by Derek Davison
This Monday marked the end of a five-day conference (May 15-19) in Kiev, called “Ukraine: Thinking Together,” organized by The New Republic and specifically its literary editor, Leon Wieseltier. The conference press release promised that “an international group of intellectuals will come to Kiev to meet Ukrainian counterparts, [...]]]>
by Derek Davison
This Monday marked the end of a five-day conference (May 15-19) in Kiev, called “Ukraine: Thinking Together,” organized by The New Republic and specifically its literary editor, Leon Wieseltier. The conference press release promised that “an international group of intellectuals will come to Kiev to meet Ukrainian counterparts, demonstrate solidarity, and carry out a public discussion about the meaning of Ukrainian pluralism for the future of Europe, Russia, and the world.” However, Wieseltier’s remarks at the conference, delivered on May 17, focused very little on “Ukrainian pluralism” and instead painted a picture of a crisis that bears little resemblance to what we actually know about the situation in Ukraine.
Wieseltier should be familiar to anyone who has been paying attention to the neoconservative policy world. Despite being considered a liberal thinker, he has worked on behalf of the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) and its offshoot, the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq (CLI), as well as continues to be affiliated with PNAC’s successor, the Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI). FPI has written many letters, all including Wieseltier’s signature, to prominent DC politicians, endorsing a litany of neocon policy goals: military intervention in Syria, increased hostility toward Iran, and belligerence toward Russia. Wieseltier himself insists that he is not a neocon, and former LobeLog contributor Ali Gharib once declared him a “liberal neocon enabler and booster” rather than a neocon in his own right. This may be a distinction without much of a difference.
During his remarks in Kiev, Wieseltier began by placing his feelings on the situation in Ukraine in the context of his “somewhat facile but nonetheless sincere regret at having been born too late to participate in the struggle of Western intellectuals, some of whom became my teachers and my heroes, against the Stalinist assault on democracy in Europe.” That desire seems to have motivated Wieseltier to concoct a new narrative of recent events that papers over the very real internal struggle going on among the Ukrainians themselves, in order to make the crisis entirely about Russian aggression. He concedes that “Putin is not Stalin,” at least, and no one could challenge his assertion that “Putin is bad enough,” but Wieseltier was still trading in half-truths through much of his speech.
For starters, Wieseltier opines that “[t]he Ukrainian desire to affiliate with the West, its unintimidated preference for Europe over Russia, is not merely a strategic and economic choice; it is also a moral choice, a philosophical choice, a societal decision about ideals, a defiance of power in the name of justice, a stirring aspiration to build a society and a state that is representative of some values and not others.” This assumes facts not in evidence — specifically, of a “Ukrainian desire to affiliate with the West.” According to polling data, prior to Crimea’s secession in March, when Ukrainians were asked which economic union their country should join if it could only join one, support for joining the European Union never polled higher than a slim plurality of Ukrainian citizens. A Gallup poll taken in June-July 2013 found that more Ukrainians saw NATO as a “threat” than as “protection” (a plurality chose “neither”). Predictably, Ukrainians in the country’s east have been more likely to have a negative view of NATO and the EU than Ukrainians in the west.
Even now, after Crimea’s secession and the implied threats of a Russian invasion, only 43% of Ukrainians want stronger relations with the EU to the exclusion of stronger relations with Russia, and only 45% of Ukrainians have a positive view of the EU’s influence on Ukraine. These are both pluralities, yes, but they hardly speak to some universal “Ukrainian desire to affiliate with the West.” In fact, there is evidence to suggest that recent polling that indicates growing support for joining the EU reflects the Ukrainians’ response to what they see as Russian aggression and does not necessarily involve any abiding Ukrainian desire to join the West.
Wieseltier talks about four principles that guide the Ukrainian “revolution”: liberty, truth, pluralism, and moral accountability, but in each case his remarks obscure what is really happening in Ukraine. He talks about liberty, “the right of individuals and nations to determine their own destinies and their own way of life,” but ignores the fact that, for many Crimeans and Russian speakers in eastern Ukraine, the Euromaidan protests that ousted former President Viktor Yanukovych took away their rights, as individuals, “to determine their own destinies.” This was not a democratic or electoral transfer of power; it was a coup against what was by all accounts a legitimately elected government. Weiseltier seems unconcerned that Ukraine’s revolution effectively disenfranchised vast numbers of Ukrainian citizens by short circuiting their electoral process. He also criticizes Russian propaganda that calls the Kiev government “fascist” without acknowledging that there are fascist or soft fascist elements involved with Euromaidan who have been given a significant role in the government.
But it is on the principle of “pluralism” where Wieseltier is most confounding. He says that “[t]he crisis in the Ukraine is testing the proposition that people who speak different languages can live together in a single polity. That proposition is one of the great accomplishments of modern liberalism. Putin repudiates it.” But Putin’s geopolitics aside, it was, in fact, the new Ukrainian parliament installed by Euromaidan that initially repudiated that proposition; its very first act was a repeal (passed but not signed into law) of a 2012 law that allowed regional languages to attain semi-official status in parts of Ukraine with sizable non-Ukrainian populations. The impact of this action in terms of stoking the fears of Ukraine’s Russian population about the intentions of the new government probably can’t be overstated.
