic growth of Russia and EU by virtue of implementation of modernized agenda including in customs sphere. Because of that author analyses customs cooperation issues provided by the Initiative, detects its weak points and proposes approaches towards enhancing Russia-EU trade-economic cooperation by means of modernization of trade flows customs administration.

The article considers peer review as the main procedure for demarcating scientific knowledge from other kinds thereof, which do not meet the criteria set for research results. The authors examine the history of peer review, which has first been used in early scientific journals and then has become one of the key approaches to distributing funds for research in science foundations, such as the U.S. National Science Foundation. The article also considers the role of peer review in the legal process, wherein observance of this procedure can be seen as the main criteria, which separates scientific evidence from mere testimony. The description of the main elements of the peer review procedure is based on the "Statement of principles for scientific merit review" the summary of the results of the Global Summit on Merit Review, which brought together heads of science funding organizations from more than 50 countries. The Statement listed the following principles: expert assessment, transparency, impartiality, appropriateness, confidentiality, integrity and ethical considerations. Although these principles are seen as a way to guarantee efficient peer review one has to consider the peculiarities of a particular research area, first of all the differences between social and natural sciences. Accordingly the article gives an overview of key traits of peer review in the social sciences and humanities. The authors also consider the main procedural elements - preparation of individual reviews, consideration by panels, anonymity of reviewers. Finally the article addresses the problems of peer review such as non-transparent process, elitism in selecting reviewers, conservativeness of decisions, and possible ways of handling these problems.

Events that occurred in 2013 as a result of illegal assignment of academic degrees, acquired the nature of scandal. According to the author, thesis scandal has provided a deeper understanding of the essence of processes both in the scientific and educational community and in the whole socio-humanitarian sphere of Russian society. The scandal, which affected many deputies of the State Duma, governors of some Russian regions and senior government officials, has attracted attention of Russian political leaders and the general public. It uncovered many shortcomings of existing approaches to the determination of qualification level of the research and education community's members, the viability of the universities; revealed the real challenges to the successful development of science and higher education. Thesis scandal showed values which define the state of social and humanitarian spheres of Russian society, the relations within the scientific and educational community and the results of reforms in it. Analyzing the situation in domestic science, the problems specific to the Russian scientific and educational community, the author is not limited to the conclusion that this scandal has deep socio-cultural reasons. The author has to declare, that forced borrowings of alien norms and principles for domestic science, promising to come to the fore in the future, today turn into the traditional desire to take the lead on the "top-down" indicators.

In this article social practicians of large Russian corporations, conditions of creation of social strategy by them are analyzed. The ambiguous treatment of the corporate social responsibility (CSR) of subjects of interaction in system "business-society-state', a big range of economic, social, cultural problems which corporations need to consider at adoption of business solutions, is the soil for the conflict of interests and limits possibilities of development of business. New trends in practice of CSR of the Russian corporations concern change of character and essence of their social activity that reflects more adequate level of reflexivity business community of requirements of the changed society. Dynamics in approach of the Russian corporations to a choice of spheres of application of social investments, change of motivation of social and responsible behavior and interaction forms with authorities, public groups and movements is revealed. The most effective, from the point of view of business, model of interaction of business and the state is joint definition of priorities of social policy and those areas in which business can take active part. Large corporations start acting as initiators of dialogue and partner interaction with representatives of authorities and local communities, there are the social innovations initiated by business community and directed on increase of efficiency of social investments, development of social partnership and social business.

Under the conditions of the accelerated development of Russian economics, commercial sector and due to a great number of international private companies we can see the intensified problem of tolerance of future diplomats, international specialists, regarding to the system, its the main components such as political, economic, military. It is supposed, that in the modern student environment of future diplomats we can notice the exaltation of values of individual pragmatism and increasing the lack of sociality by deciding of questions about their present and future professional activity. Sociological researches carried out among the students of faculty of international affairs in 2002, 2007 and 2012 review different factors of professional and communicative tolerance. The author of this article markes and diagnoses the materially - pragmatic and art-substantial values of the chosen profession and it's given an interpretation of value orientations content on the categories of employment after the university graduation. Students' estimations define the personal competents of government employee, which are necessary for the successful carrier in the system of MFA of Russia. The interpretation and the real content of communicative tolerance levels are reviewed in the article. The ethnic component of communicative tolerance is studied separately. In conclusion of the article we can define the role of material differentiation of students in the context of communicative tolerance. According to the analyse it is confuted the initial supposition about the glorification of individual pragmatic values and shortage of social responsibility in the student environment. It was found out, that in the communicative tolerance the level of empathy in the personal contact is keeping to be prevalent and stable according to different years of survey. However, it is deduced, the occurred for 10 years the growth of students material welfare didn't contribute to the growth of communicative tolerance. On the whole, data analysis for 10 years of monitoring shows, that the balance of tolerant and intolerant factors regarding the selected profession and communicative practices is keeping to be the same in the student environment.

