EVOLUTION, PRESENT STATE
AND FUTURE OF POLITICAL
PARTIES IN UKRAINE:
EXPERT OPINIONS
F
or all-round assessment of the process of the multi-party system establishment in Ukraine, its present and
future, Razumkov Centre asked leading political scientists about specificities of the multi-party system
establishment in Ukraine; the place and role of political ideologies in that process; the present state of political
parties in Ukraine and possible lines of their evolution.
The answers of experts are presented by groups of the questions put, in the alphabetic order.
an impetus to the emergence of parties. The emergence of
most of them was prompted by the desire to do away with
the monopoly rule of one party. This laid down the leader’s
(or even fuehrer’s) approach to party building that levelled
the role of classic ideologies in party life.
Ihor KOHUT,
Chairman of the
Board, Laboratory
for Legislative Initiatives
What are the main features of Ukraine’s party system
evolution compared to similar processes in other postSoviet countries? What trends are specific of Ukraine’s
party system evolution now, what may their effects be?
The key feature of political parties’ evolution in
Ukraine (as well as in most post-Soviet countries) is that
by the method of formation, execution of constituent
documents, registration, the logic of internal systemic
activity and specificity of participation in political
processes most of them follow the CPSU model
and pattern. Weak attempts to change the process of
emergence and creation of new party projects fail.
The very word combination “party projects” showily
illustrates introduction of business approaches and
strategies to the system of activity of modern political
parties. Most attempts of Western party foundations and
institutes to show an alternative way of development
either failed or prompted emergence of party hybrids with
typical for European parties outward signs, but Sovietstyle communist essence and goals.
Although the principle “whatever we build, the CPSU
goes out” rules, development of modern party systems in
the European part of the USSR started in the turning year of
1989 – the year of the first free elections, when independent
MPs came to the USSR Supreme Council. Creation of the
Democratic Platform and other alternative groups gave
34
The described approach made parties more dependent
on financial business influences. The sources of funds for
most political parties still remain secret. By contrast to
European countries where the state financially supports
political parties and the system of private contributions
is strictly regimented, Ukraine has not managed to work
out and legislatively introduce balanced approaches to
party funding in course of 18 years of independence.
The undemocratic model of funding became one of the
reasons for the crisis (or, rather, oblivion) of internal
party democracy principles. In Ukraine, monopoly party
funding in fact means control and manipulation of its
activity. Similar processes take place in Moldova (for
instance, they, as well as Ukraine, have passed but not
implemented legislation on state funding of political
parties). The only difference between the two countries is
in the scale of financial and resource influence of FIGs.
In Russia, they managed to “tame” the main political
parties – i.e., to create a “virtual” party system where
parties are drawn into a controlled and loyal structure. In
Belarus, due to the specificity of its social development,
parties play no significant role, oppositional parties remain
on the outskirts of socio-political processes. Those two
countries fundamentally differ in the authorities’ attitude
to parties. A showy example: there are no members of
any party in the top leadership of Belarus, while Russian
leaders are honorary heads of United Russia party.
Party building in the Caucasus has some common
trends. For instance, Armenia has one big and strong
party in power and many small ones. Oppositional parties
suffer from the lack of funds and programme-ideological
principles. They are tailored to political figures and
operated as business projects – get funding from the party
of power and support it at elections.
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
EVOLUTION, PRESENT STATE AND FUTURE OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN UKRAINE: EXPERT OPINIONS
By and large, in most post-Soviet countries,
political parties lost interest not only in ideologies and
programmes, but even in rank-and-file members. Now,
most of them are nothing but projects, that is why the
authorities view them only as mutes. In such conditions,
the trend whereby citizens’ involvement in party life is
measured by 2% remains on the agenda.
In the person of Yanukovych Ukraine got the first
partisan President. Previous heads of state either avoided
a party status or contented themselves with the status
of honorary heads (as in the case of Yushchenko). This
witnesses the growing influence of parties in the political
system and formalisation of some aspects of democratic
political competition. Given such shifts, it is very
important at the present stage for Ukraine to solve the key
problems of party building, namely to reform the election
legislation, change the party funding system (with the
need of introduction of partial state funding and publicity
of sources of private funding), encourage internal party
democracy (introduction of the institute of membership
and an open procedure of delegation of members to party
forums, election of the party leadership and candidates to
representative bodies through “primaries” or other forms of
internal party competition, work of specialised commission
of ethics (elders’ quorums) solving internal party disputes
and responsible for the “good name” of a party).
Evidently, when studying evolution of political
parties in the post-Soviet space, one should note different
constitutional-legal modalities of their activity. Effective
parliament is the main institute that can encourage
democratic development of the party system, being
a representative body, it should effectively discharge
legislative and controlling functions. Emphasis should be
made on the problem of imperative mandate, to ensure
political responsibility of parties and individual party
members. One should not forget about the format and
procedures of national decision-making, since namely
parties are to accumulate social interests, and therefore,
protect interests of voters and meet their expectations. 
Andriy MELESHEVYCH,
Dean of the Law Department,
National University
of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy
What are the main features of Ukraine’s party system
evolution, compared to similar processes in other postSoviet countries? What trends are specific of Ukraine’s
party system evolution now, what may their effects be?
The main features of development and the present
state of the Ukrainian party system most of all correlate
with the development and state of democracy in the
country. After the USSR break-up, many former Soviet
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
republics announced building democratic society as
their future political goal. Some of them (namely, the
Baltic states) successfully joined the world community
of constitutional democracies. Now, the main political
parties in those countries generally meet the traditional
model of parliamentary parties of the European type.
Some post-Soviet countries that never had democratic
ambitions replaced one form of authoritarian society with
another; parties are either absent there or present nothing
more than a tool of keeping power by the ruling elite.
Ukraine appeared in the group termed by T.Caroters
as countries of feckless pluralism, lying in the grey zone
between democracy and authoritarianism. Such a state is
transitional and cannot last long, the country sooner or
later either comes to standards of democracy or returns to
an undemocratic system. Such was the drift of almost all
other states of that group (Belarus, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan,
Russia). In most of them, parties of power perform the
main governing function.
Ukraine is still in the state of “irresponsible
pluralism”. On the one hand, formally, politics in Ukraine
are made within the party system, there is a variety or
parties, parties really compete for votes. Since 2005,
parties’ role in the Ukrainian political system gained
strength, they “seized” traditional for parliamentary
parties political niches: electoral and governmental.
Identifiability of parties in society increased.
On the other hand, parties remain “fragile”,
personified, largely non-ideological. They have no firm
roots in society and do not represent voter interests; the
level of public trust in them is too low. Their political
accountability is in embryo. All leading parties are not
ashamed to abuse power. They bear traits of parties of
power, to a smaller or lesser extent.
What factors exerted the greatest influence on
Ukraine’s party system evolution in 1991-2010?
The Ukrainian party system evolution was most of
all influenced by three factors: (1) the election system of
proportional representation; (2) the 2004 constitutional
reform; (3) in a way, the Orange Revolution.
Before 1998, when the mixed election system was
used for the first time, political parties were practically
inexistent in Ukraine. The mixed system of the
Verkhovna Rada election catalysed institutionalisation
of parties, political actors realised their value as a means
of achievement of political power. The informal and
amorphous party of power that seriously hampered the
party system development was finally removed by the
election system of proportional representation, under
which, elections were held in 2006 and 2007.
Although the 2004 constitutional reform deserves
criticism, it was one of the main drivers of political
parties and the party system development in Ukraine.
Strengthening of Parliament’s role at the expense of
presidential powers, namely, in formation of the Cabinet
of Ministers and some control of its activity, in turn,
helped parties fill one more their traditional niche – of
Government formation.
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
35
UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
The Orange Revolution influenced the process of
legitimisation of transparent and fair elections as the only
mechanism of formation of the state authorities. It may
be reasonable argued that the political elite of different
colours better realised that abuses at elections may be too
risky for ambitious politicians.
Therefore, it may be said that an institutional and
legislative mechanism has been established in Ukraine
favourable for further development of the national party
system, and political parties are the main (if not the only)
means of coming to power.
To be sure, growing identifiability of political parties
potentially entails growing political responsibility to
voters. Parties may wish that or not, but they cannot
ignore this factor. In this connection, there are two options
of Ukraine’s party and political system development.
If parties, especially ruling parties, realise that they
inevitably have to pass a test of political responsibility
to society, at least during elections, and voters, instead
of blindly following their idols, adequately perform
their democratic function of the examiner, Ukraine has a
chance to part with the stage of “feckless pluralism” and
approach the world democratic community.
Another option is to move in the opposite direction.
Alarming signs of curtailment of democratic elements
after the new team coming to power witness practical
risks of establishment of an authoritarian party of
power compromising the very idea of political parties in
Ukraine. From this viewpoint, the next parliamentary and
local elections may present kind of litmus paper, if any. 
Oleksiy HARAN,
Professor
of Political Science,
Research Director,
School of Political Analysis
of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy
What place did political ideologies occupy at initial
stages of the multi-party system development in Ukraine,
what place do they occupy now?
If we speak about the “end of ideologies”, that idea
proved rather controversial. On the one hand, there
really arose a trend to convergence of all main ideologies
of the present time: social democracy, liberalism, and
conservatism. Barriers among them are often blurred.
However, there remain differences: between the leftof-centre and right-of-centre in the European policy,
between democrats and republicans in the USA. Although
ideological borders are not so distinct as in the 1st half
of the 20th century or right after World War II, some
ideological markers remain.
Ukraine really faces a problem with establishment
of ideological and programme-oriented parties. The
36
problem is that all the period of independence we
actually return to the need to defend, first, democracy,
and second, sovereignty and independence. For that,
broad non-ideological associations are needed. And the
People’s Rukh of Ukraine arose in 1989 as a broad front
uniting different ideological forces, from communist
reformers to right radicals. However, Rukh rapidly
radicalised and as soon as the fall of 1990 became a
right-of-centre anticommunist force that set the goal
of Ukraine’s independence. But when after 1991 Rukh
was transformed into a party, this naturally narrowed its
electoral base.
Next, “Our Ukraine” could become a strong right-ofcentre party. Factors of Yushchenko’s victory included
successful mobilisation of society under slogans common
for the country’s West and East: fighting corruption, the
rule of law, European values. There was an opportunity to
establish a normal right-of-centre party of the European
type, but the party was built by administrative methods,
and it experienced what a party built “from the top”
should have experienced. Plus internal contradictions: the
party wouldn’t make up its mind and hesitated along with
the President, which resulted in its marginalisation.
There is an evident trend towards a decrease in the
CPU influence: once, it collected over 20% of votes,
now – only 3-5%. One of the reasons is that many leftminded and Russophile voters are engaged by the Party of
Regions. If we speak about radicals, in principle, radical
ideologies have never been strong enough in Ukraine:
neither extreme left (communists de facto ceased to be
“anti-systemic” yet in Kuchma’s times), nor extreme
right, neither Ukrainian nationalists, nor pro-Russian
ones. Such parties almost never passed the 3% barrier.
