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<article xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:ali="http://www.niso.org/schemas/ali/1.0/" article-type="research-article" dtd-version="1.2" xml:lang="ru"><front><journal-meta><journal-id journal-id-type="publisher-id">Digital Economy &amp; Innovations</journal-id><journal-title-group><journal-title xml:lang="en">Digital Economy &amp; Innovations</journal-title><trans-title-group xml:lang="ru"><trans-title>Цифровая экономика и инновации</trans-title></trans-title-group></journal-title-group><issn publication-format="print">3034-2074</issn><issn publication-format="electronic">3034-4204</issn><publisher><publisher-name xml:lang="en">Togliatti State University</publisher-name></publisher></journal-meta><article-meta><article-id pub-id-type="publisher-id">926</article-id><article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.18323/3034-2074-2026-3-66-4</article-id><article-categories><subj-group subj-group-type="toc-heading" xml:lang="en"><subject>Articles</subject></subj-group><subj-group subj-group-type="toc-heading" xml:lang="ru"><subject>Статьи</subject></subj-group><subj-group subj-group-type="article-type"><subject>Research Article</subject></subj-group></article-categories><title-group><article-title xml:lang="en">A comparative analysis of the institutional conditions for the functioning of small and medium-sized enterprises in the economic models of Russia and China</article-title><trans-title-group xml:lang="ru"><trans-title>Сравнительный анализ институциональных условий функционирования малого и среднего предпринимательства в экономических моделях России и Китая</trans-title></trans-title-group></title-group><contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author"><contrib-id contrib-id-type="orcid">https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4953-9560</contrib-id><name-alternatives><name xml:lang="en"><surname>Khmeleva</surname><given-names>Galina A.</given-names></name><name xml:lang="ru"><surname>Хмелева</surname><given-names>Галина Анатольевна</given-names></name></name-alternatives><address><country country="RU">Russian Federation</country></address><bio xml:lang="en"><p>Doctor of Sciences (Economics), Professor, Professor of the Department of Regional Economics and Management</p></bio><bio xml:lang="ru"><p>доктор экономических наук, профессор,профессор кафедры «Региональная экономика и управления»</p></bio><email>galina.a.khmeleva@yandex.ru</email><xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1"/></contrib><contrib contrib-type="author"><contrib-id contrib-id-type="orcid">https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7262-3256</contrib-id><name-alternatives><name xml:lang="en"><surname>Materova</surname><given-names>Elena S.</given-names></name><name xml:lang="ru"><surname>Матерова</surname><given-names>Елена Сергеевна</given-names></name></name-alternatives><address><country country="RU">Russian Federation</country></address><bio xml:lang="en"><p>PhD (Economics), Associate Professor, Assistant Professor of Department of Economic Theory</p></bio><bio xml:lang="ru"><p>кандидат экономических наук, доцент,доцент кафедры «Экономическая теория»</p></bio><email>nedlen63@yandex.ru</email><xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1"/></contrib></contrib-group><aff-alternatives id="aff1"><aff><institution xml:lang="en">Samara State University of Economics</institution></aff><aff><institution xml:lang="ru">Самарский государственный экономический университет</institution></aff></aff-alternatives><content-language>ru</content-language><pub-date date-type="pub" publication-format="electronic" iso-8601-date="2026-09-30"><day>30</day><month>09</month><year>2026</year></pub-date><pub-date date-type="collection"><year>2026</year></pub-date><issue>3</issue><issue-title xml:lang="ru"/><fpage>45</fpage><lpage>57</lpage><history><date date-type="received" iso-8601-date="2026-09-30"><day>30</day><month>09</month><year>2026</year></date><date date-type="accepted" iso-8601-date="2026-09-30"><day>30</day><month>09</month><year>2026</year></date></history><pub-history><event event-type="received"><event-desc>Received:<date date-type="received" iso-8601-date="2026-09-30"><day>30</day><month>09</month><year>2026</year></date></event-desc></event><event event-type="accepted"><event-desc>Accepted:<date date-type="accepted" iso-8601-date="2026-09-30"><day>30</day><month>09</month><year>2026</year></date></event-desc></event><event event-type="pub"><event-desc>Published:<pub-date date-type="pub" publication-format="electronic" iso-8601-date="2026-09-30"><day>30</day><month>09</month><year>2026</year></pub-date></event-desc></event></pub-history><permissions><copyright-statement xml:lang="en">Copyright ©; 2026, Khmeleva G.A., Materova E.S.</copyright-statement><copyright-statement xml:lang="ru">Copyright ©; 2026, Хмелева Г.А., Матерова Е.С.</copyright-statement><copyright-year>2026</copyright-year><copyright-holder xml:lang="en">Khmeleva G.A., Materova E.S.</copyright-holder><copyright-holder xml:lang="ru">Хмелева Г.А., Матерова Е.С.</copyright-holder><ali:free_to_read xmlns:ali="http://www.niso.org/schemas/ali/1.0/"/><license><ali:license_ref xmlns:ali="http://www.niso.org/schemas/ali/1.