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Lenin's contribution to economic theory is studied by only a limited number of researchers, since most of the academic community considers referring to the investigations carried out by this author to be highly improper. The writer of this article shows, however, that even 150 years after the birth of V.I. Ulyanov, the Leninist theory of imperialism remains relevant, despite requiring critical development and supplementation. This latter is true, in particular, of Lenin's conclusions (1) to the effect that the process of monopolisation leads to the undermining of free competition, which corporate networks in the twenty-first century have turned into a system of relations of manipulation by market actors; (2) on the hegemony of finance capital, which in the present period has served as the cause behind the processes of financialisation; and (3) on the hegemony of transnational corporations and the division of the world between super-powers, which is now leading to the danger of a new repartitioning of the world economic and political space. Following a spiral of the "negation of the negation" (imperialism — social capitalism — neoliberal capitalism), the world is again burdened with problems that are reproducing, on a new level, the causes of the World War and of the series of revolutions in the early twentieth century. "…We need to know how to begin from the beginning several times over": how Lenin's conception of the socialist reconstruction of Russia's economy came into being.

This article offers an initial analyses the mass protests that began in Belarus following the presidential elections of August 2020. Written 'in the heat of events' it has the character of preliminary observations. The authors begin with the background and context of events and the outcomes of the economic and social development of the Republic of Belarus during the 25 years of rule by Lukashenko. A preliminary analysis of the social and class make-up both of the protesters and of those who at the time of writing remained a 'silent majority' is situated in the context of the contradictions within the Belarusian 'power elite'. We attempt to distinguish the main factors behind the developments in Belarus and point to initial lessons of these events for social and humanitarian-oriented networks and organisations.

NEP 100 years ago and today: how should we understand it? Here the editors publish the materials of a discussion on the significance of the New Economic Policy for the development of Russia in the Soviet and post-Soviet periods, and also for the work of devising a strategy for the development of modern capitalism as a whole. The discussion took place in a round-table format, and was organised by the editorial board of the journal Questions of Political Economy together with the Department of Political Economy and the Laboratory of Comparative Research on Socio-Economic Systems of the Faculty of Economics at the M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University. The round table session was held on 3 May 2021 in online format. The following questions were put forward for consideration: Who came up with the concept of NEP – Lenin, Bukharin, Trotsky or Martov? What was the essence of NEP – the mixed economy, taxation, or the chervonets? What was NEP - a retreat, a model of the "integral society", or a highway to socialism? Could NEP have continued for longer, and why was it overturned? Does Russia need a NEP today? Over the past three decades, research into the dynamics of the commercialisation of the Russian economy has made it possible to reveal four periods in the development of this process: a period of accelerated commercialisation, a period of hypercommercialisation, an incipient period of de-commercialisation, and an anticipated period of post-commercialisation. The article analyses the peculiar features and most characteristic phenomena of each of these periods, formulating the main trends of economic policy, trends aimed at overcoming a lack of balance in the relationship between the commercial and non-commercial sectors of the economy. The contours are noted of tendencies in economic theory that break out of the confines of the modern mainstream, and that are oriented toward making quantitative measurements in the field of non-commercial goods. Underlying these tendencies is an effective synthesis of culturology and ...