Social and structural changes in Russia: problems and prospects

This article is devoted to a review and general analysis of the main social trends in modern Russian society. In particular, the authors analyze statistical data on the most pressing problems of modern society, in parallel, attention is paid to assessing social trends in a number of the most painful issues, such as: vocational education and employment of the population, stratification of society, labor migration, demographic composition of society, demographic dynamics, processes, social consent and civic engagement of the population.

The Impact of Investment on Sustainable Competitiveness Aspects

The European Union (EU) consists of 27 economies characterized by different economic structures, living standards, demographic dynamics, technology development, and other factors shaping their sustainable development patterns. This chapter aims to examine the impact of total investments and R&D investments on the sustainable development of EU economies and determine how these financial investments impact sustainable competitiveness in the global market. The assessment of the sustainable development performances was performed for the period from 2008 to 2019 using the linear regression model. The key findings pointed out that total investments and R&D investments had different impacts on sustainable competitiveness aspects in old member states (OMS) and new member states (NMS). The results could help policymakers understand, adjust, and optimize sustainable competitiveness to secure economic growth in all regions and reduce the differences between OMS and NMS.

The EAEU Demography and Human Capital: Trends and Losses in the Context of a Pandemic

Demographic dynamics becomes crucially important for successful scenario of the future for both Eurasian integration and each EAEU member state. The “pandemic crisis” caused an increase in excess mortality, reduced social well-being and created serious legal and managerial conflicts. Within the EAEU new barriers to mobility and migration have emerged and social tension has increased. In the existing realities the current supranational solutions are insufficient, they are poorly focused on achieving the demographic security of the EAEU member states. Coordinated actions are needed to significantly improve the demographic situation in the EAEU.

Demographic future of Russia in the UN forecasts: "scientific foresight" and reality

The article provides a brief history of the emergence of demographic forecasts, shows their use by the United Nations, the range of countries for which forecasts were made and are being drawn up, considers demographic forecasts that were carried out during the Soviet era and provides a detailed analysis of demographic forecasts for Russia. In contrast to the forecasts of the population of the Soviet Union as a whole, for Russia they initially began to focus on the downward dynamics. It is concluded that over two decades (1996-2015) in countries with a predominance of the Slavic ethnos (excluding the former republics of Yugoslavia), the population as a whole has decreased to 95.5%, while in countries with a predominance of the Anglo-Saxon ethnos — it increased to 123.8%. The forecasts given in the article are compared with the actual size of the population that has already taken place. Everywhere in countries with a predominance of the Slavic ethnos, the actual population is higher than the predicted, and in countries with a predominance of the Anglo-Saxon ethnos, on the contrary. Comparing the forecasts with the actual population dynamics, the conclusion is substantiated about a noticeable change in the ratio between the two groups of countries united by ethnicity, a decrease in the demographic potential of the Slavic group and its increase in the group with a predominance of the Anglo-Saxon ethnos. In the final part of the work, it is said that the presented rates of change in the population size in 35 years and then in another 50 years, arising from the UN demographic forecasts for 2050 and 2100, as well as the demographic dynamics in the 90s of the twentieth century and in the first 15 years of the new century, indicate that if Russia, like other Slavic countries do not make radical efforts and, accordingly, do not consistently take effective measures to change the demographic trends, then the same thing can happen to Russia as has happened in different centuries to many countries such as Assyria, the Hunnic Empire, etc. The current geopolitical situation in which Russia is, its status as a great power, the country's largest territory in the world, favorable geographical position and colossal natural resources, dictate the need to increase its economic, defense and, naturally, demographic potential.

Accounting for spatial sampling patterns in Bayesian phylogeography

Statistical phylogeography provides useful tools to characterize and quantify the spread of organisms during the course of evolution. Analyzing georeferenced genetic data often relies on the assumption that samples are preferentially collected in densely populated areas of the habitat. Deviation from this assumption negatively impacts the inference of the spatial and demographic dynamics. This issue is pervasive in phylogeography. It affects analyses that approximate the habitat as a set of discrete demes as well as those that treat it as a continuum. The present study introduces a Bayesian modeling approach that explicitly accommodates for spatial sampling strategies. An original inference technique, based on recent advances in statistical computing, is then described that is most suited to modeling data where sequences are preferentially collected at certain locations, independently of the outcome of the evolutionary process. The analysis of georeferenced genetic sequences from the West Nile virus in North America along with simulated data shows how assumptions about spatial sampling may impact our understanding of the forces shaping biodiversity across time and space.

Impacts of Covid-19 on Migration Dynamics and Remittances in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)

The paper therefore x-rays the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on migration dynamics by analyzing types and trends dynamics of migrants’ movement, demographic dynamics of migration as related to the inflow of remittances (both cash and in-kind) to SSA countries prior to the pandemic. Also discusses the constraints of transferring cash remittances and subsequent decline posed by the COVID-19 outbreak during and beyond the pandemics. Secondary evidence from Somali and Nigeria were analyzed on the constraints of remitting cash, while in-kind remittance from the Republic of Chad was evaluated. The importance of remittances to the home communities was established. Measures to safeguard SSA migrants’ mobility and their remittances, citing some selected countries of destination, were exploited. The paper concludes that COVID-19 impacts on migration should be opportunities for policymakers (both home and destination countries) to reset their efforts towards protecting migrants and their future activities.

Admixture dynamics in colonial Mexico and the genetic legacy of the Manila Galleon

Mexico has considerable population substructure due to pre-Columbian diversity and subsequent variation in admixture levels from trans-oceanic migrations, primarily from Europe and Africa, but also, to a lesser extent, from Asia. Detailed analyses exploring sub-continental structure remain limited and post-Columbian demographic dynamics within Mexico have not been inferred with genomic data. We analyze the distribution of ancestry tracts to infer the timing and number of pulses of admixture in ten regions across Mexico, observing older admixture timings in the first colonial cities and more recent timings moving outward into southern and southeastern Mexico. We characterize the specific origin of the heterogeneous Native American ancestry in Mexico: a widespread western-central Native Mesoamerican component in northern Aridoamerican states and a central-eastern Nahua contribution in Guerrero (southern Mexico) and Veracruz to its north. Yucatan shows lowland Mayan ancestry, while Sonora exhibits a unique northwestern native Mexican ancestry matching no sampled reference, each consistent with localized indigenous cultures. Finally, in Acapulco, Guerrero a notable proportion of East Asian ancestry was observed, an understudied heritage in Mexico. We identified the source of this ancestry within Southeast Asia--specifically western Indonesian and non-Negrito Filipino--and dated its arrival to approximately thirteen generations ago (1620 CE). This points to a genetic legacy from the 17th century Manila Galleon trade between the colonial Spanish Philippines and the Pacific port of Acapulco in Spanish Mexico. Although this piece of the colonial Spanish trade route from China to Europe appears in historical records, it has been largely ignored as a source of genetic ancestry in Mexico, neglected due to slavery, assimilation as "Indios" and incomplete historical records.