The niche of social democracy might accommodate
Moroz’s SPU. There was such drift, and it was positive,
but after the 2006 elections it lost popularity and brought
discredit upon itself, as “social democracy (united)” did
previously. As a result, the niche remained vacant.
What criteria and “markers” may be applied to
categorise the leading political forces in Ukraine as
left, centrist, right? How would the political forces
represented in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine be
positioned of the left-right scale, if those criteria are
used?
After the sharp turn of SPU, the left-of-centre niche
was claimed by BYuT (that at the 2002 elections, with
such Ukrainian centre-right patriarchs as Lukyanenko and
Khmara in its ranks, was to the right of Our Ukraine). But
Batkivshchyna, a core of BYuT, suddenly turned right and
became an associated member of the European People’s
Party (along with Our Ukraine and Rukh).
Key words of conservatism rhetoric dominated the
discourse of Yushchenko. One of the problems lies in
personal rivalry, in the result of which, Our Ukraine, For
Ukraine!, the Ukrainian People’s Party, Rukh and others
appeared in the same [part of the political] spectrum. This
further complicates the process of creation of the right-ofcentre force and their ideological differentiation.
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
EVOLUTION, PRESENT STATE AND FUTURE OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN UKRAINE: EXPERT OPINIONS
The Party of Regions, while being a party of big
capital and comparing itself with US Republicans, now
seems to demonstrate a non-ideological stand. Lytvin’s
Bloc is out of the question: [it took] an absolutely servile,
conformist stand.
Indeed, it may be said that there are no parties
in Ukraine clearly representing the basic political
ideologies – liberalism, social democracy, conservatism.
Those niches are basically free, but this does not mean
that Ukrainian society does not need them.
Therefore, Ukrainian society faces a dual task in
the policy sector. On the one hand, creation of true
programme-based parties. On the other, the present
“Thermidorian” situation resets the task of establishment
of a wide front to protect democratic freedoms and
sovereignty of Ukraine. This, however, again hinders
building of purely ideological parties, since ideological
differences must be laid off.

However, parties are in fact used solely as a tool of
political struggle.
That tool is often not backed with elaborate
programmes containing not only a strategic idea of
Ukraine’s development, but a list of concrete measures
aiming to achieve those goals.
As a rule, parties come to power absolutely unprepared
to exercise it. Unfortunately, parties’ intellectual potential
is weak, but even it is not fully used.
There are no nationwide parties in Ukraine, due to the
political split of society. Ukrainian parties mainly target
voters of either South and East, or Centre and West.
Catch-all parties in Ukraine (in their classic meaning)
are out of the question. Meanwhile, an interesting
phenomenon is observed: to promote their ideas on
“hostile” ground, actually all parties use populist socioeconomic slogans.
There can be no talk of a steady social base of parties
in Ukraine, with few exceptions. Meanwhile, parties
often break their election promises or pass decisions
inconsistent with expectations of their voters.
Ihor ZHDANOV,
President, “Open Policy”
Analytical Centre
What place do Ukrainian political parties really
occupy in the system of governance and in society? What
functions of political parties do they really perform?
Whose interests do they represent?
Formally, political parties are one of the pillars of
Ukraine’s political system. Parliament and most local
councils are elected by closed party lists. In line with
the election results, the winning parties (blocs) form
parliamentary factions that make a coalition and form the
Government. This formally gives parties (blocs) serious
tools of influence on the Ukrainian foreign and home policy.
However, given that most parties in Ukraine either
serve their leaders or interests of financial-industrial
circles, their formal status not always fits with the real
one.
In reality, the role of most Ukrainian parties is actually
reduced to translation, integration and promotion of
interests or a specific group of politicians – party leaders,
or party sponsors from the same FIGs. Furthermore, the
Constitutional Court’s recent ruling allowing individual
membership in the coalition also seriously reduced
the influence of factions (and therefore – parties) on
formation of the Government and coalition.
Concerning parties’ performance of their functions.
The most effectively performed today is the function
for which a party is actually created – fighting for power.
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
Unfortunately, parties have not become a social career
lift, poorly perform functions of building the Ukrainian
political elite. As a rule, on party lists appear either tested
party “fighters” who are national deputies for several
terms in a row, or party sponsors who fund the election
campaign to secure a place in party lists for themselves. It
is very difficult today to make a party career for a young
and energetic, but not too experienced and monied party
member.
One of the main party functions, of social and public
integration, is not performed at all today. On the contrary,
at parliamentary or presidential elections, the election
rhetoric used by most political forces further aggravates
the split in Ukrainian society.
Are political parties representing interests of social
groups distinguished on the socio-economic basis
relevant in today’s Ukraine, or transition to the model of
catch-all parties is irreversible?
There are no catch-all parties in Ukraine generating
ideas acceptable for all strata, social and, even more
important, regional groups without exception. The
political split of society makes creation of such party (I
say again, in the classic meaning) impossible.
The idea of a catch-all party in Ukraine works only on
the level of public opinion polls. After all, socio-economic
problems are the same in all regions of Ukraine. Election
slogans of the Party of Regions, “Our Ukraine” or BYuT
on social issues differ only in details. All promise higher
wages and pensions, lower taxes, greater social benefits.
However, their election programmes have serious
differences as far as they deal with political issues:
language, lines of foreign policy, etc.
Democratic countries now witness convergence of
ideologies, parties gradually turn into voting machines,
trying to target entire society in their programmes, the
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
37
UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
social base of traditional parties – social democrats, liberal
democrats and conservatives – is gradually “diluted”.
Similar processes take and will take place in Ukraine,
with allowance for its specificity. As far as socioeconomic issues are concerned, parties will certainly
“catch all” here. And this process was actually irreversible
(with a small exception – for instance, CPU, that will
continue to target specific electoral groups).

Volodymyr FESENKO
Chairman of the Board,
Penta Center for Applied
Political Research
What place do Ukrainian political parties really
occupy in the system of governance and in society? What
functions of political parties do they really perform?
Whose interests do they represent?
In the system of governance, Ukrainian political
parties occupy an unnatural monopoly place, but do
not play a decisive role. The system of governance is
influenced not as much by parties as institutions as by
party leaders and their milieu, and by influential businesspolitical groupings within and beyond parties. Quite
probably, under the new political regime, if it continues
the way it is and takes root, political parties’ influence on
the system of governance will even decrease.
In Ukrainian society, the place of parties is important,
but very controversial. First of all, the public perception
of parties is mixed. On the one hand, Ukrainian voters
got used to the present parties, view political parties as
an element of the system of governance and one of the
rules of the electoral democracy game. On the other, the
attitude to parties is rather critical. According to the poll
conducted by the Institute of Sociology of the National
Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and SOCIS Centre
Are there political parties and movements in Ukraine,
to which, power may be entrusted?
% of those polled
1994
13.9
2000
16.7%
2004
2008
28.0%
31.2%
25.5%
29.8%
Yes
58.1%
No
52.1%
30.9%
43.6%
39.5%
Hard to say/no answer
30.7%
(April 2009), only 32.7% of respondents admitted the
existence of a party whose ideological and programme
goals they shared (48% did not see such a party), only
30.1% reported the existence of parties protecting the
interests of the people like those respondents (46.2%
denied the existence of such parties). According to
the data of public opinion monitoring by the Institute
of Sociology of the National Academy of Sciences of
Ukraine, the polarity of attitude to political parties goes
up (See diagram).
Out of all classic functions of political parties,
Ukrainian parties are almost entirely concentrated on
the function of struggle for presence in elected bodies
of power (although they compete only with each other).
That is, they mainly act as voting machines. The function
of participation in state governance is a derivative of the
electoral function. Our parties influence representative
bodies mainly via their factions, while influence on
the executive branch is mainly exercised via their
representatives delegated to the concerned bodies of
power. In both cases, that influence is mixed. Party
discipline in factions is often weak, while representatives
in the executive branch largely discharge lobbyist
functions. The main problem is that Ukrainian parties
do not generate a systemic vision of the state policy and,
respectively, do not implement their political course in
state governance bodies.
The function of selection of leaders and elites is
performed extremely poorly. In this country, leaders make
parties, not vice versa. Low quality of political elites
ensues from poor performance of that function, sale of
ranks in election lists, absence of a systemic HR policy in
parties, etc.
The functions of representation and coordination
of social interests are also poorly exercised. Modern
parties increasingly part with their former role of
exponents of specific social interests, representing instead
interests of some charismatic leaders and businesspolitical groupings. One may also speak about some
indirect representation of interests of big ethno-cultural
communities (e.g., the Russian-speaking and Ukrainianspeaking population). Concerning the agreement of
differing social interests, Ukrainian parties can hardly
agree even their own party interests, due to their poor
ability to come to terms.
The function of involving citizens in politics is
performed at an average level (although better than
previously). According to the above-mentioned annual
monitoring, currently, political party membership was
reported by some 4% of respondents (for comparison:
before 1998 – below 1%, in early 2000s – nearly 2%).
This index meets European standards.1
The function of competition in struggle for political
power is performed fairly well. Ukrainian politics are
among the most competitive in Eastern Europe, let
alone the post-Soviet space. Will they remain such? The
1
According to the data of comparative European studies, by different indices of party and political activity (participation in meetings and demonstrations, use
of party symbols, etc.) Ukraine is ahead of actually all East European countries and yields only to some developed democracies.
38
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
EVOLUTION, PRESENT STATE AND FUTURE OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN UKRAINE: EXPERT OPINIONS
question remains open. A trend of transition to “controlled
democracy” is not ruled out.
Performance of the function of formation of the public
opinion on socially important issues is unsatisfactory.
This function is discharged in a deformed way, as party
discussions emphasise problems not critical for society
(such as the language issue), while strategic issues of
state development, issues of the substance and forms of
structural reforms are not mentioned in party political
discussions. The culture of party discussions also remains
very low, giving a bad example to citizens.
The function of guarantee of the political system
legitimacy is also performed ineffectively. The lack of the
leading parties’ unity on the key issues of the state policy,
extreme proneness of Ukrainian politics to conflicts
undermine trust in the system of governance and in
political parties as such.
Are political parties representing interests of social
groups distinguished on the socio-economic basis
relevant in today’s Ukraine, or transition to the model of
catch-all parties is irreversible?
The model of representation of interests of specific
social groups is being abandoned even by modern EU
parties, so, one should not expect a stake on social and
group “specialisation” from our parties. However, the
model of catch-all parties does not fully work here because
of the ethno-cultural variety of society. Connection with
specific social groups can still be traced here. First of all,
as we noted, it is the connection with some ethno-cultural
groups. The mentioned Party of Regions in the recent
years has been positioning itself as a party representing
mainly the interests of the Russian-speaking population.
Parties of the national democratic and nationalist trends
target the Ukrainian-speaking population. Another
example – SPU and Lytvyn’s Bloc that made a stake on
Central Ukrainian regions and mainly rural voters. There
were attempts, may be failed, to represent interests of the
new middle class. However, work with the target social
group and systemic representation of its social interests
are not the same. In their programmes and election
activity, our parties are mainly engaged not in formulation
and representation of specific social interests, but
rather in advancing mass social instincts, imitation and
manipulation of social interests. 

