Competitive ability of the region: strategic factors of social and economic development

The article analyzes objective and subjective factors of formation of the region's competitive ability. Particular attention is paid to the role of information resources, the existing image of the territory, and the region’s position in the media space. Objective indicators of the development of regions of a similar industrial specialization are analyzed; the possibilities of interpreting the development results in the context of the target setting for creating a brand of the territory are shown. The necessity of forming the Strategy of social and economic development of the regions considering the achieved indicators, perspective areas for transforming the economics structure, neutralization of stereotypes regarding the concentration of negative factors of territorial development, and the use of subjective assessments of the level of satisfaction with public services as a condition for transformations in the modern social and economic system is substantiated. Problems of assessing the value of public goods, taking into account the role of virtual factors, which have a significant impact on the competitiveness of the region, is revealed in the staging order.