Taras Kuzio’s Blog

Dear Dr. Kuzio. The three articles above are too long and disparate to comment on them all in a single post. But please allow me to comment on your introductory remarks.

“…even moderate Ukrainians believe: Russia refuses, cannot and will not come to terms with Ukrainians as a separate people or Ukraine as an independent nation.” I have yet to see a sociological study showing that Ukrainians don’t see Russia as recognizing Ukraine as an independent nation. The only thing close to such sociological study of Ukrainians’ opinion on that matter that I have seen shows the opposite. Perhaps you are aware that the most popular TV entertainment in Ukraine are political talk shows and they are run by most every national channel. The theme of 2009-05-29 Shuster Live (perhaps the most popular talk show in Ukraine) was the relations between Russia and Ukraine. The in-studio audience of Shuster Live is assembled by one of the leading Ukrainian sociological institutions to be representative of the nation. One hundred volunteers are picked for each show to correspond with Ukraine’s population in every possible way: same gender distribution, same age distribution, same regional (west-center-east-south) distribution, etc. So, the answers of the audience of Shuster Live are more or less representative of the public opinion in Ukraine. And the answers to the question “Why the relations between Russia and Ukraine are worsening?” were distributed as follows.
1. Due to the pro-American policies of Ukraine 35%
2. Due to the imperial policies of Russia 33%
3. Personal dislike between leaders 22%
4. A fight over language and history 10%
So, it seems like only one third of Ukrainians see Russian “imperialism, chauvinism, racism” as the major problem obstructing the Russo-Ukrainian relationship. And more Ukrainians see a major cause of these Russo-Ukrainian quarrels in the policies of the Ukrainian leadership. I agree on this with most of the Ukrainians as the Russia’s view towards Ukraine seems driven not by imperialism, chauvinism, racism or them all but by dry pragmatism. Russia is worried not by Ukrainian independence per se but by the possibility of Ukraine carrying out the hostile to Russia foreign policy. This is hardly an incomprehensible position since the prospect of the neighboring country carrying a hostile to you foreign policy (and Russia, justifiably or not, sees NATO as a block hostile to Russia by the block’s very design) would be a cause of concern for any country in the world.

As for your Scotts in UK comparison, I am afraid discussing the position of Ukrainian elite in the Russia-led empires does not make a good argument to prove the occupation point of view. Scotts may be running the Labour Party, but, for example, Ukrainians in the Russian Empire practically ran an institution of a much greater role for Russia than the Labour Party for the UK, namely the Russian Orthodox Church which was practically dominated by the Ukrainians from accession well into the 18th century. At the same time, the nobility of the Ukrainian origin took many various prominent positions among the empire’s state and military leadership. Similarly, there is no lack of examples of Ukrainians in the Soviet leadership through all 70 years of the country’s existence. Comparison with Ireland misses another important aspect. London never made an attempt to truly integrate Ireland as the latter was viewed more like a colony while the Ukrainian lands were truly integrated in the Russian Empire (as well as in the USSR). The status of the Imperial administrative subdivisions in Ukraine (Governotates), the position of Ukrainian nobility and the Ukrainian lower classes were no different in Ukraine than in the rest of the empire. Ukraine’s resources and its people were exploited for the imperial needs no more and no less than the resources and people of Russia. Finally, the standard of living in Ukraine was similar to that in Russia which all shows that the status of Ukraine within an Empire was that of a fully integrated part of the country rather than of the occupied territory or a colony.

“To Ukrainians, Russia and the USSR were types of empires.” Perhaps so it was for Ukrainians who belong to a minority nationalist camp but there is no evidence to suggest that all or most of Ukrainians considered Russia as an imperial towards them power with Ukraine being the colony of the latter.

By Burachek on Jun 13, 2009

Buracheck, a few comments regarding your post.

