East/West: Journal of Ukrainian Studies
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Article One: A Linguistic Approach
Full text linkAn English-language translation of an article authored by Iurii Shevel\u27ov (George Y. Shevelov) on the origins of the Ukrainian language
Review of Wiktoria Kudela-Świątek. Eternal Memory: Monuments and Memorials of the Holodomor
No full textReview of Wiktoria Kudela-Świątek. Eternal Memory: Monuments and Memorials of the Holodomor. Translated from the Polish by Guy Russell Torr, preface by Frank E. Sysyn, Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies P in co-operation with Wydawnictwo Księgarnia Akademicka, 2021. 410 pp. Illustrations. Bibliography. List of Illustrations. Index. $43.95, paper
Review of Myron Korduba. Shchodennyk 1918–1925 [Diary, 1918–1925]
No full textReview of Myron Korduba. Shchodennyk 1918–1925 [Diary, 1918–1925]. Compiled, edited, and with an introduction by Olia Hnatiuk and Myroslav Chekh, biographic foreword by Oleh Pavlyshyn, Vydavnytstvo Ukraïns\u27koho Katolyts\u27koho U, 2021. Ukraïna. Ievropa: 1921–1939 [Ukraine. Europe: 1921–1939]. 688 pp. Illustrations. Dictionary of archaic and foreign terms. Indexes. $54.95, cloth
Perceived Social Cohesion in Ukraine: Diversity and Attitudes
Full text linkThis article demonstrates the ways in which social cohesion as a “sense of togetherness” is progressing within Ukrainian society—a society that is striving to escape the post-Soviet model as it undergoes the processes of state- and nation building and democratic development. This study draws on a national population survey and applies cluster analysis to identify homogeneous groups of the population in terms of their social-cohesion perceptions and behaviours. Six clusters are identified: distrustful, disunited, ambivalent, tolerant, connected, and declarative. The authors establish the composition of each cluster in relation to socio-economic, socio-demographic, ethnocultural, and attitudinal characteristics. Their research questions the relevance of institutional trust as a social-cohesion indicator in the context of the specific conditions of transitional societies. The authors submit that trust in political institutions might strengthen social cohesion at the level of society without necessarily corresponding to individually oriented indicators of social cohesion, such as civic and political participations. This paper sheds light on the weaknesses of the methodological approach advanced by Joseph Chan and colleagues. With the application of cluster analysis in the present study, one finds that the horizontal dimension of social cohesion is particularly well suited for use in cross-cultural studies. By contrast, the vertical dimension emerges as more contextual, requiring greater attention to the specificities of a given political regime. This paper proposes the existence of social-cohesion zigzags displaying an ambivalent state of perceptional schemes where the highest cohesion scores in some indicators are accompanied by the lowest ones in others within the same representative group. This study confirms the complexity and multi-level nature of social cohesion in transitional societies
Soviet Legacy and Colonial Mentality: Continuity and Change in Ukraine’s Higher Education
Full text linkThis article considers the forces that impeded university reform in Ukraine prior to the Russian invasion in 2014 and the onset of the full-scale war in 2022. Ukraine’s post-Soviet educational system, which was originally designed to reproduce the subservience, compliance, and rigidity of the Russian and Soviet empires, preserved administrative mechanisms and entitlements that curbed institutional transformation. Russia’s invasion, however, spurred universities in Ukraine to make a radical move away from the Russian/Soviet template of higher education. This paper contextualizes the contentious history of Russo-Ukrainian relations within a discussion of the constraints spawned by the Soviet legacy and colonial mindset in Ukrainian universities. An analysis of the challenges to transformation is followed by policy recommendations for reformers and intellectual leaders seeking to decolonize their academic communities through the internationalization of higher education.
Preventing and Combatting Domestic Violence: Incrementalism and Interest Groups in Ukrainian Public Policy
Full text linkStatistical data indicates that domestic violence in present-day Ukraine is a particularly acute phenomenon. Urgent policy responses are therefore required on the part of state authorities in order to prevent and combat the problem. Moreover, Ukraine must improve its legislation in this regard in order to meet international obligations and achieve legislative approximation with the European Union (EU) in connection with EU membership. But for eleven years until June 2022, Ukraine underwent significant struggles in this sphere and was unable to ratify the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (the Istanbul Convention). This article turns to incrementalism and interest-group analysis for an exploration of both the challenges in ratifying the Istanbul Convention in Ukraine and the policy-making process that was adopted on account of those challenges. Using the case of domestic-violence legislation in Ukraine and the issue of the ratification of the Istanbul Convention, the authors contend that incrementalism remains a viable policy-making practice, as it considers a variety of stakeholders (including interest groups) and promotes progress by fostering common-ground approaches and gradual improvements. Ukraine’s trajectory ultimately shifted when the Istanbul Convention was ratified in 2022. Diverging from incrementalism in such a way, though, risks reversing crucial changes because the local opposition of interest groups in relation to a major decision remains unresolved. This article, first, reviews Ukraine’s policy path and show that it was incremental prior to 2022. Then, it looks at interest groups and examines their arguments for and against ratification of the Istanbul Convention. Afterward, the authors address the Europeanization of Ukraine and its impact on the adoption of legislation related to domestic violence. Finally, the article discusses how ratification became possible in 2022 and how EU conditionality both contributed to realizing that goal and created potential risks for the future
Silenced Archive of the Holodomor: The Ukrainian Civil Committee for Saving Ukraine, Transnational Humanitarianism, and Networks of National Compassion
Full text linkIt is a commonly held contention among scholars that the Great Ukrainian Famine of 1932–33—denied by the Soviet authorities while it was happening—received no relief in the form of organized international humanitarian aid. Thus, accounts of the famine rarely (if ever) feature a humanitarian narrative. By analyzing the activity of the Ukrainian Civil Committee for Saving Ukraine (Ukraїns\u27kyi Hromads\u27kyi Komitet Riatunku Ukraïny), this article challenges such views, as it situates interwar famine-related humanitarianism within the context of small-scale ethnic aid committees working in the interests of the starving across Europe. The records of the Ukrainian Committee stored at the National Library of Poland, as a group, constitute the “silenced archive of the Holodomor”—namely, scattered evidence of the famine that has been affected by displacement and erasure. Analyzing these largely understudied materials, this article argues that the official denial of the famine triggered the deployment of a transnational humanitarian narrative based on what the author calls “national compassion”—a moral duty and obligation uniting Ukrainians across borders. The article, moreover, points to the importance of situated knowledge, information networks, and documentation as tools in countering acts of violence and the power of repressive regimes
Myron Korduba: A Legacy of Ukrainian Geography
Full text linkThis article examines the life and research activity of the distinguished Ukrainian scholar in the field of geography Myron Korduba (1876–1947). His contributions to Ukrainian geography are revealed through a survey of his work in the areas of the population geography of Ukraine; econo- and politico-geographical regional and country studies; geographical pedagogy and cartography; and historical and toponymic geography. Korduba’s geographical legacy has not been widely investigated and is not well known in Ukrainian and international scholarship and education. This is mainly owing to the fact that he is perceived primarily a historian—indeed, one who enriched Ukrainian scholarship with innovative production in the historical disciplines. Thus, those who have studied Korduba’s creative output have tended to overlook his extraordinarily significant geographical oeuvre; it has heretofore received only superficial contemporaneous and contemporary exploration. Korduba’s principles and postulations in geography are introduced into the geographical scholarly literature in a novel way. They include ideas on the space, territory, and population of Ukraine; on the Ukrainian people, state, and language; on the treatment of geographical names as a historical source; and on the gleaning of information from the names of settlements