Expert discussion, May 27, 2010
Vadym KARASIOV,
Director, Institute
of Global Strategies
May a nationwide political party appear in Ukraine,
for which, differences in socio-cultural orientations
of citizens of different regions would not be of priority
importance?
Emergence of a nationwide political party in Ukraine
is an academic rather than practical issue. Such party may
appear only when the nation, having drawn its external
administrative borders, stands as a mature and united
politico-legal, national-cultural, language community.
Such national community does not face the problem
of choice of the civilisational code, and therefore,
the format of statehood and the strategy of national
development. Contradictions on social, economic,
political and party development existing inside a mature
nation are channelled to the competitive party system.
In such societies parties represent interests of different
social groups and compete, proposing programmes of
socio-economic development; so, they can be mass and
nationwide, since all guard state and national interests.
In 1991, the idea of nation-building promoted by the
mass national democratic movement, Rukh, was laid in
the basis of Ukrainian statehood. However, after gaining
independence, the idea of economic sovereignty and
institutional signs of formal statehood replaced the idea
of nation-building. The priority tasks of the post-Soviet
political elite were to set up an autonomous from the
Union centre administrative-bureaucratic system and to
restore economic ties in the post-Soviet and post-socialist
space.
By contrast to post-socialist Eastern Europe, where
democratic movements were to reconvert the political
regime and reinstate market economy, in post-Soviet
Ukraine the national movement was to get rid not only
of the totalitarian past, but also of the imperial centre.
That is, Ukraine faced a dual task – re-foundation of the
Soviet republic on the principles of an independent state
and nation-building, plus building democracy and market
economy.
While the administrative-bureaucratic system was
built, parties were active as regional, local organisations.
However, after the completion of the administrative
project of statehood, the Ukrainian bureaucratic elite
faced the problem of the political system modernisation.
Then it appeared that the first stage of nation-building
was wasted. All attempts of “nationalisation” of parties,
i.e., transformation of regional-territorial associations
into nationwide political organisations, failed. The
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
39
UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
unresolved issue of nation-building after every election
froze electoral-regional differences in different aspects –
language, economic, historic, confessional. The most
critical factor hindering state- and nation-building is
that those aspects overlap and are cemented by regional
differences: in the country’s East – Russian-speaking
population, Orthodox believers mainly of the Moscow
Patriarchate, the Slavic-Russian identity, post-Soviet
lo-tech industrial economy; in the West – Ukrainianspeaking, multi-confessional population, the UkrainianEuropean identity, small and medium business.
Therefore, a civilisational split gradually appears in
Ukraine: European West – Russian East. On the party
field, those regional clusters are represented by two
conventional “parties” – “the party of Europe” and “the
party of Russia”. That is why a nationwide party is only
feasible after maturing of either European Ukraine, or
Russian Ukraine. Or there will be two separate Ukraines.
What should its main programme principles be in the
economy, social sector, home (including humanitarian),
foreign policy? May such party be referred to some
ideological trend?
Formulation of the key programme principles of a
nationwide party directly depends on the civilisational
vector – pro-European, or pro-Russian.
After Yanukovych came to power as a representative
of the East, Ukraine began to rapidly enter the Russian
space. The Party of Regions, most probably, will try
to create an all-Ukrainian party of power on the basis
of the pro-Russian foreign policy vector and frontal
all-round integration with the Russian Federation – a
version of “pro-Russian deviationists”. Deviationists,
first of all because the programme principles of that
party will pursue Ukraine’s involvement in the Russian
geopolitical, cultural, humanitarian, socio-economic
civilisational space. That is why the issues of home policy
and socio-economic development will be subordinated to
coordinates of the imperialist policy of Greater Russia.
Can the ideology of such party be defined? Ideology
cannot rest of a unilateral foreign policy turn alone, it
is to have an internal national content. The absence of a
national agenda, and therefore, a national programme
of economic and social reforms will mean that Ukraine
witnesses one more failed attempt of imitation of a
nationwide party.

Expert discussion, May 27, 2010
Mykola PRYMUSH,
Professor, Donetsk
National University
May a nationwide political party appear in Ukraine,
for which, differences in socio-cultural orientations
of citizens of different regions would not be of priority
importance?
In its present meaning, a party is a group of people
united for participation in political life and aiming to win
political power. In terms of structure, three tiers may be
distinguished in a party. The most uncertain and fuzzy tier
is made up of the body of voters identifying themselves
with a party and regularly voting for it at elections. The
second one is presented by the official party organisation.
A party organisational structure surely begins with voters.
The third tier – a party in the system of governance,
made up of officials in the state machinery appointed
because of their membership in the concerned party (state
administration heads, MPs, members of regional councils,
local authorities, etc.).
In many countries, communist, socialist and even
social democratic parties are in decay, if not complete
oblivion. Even conservative Britain witnesses the process
of de-ideologisation of old parties and emergence of new
ones. The fall of the “old labour” is especially evident.
Today, it may be argued that not only Ukraine, but the
whole world witnesses a crisis of ideas – up to complete
dilution and disappearance of ideologies.
Ukraine rejected socialism, but our political elite
has not adopted Western liberalism either. Over the
past 10 years, CPU, SPU, PSPU, a number of social
democratic parties, Rukh actually passed from the picture.
Meanwhile, parties adhering by classic liberal values
did not appear and mature. However, any party without
an ideology turns into an ad hoc committee or a lobbyist
agency consciously manipulating people’s fears.
Political ideologies become ever more changeable,
designed not for decades, let alone centuries, but “from
election to election”. On the one hand, this seriously
undermines trust in such ideologies, on the other –
lets politicians personifying them promptly respond
to contemporary challenges. This lets political parties
be more concentrated on implementation of priority
national projects in the sectors of public health, education,
agriculture and housing construction.
The experience of United Russia party is
demonstrative – although it arranges all-Russian
competitions of social projects pursuing establishment of
40
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
EVOLUTION, PRESENT STATE AND FUTURE OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN UKRAINE: EXPERT OPINIONS
civil society institutes, even that party cannot be deemed
nationwide, since it relies on the administrative resource
in its work, and party ideas are imposed and implemented
from the top. In this sense, the party entirely follows the
sad path of CPSU:
1. Although United Russia defined its ideology in
the programme documents (conservatism), the methods
of work, party structure, conscience of many officials
remained “soviet”, that is, party functionaries disregard
socio-cultural features of Russia’s residents. This brings
about the Chechen problem, [the developments in]
Ingushetia;
2. Although United Russia collects over 60% of
votes at elections, it ranks second in four regions: in
Irkutsk, Bryansk, Sakhalin and Tula regions voters prefer
communists.
A similar situation, with serious reservations, is
observed in Ukraine. The similarity with Russia is that
officials’ minds and methods of their work retained
elements of the Soviet administrative system, employment
of the administrative resource is normal for them. This
was evident in 1998 in SDPU(u), and in 2002 in the Bloc
“For a United Ukraine!” The only difference from Russia
is that in Ukraine, the socio-cultural dimension really
matters: say, residents of the East and South are guided by
the pro-Russian Party of Regions, residents of the Centre,
North and West by nationalist parties declaring the course
of European integration of the country. This means that
establishment of a united nationwide party is not on the
agenda, although many parties term themselves that way
and propose a “nationwide development strategy”, but
the alternatives proposed by them will hardly replace
the old policy with its division into the left and right.
Experts note that the decay of the left and right may lead
to the complete loss of what we got used to: the rhythm of
politics, its connection with the past and future, a distinct
and clear set of threats and challenges, stable activity
of voters and their political affiliation. This not only
aggravates disappointment in politics, but enhances the
impression of feebleness of the ruling elite that seems to
care only about its financial interests.
It should be stated that at present, there are no
political, let alone ideological, project that could be
termed as attractive and at the same time safe as the
projects of a nation-state, democracy, welfare state or
European integration. The political projects intended to
fill that emptiness endanger democracy and integrity of
society.
Although the end of ideologies may seem tempting,
without ideas, without discussion policy rots, and
a voter cannot make a conscious choice. More than
that, the consensus of elites depends on things silently
but methodically eliminated from public discussion:
the reasons for poverty, the power of big business,
evisceration of democracy and so on. All this is replaced
with farfetched problems of language, federalisation...
The left utopia of “equality of the poor” has proven its
incapacity and was rejected by society. Utopias of right
liberals were shattered by the experience of reforms of
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
1990s. The energy of the dogmatic confrontation of the
“right and left” splits society, causes social conflicts. A
national by its essence party is a party of civic accord, not
civic confrontation.
So, in view of the above and with account of
established world and all-Ukrainian trends, it may be
assumed that emergence of a nationwide party on the
Ukrainian political Olympus is impossible, even on the
condition of tolerant relations among regions in the sociocultural sector.
What should its main programme principles be in the
economy, social sector, home (including humanitarian),
foreign policy? May such party be referred to some
ideological trend? To which, if any?
Let us assume that a new ideological teaching has
been created. Its establishment as an actually ruling
ideology will depend on great many factors lying
beyond that teaching. Will there be people willing to
take such teaching as the basis for their ideology? Will
those people manage to create an organisation that will
cherish, improve, protect and promote that teaching? Will
they manage to work out on the basis of that teaching
a programme of action similar to the one in due time
created by communists led by Lenin? Will they manage to
form perceptions of concrete current events in the spirit of
the new teaching? Will there be large enough and socially
active forces among the population ready to adopt the new
ideology? To what extent will adherents of that ideology
be ready to make sacrifice to protect the new ideology and
achieve the ideals promoted by it?
Considering those factors, Ukraine’s post-Soviet
reality looks rather grim. The forces that do not want the
appearance of the new ideology mentioned above and can
hinder its appearance are strong; the forces that seek its
emergence and are ready to make efforts for that are weak
(if any). The whole system of education is designed not
to give the way to people with a way of thinking letting
them accept and understand new ideas. Mass media that
became the main factor shaping ideological preferences
of the population freely inoculate in people, from their
very childhood, a way of thinking effectively ruling out
any scientific perception of reality and scientific teachings.
People at least interested in the ideas of the teaching
cannot appear from nowhere. The new secular ideology
is inimical for the state that rejected secular ideology and
embarked on the road of revival of the religious principles.
Business circles are at best indifferent to it. Political crises
and social differences lead the process of ideological
degradation of the country. That is why the new ideology
may hardly hope for marked success in isolation
from Western countries. It should be developed as an
international rather than narrow national phenomenon.
For an ideological teaching to survive and play a
visible role, there should appear an organised group of
people accepting that teaching as their convictions and
ready to turn their efforts to its protection and promotion.
Historic patience is needed here, because such activity
can bring the desired fruit only in many years, maybe
decades.
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
41
UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
If with time the number of people accepting the new
ideology grows enough, they will be able to create a party
relying on that ideology and to work out a programme
of practical activity. The concrete form of that party will
depend on specific conditions formed in the world at that
time and the party members’ ability to understand them
and to make right practical conclusions. But this is a
matter for the future, and only hypothetic.