1. “Shuster-Live”:
You wrote – “one of the leading Ukrainian sociological institutions…”
- Shuster had never unveiled the name of this institution. If you know – inform please.
“One hundred volunteers are picked…”
- One can easily estimate the simplest (only math. statistical) error: ~ Square root of N. In the case of 100 participants it is 10%, whereas when he shows separate results for every group (4 regions of Ukraine, age categories, etc.) it runs up to 20%.
Well, it’s not the greatest sin, and sometimes (rarely) even Shuster comments it as a “trend”. What’s much worse – practically all of our so called “sociology” is not a science as it ought to be. Why? The “human factor error” can be by order of magnitude higher even in natural sciences to say nothing of such as sociology and especially in highly corrupted society.
Maybe you know (it’s not a secret) that it is common practice among our sociological institutions to produce two types of “results”: one – “custom-manufactured”, i.e. ordered by political parties which pay money to know real state of things (and of course it’s a “busyness secret”) and another type – exposed for public. It’s easy to guess that they may differ substantially both by absolute values and “quality” of questions. Honest scientist working against contract can suspend publishing of results, but he will never publish corrupted data or intentionally give wrong interpretation.
The form of questions in most TV-shows is highly manipulative, mainly “black-white”; they stimulate people not to think in “weight manner” but rather in “friend-alien” coordinates. Also I think that even most objective polling results may work both for the good of society and “for the bad” – it depends on who and in what way is interpreting them.
One of examples of our “leading sociologists” is I.Bekeshkina’s paper: – “Ukraine: Failed Democracy” (http://main.pravda.com.ua/news/2009/6/5/96046.htm).

2. Only short comment on your “…minority nationalist camp”. How do you understand the word “nationalism”? As D.Tabachnik et.al. who hates all Ukrainian? Or like some ordinary “Russian-thinking” who call “nationalists” those who speaks Ukrainian in Ukraine (but in company of so-called Russian-speaking)? Or as O.Tyahnybok? This word is not “black-white”, it has variety of meanings, it’s highly relative and changeable both “in space and time”, and maybe it is due to this it is so “successfully” used in political speculations.

3. As for “Russians-Ukrainians” relations – both historical and present-day – it’s very complex problem and simplified approach (based on Shuster-like “shows”) cannot work.

By Yuri_D on Jun 14, 2009

“why are Russia-Ukraine relations worsening”?

That question, of course, contains a huge assumption.

But the answers of the audience are revealing:

1) due to the pro-American policies of Ukraine – 35%

2) due to the imperialist policies of Russia – 33%

Those are both the same thing, actually.

In other words, Russia stamps its feet and pouts and shouts and throws temper tantrums when Russia can’t have its boot on someone else’s throat.

So if Ukraine does indeed have “pro-American policies” (which I doubt), Russia throws a temper tantrum – because Russia has imperialist policies.

And there it is again – sovok propaganda:

- “nationalist”

- “no evidence”

I don’t know why little sovoks always resort to the “there is no evidence” crutch – when there is plenty of evidence for whatever the little sovoks are trying to “disprove.”

Whether the boot on Ukraine’s throat was tsarist or sovok, there is plenty of evidence that Russia’s policies were to eliminate “nationalism” – Ukrainian nationalism. Ukrainian identity, language, culture, history and people.

Ukraine was severely exploited by imperialist rasha.

St. Petersburg was built “on the bones of 10,000 Ukrainian Cossacks.”

Catherine the Prussian imported Germans into Ukraine and Russia – and gave them MORE rights than Ukrainians had.

Ukrainians had – serfdom.

Those are just 3 examples.

“Fully integrated” into the empire.

Burachek, you need to go peddle your little sovok nonsense somewhere else.

It’s the same old sovok nonsense, it doesn’t fly, and people are tired of it.

By elmer on Jun 14, 2009

Dear Yuri,

on 1 (how representative the answers of the Shuster’s audience are of an overall opinion in Ukraine) please note that I was rather cautious in introducing them. Dr. Kuzio’s comment stated an opinion and simply postulated that this is an opinion in which “even moderate Ukrainians believe”. The latter was given without any supportive data showing that moderate Ukrainians indeed share this view. In my opinion any statement about what the public opinion is should be backed by proper sociological data. I noted that I am not aware of any proper sociological research of Ukrainians’ opinion on whether Russia accepts independent Ukraine or not. I further noted that “the only thing _close_ to such sociological study” is the data from the Shuster’s audience. I am aware of all the pitfalls of manipulative sociology. Personally, I do not believe polling the Shuster’s audience can be substantiated for high-quality sociological research, but it can indeed roughly point out to the trends. If you have any better data, please share it. All I am saying I have not seen anything anywhere that would support the thesis that most Ukrainians think that Russia does not accept the fact that Ukraine is an independent nation.

