Narine Petrosyan

Type of the article: Research Article

Abstract
Fiscal structural reforms play a decisive role in strengthening macroeconomic stability, enhancing public sector efficiency, and improving institutional resilience in transition economies. Armenia represents a particularly relevant case, where successive reform waves have been closely linked to external adjustment programs and domestic political cycles. The purpose of this study is to measure the intensity of fiscal reforms in Armenia and to evaluate their dynamics over the period 1995–2024. For this purpose, a Fiscal Structural Reform Index (FSRI) is constructed, integrating revenue, expenditure, and institutional reforms based on IMF MONA benchmark data. Reforms are coded by significance (0.25 = minor, 0.50 = medium, 1.00 = major), adjusted for persistence through a geometric decay factor (0.8), and aggregated using Principal Component Analysis (PCA). The first principal component explains 71.2% of the total variance, ensuring the robustness of the composite index. The results indicate that reform intensity in Armenia exhibits a cyclical pattern, peaking during IMF-supported programs in 1999–2001, 2009–2011, and 2016–2018, and moderating during periods of political transition. Institutional reforms display the highest persistence, accounting for the largest share of the index, while revenue and expenditure reforms are more episodic. The analysis demonstrates that both external conditionality and internal political shifts strongly influence reform momentum. The FSRI provides a replicable framework for tracking fiscal reform intensity, supporting policy design, and strengthening structural diagnostics in transition and developing economies.

Type of the article: Research Article

Abstract
Real GDP growth alone does not reveal whether economic expansion is productive, resilient, inclusive, institutionally grounded, or environmentally sustainable. This study develops a Directional Growth-Quality Conditions Index (DGQCI) for Armenia for 2003–2023. The composite contains 22 indicators in six dimensions: sources of economic growth, macroeconomic stability, human capital, structural transformation and innovation, institutional development, and inclusiveness and sustainability. Six context-dependent series (private and government consumption contributions, the real effective exchange rate, reserves, the current-account balance, and FDI/GDP) remain diagnostics but are excluded from aggregation. Publication requires at least 80% total indicator coverage and at least 50% of the intended indicators within every dimension; a stricter two-thirds rule is tested separately. Real GDP growth and the breadth of favorable growth-quality movements diverge substantially. Human capital has the highest average directional score, while inclusiveness and sustainability have the lowest. Results are highly stable to alternative weights, robust to a constant 16-indicator information set and to reassigning poverty to the inclusiveness dimension, but materially less concordant under magnitude-sensitive scoring. The DGQCI is therefore a directional monitoring tool, not a cardinal measure of welfare, causal policy impact, or the magnitude of socioeconomic progress.