So far, only one thing may be said for certain: the
Party of Future should not view itself as an exponent
of interests of some part of the country’s population,
e.g.: suppressed, exploited, destitute, etc. classes, like
proletariat in Marxism. This does not mean that such
social groups are absent – they are numerous enough.
However, the Party of Future should cede representation
of their interests to other organisations, along with the
use of those groups of people in the party interests (for
instance, as voters). It should view itself, first of all, as
a specific alliance that has one goal: development of a
new ideology (ideology of the future), its promotion
among compatriots irrespective of their social status,
ethnic affiliation, sex, occupation and so on, growth of the
number of like-minded persons and their unification for
joint action to attain that goal.
The very nature of the new ideology prompts that
the new ideology may, first of all, be supported not by
representatives of lower classes, but by people with
relatively high education, culture, morality, intellect,
i.e., part of the intellectual, creative and business elite
disposed to individual opposition to the existing system
and way of life, that sees and somehow realises the
social essence of the main line of humanity evolution,
concerned by ruinous effects of such evolution. Such
people have to have rather high social status, be active
and even successful in their activity. In the current global
situation, the Party of Future may be conceived only on
the highest level of intellectual, creative and moral life of
modern society.
The Party of Future should not be involved in smallminded socio-political fuss within the framework of the
present social organisation. The opposition of such level
should not act to the benefit of that organisation. It has a
greater goal of the epoch-making scale – to lead the fight of
humanity for a social ideal alternative to the Western one.
Therefore, the Party of Future may be referred
to the so-called ideology of Enlightenment – kind of
synthesis of opposite ideas: conservatism and neoMarxism. Furthermore, the latter will go through complex
transformations, for instance, in international policy and
economy. The domain of international relations will
gravitate to realist ideas of the need of armed defence
of own territory, but with account of preservation of
the dominant world order (for instance, China and
Venezuela). In economics, socially oriented economy will
grow in popularity with industrial introduction of high
technologies (for instance, in the EU and USA).
resting on traditions of classic morality; the social sector
will pursue support for social justice and tolerance of
socio-cultural differences in society.

Valentin YAKUSHIK,
Professor,
National University
of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy
How would you describe the present state of
Ukraine’s party system? May one speak of its crisis?
The idea of a “crisis of the party system” in presentday Ukraine prompts a question: “If this is a crisis, what
is flourishing then?”
The huge number of officially registered parties (at
least 180) may certainly be viewed as a sign of the “crisis
of overproduction”. However, active participation of
many of them in parliamentary and extraparliamentary
politics proves that they are a live, active, essential
element of political processes in Ukraine (what type of
processes, is another question).
And the existence of a specific market of parties as
merchandise, usually for a pretty penny, often “turnkey”, proves that parties as institutions of political system
quite harmoniously fit into processes of extension of the
principles of “free” (and sometimes “controlled”, as the
associated democracy) market to almost all sectors of a
“transitional” post-Soviet society.
Some will certainly say that a “true”, “correct” party
system must look like the modern British or German one.
But first, why only modern? Their party systems, too,
passed a number of stages, quite controversial, including
from the viewpoint of the basic postulates of “pure
democracy”. And, second, why namely those European
countries? Why such neglect of the experience of no less
great nations, such as, say, Japan or Brazil? And why forget
about sub-Saharan Africa or traditionalist Oceanic states?
In that case, conservatism will focus on the social and
humanitarian sectors. In the humanitarian sector, the Party
of Future will make emphasis on a new education system
42
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
Expert discussion, May 27, 2010
EVOLUTION, PRESENT STATE AND FUTURE OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN UKRAINE: EXPERT OPINIONS
Yet, nobody knows what should be seen as an example
of “atypical” isomorphism (similarity of outward forms
with different guts): (1) the present exemplary democratic
state of party systems in the countries of Northern Europe
that originated from a lucky concurrence of historic
circumstances, or (2) flourishing “clannish-tribal” party
building in the majority of modern African (and some
post-Soviet, post-Communist) countries.
Which of the problems faced by Ukrainian political
parties and the party system are real, and which are
imaginary?
I will dwell upon two problems.
The problem of internal party democracy. Party
leaders in Ukraine are rightfully criticised for doing their
utmost to bar true rotation of elites, both within parties
and in the country as a whole. But who said that parties
must be built on the basis of true internal democracy?
Indeed, in Ukraine, parties are legislatively (and on
the level of the dominant political discourse) “forced”
to imitate internal democracy. But many (if not most)
organisers of party building and immediate consumers of
their political products prefer autocratic and authoritarian
structures and processes within parties.
And a “true” democracy should grant aspirants for the
role of political “pastors” and their potential and actual
“flock” alike the right to choose, including to choose the
model of their party organisation structure.
The problem of ideological parties. Political parties
may rightfully be created not only to unite ideologically
like-minded people (and their companions), but also to
represent (including on the extra- and supra-ideological
basis) specific clans, ethnic and sub-ethnic, language,
regional and fellow countrymen groups, as well as groups
structured on the basis of traditional ties among former
and present colleagues and/or alumni.
Given all this, Ukraine’s party system leaves
much space for creation of comfortable conditions to
promote club activities and structures under the mask
of partisanship encouraging utmost self-actualisation
and self-assertion of the “second and third echelon”
leaders. In particular, this refers to self-education and
“political tourism” projects enabled specifically thanks
to numerous pan-European parties and global inter-party
Internationals.
Our compatriots often (and not without reason) see it
as a specific market of “officially declared values-based
loyalties” and associated club services and privileges.
For instance, the dilemma once faced by Tymoshenko’s
Batkivshchyna, the loyalty choice between the Socialist
International (the Party of European Socialists) and the
European People’s Party, was not essentially values-based
but rather “market-motivated”.
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
Criticism of such events from the standpoint of
specific values is normal, as normal as that political
reality, though it may seem “perverted” and “cynical”.
It is adequate to the type of society, its evolution and
current general systemic state.
What scenarios of Ukraine’s party system evolution
are possible in the future? What factors will determine
their choice?
The following options seem possible, although not
equally probable.
1. Continuation of the “controlled chaos” of party
building specific of the “Orange” and early “post-Orange”
period, preservation of an atomised party system with
two varieties of opposing centres of gravity and two types
of political cleavages: ethno-nationalism (with elements of
tribalism) vs. civilisational conservatism; protection of oligarchic omnipotence and a system of bureaucratic arbitrariness vs. drift to social solidarity and humanistic justice.
2. Uncontrolled moderate polarisation of the party
system on the basis of establishment of inter-party (and
non-party) “megablocs” within the framework of the
common logic of civilisational values-based cleavages
along the conventional “West – East (South East)” axis.
At that, there will remain a “grey zone” that may be filled
by party and faction structures established by non-ethnonationalist, pragmatically minded groups split from BYuT.
We may also witness further radicalisation of the present
BYuT leadership and the political forces led by it, their
further drift to a regional “political ghetto”.
3. Shift of real party politics from the capital (from
national political institutes and mass media) to regions
and regionalisation of the party system, formation of
largely autonomous regional party systems. Such situation may arise in case of a weak-willed and amorphous
policy of party- and coalition-building by the present
political hegemon, the Party of Regions, and its political
satellites, or, vice versa, domination of that policy by resolute and well-structured actions guided by strategically
futureless, unrestrained bureaucratic (and business) egocentrism.
4. Formation of a precise, in terms of PR and political science, pluralistic party system with a hegemoniс
party adopting effective elements developed by Liberal
Democrats in Japan, Christian Democrats in Italy, the
Institutional Revolutionary Party of Mexico, and United
Russia party in the Russian Federation. Creation of such
a party system is not ruled out, but is very unlikely, due
to the wide range and complexity of the tasks associated
with that project.
What is undoubtful anyway is that Ukraine’s party
system will be fundamentally reformatted in the near
future, either evolutionarily or by leaps and bounds. 
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
43
EVOLUTION, PRESENT STATE
AND PROSPECTS OF UKRAINE’S
PARTY SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT
IN EXPERT ASSESSMENTS
Evolution of the party system:
the character and factors of influence
of fighting for power, worst of all – the functions of social
integration, social representation.
The overwhelming majority of experts described the
character of the party system evolution in course of 20
years as stagnation.
Equal shares of experts believe that citizens’
interests in social processes should be represented by
political parties and public organisations. Those two
types of institutes are far ahead of others mentioned in the
list (trade unions, mass media, individual politicians and
so on).
According to expert assessments, the greatest influence on its formation was exerted by changes in the legal
framework of party activity (changes in the election legislation, adoption and amendment of the Constitution,
passage of the laws On Associations of Citizens and On
Political Parties).
The second strongest influence was exerted by political events, including those that led to changes in the character of the political regime (first of all – the Orange Revolution, presidential elections of 2010 and Yanukovych’s
victory there), and by some processes in political parties (the ban of CPU in 1991, reorganisation of Rukh into
a political party in 1993). Assessed a bit lower was the
influence of political processes and developments of late
1990s – early 2000s, and establishment of specific types
of parties (“parties of power”, “leader’s parties”, etc).
According to experts, political parties and the party
system are most of all influenced by the stand of the
biggest FIGs. A bit lower they assessed the effectiveness
of mass media and actions of the authorities (creation
of the legal framework of party activity). Still lower
influence was reported for the public opinion, activity
of international foundations and programmes, the stand
of governments of foreign countries and governing
bodies of their unions, the stand of Ukrainian civil
society institutes. The stand of political parties of foreign
countries ranked last.
Present state of political parties:
features and problems
Interesting opinions were produced by experts
regarding the features specific of Ukrainian parties. In
particular, the majority of experts believes that there
are parties in Ukraine representing interests of specific
social groups and maintaining continuous contact with
them. At the same time, also the majority of experts
questions the very existence of nationwide parties
financially independent from FIGs, regularly reporting
to their voters and abiding by the principles of internal
party democracy.
Expert opinions about the existence of ideologically
consistent parties split almost equally: 49% recognised
the existence of such parties, while 44% denied it.
Assessing parties’ possession of specific features,
experts assessed the most critically their ability
and willingness to defend the interests of ordinary
people, and the ability to resolve concrete problems
concerning ordinary citizens – over 40% of experts
suggests that no political party has those qualities.
The majority of experts (from overwhelming to
simple) believe that few parties possess such qualities as:
the ability to organise local activity; presence of strong
leaders; the ability to work out a clear programme of
action; sufficient funding; the ability to cooperate with
public organisations and associations of citizens; existence
of an elaborate strategy of the state development. Only
1-3% of experts believe that each of the above features is
found in actually all Ukrainian parties.
According to the absolute majority (90%) of
experts, political parties in Ukraine serve the interests
of financial and business structures. More than half
of experts believe that they serve the interests of party
leaders, and only 12% are sure that parties serve the
interests of voters.
The biggest shares of experts believe that political
parties in the first place lack an articulated stand on the
state development strategy, and the ability and willingness
to defend the interests of ordinary people.
Experts differently assessed parties’ performance
of their functions. They best of all perform the function
Somewhat fewer experts reported that parties lacked
the ability to work out a clear programme of action,
1
All-Ukrainian expert poll “Development of political parties in Ukraine” was conducted by the Razumkov Centre Sociological Service on May 14-20, 2010.