The variety of conceptual aspects of the Frances's external cultural policy is considered in the article through adjustments introduced to it by different governments which staggered each other since 1980s. The modern concept of the French cultural diplomacy was a result of a long historic evolution in the framework of the traditional action of its governors aimed at protection of cultural identity and national interests of their country. From its genesis in the Middle Ages in the form of voluntary acts by its Monarchs and further by Republican Presidents this very concept was never translated into a basic programmatic document. It happened only in 1983 within specific historical circumstances in a form of a doctrinal paper entitled "External cultural project of France" elaborated and approved by the government of socialists. Since that time, conventionally speaking, the doctrine of the external cultural action of France could be divided in three stock ideas: cultural "shining", cultural exception and cultural diversity which alternated each other.

The article considers psychological aspects of androgynous, dual human nature promoting harmonious relationship among the people, interaction between feminity and masculinity. The concepts of androgyne, androgynity and androgynization which correspond to cultural and socio-political conditions of traditional, modern and post-modern society are introduced. The article examines the history and evolution of the phenomenon of androgyne in ancient mythology, medieval religious philosophy, modern philosophy, present-day psychological science and practice. The author comes to the conclusion that there are two kinds of psychological androgynity: symbolic and real. The real androgynity became the subject of special psychological researches, caused the renunciation of the symbolic one and can be regarded as an important individual feature and human advantage. The transformation of the concept of androgyne is analyzed: from its interpretation as а first man to divine, ritual, psychological androgyne finally regarded as a "post-gender". The results of the study on "Psychological gender in socio-cultural dimension" conducted under the auspices of the Laboratory for Sociological Researches of MGIMO-University (School of International Journalism) are presented.

The article adresses the modal and grammatical functions of the polyfunctional verb should as presented in the language corpus ICE-GB compiled in 1993. It is based on the ideas of poly functionalism laid out in the works of A. Smirnitsky, T. Komova, and others scientists. The author aims at studying the distribution of functions of the verb should; the material is also considered from the standpoint of the extralinguistic parameters of the speaker's gender and age. The analysis of the material shows that the modal function still prevails over the grammatical one, which explains the logic of presenting the material in books on grammar where the first meaning of this verb to be studied is (mild) obligation. The grammatical function is realized in the Suppositional and Conditional oblique moods (A. Smirnitsky's classification). Genderwise, men's speech contains a few more polite formulae that show more consideration for the interlocutor which is generally considered to be typical of women's speech; on the other hand, there is some proof that phrases constructed by men are perceived as more aggressive. Bringing the speaker's age into play seems to suggest that a higher ratio of oblique moods in the speech signifies a free use of language. Some of the notional lexical verbs forming regular collocations with should have been singled out and grouped.

'At the heart of any language lies a vision. It embraces the world around us in myriads of complex ways. It is the lifeblood of every people's identity. It is so essential and indispensable that few assets of humankind can rival it for value or timelessness. It is known as the linguistic picture of the world, and it is notorious for being among the knottiest study subjects of language science. No coherent methodology has been proposed to date as to how it should be consistently structured to result in a systemic and navigable map of its core words and concepts. This constitutes a conspicuous gap in contemporary linguistics, which the present article addresses from the perspective of cognitive lexicology and lexicography while engaging the linguistic picture of the world on a segment-by-segment basis. In keeping with the aforesaid approach, one segment at a time is selected, and the discourse that reflects it is analysed with a view to identifying transcendental notions contained therein. The latter are construed as a type of cognitive concepts which epitomise the core ideas inherent in a particular type of spoken or written discourse. Being verbalised by means of relevant verbal fields, these transcendental notions permeate the cognitive and textual fabric of the selected segment of a linguistic picture of the world. By way of demonstrating the feasibility of this approach, a new type of dictionary has been compiled by the author, which captures and reveals in a semantically structured way the verbal side of the transcendental notion "countering" in the socio-political discourse of English-language media. Along with other transcendental notions, such as "facilitation", "communication", "attitude", etc., it is viewed as part of a range of the cognitive pillars which are essential to a limited segment of a linguistic picture of the world, but are by no means reserved to it, stretching far beyond and reaching throughout the vision of the world enshrined in the English language. The present article asserts and demonstrates by example that by creating the described type of dictionaries a basis can be laid for engaging the broader linguistic picture of the world in a whole new way, as their structure enables the drawing of clear semantic boundaries between and within the verbal fields of major concepts. These, in turn, can be used for creating maps, or rather atlases, initially of the smaller segments of linguistic pictures of the world, which may over time, and with enough methodological evolution, transform into larger-scale projects covering different languages, which arguably contains a hitherto unexplored potential for comparing them at a new systemic level, that of the structure and internal semantic delimitation of linguistic pictures of the world.