On 2 (how I understand the word “nationalism”) I prefer to avoid giving my own definitions to well-established phenomena. I am not familiar with Mr. Tabachnik views, so it is difficult for me to say whether my understanding is similar to his. But to answer your more generalized question, I am unlikely to give much credit to an opinion on Ukraine held by anyone who “hates all Ukrainian”. Also, I don’t buy that there is such thing as “ordinary Russian-thinking”. Thinking can be good or bad but I refuse to define “thinking” in national terms, be it Ukrainian, Russian or whatever. I certainly would not call anyone a nationalist merely for speaking Ukrainian but speaking Ukrainian. We can certainly discuss how it is best to define what constitutes Ukrainian nationalism but it in no way affects the main premise of my comment being that there is no evidence to generalize that the view that Russia was an empire towards them is the view held by most Ukrainians, as Dr. Kusio’s remark implied.

On 3 (that the relations between Russians and Ukrainians -both historical and present-day – are very complex and a simplified approach cannot work) I fully agree. And the approach based on the view that Russia was an imperial power which held Ukraine “occupied” is precisely such a simplified approach. This is exactly why I expressed my being uncomfortable with the term “occupation” being used passingly as if the applicability of this term is undisputed and long settled just like the occupation of Ukraine by Nazi Germany during the WWII.

As for Elmer’s comment, it speaks for itself and I don’t think it needs any response.

By Burachek on Jun 14, 2009

well, Burachok, you are indeed a true sovok.

2 more sovok “techniques” – denial and arrogance.

What you don’t like – deny.

And you want yours to be the only opinion, while offering a pretense of examining “the facts” and the opinions of others.

For a sovok-brainwashed person like you, the only “occupation” of Ukraine was indeed by Nazis – those big, big boogeymen of sovok propaganda.

And by “nationalists” like Bandera – another big, big boogeyman for sovoks.

According to sovoks like you, it was impermissible for Ukrainians like Bandera to occupy their own land – because they did not want to be subservient to sovok roosha.

You deny what imperial roosha and sovok roosha did to Ukraine, as I mentioned above.

You are certainly not engaging in any sort of sociologocal or historical research or fact-finding.

You merely continue to blather your sovok nonsense.

By elmer on Jun 15, 2009

Dr. Kuzio -

Further to your observation of the surprisingly lingering after-effects of the sovok era – this article and video from June 16, 2009.

http://5.ua/newsline/232/0/60217/

There was a protest in the city of Kherson against sovok era monuments, including one that still stands of Felix Dzerzhinsky, the notorious murderer. Apparently, the monuments number well into the tens.

Note the video (there is a little camera symbol that links to the video) – some commies came out to shout at the young man standing quietly. Note especially the old babushkas acting like rabid dogs. Note that one of the babushkas points at the cameras – sovok style. Cameras were “very dangerous” in the sovok union.

This is brainwashing, plain and simple.

It is obviously not representative of the majority of Ukrainians today – but nevertheless…

It is no different than defending monuments to Hitler “for historical reasons.”

It is hideous.

By elmer on Jun 18, 2009

This is a report and film on Lenin monuments in Kyiv:
http://www.rferl.org/section/Multimedia/404.html

In May the president called for all “communist” monuments to be removed. I do not understand the point of calling for this when nothing will be done about it. All that has to be done is for the SBU to organize a group of Tyahnobok’s Svoboda, KUN, SUM and other nationalists to do it in one stroke over one night.

By Taras Kuzio on Jun 18, 2009

I had seen the report, and I recall Yushchenko’s call for communist monuments to be removed.

In Western Ukraine, many of them have been removed.

One interesting thing – sovok era grave monuments have not been removed.

But it seems that certain grave monuments have had sovok propaganda engraved on the monuments removed from them.

Inertia – there seems to be a lot of it in Ukraine, unless the activity is using government to rob and steal.

