GLOBALISATION OR AUTONOMY OF A BIG CITY: EVIDENCE FROM ST. PETERSBURG

In the context of a globalizing world, the representative offices of large international corporations, with profits comparable to the budget of an entire state, are located in big cities. Despite enormous profits attracted by big cities, there seems to be a gap between their demand for goods and services from the enterprises of primary, secondary and tertiary sectors of economy and supply.The purpose of this research is to evaluate the change in the autonomy of St. Petersburg - the second-largest city of Russia - as a result of its territorial structure evolution during the last 25 years, in the course of which the country has passed from a planned to a market economy. In this paper we study the city`s territorial structure dynamics, from the perspective of its influence on the degree of autonomy related to imported goods.