Volodymyr Ishchenko is a sociologist based in Kyiv. He has published articles and interviews in the Guardian and New Left Review.
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has been criticized for recent moves to centralize power. But these developments are less about the actions of a single leader and more the result of decades of state weakness following the dissolution of the USSR.
The invasion of Ukraine is not simply a product of Vladimir Putin’s expansionist mindset. It corresponds to a project for Russian capitalism that he and his allies have pursued since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The criminal Russian invasion has devastated cities around Ukraine and forced millions to flee the country. Achieving a cease-fire is top priority — but the war has already brought changes that will echo for decades to come.
The Ukraine crisis is extremely complex and little understood. Sociologist Volodymyr Ishchenko explains the crisis’s origins, the fictions that surround it, and why war is still far from inevitable.
The strikes in Belarus last week showed that the protests against Alexander Lukashenko aren’t just a “hipster rebellion.” But while citizens are joining the protests for all manner of different reasons, there are well-organized neoliberal forces well-placed to assert their own control.
Elections to Ukraine’s parliament produced the first one-party majority since the end of the USSR. But as nationalist violence persists, comedian-president Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s base is anything but stable.
In Sunday’s election Ukrainian voters dealt a decisive rebuttal to the post-Maidan establishment. Yet well-organized nationalist forces represent a time bomb under the new president-elect.
Ukraine’s politics are dominated by oligarchs. Its streets are more and more run by the far right.