Evaluation of Temporal Growth of Russian Cities

The development of a regional policy framework shifted the topic of the role of cities to the focus of the current scientific and political agenda. The purpose of the article is to analyze the stability of the urban system of Russia using the Zipf's law and assess the growth of Russian cities using the Gibrat's law. Design/methodology/approach: Zipf's law, Gibrat's law were used as methodological tools; the exponential function was estimated using the ordinary least squares method. We used official statistics and archival materials. Findings: For the analyzed period 1897–2014, the value of the Zipf coefficient increased from 0.64 to 1.2. Consequently, the urban system of Russia can be considered as stable, the population is unevenly dispersed in small and medium cities. The process of urban growth over the period 1897-2002 was ambiguous: until 1970, small cities grew faster than large ones, as the population migrated from the village to small cities within the region's borders. Since 1989, large cities have been growing faster than small ones, since the process of population migration from small to large cities has been taking place. The development of urban systems is influenced by external factors, which makes it possible to manage their sustainable development with the help of political and economic instruments. Research/practical implications: The results will serve as the basis for the formation of political recommendations and allow us to evaluate the correctness and effectiveness of government regulation measures aimed at achieving a balanced and sustainable development of Russia's urban systems and the development of program-design mechanisms for managing urban structures. Originality/value: The analysis used archival census data of the XIX century in Russia. A comparative analysis of demographic dynamics in the context of federal districts for the cities of Russia has not been conducted before; the Gibrat's law is empirically analyzed using nonparametric methods for the first time and is directly related to the results of estimates of the cities' size.