By elmer on Jun 18, 2009

If I am not mistaken, Kuchma also issued a call to remove Communist monuments. Remember it took the whole of the 1990s for the Hammer and Sickle to be removed from the front of parliament.
A country that seeks international recognition of the famine as genocide has thousands of monuments up to Lenin and the regime that committed the genocide. An example of multi-vectorism?

By Taras Kuzio on Jun 18, 2009

Dear Dr. Kuzio,

I am surprised you were silent when Elmer did his act in your blog employing ethnic slurs and other signs of hatred, but coming back to what you said here, there is a direct connection between the Soviet monument removal and local public sentiment. They are removed precisely in the communities where public does not want them and they stay on where the local public does not want them removed. It seems to me that in democracy the issue of monument should be decided by the local communities rather than central government, don’t you agree?

I still would be interested to see your response to my earlier comment. Do you still think that Ukrainians, both the lower classes and the nobility, in the Russian Empire were treated by the state significantly differently from their Russian counterparts since this was one of your arguments in support of the view that the term “occupation” applies to the control of Ukraine by the Empire?

Thank you,

By Burachek on Jun 19, 2009

“Do you still think that Ukrainians, both the lower classes and the nobility, in the Russian Empire were treated by the state significantly differently from their Russian counterparts since this was one of your arguments in support of the view that the term “occupation” applies to the control of Ukraine by the Empire?” – Burachek

Of course they were treated differently. In tsarist circles the nobility mostly spoke French, but permitted the celar class Muskovites to carry on in Russian, permitted Russian print, etc. Russian intelligensia was untouched and allowed to flourish (except for the Marxist crowd, but not until they killed the tsar in the mid 1800s).

In Ukraine, the Russian occupiers did what they could to stamp out the Ukrainian language. The Ukrainian intelligensia was continually persecuted and periodically liquidated by the tsarist state.

Also note the difference in the way the Moscow patriarkhat was treated (purged, but permitted to exist) vs the Kyivan patriarkhat (exterminated).

But me thinks you already know that and simply cannot bring yourself to understand the legitimacy of the Ukrainian cause.

By Bohdan on Jun 19, 2009

In Burachek’s democracy, I think that the people should be allowed to raise a monument to hitler – right in front of Burachek’s house.

After all, if that is what local people want, then it should be done.

And Burachek will have a nice monument of hitler to look at all day long – right in front of his house.

By elmer on Jun 19, 2009

Elmer, your analogy is flawed because it is based on an argument so fictitious that it is absurd. There exists no community in Ukraine, eastern or western, that revers Hitler and would erect a monument to him. Hitler is universally despised everywhere in the world. Same can’t be said about figures you seem to despise. I am not judging your views. I am simply stating plain facts. It so happens that not every controversial historical figure is universally despised because many of them are seen differently by different people depending on what part of their legacy appeals to the heart of a particular community. For example Russians revere and erect monuments to Suvorov for the victories of the Russian army achieved under his command while Poles see him as a person responsible for the Praga massacre in 1794 (despite there is no evidence that the massacre was ordered by Suvorov.) Another example, to this day there is a lot of respect to Napoleon Bonaparte in France where his monuments are not under any danger of demolition while there is none (and there can’t be) in Russia or in England. Or returning back home, Catherine the Great is mainly viewed by some people in Ukraine through a prism of her crushing of Sich and the remnants of the Ukrainian autonomy while others primarily see her role in founding of their their city or community. BTW, Catherine is also highly regarded by the descendants of the Zaporozhian Cossacks who now comprise the majority in Kuban. In fact, Kuban Cossacks came all the way to Odessa to protect her monument during recent infamous events. Same can be said of the UPA leaders. While for some their commitment to Ukrainian independence trumps whatever crimes they are responsible for, for others it is the war crimes committed by the Ukrainian nationalist formations during the war under such leaders is what defines their attitude to these historic figures.

Ukraine, being a multinational and multicultural country, lacks an ideology that would be universally embraced by most of its population, Ukrainian nationalism remains a minority faith in the country and controversial figures, be it Catherine II, Peter I, Petlura, Shukhevych etc. are viewed differently in different regions of the country. So, Odessans erected a monument to Catherine the Great for her role in the historic events that brought about the foundation of their city and the monument to Peter I of Russia remains in place in Poltava. And while in Western Ukraine the UPA leaders are commemorated in stone and in local topography for their commitment to the idea of achieving the Ukrainian independence whatever the cost, the Eastern Ukrainian as well as Polish communities erect monuments to UPA victims (which were many). And everyone is right here in their own ways.