Thanks to different mass media sources, members of any society are well aware of political developments and events and politicians. Every person has his or her own formed political beliefs and affirmations, interpreters other people's actions during political developments and evaluates events that take place. Political forces, in turn, see a person (a potential elector) as an object of external information influence. This lets them use political communication when competing for the power. In the modern democratic society this competition is carried out via parliamentarian debates, politicians' speeches, examining political parties' programs, political agitation and voting. General audience-oriented political discourse implements its function of political information influence. As the goal of any political party's program (as an independent form of text in the system of political discourse) is to win the elections and come to power, thus the audience influence function is one of the most fundamental and serve as the basis for the text. The text of a program itself is characterized by its persuasive orientation towards the audience, which reveal itself in such methods as convincing, argumentation, manipulation and evaluation. All the political programs pertain to parties which are at the power or which are in opposition. The main characteristic of oppositional programs is the criticism of the power, vice versa, the dominant party's programs confirm the correctness of their policy. All the political programs are multi-authored. The written form of any political program lets put into practice a detailed text analysis. This article presents the analysis of the texts of two leading Spanish political parties (the Spanish socialist worker's party and the people's party of Spain).

The article is devoted to personality intercourse between writer and reader in Belles-Lettres. The intercourse between the self of the writer and the self of the reader realizes itself in the processes of writing and reading belles-lettres texts that serve as specific mediators between the two selfs. The article shows the free and personal nature of the intercourse. In the article, the author singles out and gives descriptions of stages/levels of involvement into belles-lettres personality intercourse. The author distinguishes five conventional stages: superficial or shallow stage, contradiction or conflict stage, identity or emotional stage, transcendental stage and supersensitive stage. Degree of openness of selfs to each other and degree of willingness on the part of the participants to express their own selfs serve as criteria of separating one stage from another. Degree of openness of selfs to each other is represented as a degree of the reader's openness to the writer's influence. While degree of willingness to express one's own self is perceived as a degree of the writer's or reader's readiness to reveal their self. The author argues that at each stage of intercourse its participants demonstrate a different degree of their involvement into it, which leads to misinterpretations of texts on the part of the reader and on the whole to misunderstanding between the reader and writer. The reader's transition from one stage to another can have a gradual character. However, the reader's transition to the writer's stage of intercourse can also be instantaneous, which depends on the reader's individual ability of perception as well as the writer's skill. The author of the article comes to the conclusion that understanding or misunderstanding between writer and reader as well as different interpretations of the writer's belles-lettres work by the reader lie at different stages in a degree of the reader's involvement into the intercourse suggested to him/her by the writer. In cases when both parties find themselves at one and the same stage of personal involvement the intercourse between them results in agreement of the written text and its interpretation by the reader. Thus, the writer acquires their readership while the reader discovers the writer who responds to his/her individuality.

