There Is Too Much At Stake In Ukraine To Give Up Now

photo credit

I made the point in an article a few days ago that Ukraine could be at the start of a promising economic recovery (Why I Am Optimistic About Ukraine, Euromaidan Press) that would support a stronger civil society.

The Financial Times this week has two opinion pieces that focus on the one threat to that recovery, the entrenched business and political interests bent on undermining Ukraine's economic and social reforms, as I had discussed in my article.

That both opinion pieces and my article highlight the threat at this time reflects the deep concern in the West that recent political turmoil in Kyiv could derail the reform program.

To conflate the two opinion pieces, both write that there is too much at stake in Ukraine to give up now.

In the first piece, Too Much Is At Stake To Give Up On Ukraine, Tony Barber, FT Europe Editor, warns that if Ukraine "veers off the path of domestic reform it is less likely to flourish as an independent state,"  And, indeed, the current political turmoil in Kyiv around the reform agenda is a serious threat to Ukraine's economic and social development.

However, Barber's observation that the mood has soured and embittered Ukrainians find that "post-Maidan authorities turned out to be no better than their predecessors" does not mean that Ukrainians are ready to give up on reform.  Few Ukrainians would return to the earlier time when Yanukovych and his Donetski thugs lorded over Kyiv and Ukraine.  Therefore, something new has to take its place.  Too many lives have been sacrificed in opposing corruption and Russian aggression.  Attacking the reform agenda is unlikely to dampen Ukrainian civil society's intent to see the reforms through, even if it is likely to result in dramatic moments along the way.

Even so, more can be achieved by civil society with technical and financial help from the West. Francis Malige, EBRD Managing Director for Eastern Europe and Caucasus, in Now Is Not The Time To Give Up On Ukraine, makes the case for Western support; "Giving up on Ukraine means giving up on courageous and determined people, alongside an entire country, at a time when they need us [the West] and when we can protect past successes and achieve much more, if we do it right."  Malige's piece is a convenient checklist of ways that international institutions and bilateral support can help by strengthening the private sector in Ukraine to improve people's well-being, while civil society reforms.

Short of a full-on Russian invasion, it is unlikely that reforms will fail because they have become part of civic culture in Ukraine.  But the reform process does need to keep up momentum so that the benefits--especially economic--become visible and tangible for all Ukrainians.  It is too early to see the full shape of Ukraine's transformation but the elements are there; popular support, civic activism, the realization that change is possible, a maturing multi-party political system and growing familiarity with civic culture in the West to which Ukrainians aspire.