The silliest thing for a central authority would be to impose certain views nationwide over all people as this would further destabilize such a multicultural country as Ukraine. There are virtually no Soviet monuments left in western Ukraine (and that reflects the local sentiment there) while in Eastern Ukraine the local communities express no wish to part with this part of their history. I am surprised that any person who proclaims his respect to democracy and freedom of expression would actually advocate governmental imposition of certain ideology upon the population. Such an idea reminds me more of Soviet totalitarianism than any model of a free society we attempt to build in Ukraine. I hope Dr. Kuzio’s earlier suggestion that SBU should covertly rally the nationalist extremists to “deal” with Soviet monuments in Ukraine was made jokingly. In fact, I hope that covert alliances between the state security apparatus and the extremist organizations would become history. At least, there should be none in my opinion.

Bohdan, unfortunately you answered a different question from the one I asked. I did not mean to say that the Moscow rule was beneficial for the Ukrainians. It is a question for the alternate history writers whether remaining under the Polish domination instead of falling under the Russian one would have been more beneficial for Ukraine (independence was not in any realistic picture at the time.) For some patent Russophobes the answer of Russia vs Poland question is perhaps clear but, thanks god, hard-core fanatics of any sort do not dominate the historic thought even though there are some even in academia. However, my question was not whether Moscow authorities treated Ukrainians “well” or “badly” but whether they treated them better or worse than they treated Russians.

True, the regime did not tolerate the ideological dissent. Pushkin was treated harshly by a regime for his position towards the regime’s autocracy were deemed dangerous just like Kostomarov who dared to challenge the ideology of single unified Russian nation. Both suffered the same fate and were exiled regardless of their popular standing among the intelligentsia. The idea of the separate from Russian Ukrainian language was viewed by the regime as dangerous as it challenged the territorial integrity of the Empire. No wonder it was not well received by the authorities no different than the reception of the criticism of autocracy or of a social order in the empire.

My point, Bohdan, is different. Yes, Ukrainians who challenged the regime suffered from it just the same as did the Russians who challenged it. But the rest of Ukrainians received the same treatment as their Russian peers. Indigenous Ukrainian nobility received the same status in the society enjoyed by the Russian nobility and the Ukrainian peasantry suffered the same exact serfdom as the Russian one (and, btw, it was not any better than the condition of serfs in Ukraine under Polish domination prior to the accession.) Ukrainian elite that did not challenge the regime had no obstacles in the Empire for the career advancement. For good 200 years Ukrainian clerics dominated the Russian Orthodox Church while educated Ukrainian nobles reached the highest positions in the Imperial civil and military political establishment. Such things cannot be said about the fate of , say, Irish people in the UK and this is why calling the regime in Ukraine as “occupation” is at least questionable.

By Burachek on Jul 6, 2009

Buachek, you took a long time to say nothing. Everyone can’t be right.

lenin and his monuments don’t fit in with democracy. Period. Neither does hitler.

Catherine was Prussian, not Russian. She kept Ukrainians in serfdom, while granting land rights and all sorts of other rights to Germans to induce them to come to Ukraine and Russia. That doesn’t fit in with democracy either.

It is absurd for a democratic government to erect or maintain monuments to tyrants.

And that’s the issue – the power, and the responsibility of government.

The baggage left over in Ukraine, thanks to Russia both from imperial times and sovok times, is that government had all the power, but no accountability and no responsibility.

It’s time to get rid of all of that baggage in Ukraine.

The Russians – well, they can rot in their own misery. They’re always done a fine job of it, and they’re doing a fine job of it now.

The task is to confine Russian misery to where it belongs – Russia.

