RESUMO
COVID-19 pandemic has strengthened the paternalistic state policy to protect its own interests;globalization is giving way to autonomous economic development of the world. The development of the world is beginning to depend more on neighboring countries than on the global economy. State decision-making on the future trajectory of economic development requires a balanced quantitative analysis of the explanation factors that have the greatest impact on economic development in the "new reality". The purpose of the work is to study the influence of the spatial location of countries on the level of their economic development in a pandemic. The processes of convergence and divergence of development of countries in a pandemic are analyzed. Different spatial models of countries' development are compared in terms of macroeconomic efficiency indicators. An econometric model of spatial development of European countries for forecasting the pace of economic development has been developed. © 2021 IEEE.