Le Dr Roman Rukoveda est un politologue et analyste à la Fondation ukrainienne pour la démocratie People First.
"We don't know the society in which we live in. This proves to be wholly true in the case of Ukraine as well. Its citizens, who have been searching for their path for already some 20 years, do not completely realise that frequently they are the main obstacle on their way to changes. What exactly are the characteristics of today's Ukrainians?
Social fatalism became the world outlook on grounds of survival. And as a result, there developed ultrahigh adaptive skills. The majority of Ukrainians have a high level of communicativeness which results from the need to negotiate with different powers which have controlled Ukraine in different historical periods.
An inalienable trait, which goes together with the social fatalism, is belief in successful future. According to sociological studies, 35% of Ukrainians have optimism concerning the development of Ukraine and their life, and 42% have hope that this will happen. Hence, Ukrainians are not concentrated on the negative past and are not focused on going through it over and over again, and imposing a sense of regret and blame on the external world towards themselves.
At the same time, the Ukrainian society, taking into account a modern level of technological development, including those in the public sphere, continues to remain traditional to a large extent. It is true not only concerning the 15 million rural people, but also regarding the greater part of small and medium-sized towns and the first and second generation of 'new' residents of Kyiv, Odessa, Kharkiv, Lviv and so forth.
The majority of Ukrainians aren't aware of the firmness and continuing work of traditional values at the level of the collective unconscious. An example: the overwhelming majority of Ukrainians celebrate traditional holidays (Christmas, Easter) with their parents or families and respect other religious family holidays. The cult of 'Father' and 'Mother' actively works in the society.
The greatest traditional trait is the 'Sanctity of the Native Land': the cult of Ukraine It is possible to assume that tradition is a component of survival and adaptive mechanism formula of Ukrainians. The Orthodox Church promotes the cultivation of traditionalism in the Ukrainian society.
Traditionalism often turns into obstinacy among Ukrainians. Traditionalism and obstinacy in the Ukrainian psyche sometimes leads to a lag effect in thinking and actions. In political culture, this is demonstrated by unreadiness 'to stake everything' and carry out their own policy, or stake on some single political patron. Ukrainians always 'secure themselves' and keep their options open, practically never 'burn their bridges' in politics and try to make advances to at least two-three partners.
Hence, external forces, including Russia, should understand that the development of really deep partner relations with Ukraine is possible only in the 'soft' format, and not by force of arms, which will take a long period of time.
Liberty is an inalienable element of the Ukrainian mentality. In proverbs it can be observed in such examples: 'life is priceless, and liberty is more valuable than life', 'the free need no freedom', and 'will gives strength to the weak'. The majority perceives the authorities as a group of those who have won a public struggle, as those whose will is stronger.
At the unconscious level, inside themselves, people feel 'free' (the free need no freedom) from the state. For this reason Ukrainians always perceived the state as something limited which can't infringe on their liberty.
This is where a phenomenon of Ukrainian anarchism arises from – associations of free people who wouldn't stand any public system restrictions even if this state is theirs. This also helps to understand why Ukrainians aren't too respectful of their state. Ukraine is to be respected and not the Ukrainian state. The state restricts their liberty. It is the prey of the rich and strong, it doesn't deserve some special respect. The binding of Ukrainians to precisely the country, and not to the state, managed to preserve the territory of Ukraine for them as the nation and keep it under their cultural influence.
Ukrainians have no special internal negations in terms of democracy to the extent it doesn't interfere directly with the life of people or violates their liberty. Therefore, the population, on the whole, will have a positive attitude towards participation in referenda. The optimum democracy for Ukrainians is the one which will help them to narrow down the state functions, minimise them only to the most necessary ones and provide as much free mode of activities as possible in public, political, economic and other spheres.
Probably, democracy in Ukrainian is minimisation of power with its maximum decentralisation in favour of regions. With such a formula, necessarily backed by the equality of laws for everybody and their general performance, Ukrainians will quickly master democracy and turn into law-abiding citizens.
This is why, taking into account the mental features of Ukrainians, the optimum variant for them is integration with the European Union where Ukraine will have the maximum sovereignty and power decentralisation, where there will be no tough centre of decision-making and verticality of power as in Russia.
That's why, participation of Ukraine in the Russian-backed Eurasian Union will hardly be natural, sincere or comfortable for its citizens. Ukrainians managed to preserve their will over the last 500 years, and will keep it now, even if the current Ukrainian leadership thinks otherwise."
