Socio-economic differentiation of space: inconsistencies between the theory and regulation practice

The article notes the inconsistency between significant efforts aimed at resolving the differentiation issue of the social-economic development and low effectiveness of countries, regions. The article analyzes the theories relating to the subject matter of asymmetric development and current reality. The author argues that the modern economic theory leaves unanswered the question concerning the possibilities to eliminate the issue of inequalities within the existing world order, which can potentially result in social tensions and conflicts. The article notes the specifics of the Russian research experience with regard to the socioeconomic differentiation: great number of scientific works, extrinsic interest of the management system, lack of theoretical development, research bias. The criticism of the basic research and regulation postulates of the differentiation in Russia allowed determining the main problem - the necessity to develop the quantitative analysis of the differentiation issue.