By elmer on Jul 7, 2009

Elmer, I find it ironic that you invoke a word “Democracy” to argue your views while, sadly, you totally lack any understanding of the word you use. Perhaps you should educate yourself on what the meaning of this term is, especially since the concept of democracy, established since the times of Plato, is one of the most basic concepts in the modern society. The meaning of democracy, Elmer, is that the control of authority comes from the public, rather than the small part of the public that agrees with you. So, what monuments fit in with democracy gets decided by local communities that expresses their opinions either directly, through a referendum, or through the democratically elected legislatures, local in this case. It so happens, that in different parts of Ukraine different historical figures get public respect and are considered worthy to be embodied in stone. To an average Crimean or Odessan the monument to Shukhevych or Bandera is no less offensive than the monument to Catherine II or Peter I to an average Galician or to yourself. This is precisely why there are no monuments to Bandera in Odessa and there are no monuments to Catherine in Galicia but vice versa. Yours or anyone’s fixation on the monuments to figures you find particularly disagreeable cannot be imposed on the Ukrainian communities precisely because Ukraine now IS a democracy (albeit an imperfect one). It would be a true tragedy for Ukraine if people with authoritarian views who think, just like you, that they get to impose their preferences over the whole country get the power again. Luckily, the authoritarian politicians in Ukraine from both sides of the political spectrum do not get much traction in elections with the Ternopil Oblast recent election being the only, though frightening, exception.

I am also saddened to see a strong and irrational Russophobia sticking like a sour thumb from most every your post. And this reminds me of the question asked earlier by Yuri_D in his post of Jun 14 above. He asked ‘How do you understand the word “nationalism”?’ Luckily, we do not need to invent the definitions of a well established political terms, such as Nationalism, or its particular application to Ukraine. There is a great book devoted to the Ukrainian Nationalism in post-Soviet Ukraine written recently by Andrew Wilson. I am not sure you, Elmer, are familiar with many academic books on the Ukrainian history since you seem to base your opinions on your political views rather than the facts, but Dr. Kuzio, I am sure, is aware of the Wilson’s book “Ukrainian Nationalism in the 1990s: A Minority Faith” published by Cambridge University Press. So, in this book Wilson states the obvious that the disparate Ukrainian nationalists are united by three common traits “the special rights of ethnic Ukrainian indigenes, the unique status and special suffering of the Ukrainian people and the inevitability of cultural and political conflict with Russia”. Your endless invocation of the unique suffering of Ukrainians in the hands of the evil Russians as well as the obvious hatred of Russia and frequent ressentiment towards anything Russian expressed in your posts greatly undermine the credibility of other things you are trying to say. So, you might consider toning down the ant-Russian rants in the future. I must note, though, that your irrational Russophobia is very rare among the Ukrainians, as we are a very tolerant nation overall, and this addresses the point I raised in my earlier post in this very thread that such aggressive nationalists like yourself do not speak for all Ukrainian despite they try to pretend the opposite.

By Burachek on Aug 9, 2009

Wilson’s book was negatively reviewed everywhere, including by myself in International Affairs. After this review he refused to include his name as joint author on the second issue of Ukraine. Perestroika to Independence in 2000. The first issue published in 1994 had both names. So much for tolerance of criticism.
wilson’s book (his LSE PhD) was notable for being russophile and lacking in theoretical and comparative knowledge of nationalism.
“Nationalism” is a notoriously very difficult concept to define as it appears through every political ideology from communism to fascism. Some examples of this being discussed are (The Myth of the Civic State):
http://www.taraskuzio.net/Nation%20and%20State%20Building_files/national-myth.pdf

See also my criticism of Wilson and other russophiles on their application of nationalism to Ukraine:
http://www.taraskuzio.net/Nation%20and%20State%20Building_files/national-states.pdf

I agree that widespread anti-Russian feelings are absent in Ukraine, if one understands them as seen in the Ukrainian diaspora. But, this most people understand as anti-Russian feelings along ethnic-cultural lines. Anti-Russian criticism of Russia along territorial-state lines are more difficult to define but exist. Most Ukrainians are very critical of Russian policies to Ukraine which are done in patriotic, territorial derzhavnytske tones.

This is not different to Scotland and Ireland most of whose populations speak English. But, Scots and Irish patriots have strong criticisms about England and Britain.

