From “The Ukraine” to Ukraine: A Contemporary History, 1991–2021, edited by Mykhailo Minakov, Georgiy Kasianov, and Matthew Rojansky is a timely contribution to the field of Ukrainian Studies and Comparative Politics. The volume comprises nine chapters written by twenty contributors and “reflect the diversity and quality of scholars who have come to the Kennan Institute to advance their research on Ukraine over many years” (xi). The introduction outlines the ambitious aim of the volume: to explore the contemporary history of the people of Ukraine over the past three decades. Each chapter, co-authored by well-established scholars from Ukrainian and international universities, explains a particular angle of the subject under investigation.
Chapter 1, written by Serhiy Kudelia and Georgiy Kasianov, analyzes Ukraine's political history through the lens of state-building and elite competition. The co-authors explain how Ukraine's formal institutions have become a reflection of compromises between competing elite groups. On the one hand, Chapter 1 demonstrates that elites’ non-stop competition over the right to set the rules had little to do with representing the people's interests. Elite groups politicized the core salient issues in order to maximize their electoral gains, and this largely contributed to the fact that “the shared vision of a Ukraine that could represent the diverse preferences of its citizens never emerged” (12). On the other hand, the co-authors highlight another (unintended) consequence of elite competition: while it kept undermining the prospects of consolidating democracy in Ukraine, it prevented irreversible backsliding of Ukraine's democratic proceedings.
Chapter 2, written by Tymofiy Mylovanov and Ilona Sologoub, Chapter 3, co-authoured by Yuliya Yurchenko, Pavlo Kutuev, Maksym Yenin, and Hennadii Korzhov, and Chapter 4 by Margarita Barmaceda and Andrian Prokip investigate Ukraine's major economic reforms: privatization and energy reforms. The chapters’ common ground is that these economic reforms have fundamentally changed the distribution of power and wealth in Ukraine, but they evaluate and interpret the policy outcomes from different perspectives. Chapter 2 applies a goal-attainment model and evaluates the efficiency of privatization with respect to the development of Ukraine's private sector. It assesses the progress with policy-implementation and identifies the major obstacles faced. Chapter 3 argues that the two major consequences of privatization were “state capture” by oligarchy and vast inequality. The chapter alerts readers that public disappointment with the outcomes of the ongoing economic transformation may lead to blunt bottom-up demands of accommodating public needs and interests. Chapter 4 applies a geopolitical lens to argue that Ukraine’ energy policies “contributed to change in the opportunity structures confronting Ukraine's largest economic groups” (page 156). Taken together, the three chapters explain why privatization and energy reforms led to the results that hardly resembled the declared/intended aims of the reformers.
The next four chapters examine how transition has been affecting the identities of the people of Ukraine. The chapters’ common ground is that pluralistic identities have been dominating in Ukraine for thirty years. Chapter 5, co-authored by Diana Dutsyk and Marta Dyczok, argues that Ukraine's media has been used as a tool for democratic developments and as a means of competition among oligarchic clans; however, “there was really no effort to use media to foster a common Ukrainian identity” (199). Similar to the media, Ukrainian art has been evolving and changing its interconnection with the state and the market. Chapter 6, written by Oksana Barshynova and Olena Martynyuk, interprets Ukraine's art as reflections of what it means for society to come through the crises associated with transition and to jointly evolve. Chapter 7, by Tymofii Brik and Jose Casanova, finds that “Ukrainian religious pluralism and diversity have been constant from the early 1990s to the present” (263) and the unification of Ukrainian orthodoxy based on the Orthodox Church of Ukraine has not undermined it. Chapter 8, written by Oksana Mikheieva and Oxana Shevel, examines how fluid and situational identities have evolved to declarative Ukrainian national identity over time. The co-authors’ alert that “[d]espite the growth of declarative Ukrainian national identity, we should be cautious when speaking of the emergence of a political nation in Ukraine at this time” (314).
The concluding chapter by Mykhailo Minakov and Matthew Rojansky crystallizes the overarching theme of the volume as outlined in the Introduction and supported by evidence in various chapters. The co-authors argue that the growing tensions between a liberal democratic façade and the extractive practices of oligarchic groups at the expense of public interests have produced two revolutionary cycles in Ukraine: in the early 2000s and again in the 2010s, and “[s]ince 2014, a third cycle appears to be under way” (321). The Chapter explains what factors can lead to its outburst and what factors can prevent this from happening.
Since February 2022, Ukraine has been demonstrating continuous resilience against Russia's fully-fledged invasion. Arguably, this reflects the people's collective effort that has not been observed before. Unlike before, it has become crystal clear to the Ukrainians why their collective interests can matter more than private ones. I believe that academics and policy-makers can understand how much this fundamental change matters only after having reinvestigated Ukraine's contemporary history.