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0</ali:license_ref></license></permissions><self-uri xlink:href="https://vektornaukieconomika.ru/jour/article/view/926">https://vektornaukieconomika.ru/jour/article/view/926</self-uri><abstract xml:lang="en"><p>Abstract: Problem. Despite growing attention to the institutional conditions of entrepreneurship in Russia and China, there is a shortage of studies that integrate key factors into a single model and assess their combined contribution to the observed gap in the economic performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Aim. To identify the critical institutional gaps between Russia and China in the development of SMEs and to determine priority areas for institutional transformation in Russia on the basis of a comparative analysis. Methods. The study is based on the method-ology of neo-institutional economic theory and employs the comparative case-study method. For each country, four key institutional conditions for SME development were analyzed: the regulatory and legal framework, state support, access to credit, and the tax burden. For these areas, quantitative indicators were developed, on the basis of which the institutional conditions were ranked according to their significance. Results. The overall gap in the SME share of GDP between Russia and China amounts to 40.5 percentage points. The identified hierarchy of institutional factors makes it possible to deter-mine the dominant role of access to credit as the principal structural constraint. The second most significant factor is state support, whereas the regulatory and legal framework and the tax burden demonstrate a relatively smaller lag. A substantial part of the gap is not explained by formal institutional parameters and is interpreted as an institutional residual that reflects differences in the quality of the administrative environment and in informal institutions. Conclusions. The identified hier-archy of factors indicates that priority measures should lie in the sphere of expanding access to credit and increasing the scale of state support relative to GDP. However, a substantial part of the gap is not eliminated by simply increasing quantitative parameters, which requires deep transformations of the institutional environment.</p></abstract><trans-abstract xml:lang="ru"><p>Аннотация. Проблема. Несмотря на растущее внимание к институциональным условиям предпринимательст-ва в России и Китае, существует дефицит работ, интегрирующих ключевые факторы в единую модель и оцени-вающих их совокупный вклад в наблюдаемый разрыв экономической результативности малого и среднего пред-принимательства (МСП). Цель. Выявить критические институциональные разрывы между Россией и Китаем в сфере развития МСП и определить приоритетные направления институциональной трансформации в России на основе сравнительного анализа. Методы. Исследование базируется на методологии неоинституциональной эконо-мической теории и использует метод сравнительного кейс-стади. Для каждой страны проведен анализ четырех ключевых институциональных условия развития МСП: нормативно-правовая база, государственная поддержка, доступность кредитования и налоговая нагрузка. По данным направлениям выработаны количественные показате-ли, на основе которых произведено ранжирование институциональных условий по степени их значимости. Результаты. Общий разрыв доли МСП в ВВП между Россией и Китаем составляет 40,5 п.п. Выявленная иерархия институциональных факторов позволяет определить доминирующую роль доступности кредитования как главного структурного ограничителя. Вторым по значимости фактором выступает государственная поддержка, тогда как нормативно-правовая база и налоговая нагрузка демонстрируют относительно меньшее отставание. Значительная часть разрыва не объясняется формальными институциональными параметрами и интерпретируется как институ-циональный остаток, отражающий различия в качестве административной среды и неформальных институтах. Выводы. Выявленная иерархия факторов указывает на то, что приоритетные меры должны лежать в сфере расши-рения доступа к кредитованию и увеличения масштабов господдержки относительно ВВП. Однако значительная часть разрыва не устраняется простым наращиванием количественных параметров, что требует глубоких преобра-зований институциональной среды.</p></trans-abstract><kwd-group xml:lang="en"><kwd>state support for SMEs</kwd><kwd>access to credit</kwd><kwd>institutional conditions</kwd><kwd>institutional gap</kwd><kwd>small and medium-sized enterprises</kwd><kwd>tax burden</kwd></kwd-group><kwd-group xml:lang="ru"><kwd>государственная поддержка МСП</kwd><kwd>доступность кредитования</kwd><kwd>институциональные условия</kwd><kwd>институциональный разрыв</kwd><kwd>малое и среднее предпринимательство</kwd><kwd>налоговая нагрузка</kwd></kwd-group><funding-group/></article-meta></front><body></body><back><ref-list><ref id="B1"><label>1.</label><citation-alternatives><mixed-citation xml:lang="en">Kuratko D.F., Audretsch D.B. The future of entrepreneurship: the few or the many? Small Business Economics, 2022, vol. 59, no. 1, pp. 269–278. 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