Mission and goals of territorial development: common rules of strategic planning

The study focuses on the fact that the goal-setting is pivotal while devising (updating) the strategy for the social and economic development of the territory. The research analyzes the mission and principal goals approved by the modern strategic planning instruments of million-person cities in the Russian Federation. The major challenge of the Russian strategic planning lies in the lack of common approaches (techniques) applied to generate territorial strategic planning documents. The author develops recommendations for improving the goal-setting process at different levels of the territorial strategy development. The study can be useful for university and PhD students, researchers, experts devising (updating) and implementing the strategies for the social and economic development of the territories, public and municipal officials and other interested persons.