On a final note, Wilson’s 1997 book Ukrainian Nationalism. A Minority Faith was undermined by the 2004 Orange Revolution that showed that Ukrainian nationalism was a majority faith. And, guess who rushed to get a book out to prove it – the same Wilson. Both him and Dominique Arel (also with same russophile views in the 1990s on Ukrainian nationalism) changed their views from around 2001 onwards when they saw that those they disparaged as “Ukrainian nationalists” were actually the main bulwark against autocracy and support for democracy in Ukraine. As seen in the Ukraine Without Kuchma, Arise Ukraine! and Orange Revolution protests.

By Taras on Aug 10, 2009

Dear Dr. Kuzio, thanks for your response.

Unfortunately, I don’t see any basis of fact in your assertion that the Orange Revolution proves the popularity of the Ukrainian nationalism among the Ukrainians. The Orange Revolution was a democratic revolution rather than a nationalist one and it succeeded thanks to the people in the Ukrainian capital like myself who held the ground for several days until Yushchenko’s supporters from other regions joined. I can assure you that we would have never taken it to the streets for the nationalist ideas but it was the election fraud that infuriated us. Had Yanukovych won the election fair and square, we would have never protested against the election outcome. And if, god forbids, he indeed wins the next election (which seems possible) there would be no strong public protests in Kiev despite Kievans in their majority would not vote for him.

I can add one more thing. The 2004 Yushchenko was a lot different from Yushchenko we know today. Back then he was doing everything possible to distance himself from the nationalists precisely because in Ukrainian politics to be perceived a nationalist is a kiss of death in the national election (it does not hurt in some regional election though). During the election campaign Yushchenko pledged to never ever close Russian schools and in his TV ad he explicitly stated that this is a local community issue. He also pledged to never interfere into the church affairs and after one particularly xenophobic speech of Mr. Tyahnybok Yushchenko expelled Tyahnybok from Nasha Ukraina parliamentary faction. From the policies pursued by Yushchenko in the office it is now clear that his inclusionist and uniter not a divider rhetoric was just as much a lie as similar election rhetoric of one well-known US politician but back then many Ukrainians were misled. Besides, we did not have much of a choice as an alternative of more years of Kuchma seemed just horrible.

Also note that despite all Yushchenko’s attempts to distance himself from the nationalist ideas that he later implemented in his policies, he still won the election by a margin of only 8 percent against the convicted criminal precisely because his opponents’ campaign to paint Yushchenko as a nationalist was partially successful and Ukrainians just do not elect the nationalist politicians.

On a side note, this is the reason of the current Tymoshenko’s success in the Ukrainian democratic camp. Unlike Yushchenko, Tymoshenko does not hold any nationalist views, which makes her electable. But back to the Orange Revolution, perhaps you were not there back then but my family was there and you might be interested to know that Maidan was Russophone for at least 2-3 days and even after that when protester from other regions joined the Maidan remained mostly Russophone because to a large degree it was still composed from Kievans most of who speak Russian in their everyday lives. The miserable performance of Mr. Tyahnybok’s party in Kiev is just another proof that nationalist ideas just do not fly among the Kievans, the very same ones who made the Orange Revolution a reality.

By Burachek on Aug 10, 2009

I largely agree with your assessment of Yatsenyuk. As for the first part of your post, I think it is rather fruitless to carry a terminological argument. If there is no consensus over the meaning of the term, it is useless to discuss the implications of such term. I just want to note that if you define the Ukrainian nationalism as more of a simply pro-western democratic movement, you will find it difficult to reconcile such view with those in Ukraine who consider themselves Ukrainian nationalists as their agenda (that you can find in openly published articles of Svoboda leaders) includes allocation of ethnic quotas for non-Ukrainians in the employment and public education, language restrictions on the privately owned media, etc, which is hardly “democratic” or “pro-western”.

But I also have a question on your description of BYuT’s composition. Who are the “national democrats” that along with “centrists” comprise BYuT’s base. I understand the term “Democrat” but what is the meaning of “National Democrat” is still puzzling to me. I saw the term used before and always wondered how the “democrat” can be qualified as “national” that is who are those democrats who aren’t “national democrats”?

By Burachek on Aug 10, 2009

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By Rengenx on Feb 14, 2010