The article is devoted to the problems of actualization of phraseological units in the context of the French youth press. Due to the development of the connotative component of the meaning, phraseological units, as expressive means of the language, are often used in the process of communication to influence the addressee. The phraseological units with positive or negative estimation, expressing emotionally-evaluative attitude of the speaker towards the subject, influence the creation of the pragmatic direction of the utterance. Effected by the context, some changes take place within the structure of phraseological meaning. As the result the pragmatic direction of the text is increased. When a cliché is included into the context, the virtual (pragmatic) meaning is substituted by the actual (syntagmatic) meaning. Here, two variants of interaction of these meanings are possible. In the first case, the paradigmatic meaning and the syntagmatic meaning can coincide (thus, the phraseological unit is presented in its casual meaning.) In the latter case, the meaning of the cliché can be transformed under the influence of the context. It often leads to the divergence between paradigmatic and syntagmatic meanings. Thus, connotative-pragmatic characteristics of any phraseological unit can be defined by the context and it leads to : a) a cliché, losing its situational-evaluative feature (influenced by the context, the situational feature disappears and the cliché gets a positive or negative evaluation); b) the transition of the cliché to the "oppositely charged" field (phraseological units with negative connotation get positive connotation and vice versa); c) the intensification of phraseological meaning. The analyzed examples, proving the influence of the context on phraseological meaning, were taken from various French youth journals. (Okapi, le Monde des ados, Geo ado, Phosphore, Etudiant, Science & Vie Junior, Planète Jeunes).

In a consequence of the perpetual changes in the world of fashion, which can be explained by the introduction of new tendencies, materials and designers, the vocabulary that describes clothing enlarges by the internal means of the language and with the help of lexical borrowing. The article considers the characteristic usage of terms-eponyms for clothing description in Spanish language. Eponyms complicate the learning of languages and translation being a result of the worldview reflection of a determinate group of people in a determined period of time. As the study sets out to find out and explain the connotative meanings of vestimentary eponyms and suggest an approach for synonyms choice from their family for the discourse purposes, the toponyms are not taken into consideration, and the study concentrates on the anthroponyms, proper nouns which identify people, because they can adjust special connotative meanings to the terms within cultural linguistics context. The author shows the examples of etymology of originally Spanish and borrowed terms. Their comparison allows to make out the principles for the classification, authenticity and internationality amongst them. This classification divides all the vestimentary terms-eponyms into two main groups (neutral and with connotative meaning). Then it is possible to systematize and explain the meaning of the second group. According to the study international borrowed terms-eponyms look to neutrality, but among other synonyms acquire the meaning of elitism. Not international vestimentary terms-eponyms have a special connotative meaning, which is known amongst native speakers, that is why while teaching or translating more attention should be paid to them.

The article considers new tasks of universities and faculties training students of international relations. The author analyzes the essence of the concept "paradigm" in education because paradigm serves as the basis of the educational process in universities. The content of professional education depends on the aims of professional education of specialists in international relations. The process of globalization, global changes, challenges and threats bring about the necessity to study specific features of international cooperation in ecology, psychology of conflict, psychology of leadership, etc. In the age of globalization, national economies are converging while national cultures are diverging. Representatives of different nations realize the importance of preserving cultural identity. It is of vital importance to instil tolerance in future specialists in international relations and prepare them for cross-cultural communication. At the same time, it is necessary that they should not only enjoy individual freedom and national cultural identity, but realize their own responsibility to the state. In the modern world, the axiological and educational functions of professional training are growing. At the same time, it is crucial to let the students build a number of professionally relevant competences that will make it possible for them to effectively perform their professional functions. It is the competence-based approach that makes the basis of Federal state education standards, including education standards for faculties of international relations. Another direction that needs developing is training and retraining lecturers for universities specializing in international relations. Foreign language training of lecturers in basic subjects will make it possible for the, to give lectures in foreign languages, particularly in English, which, in its turn, will help to make Russia's universities more competitive.

The research is devoted to a multi-level study of the essence and role of text creation comprehension in teaching a foreign language. Capturing motivational and logical mental structures along with recognising communicative and cognitive aspects of a person's identity in a text are key linguopsychological elements of studying text activities. The scientific value of the research is in specifying the operational approach to describing a concrete level of a person's consciousness, on which cognitive structures acquire language realisation in the process on communication. Existence of a person's concsiousness is considered on three levels of abstracrion within the conscious: sensory field, associative field, motivational field. The contents of a person's language consciousness can be described through its thesaurus and presented as a filter that sifts through incoming meaningful information expressed in the sign form. The process of first language acquisition by a child is closely related to the apprearance of the correlation between dynamic and static systems of sound production (syllable production and articulation). Tranfer to foreign language acquisition will then be connected only with changing the characted of the correlation in each specific case. Foreign language teaching is connected with the learners' using the language skills they already possess. Peculiarity of language consciousness is revealed both when comparing lexical and grammatical categories in several languages, in which the forms of the same category have different meanings, and when comparing a limited set of such linguistic meanings with an unlimited number of linguistic features and relations between the objects.