100 experts were polled – representatives of the state authorities, think-tanks, political party leadership, higher educational establishments, experts, political
scientists, lawyers.
44
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
EXPERT ASSESSMENTS
sufficient funding, the ability to resolve concrete problems
concerning ordinary citizens, to organise local activity.
The most pressing problems of political parties,
according to experts, include political corruption, nonaccountability to voters and dependence on FIGs.
They also mentioned, in the descending order: mainly
regional support; weakness of programme ideological
fundamentals; absence of permanent communication with
society; lack of internal party democracy; absence of a
stable social base and dependence on foreign influence.
All those problems are quite urgent – from 3.47 to 4.32
points on a five-point scale.
Parties and ideologies
Experts much more definitely than ordinary citizens
noted adherence of left, centrist and right parties to
specific political principles (Table “Expert definition of
the main principles of left, centrist and right parties”).2
In expert eyes, the difference of those parties regarding
the key principles in different sectors of home and foreign
policy looks quite distinct.
Assessing Ukraine’s lead political forces in terms of
“left – right – centre”, experts unanimously termed
left the CPU.
Expert definition of the main principles of left, centrist and right parties
Trends
In socio-economic policy
In home and legal policy
In humanitarian policy
In foreign and security policy
Left
parties
a ban on free purchase and sale
of farming land;
growth of the state sector of
economy, nationalisation of
previously privatised enterprises;
protection of interests of lowincome citizens;
fairer distribution of profit
between enterprise owners and
hired workers, growth of the
cost of labour;
a ban on sale of land to noncitizens of Ukraine
priority of community (collective,
territorial community, whole nation,
etc.) rights over personal rights;
equality of all citizens to the law –
“one law for all”;
formation of strong authorities, their
empowerment to restrict civil rights
and freedoms in the interests of state
development
the status of Russian as the
second official language
Ukraine’s accession to the
Union of Russia and Belarus
and to SES;
accession to the defence
union of CIS states (CSTO)
Centrist
parties
protection of interests of the
“middle class” – qualified
employees with average
incomes;
priority development of small
and medium business;
creation of favourable conditions
for foreign investments in
Ukraine, protection of foreign
investor rights;
fairer distribution of profit
between enterprise owners and
hired workers, growth of the
cost of labour
restriction of power of the central
government, delegation of some
powers to regions;
equality of all citizens to the law –
“one law for all”;
treatment of the authorities as the
“hired worker” of society, provision
of accountability and controllability of
the authorities for society
perception of the Ukrainian
nation as all citizens of Ukraine
irrespective of their ethnic
origin;
equal protection of rights of all
ethnic groups by the state;
equal treatment by the state of
all Churches and confessions
existing in Ukraine, partner
relations with them, noninterference into confessional
and church relations
Ukraine’s implementation
of the course of adoption of
European standards of life
and protection of civil rights,
not raising the issue of
membership in international
organisations;
Ukraine’s non-accession
to existing military blocs,
establishment of its status of
a neutral state.
Right
parties
state support for big national
business;
private land ownership, free
purchase and sale of farming
land;
creation of favourable conditions
for foreign investments in
Ukraine, protection of foreign
investor rights
extension of some privileges to the
elite ensuing from its status;
priority of personal rights over
community (collective, territorial
community, whole nation, etc.)
rights;
strong authorities, their
empowerment to restrict civil rights
and freedoms in the interests of state
development;
restriction of power of the central
government, delegation of some
powers to regions;
treatment of the authorities as the
“hired worker” of society, provision
of accountability and controllability of
the authorities for society.
perception of the Ukrainian
nation as Ukraine’s citizens
of the Ukrainian origin, the
indigenous people; citizens of
other ethnic origin – as national
minorities;
priority protection of the rights
of the Ukrainian nation by the
state;
the official status of the
Ukrainian language;
state support for creation of the
united local Orthodox church in
Ukraine
Ukraine’s accession to
NATO;
Ukraine’s accession to the
EU in foreseeable future
2
A principle is referred to features of one group of parties if it was referred to it by over 50% of experts. Where a principle is referred to one group by less than
half of experts, it is referred to the groups to which it was referred by not less than 30% of experts. Principles are grouped by sector, in the descending order.
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
45
PRESENT STATE AND PROSPECTS OF UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT
The overwhelming majority called Lytvyn’s Bloc
centrist.
“Our Ukraine” was termed right by the majority of
experts, although 27% called it centrist. The majority
called the Party of Regions centrist, too, but quite many
experts also referred it to left and to right political forces.
A relative majority referred BYuT to centrist forces,
although almost as many – to the right.
Given the “markers” put by experts, such assessments
are not surprising since programmes and approaches of
the mentioned parties and blocs (except CPU) combine
principles that, according to experts, are inherent in
different political forces.
Parties in Parliament: the majority and
opposition, the election legislation
According to nearly half of experts, parliamentary
political forces do not seriously differ by election
programmes (notable difference or, vice versa, its
absence were reported by equal shares of respondents).
Meanwhile, the opinions on the character of political
forces’ activity are far less definite: a relative majority
(39%) of experts believe that the difference is evident,
35% – that the difference is almost nonexistent. Every
fifth expert noted small difference.
Experts easily categorised parties by affiliation
with the opposition. Over 70% of experts referred to
opposition BYuT and Svoboda, more than 50% – People’s
Self-Defence, Rukh, Civil Position, Our Ukraine, over
40% – the Front for Change and the Ukrainian People’s
Party. Only 5% called Strong Ukraine party led by
Tihipko oppositional.
The overwhelming majority of experts noted
insufficient protection of opposition rights in Ukraine:
46% believe that those rights are protected to some
extent; 40% consider them entirely unprotected; only 13%
suggest that opposition rights are protected in Ukraine.
According to experts, relations among political
forces at decision-making in Parliament are most of
all influenced by the community/conflict of interests of
those forces fighting for power and interests of financial
sponsors of parties. The second important group of factors
is presented by economic interests of the party leadership
and internal party competition (conflicts among party or
bloc leaders). Other factors include (in the descending
orders): interests of party members, international
influence, ideologies, election programmes; interests of
voters who voted for those parties came last.
Desired party model
Expert ideas of the “standard model” of political
party building are controversial. The overwhelming
majority of experts are sure that parties must have an
ideology, i.e., prefer “ideological” parties to “pragmatic”.
Meanwhile, only 36% of experts sees it necessary for
parties to represent some social group, 19% stands for the
“catch-all” party model, 20% accepts both approaches.
A relative majority (43%) of experts believe that
parties in Ukraine should evolve towards the “catch-all”
model, seek support of different groups of the population;
three times fewer experts support the model of “class”
46
parties representing interests of specific social groups;
40% are sure that there should be parties of both types in
Ukraine.
A relative majority of experts also supports evolution
of parties to “pragmatic”, whose programme documents
will consider the needs and interests of the widest possible
range of voters. Evolution of parties as “doctrinal” whose
programme documents rest on classic political ideologies
is supported by less than a quarter of experts. A third
believe that there should be parties of both types in
Ukraine.
In the issue of relations between a faction and an
MP elected by a party list of the relevant party or
bloc, most experts support the so-called “imperative
mandate”: believe that an MP should not be allowed not
to join the faction or freely leave it, to stay unpunished
in case of expulsion from his faction, to join the coalition
“individually”, if his faction stays in opposition. Most
experts support MPs right to vote differently from their
faction and publicly criticise its position.
Meanwhile, it should be noted that on all questions
of the questionnaire, quite many experts had opposing
opinions.
Experts rather critically assess the effect of
proportional election of the Verkhovna Rada and
local self-government bodies. On a 10-point scale, all
assessments ranged within 3.89-4.79 points. The influence
of the proportional system on Parliament’s activity was
assessed relatively higher, on the activity of district and
city councils – the lowest.
When asked about the ways to improve the
present model of proportional election of Parliament,
the overwhelming majority of experts mentioned
introduction of open/regional election lists. The
overwhelming majority also opposed cancellation of the
election barrier. More than half supports the proposal
to set up a differentiated barrier for political parties and
election blocs.
Proposals of a large increase of the election barrier
and of the blocs’ ban to take part in elections met a mixed
reaction (they were supported, respectively, by 45% and
41%, opposed – by 43% and 32%).
Lines of the party system evolution
By contrast to citizens, the absolute majority of
experts admits the need of a multi-party system in
Ukraine. Expert opinions about the number of parties
split: roughly equal shares believe that there should be up
to five parties, and from 5 to 10 parties, somewhat fewer –
that there should be 10 to 20 parties.
A relative majority of experts supports the
option of a party system with 5-7 parties of different
ideologies that can make coalitions in different
formats, i.e., a multi-party system without a dominant
party – moderate pluralism.
Equal shares of experts (28% each) support,
respectively, evolution towards the two-party system
(with two strong centrist parties) and to the “tri-party”
system, where one party (centrist) dominates, others (leftand right-of-centre) in turns make a coalition with it. 
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
EXPERT ASSESSMENTS
20 years ago, a multiparty system began to be formed
in Ukraine. Now, more than 170 political parties
are registered. How would you describe the process
of the multiparty system development in Ukraine?
% of those polled experts
Stagnation
(absence of
positive changes)
Regress
18.0%
70.0%
Progress
8.0%
Hard to say
4.0%
7.22
7.18
2.55
2.50
2.02
90.0%
56.0%
Of party leaders
Of voters
6.73
6.65
6.23
6.14
Of the state authorities
Hard to say
12.0%
9.0%
3.0%
* Experts were supposed to give all acceptable answers.
6.10
6.03
5.71
5.36
5.29
5.04
4.92
4.92
4.91
4.62
Assessment of performance of their functions
by Ukrainian political parties*
average mark
4.56
Fighting for power
Political recruitment
(formation of the ruling elite)
Formulation
and implementation
of the political course
Social representation
2.13
Social integration
2.07
3.01
2.60
* On a fivepoint scale from 1 to 5, where “1” means complete nonperformance,
“5” – full performance.
Are there political parties in Ukraine
meeting the following criteria?
% of those polled experts
Representing interests of certain
social groups, maintaining permanent
contacts with them
28.0%
8.0%
4.0%
Business structures
3.0%
Individual politicians
3.0%
Hard to say
2.65
63.0%
31.0% 6.0
29.0%
Public organisations
Other
Of financial
and business circles
7.16
% of those polled experts
Mass media
3.26
2.76
7.34
Who should represent your interests
in social processes first of all?
Trade unions
3.98
3.39
Whose interests do political parties serve in Ukraine?*
% of those polled experts
4.60
* On a five-point scale from 1 to 5, where “1” means minimum influence, “10” –
maximum influence.
Political parties
Stand of the biggest FIGs
Activity of mass media
Actions of the authorities (passage of laws, other regulatory acts
dealing with political parties)
Public opinion about political parties
Activity of foundations, programmes, projects of assistance
implemented in Ukraine with support from foreign countries and
international organisations
Stand of governments of foreign countries and governing bodies
of their unions
Stand of Ukrainian civil society institutes (non-governmental
organisations, trade unions)
Stand of political parties of foreign countries
* On a five-point scale from 1 to 5, where “1” means minimum effect, “5” – maximum
effect.
