A distinctive feature of today's world is the growth of conflicts and their ethnic basis which predetermines the increased interest in the problems of ethnicity, ethnic relations, the nation-state in the modern scientific and socio-political discourse. It is caused by blurring the social foundations of the old world order, destruction of the social space, which has been called “social state”. As a result, today's society is not just segmented and heterogeneous, but also conflict prone. Exhaustion of previous mechanisms of economic growth and legitimation of power exposed social problems and imbalances in the current system and left the man alone against the deteriorating socio-economic situation. In the modern political space there are no political parties or civil society institutions that can offer a way out of the current situation, to formulate a constructive agenda for the world community. The protests are largely atomized, reflecting the peculiarities of the social structure of modern society. Under these conditions, ethnicity is often the only unshakable foundation of collective identity to which people can resort to protect and defend their interests. The author analyzes the socio-political context of aggravation of ethnic tensions and the growth of ethno-political conflicts in the last decade, which threatens the integrity and sovereignty of modern nation-states. The author proposes a system of aggregated indicators to assess not only the deterioration of the socio-economic situation, but also the potential for inter-ethnic tensions. In the final part of this article author discussed the situation evolving in the Russian Federation. The author called imbalances in socio-economic development of the country, which can potentially lead to an increase in inter-ethnic tensions, formulated general methodological approaches to the development of socio-economic policy in a multi-ethnic state.