When solving problems of a wide range, including economic, methods of logical cognition are used, among which analysis and synthesis stand out. In the aggregate of all methods of logical research, these two are characterized by the fact that they are used practically without restrictions, can be used both at the scientific level of cognition of laws, and for everyday comprehension of facts, phenomena, events.
Analysis is such a research method, a logical technique in which the researcher mentally divides the object or subject of the study into conditional components, and then studies each of the selected parts separately. In everyday life, we often use this word, sometimes without attaching special importance to the conditions that are put forward by using this method in cognition. One of the most important such conditions is that both the analysis and the synthesis used in the study of a subject should be mentally divided only and exclusively into those components that together form the subject of the study. Replacement with analogues and similar components is not allowed, this replacement already means a transition to another method of logical cognition - modeling.
Synthesis is such a logical method in which individual elements of the subject of knowledge are combined into a whole and investigated as part of this whole. As can be seen from the content, both methods - analysis and synthesis - represent dialectical integrity, and therefore in practice, as a rule, they are used (or should be used) together, thus ensuring a higher reliability of the results.
The application of these methods is so widespread that it directly relates in general to a person’s ability to rationally understand the world around him and the phenomena that occur in him. However, their use has a number of features that are determined by the scope and properties of the studied object or subject. For example, analysis and synthesis in economics is understood as the movement of thought in the “opposite direction”, such that the reasoning is built from an unknown economic phenomenon to a known one, and vice versa. It should also be borne in mind that both analysis and synthesis, by themselves, do not act as proof or solution to a problem, they are only a means of finding this solution.
The applied purpose of these logical methods precisely in the economy is that with their help the essential aspects of the ongoing economic processes are identified, the most important trends in the development of economic activity at the macro and microeconomic levels, global, national and local-regional economic problems are investigated.
In addition, the analysis and synthesis of control systems, for example, acts as a starting point for planning and forecasting the economic situation, regardless of the scale of the object we are studying, or what form of ownership it belongs to. Using the data of logical techniques, both independently and as part of a system analysis, makes it possible to reasonably substantiate, based on the data of science, the entire economic policy of the object that is being studied.
For example, macroeconomic synthesis and analysis in their application cover both the global and national economic spheres. The same thing at the microeconomic level is limited to considering the development of a particular industry, enterprise, and even an individual entrepreneur. Here, there is a selection as an object of analysis or synthesis the study of such indicators as the volume of production of marketable products; the costs and profitability of the enterprise or firm.
Both synthesis and analysis in the economic sphere have several varieties, due to the interests and objectives of the study itself. So, if we need to learn about past trends in the development of the enterprise, a retrospective version is used, and if we want to “look” into the future - a promising one.
The most productive is considered the correct combination of these methods as part of a combined technique, for example, with a systematic approach to the study of the object. This ensures the preservation of all the advantages of methods, while leveling their shortcomings, through the use of other methods of cognition.