Assessment of the intensity of influence of the
following events on the party system formation
in Ukraine in 1990-2010*
average mark
Adoption of the Constitution of Ukraine in 1996
Introduction of the entirely proportional system of election of the
Verkhovna Rada in 2004.
Adoption of the Law “On Political Parties in Ukraine” in 2001
Introduction of the mixed, majority-proportional system of election
of the Verkhovna Rada in 1997.
Amendment of the Constitution of Ukraine in 2004 providing for the
Government formation by the coalition of parliamentary factions
Presidential elections in 2004, the Orange Revolution
Adoption of the Law “On Associations of Citizens” in 1992
Ban of CPU (as part of CPSU) in 1991
Presidential elections in 2010, victory of the Party of Regions’
leader Yanukovych
Transformation of the People’s Rukh of Ukraine into a political party
in 1993
Political crisis of 2006-2007, early elections in 2007
Establishment of own political forces by presidential candidates at
the 2010 elections – Tihipko, Yatseniuk, Hrytsenko
Campaign of protests “Ukraine without Kuchma”
Legislative introduction of state funding of political parties in 2005
and its subsequent abolition
Attempts to set up “parties of power” in Ukraine (People’s
Democratic Party, Agrarian Party)
Presidential elections in 1999
Conflicts between President Kuchma and the Verkhovna Rada in
1998-2000
“Tapegate”, “Gongadze case”
Attempts to set up parties by business structures (Hromada, Party
of National Economic Revival of Ukraine, etc.)
Assessment of the effect of the following factors
on the development of political parties
and the party system in Ukraine*,
average mark
Building their programmes on the basis
of some ideological principles and
following them in their practical activityі
49.0%
Abiding by principles
of internal party democracy, letting young
and promising party members occupy
executive positions in the party and
be elected to councils of different levels
28.0%
Enjoying support in all regions of Ukraine,
being truly nationalwide parties
27.0%
Regularly reporting to voters for fulfilment
of their party and election programmes
26.0%
Funded mainly at
the expense of membership fees, 16.0
independent from oligarchic structures
2.0%
44.0%
50.0%
64.0%
60.0%
72.0%
7.0
22.0
9.0
14.0
12.0
23.0%
Yes
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
No
Hard to say
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
47
PRESENT STATE AND PROSPECTS OF UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT
What do political parties existing
in Ukraine lack most of all?
% of those polled
A clear stand on the state
development strategy
The ability and willingness to protect
interests of ordinary people
The ability to work out a
clear programme of action
Sufficient funding
The ability to resolve concrete
problems concerning ordinary citizens
The ability to organise local activity
Political corruption
4.32
Nonaccountability to voters
4.24
31,0%
26,0%
13,0%
8,0%
7,0%
6,0%
Strong leaders 0,0%
The ability to cooperate with
public organisations and 0,0%
associations of citizens
Other
6,0%
Hard to say
How urgent are for the present state of political parties
of Ukraine the following problems?*
average mark
3,0%
4.09
Dependence on FIGs
Mainly regional support
3.85
Weakness of programme
ideological fundamentals
Absence of permanent
communication with society
3.83
3.77
Lack of internal party democracy
3.76
Absence of a stable social base
3.57
Dependence on foreign influences
3.47
* On a fivepoint scale from 1 to 5, where «1» means minimum urgency, «5» – maximum urgency.
To what ideological trend – left, right, or centrist – would you refer a party guided
by the following ideological principles?
% of those who know (have an idea) of the difference between rights and lest parties
Socio-economic policy
Creation of favourable conditions for foreign investments in Ukraine, protection of foreign investor
rights
State support for big national business
Priority development of small and medium business
Protection of interests of low-income citizens
Growth of the state sector of economy, nationalisation of previously privatised enterprises
Protection of interests of the “middle class” – qualified employees with average incomes
Fairer distribution of profit between enterprise owners and hired workers, growth of the cost of labour
Private land ownership, free purchase and sale of land, including farming land
A ban on free purchase and sale of farming land
A ban on sale of land to non-citizens of Ukraine
Home and legal policy
Equality of all citizens to the law – “one law for all”
Extension of some privileges to the elite ensuing from its status
Priority of personal rights over community (collective, territorial community, whole nation, etc.) rights
Formation of strong authorities, their empowerment to restrict civil rights and freedoms in the
interests of state development
Treatment of the authorities as the “hired worker” of society, provision of accountability and
controllability of the authorities for society
Priority of community (collective, territorial community, whole nation, etc.) rights over personal rights
Concentration of power in the capital, utmost controllability of developments in all regions of the
country from the centre
Restriction of power of the central government, delegation of some powers to regions
Humanitarian policy
Ukrainian nation means all citizens of Ukraine irrespective of their ethnic origin
Ukrainian nation means Ukraine’s citizens of the Ukrainian origin
There should be one official language in Ukraine – Ukrainian, Russian and other national languages
should freely develop and be used across the whole territory of Ukraine in all sectors
There should be two official languages in Ukraine – Ukrainian and Russian
Ukraine should have one national Orthodox Church, the authorities should promote it by all means
The state should protect canonical Orthodoxy in Ukraine
The state should equally treat of all Churches and confessions existing in Ukraine, maintain partner
relations with them, not interfere into confessional and church relations
Foreign and security policy
Ukraine should implement the course of adoption of European standards of life and protection of civil
rights, not raising the issue of membership in international organisations
Ukraine should set the goal of joining the EU in foreseeable future
Ukraine should join the Union of Russia and Belarus and enter the SES
Ukraine should not join existing military blocs and should have the status of a neutral state
Ukraine should join NATO
Ukraine should join the defence union of CIS states
Left
Right
Centrist
None
Hard to say
6.0
38.0
48.0
7.0
9.0
9.0
9.0
72.0
77.0
15.0
48.0
4.0
79.0
45.0
52.0
26.0
10.0
11.0
25.0
14.0
66.0
9.0
27.0
35.0
62.0
15.0
7.0
63.0
34.0
28.0
7.0
16.0
3.0
2.0
6.0
4.0
2.0
5.0
3.0
3.0
6.0
9.0
6.0
4.0
3.0
3.0
5.0
5.0
3.0
11.0
34.0
5.0
10.0
28.0
47.0
40.0
41.0
16.0
28.0
9.0
17.0
13.0
8.0
19.0
11.0
32.0
36.0
20.0
8.0
9.0
18.0
30.0
41.0
12.0
9.0
56.0
15.0
13.0
6.0
11.0
27.0
28.0
22.0
20.0
8.0
16.0
32.0
43.0
7.0
13.0
31.0
6.0
15.0
64.0
62.0
7.0
4.0
10.0
6.0
14.0
4.0
52.0
41.0
3.0
7.0
63.0
6.0
19.0
9.0
55.0
17.0
20.0
13.0
21.0
8.0
14.0
18.0
7.0
13.0
28.0
12.0
13.0
62.0
12.0
8.0
10.0
29.0
56.0
3.0
9.0
8.0
81.0
27.0
2.0
70.0
54.0
4.0
11.0
74.0
4.0
34.0
7.0
54.0
11.0
5.0
3.0
7.0
9.0
7.0
10.0
12.0
4.0
9.0
12.0
11.0
* Experts were supposed to give all acceptable
48
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
EXPERT ASSESSMENTS
To what extend do Ukrainian political parties with whose activity you
are familiar possess each of the following qualities or features?
% of those polled experts
This quality
This quality
is found
is found in
in actually all most political
political parties
parties
This quality
is found in a
few political
parties
No political
party has
this
quality
Hard
to say
A clear stand on the state development strategy
3.0
15.0
56.0
23.0
3.0
The ability to work out a clear programme of action
2.0
5.0
70.0
20.0
3.0
The ability and willingness to protect interests of ordinary people
1.0
6.0
44.0
44.0
5.0
Sufficient funding
2.0
23.0
66.0
2.0
7.0
Strong leaders
1.0
17.0
75.0
6.0
1.0
The ability to organise local activity
1.0
8.0
75.0
12.0
4.0
The ability to resolve concrete problems concerning ordinary citizens
1.0
4.0
50.0
42.0
3.0
The ability to cooperate with public organisations and associations of citizens
2.0
12.0
62.0
19.0
5.0
How serious is the difference among
the key political forces represented
in the present Verkhovna Rada…?
% of those polled experts
To what political forces – left, right, or centrist –
does each of the following political forces belong?
% of those who know (have an idea) of the
difference between right and left parties
Our Ukraine
Bloc
63.0%
Yuliya
Tymoshenko’s
Bloc
36.0%
Party
of Regions
9.0
1.0%
5.0
27.0%
22.0%
Notable difference
39.0%
1.0%
13.0
41.0%
49.0%
Small difference
2.0%
3.0%
Communist
Party 4.0
of Ukraine
Lytvyn’s Bloc
4.0
20.0%
90.0%
3.0%
10.0
1.0%
1.0%
16.0%
70.0%
14.0
To the right
0.0%
14.0
55.0%
17.0%
To the left
I have no idea of it
22.0%
Difference almost absent
Hard to say
35.0%
7.0%
6.0%
In their election programmes
To the centrist
Hard to say
In the character of their activity
Are the opposition rights protected in Ukraine?
% of those polled experts
Which of the following political forces
do you consider oppositional?*
% of those polled experts
Yes
Partially
13.0%
46.0%
Yuliya Tymoshenko’s Bloc
80.0%
AllUkrainian Association Svoboda (Tiahnybok)
72.0%
Political party “People’s SelfDefence” (Lutsenko)
Political party “Civil Position” (Grytsenko)
56.0%
Political party “Our Ukraine” (Yushchenko)
54.0%
45.0%
Ukrainian People’s Party (Kostenko)
11.0%
5.0%
Communist Party of Ukraine (Symonenko)
3.0%
Socialist Party of Ukraine (Moroz)
3.0%
Lytvyn’s Bloc (Lytvyn)
1.0%
Party of Regions (Yanukovych) 0.0%
None of them
Hard to say
1.0%
To what extent do the following factors influence
relations among political forces at decisionmaking
in the Verkhovna Rada?*
average mark
48.0%
Political party “Front for Change” (Yatseniuk)
Political party “Strong Ukraine” (Tihipko)
Hard to say
40.0%
58.0%
People’s Rukh of Ukraine (Tarasiuk)
Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine (Vitrenko)
No
61.0%
5.0%
2.0%
* Respondents were supposed to give all acceptable answers.
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
Community/conflict of interests
in fighting for power
Interests of financial
sponsors of parties
Community/conflict of economic
interests of the party leadership
Internal party competition
(competition among leaders
of a party (bloc))
4.47
4.44
3.84
3.12
Interests of party members
2.90
Outside (foreign) influence
2.89
Ideologies
2.47
Election programmes
2.38
Interests of voters who
voted for those parties
2.01
* On a fivepoint scale from 1 to 5, where “1” means minimum influence, “5” – maximum influence.