It seems clear that, as Jim Sleeper writes, Wieseltier has “learned nothing from his moral posturing on Iraq.” As he and his colleagues in PNAC and the CLI did a decade ago, Wieseltier is still using the language of principle and moral absolutes to mask reality and support the desire for a more muscular American foreign policy.
]]>by Derek Davison
The Pew Research Center has conducted public opinion surveys in Ukraine (April 5-23) and Russia (April 4-20), and the results, released May 8, shed some light on the ongoing conflict between the two countries. They reveal a Ukraine that is more unified than recent events would suggest, and [...]]]>
by Derek Davison
The Pew Research Center has conducted public opinion surveys in Ukraine (April 5-23) and Russia (April 4-20), and the results, released May 8, shed some light on the ongoing conflict between the two countries. They reveal a Ukraine that is more unified than recent events would suggest, and they illuminate the domestic politics driving Russian President Vladimir Putin’s actions. At the same time, the results may offer a way for the interim government in Kiev to defuse some of the separatist tensions that have gripped cities in eastern Ukraine.
The Ukrainian results were broken down by region, with the country divided into “West,” “East,” and “Crimea” per the map below:
The headline result of Pew’s Ukrainian survey is that a large majority of Ukrainians (77%) want the country to remain united. This isn’t terribly surprising, but what is interesting is the large majority in favor of union in the eastern part of the country (70%), where Russian separatism is at its highest. Even among Russian speakers in the eastern part of Ukraine, a solid majority (58%) want to see Ukraine stay whole. In Crimea, which has already voted in favor of secession, it is no surprise that a majority (54%) of those surveyed support allowing parts of Ukraine to secede.
So despite the recent unrest caused by pro-Russian militias in eastern Ukrainian cities like Donetsk, Luhansk, and Slovyansk, only a small minority of Ukrainians in that part of the country want the right to secede — 18% overall, and only 27% of Russian speakers. However, the survey also points to the challenges facing Kiev as it attempts to bring the region back under control. Two-thirds (67%) of Ukrainians in the east say that the government in Kiev has had a “bad influence” on the current situation, compared to only 28% in the west, and 66% in the east say that the Kiev government does not respect “personal freedoms.” Some sign of competent, stable leadership from Kiev could go a long way toward easing the concerns of eastern Ukrainians. Kiev could also take steps to try to ease ethnic tensions, which 73% of Ukrainians (evenly distributed throughout the country) identify as a very or moderately big problem.
One way to ease those tensions could be by protecting regional languages other than Ukrainian; 54% of Ukrainians believe that Russian and Ukrainian should both be official languages (compared with 41% who believe that Ukrainian should be the only official language), with 73% in the east (86% of Russian speakers) supporting that idea but only 30% in the west. A compromise policy that allows regional governments to raise other languages to official status, while making Ukrainian the only official national language, could satisfy separatist concerns without raising significant apprehension in the west, and there are signs that the interim government is pursuing such a compromise. Steps must also be taken to curb the influence of neo-fascist organizations like Right Sector, which 65% of Ukrainians agree is having a negative impact on Ukrainian affairs.
It must be noted, however, that Pew’s survey was conducted before the most recent spate of violence in eastern Ukraine, in particular before last week’s clashes in Odessa in which dozens of pro-Russian sympathizers were killed by pro-Ukrainian protesters. Kiev must take steps to prevent additional violence, which will only further alienate eastern Ukrainians and reduce the chances for reconciliation.
The Ukrainian survey also points out the damage that Russia’s reputation has suffered in Ukraine. When asked about the impact that Russia is having on Ukrainian affairs, 67% say “bad” versus 22% who say “good.” Compare that figure to the results for the European Union (45% good, 33% bad) and the United States (tied at 38%) and it is clear how much Ukrainians as a whole have soured on their Russian neighbors. Even in the supposedly pro-Russian east, 58% of those surveyed (and a plurality of 44% of Russian speakers) agreed that Russia was having a “bad” impact on Ukrainian affairs.
In contrast, Pew’s survey of Russian citizens reveals a populace that is firmly behind President Vladimir Putin’s actions with respect to Ukraine and believes Russian expansion, as in the case of Crimea, is justified. When asked if “there are parts of neighboring countries that really belong to Russia,” 61% of Russians surveyed either completely or mostly agree with that sentiment, compared to only 28% who mostly or completely disagree. The percentage of Russians who are confident in Putin’s ability to handle international affairs is higher (83%) than it has been at any time in the past six years (as far back as the report’s data goes). A plurality of Russians (43%) agree that “Putin’s handling of the situation in Ukraine has led people in other countries to have a more favorable opinion of Russia,” and 55% agree with the statement: “It is a great misfortune that the Soviet Union no longer exists,” though that percentage has been relatively consistent since Pew began asking that question five years ago.
Pew’s findings illustrate that domestic Russian politics are a key driver behind Putin’s actions with respect to Crimea and eastern Ukraine, though the sharp decline in Russia’s prestige in Ukraine may help to explain why Putin seems to have adopted a more conciliatory tone in recent days.
Putin has very little to lose domestically, and much to gain, by adopting a more energetic stance with regards to the internal politics of Russia’s neighbors. At the same time, Pew’s Ukrainian survey strongly suggests that there is an opening for the government in Kiev, perhaps under the influence of its EU and US allies, to take steps — preventing further violence, protecting minority languages, and eliminating the pernicious influence of far-right groups — that will ease the concerns of eastern Ukrainians, who at this point remain largely opposed to any secession effort.
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