Enterprise Economic Security: a New Concept for a Known Problem
N. O. Rybnikova1,2, S. V. Rybnikov2
1Volodymyr Dahl East-Ukrainian National University, Luhansk
2Initiative to Contribute to Ecology-and-Economics
Integration, Luhansk
Though relatively new, economic security (ES) is now
one of the most popular concepts within the post-soviet economic thought. But
this is quite another concept than it is used to think of in western world. It
is attributed mainly to individuals as "a situation of having a stable
source of financial income that allows for the on-going maintenance of one's
standard of living currently and in the near future" [1]. Indirectly, this
affects ES of a country: American ES Index is proposed to be "the share of
Americans who experience at least a 25% drop in their available family income
whether due to a decline in income or a spike in medical spending or a
combination of the two, and who lack an adequate financial safety net to catch
them when they fall" [3]. If interpreted in general, ES can be expanded to
all economic agents, including companies; though, the latter happens relatively
seldom, as Financial Times Lexicon states [2].
Contrary to this, Russian and Ukrainian researchers
use ES mainly in the context of firms. Furthermore, what is called
"enterprise ES" in the post-soviet literature goes much further than
financial and informational aspects that are the very traditional subjects in
western security theory. This remarkable interest in enterprise ES is caused by
peculiarities of the post-soviet economies. On the one hand, economic
instability is of the highest magnitude here. On the other, in immature market
economies companies are more vulnerable: accustomed to functioning in a totally
planned system for a long time, they still lack the experience in dealing with
challenging unpredictable changes, in particular when it comes to customers'
preferences, competitors’ strategies, state's regulation.
Being mostly a post-soviet phenomenon, enterprise ES,
however, is relevant to economic science in general, since it is a tool to
develop recommendations on how to manage companies in increasingly complicated
and changing environment. The theory of enterprise ES contributes to revision
of enterprise objectives – from maximizing profit toward providing
sustainability. It is based on Herbert Simon's bounded rationality concept and
is much akin to risk management and theory of reliability.
References
1.
Economic
Security [Electronic resource]. – Access mode: http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/economic-security.html.
2.
Economic Security
[Electronic resource]. – Access mode: http://lexicon.ft.com/Term?term=economic-security.
3.
Putting a Face
on American Economic Security [Electronic resource]. – Access mode: http://farmza.com/sitedev/esi2/?p=home.
| 