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
49
PRESENT STATE AND PROSPECTS OF UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT
With what approach to party building
in Ukraine do you agree the most?
% of those polled experts
What approach to ideological fundamentals of party
activity is more acceptable in the Ukrainian conditions?
% of those polled experts
Parties should have a certain ideology on whose values
and principles party and election programmes rest
Parties need not have a certain ideology, party and
election programmes may by drawn up dependent
on the political and electoral expediency
82.0%
Both approaches are acceptable
Parties should represent interests of a certain social group
even if that stand is not popular among other voters
8.0%
Parties need not represent interests of a certain
social group. Their main task is to win the
widestpossible support at elections
6.0%
Both approaches are correct
None of the mentioned approaches is acceptable
2.0%
None of the mentioned approaches is correct
Hard to say
2.0%
Hard to say
In what direction should political parties evolve
in Ukraine, in terms of social representation?
% of those polled experts
As parties expressing interests
of certain social groups
43.0%
40.0%
Hard to say
Hard to say
Should MPs elected by party
lists have the right…?
% of those polled experts
52.0%
To publicly criticise the
position of their faction
52.0%
To freely quit the faction
on their own initiative
To join the coalition of parliamentary
faction if their party or bloc
is in the opposition
42.0%
28.0%
To face no sanctions being
expelled from the faction
24.0%
Not to join the faction of the party (bloc)
by whose list they were elected
23.0%
Yes
No
39.0%
35.0%
50.0%
65.0%
61.0%
68.0%
23.0%
20.0%
2.0%
As ideological parties whose programme
documents rest on the classic
political ideologies
As pragmatic parties whose programme
documents rest on consideration of needs and
demands of the widest possible range of voters
and resolved to meet them
There should be parties
of both types in Ukraine
3.0%
To vote contrary to the
position of their faction
19.0%
In what direction should political parties evolve
in Ukraine, in terms of programme principles?
% of those polled experts
14.0%
As parties claiming support with
different groups of the population,
“catchall” parties
There should be parties
of both types in Ukraine
36.0%
9.0
23.0%
42.0%
32.0%
3.0%
From 2006, the Verkhovna Rada and local councils
of different levels in Ukraine are formed on a partisan
basis. How would you assess the effect of such
way of formation on councils’ effectiveness?*
average mark
4.79
13.0
Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine
8.0
Regional councils
4.23
Supreme Council of the
Autonomous Republic
of Crimea
4.15
7.0
City councils
4.02
District councils
3.89
15.0
9.0
Hard to say
* On a 10point scale from 1 to 10, where “1” means utmost negative influence, “10” –
utmost positive influence.
Recently, various initiatives have been put forward to improve the Law on election
of national deputies of Ukraine. What is your attitude so the following proposals?
% of those polled experts
To introduce open election lists – where a voter himself assigns
places to all or several candidates
To substantially raise the election barrier (to 710%)
Positive
To ban participation of election blocs in elections,
leaving only political parties
54.0%
29.0%
45.0%
41.0%
To entirely cancel the election barrier (3%) 6.0
Hard to say
50
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
10.0 7.0
5.0 7.0
43.0%
32.0%
Negative
Indifferent
2.0%
16.0
5.0
77.0%
To introduce regional election lists
To set for blocs a higher barrier than for political parties
1.0%
5.0 5.0
89.0%
87.0%
14.0%
13.0
3.0%
4.0
EXPERT ASSESSMENTS
What line of future evolution of the party
system in Ukraine is more favourable
for the country development?
% of those polled experts
Does Ukraine need a multiparty system?
% of those polled experts
No
Yes
88.0%
Towards a twoparty
system with two strong
centrist parties
(left and rightofcentre)
alternating in power
Towards a party system
with 57 parties of different
trends that can make
coalitions in
different formats
12.0%
Hard
to say
0.0%
28.0%
42.0%
510
1020
6.0%
2.0%
4.0%
Up to 5
parties
Towards a party
system with a strong
centrist party and
weaker left and right
parties in turns making
a coalition with the
biggest party
23.0%
31.0%
34.0%
How many parties, roughly, should there be in Ukraine?
% of those polled experts
Over 100
20100
Other
2.0%
28.0%
Hard
to say
Assessment of electoral resources of the following political parties and blocs*
average mark
Organisational
resource
(strength,
ramified network of party
organisations in
regions, their
efficiency)
Financial
resource
(potential
capability to
raise funds
for election
campaign)
Media
resource
(presence of
own media,
access to
central and regional printed
and electronic
media)
Administrative
resource
(presence of
party representative on executive
positions in
central and local
executive bodies,
local self-government bodies)
Ideological
resource
(presence of
own party ideology shared
by voters, ability to develop
on its basis
sound election
programme
documents)
Human
resource
(presence
of trained
personnel to
fill vacancies
in central and
local executive bodies in
case of the
party victory
at elections)
PR resource
(presence of
popular party
symbols, a
“hyped-up”
brand, charismatic
figures, ability
to wage an
effective
advertising
campaigns)
Overall
index
(presence
of different
resources)
Party
of Regions
4.36
4.78
4.53
4.67
3.26
3.90
4.29
4.33
Yuliya
Tymoshenko’s
Bloc
3.86
4.08
3.45
3.03
2.89
3.23
3.94
3.73
CPU
2.74
2.18
2.02
2.05
3.18
2.17
2.67
2.40
NUNS Bloc
2.51
2.61
2.51
2.16
2.52
2.28
2.67
2.32
Front for
Change
2.35
2.78
2.20
1.69
2.17
2.09
2.59
2.28
Lytvyn’s Bloc
2.24
2.44
2.16
2.35
1.94
2.28
2.22
2.17
Strong Ukraine
2.05
2.60
2.11
1.73
1.98
1.88
2.20
2.07
Svoboda
2.19
1.91
1.72
1.43
3.03
1.83
2.56
2.00
SPU
1.79
1.54
1.45
1.52
2.04
1.66
1.84
1.63
PSPU
1.52
1.51
1.40
1.34
1.80
1.35
1.62
1.46
Civil Position
1.53
1.49
1.47
1.27
1.89
1.48
1.58
1.44
* On a five-point scale from 1 to 5, where “1” means minimal resource, “5” – maximal resource.
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
51
PARTY SYSTEM OF UKRAINE AND
ITS FUTURE: STABILISATION,
PRESERVATION, (R)EVOLUTION?
WE WITNESS INVOLUTION
OF THE PARTY SYSTEM
PARTIES CAN SUCCEED
EVEN WITHOUT OLIGARCH SUPPORT
Vitaliy KONONOV,
Former President
of the Green Party of Ukraine,
National Deputy of Ukraine
of the 3rd convocation
I well remember the process of the Ukrainian multiparty system inception, after all, the Green Party was the
third officially registered political party in Ukraine. But
20 years ago, when the party system in Ukraine was in the
making, it was very difficult to predict that it would be as
we see it now. When we were beginning, we thought that
we would have a European model, and most of us thought
of the German model of parliamentarianism…
The reasons why Ukrainian citizens reject the multiparty system today are many. One may speak of the bad
heritage of the Soviet times, when there was only one,
Communist party. So, the very word “party” caused
aversion in the Ukrainian people, not removed even now.
Unfortunately, the ruling elite of independent Ukraine also
worked a lot for the people not to love parties.
I guess that one more word should be added to
the subject of our discussion, “involution”, since the
process of establishment of true parties is coming to
nought in principle here. Today, there is a trend to
political project creation by big capital. Organisations
serving its interests are called parties, but in reality they
are political corporations.
We may say a lot of the problems hindering party
development in Ukraine, but I cannot say what should
be done for our people to accept political parties and to
begin to vote for ideas, not for personalities. So, I expect
conclusions from the expert discussion for myself, too.
Expert discussion, May 27, 2010
Mykola KATERYNCHUK,
National Deputy of Ukraine,
Leader of the European Party
of Ukraine
Ukrainian society is now passing a test for its ability
to protect the minimal democratic freedoms won over
the last five years. In this respect, a lot will depend on
parties, the party system.
Public trust in political parties is very low. The main
reason is that parties are simply used by business to
solve its tasks – to control distribution of budget,
privatisation, the media. For that, they only need to
“promote” a leader and then to build a structure for him.
That is why the majority of present-day political parties
are election projects. Their role is confined to dialogue
between the leader and potential voters supposed to like
that leader. Those structures do not really participate in
public life.
Politicians and political parties should also be well
aware of the possible effects of the economic crisis,
since it will not only undermine certain economic or
political freedoms, capabilities of trade unions, etc., but
also destroy small political parties. Say, representatives
of medium business represented in our party find it
increasingly difficult to save funds to promote the party
and its ideas.
Some suggest that parties should unite. But here, the
issue of leadership arises. Unfortunately, we witness a very
negative trend in relations among politicians – to mutual
mistrust, inability to keep one’s word, dishonesty, turning
politics all cynicism and grime. That is why people believe
that politics attract people whose qualities are below
average.
In such conditions one may speak of a crisis of
political parties, making them to cooperate with oligarchs.
However, political parties protecting interests of the
bulk of the population, whose actions and decisions are
clear for the people, have a chance to succeed. This is
possible even without serious support from oligarchs
who have actually monopolised influence on the
political system.
*
The expert discussion took place on May 27. 2010. The texts are presented after the discussion records, in an abbreviated form, in the order of presentations
by the panelists.
52
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
PARTY SYSTEM OF UKRAINE AND ITS FUTURE: STABILISATION, PRESERVATION, (R)EVOLUTION?
QUALITATIVELY NEW PARTIES WILL GROW
FROM ASSOCIATIONS OF PUBLIC INITIATIVES
Taras STETSKIV,
National Deputy of Ukraine,
Deputy Head of Our Ukraine –
People’s Self-Defence
Bloc faction
provide for their integration and structuring, might
become a serious political force.
The new political process should start from the
inventory of all that is active and viable in public life.
Then, those elements might be networked. Then, a group of
intellectuals might formulate some common stand. After all,
according to a known saying by Aristotle, politics concerns
all. Therefore, what we see in Parliament is no politics.
Politics means representation of everyday life needs and
interests of concrete territorial communities. Such might be
the trend of building qualitatively new political parties.
FOR PARTY DEVELOPMENT,
INTERNAL PARTY DEMOCRACY SHOULD
BE ENCOURAGED IN THE FIRST PLACE
The present state of Ukraine’s party system may be
described as stagnation with signs of degradation. Over
at least 10 past years, two trends of its development became
evident: some parties serve interests of concrete FIGs
creating and funding them, others are fan clubs of their
leaders.
In the recent years, and especially during the latest
election campaign, some trends were observed that may
witness degradation of the party system.
First, party fragmentation and cloning. Society
expects from politicians steps towards unity, coming to a
common idea of the country development. Nevertheless,
politicians do the opposite: they create their own parties,
and that process never ends. The main reason for that
probably lies in political leaders’ fear of competition. That
is why they start projects they lead from the very beginning,
with party organisations set up specially for them.
The second trend, substitution of practical activity
with advertising. In any big city one will see great many
billboards of political parties. In my opinion, this means
that practical political activities are substituted with a
certain amount of funds spent on advertising. Some parties
even believe that elections can be won by advertising alone.
