This article aims at explaining the clustering of economic activity using instruments of new institutional economics, taking into account well-known descriptive characteristics of the cluster, as well as recent developments in research on hybrid institutional agreements, primarily, the research conducted by Michael Porter, Claude Ménard and others.
The article positions trans-border regions that are formed in the course of cooperation between the administrative, territorial and municipal institutions of neighbouring countries or have similar important characteristics, in the hierarchical system of regions. The authors prove trans-border regions to be a type of international regions and consider specific characteristics of these regions using the Baltic region as an example.
The article is dedicated to the problem of competitiveness of border regions as subjects of the Russian Federation having specific characteristics. The authors focus on the stages, during which border regions build their competitiveness, as well as analyse certain indices characterizing it. They examine the role of these regions in the development of international trade and economic relations, cross-border cooperation and international integration, taking the North-west federal district and the Republic of Karelia as a case-study. The article describes the mechanisms of building and increasing competitiveness of border regions in today’s Russia both in general and, particularly, in the Republic of Karelia as a border region of the North-west federal district.