It is rather often said that in wider Europe, ideological
parties are an anachronism. This may be true, in a way.
Classic ideological parties may be transforming, some
convergence of the left and right is observed, but every
serious political party has a certain set of values and at
least proposes to society some ways of solution of pressing
problems. What do our parties do? They write programmes,
right things, but nobody reads those programmes or even
pays attention to party names’ correspondence to their
ideology.
Why does it happen? The thing is that society does
not view Ukrainian political parties as parties proper. The
main problem of actually all Ukrainian parties is that
they reflect no social interests, outline no prospects and
do not continuously work with the population. Party
activity does not grow from everyday needs of society. That
is why they are select clubs. Society demands renovation,
establishment of conceptual, if not ideological, parties, their
unification. However, fear of competition makes such union
impossible.
In such condition, there is a different road. A new policy
and new political parties might grow “from the bottom”,
from different forms of civic activity. There are hundreds
and thousands of local civil initiatives in all regions of
Ukraine – environmental, educational, cultural, etc.
A party that manages to unite those initiatives in a
network, to establish communication among them, to
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
Ihor ZHDANOV,
President, Open Policy
Analytical Centre
I would describe the results of the 20-year-long party
system evolution as progress, however, not at every stage
but for the whole period. If we compare the party systems
of 2010 and 1990, we will see what we achieved. But at
different stages of the party system development, indeed,
highly varied processes took place.
Now, we focus on the latest period. Stagnation of the
party system is evident. As long as parties are “tailored to
leaders” or represent interests of specific FIGs (sometimes
combining both trends), discharge of classic functions by
parties is out of question. Only one function is performed
by 100%, fighting for power. Parties present a tool of
political struggle used by few persons, party leaders or
notorious oligarchs.
The absence of ideological parties, with few exceptions,
is conditioned not only by problems already mentioned
here, but also by the absence of social demand for such parties. Motivation of voting at elections differs from support
for a certain ideology. Society is ready to support leaders,
which, in turn, prompts politicians to establish leader-oriented parties. Furthermore, dilution of the ideological basis
and convergence of ideologies are observed all over the
world, which also causes problems for establishment of ideological parties.
I share the opinion expressed here that party orientation to leaders hinders unification processes. However,
the lessons of party unification are different. On the one
hand, attempts to create a united national democratic party
on the basis of “Our Ukraine” failed. Meanwhile, in the
other part of the spectrum, the Party of Regions successfully employed the scheme of “absorption” of small parties.
That scheme worked thanks to the quite tough stand of the
regionalists and their leader.
Two main problems of parties and the party system
development may be distinguished.
The first is the lack of internal party democracy.
Most decisions are taken without wide discussion in the
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
53
UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
party. Parties have kind of self-censorship, their members
are afraid of expressing their opinion in order not to lose the
leader’s trust, and with it a place in the closed election list.
Second, monopoly funding of party structures by oligarchic groupings. The 2003 law introducing state funding of political parties somehow worked only in 2007. After
that, observance of that norm of the law has always been
suspended.
To ensure development of parties and the party system, internal party democracy should be promoted in
the first place. This may be achieved through amendment
of the legislation, including adoption of a new election
system prioritising public support for a candidate, not his
devotion to the leader.
Second, state funding of parties should be resumed,
which will reduce their financial dependence on oligarchic
groupings. The very model of economic development will
play an important role there: if the country has not five billionaires but 250 citizens possessing hundreds of millions
and engaged in politics, this will diversify sources of political party funding.
FUTURE OF UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
IS WITH REAL PARTIES
Oleh ZARUBINSKYI,
National Deputy of Ukraine,
Deputy Head
of Lytvyn’s Bloc faction
Such definitions as progress, regress of degradation are
unlikely to adequately characterise the present state of the
party system. It is better described by the word absence.
What we see today is not a system in the direct meaning of
that word.
Problems of political parties have already been
mentioned here. I would like to draw your attention to
a new and very dangerous trend: creation of a market
to purchase and sale parties in Ukraine. The scheme
is very simple. A new ambitious politician comes with a
provisional, “seasonal” rating, with his “group of support”.
He needs a political party, but it is not that easy to create
a new one. What does he do? Just buys one of 180 parties
with a nice name established “turnkey” 5-10 years ago,
leads it, and changes its name. Today, this is really a trend,
such scheme has already been employed by a number of
known politicians. I do not dare call such structures parties.
Maybe in 10 years they will become parties, but now they
are nothing but merchandise.
How can this practice be changed? Politicians, by
contrast to experts, can do that. That is why I would like
to dwell upon two bills I submitted to the Verkhovna Rada.
The first legislative initiative provides for amendment
of the Law on political parties by introducing a norm
that demands party reporting for fulfilment of their
programmes. In practice, the overwhelming majority of
political parties needs programmes for registration only,
they may be quite “ideological”, contain some value system,
54
etc. – but voting by representatives of those parties in
Parliament may have nothing to do with their programmes.
Such instances are many. Speaking of so-called ideological
parties, I dare say: interest rules out ideology.
That is why a very simple norm is proposed: “political
parties represented by national deputies of Ukraine shall
annually report on the progress of implementation of the
party programme and the election programme; parties –
participants of election blocs release a joint report. Reports
are published in official newspapers”.
Next: the Law sets requirements as to the number of
signatures in support for party establishment and existence
of its organisational structures in regions. Meanwhile,
many of the 180 existing parties have only the party leader,
a few relatives, his wife and dog. What is proposed? The
first proposal, maybe disputable: “a party shall be entitled
to nominate candidates for participation in elections of the
President of Ukraine and Parliament on the condition that it
was registered not less than two years before the date of the
elections in which it is going to take part” – not one year in
advance, as today. The second proposal, “for participation
in elections of the Verkhovna Rada of the Autonomous
Republic of Crimea, local councils and village, settlement,
city heads, local organisations of political parties shall be
registered one year before the election date”. This norm is
absent from the current legislation.
Third: additional grounds for cancellation of a
registration certificate should include, first, the party (and
the candidates nominated by it) getting at elections fewer
votes than the number of signatures necessary for its
registration, second, absence of party organisations in most
regions of Ukraine over the entire period of its existence,
not only six months after registration, as the case is now.
I realise that not everybody will like those proposals,
since then we will have much fewer than 180 parties. But
I am sure that the future of Ukraine’s party system is with
real parties engaged in practical work.
IF WE WISH TO HAVE TRUE PARTIES,
POLITICAL AND RULING ELITES SHOULD
ENCOURAGE SOCIETY-BUILDING
Vadym KARASIOV,
Director, Institute
of Global Strategies
Analysis of Ukraine’s party system establishment after
20 years is a good idea, since 20 years are a revolutionary
cycle ending either in Thermidor or in counterrevolution.
Or vice versa – stabilisation of society. In terms of parties,
the totality of parties over that period transforms into the
party system, which we have not, as was said here.
Our discussion is mainly technological, engineering. But if we don’t know what factors influence parties
and the party system, are unfamiliar with its nature at this
stage and in this society, all proposed legislative novelties
will be vain.
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
PARTY SYSTEM OF UKRAINE AND ITS FUTURE: STABILISATION, PRESERVATION, (R)EVOLUTION?
That is why I would like to focus on analysis of not
even parties and the party system but the principle of
partisanship. Because society partisanship either exists or
not, it may be covert or suffer a crisis already mentioned
today. If there is no difference between BYuT and the Party
of Regions (two big parties), this means a crisis of the party
system. Because parties mean difference. If there is no difference, there are no parties, no party system.
Regress or progress? Compared to Russia and Central
Asia – progress, compared to Central and Eastern Europe –
stagnation. The case of Russia and Central Asia is clear:
authoritarian regimes, institutionalisation of clannish policies and clannish economies, the problem of legal succession is solved: the Russian Federation is the legal successor
to the Soviet Union.
Central-Eastern Europe witnessed legal succession of
independent states that existed between the first and second world wars. What changes took place in their party systems? Previously active parties were restored and began to
work. Restitution was conducted, property was returned to
citizens, and they began to vote not as people sustained by
the budget – teachers, doctors, miners, but as owners. That
is why they care about taxes, not about budget donations
before elections. And what does representation mean? It is
the problem of taxes. Without representation, there are no
taxes, without taxes, there is no representation. Such is the
principle of the parliamentary party model.
In this respect, Ukraine is “in suspense”. It has not
solved the problem of legal succession, nobody knows
whether Ukraine is the legal successor to the Ukrainian
SSR or UNR. It is neither Russia nor Eastern Europe, now
in the EU. Such “suspended” status influences everything.
Society was mentioned here. It is absent from Ukraine,
only the population, people entitled to vote.
Where do the Ukrainian problems lie, from the viewpoint of the party system? Ukraine was to solve four
tasks: transition from plan to market; transition to democracy; nation-building; state-building. All those tasks solved
in Central and Eastern Europe have been solved by
half in Ukraine. If we take a look at market transformation, we moved “from plans to clans”, but not to the market. The same refers to democratisation. Such situation of
half-reforms, half-transition, half-transit surely influences
the state of the party system.
Let us analyse structural factors influencing the
party system in Ukraine.
First: amorphous, decentralised society, and centralised power. Centralised society knows active public organisations, trade unions, student organisations. This de-atomises people, group identities are formed and picked up by
parties. Such parties become civic, or popular. And in this
country, parties are created by the authorities that are centralised and stronger than atomised society. That is why parties incorporating the political elite are established “from
the top” here. If we wish to have true parties, political and
ruling elites should encourage society-building.
Second: weakness of ideological institutes, group identities. This feature is specific of post-Soviet countries, it is
revealed in individualised political rivalry. In absence of
group identities, where business or politics are driven by
the principle of predatory individualism, interpersonal competition will be continuously generated. Against that background, parties created by the clannish principle, as closed
structures, will have an advantage.
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
Third: the standing of the whole state. If the processes
of state and nation building are not completed, formation
of the country’s cultural, information, military borders is
not over, Ukraine’s economic assets are overly exposed
to outside pressure (first of all, Russian), only the party of
power may be nationwide, as the case was under President
Kuchma.
But if Ukraine has no external borders, there will be
internal ones. This means that the country is divided on the
level of the party system proceeding from geopolitical, or
civilisational differences. In Ukraine, geopolitical choice
presents the main factor of split. This was not the case in
Eastern and Central Europe where the elite united around
one vector, return to Europe.
That is why there are two parties in Ukraine – the party
of the East (no matter who occupies that niche today), and
the party of the West. With time, there may be the “party
of Moscow” and the “party of Ukraine”, such will be
Ukraine’s actual party system where parties will look for a
place.
What other options may there be? The party of power
may be reinstated, which will mean movement to the dominant party system. There may be one nationwide party that
will “knock” the country together. But it will be not a true
party but an administrative structure created by the government.
There is one more option. If in a few years the current authorities prove unable to fulfil their socio-economic
promises, the political pendulum in Ukraine will waggle towards Europe. Only then may one tackle the issue of
building a pro-European party system or a system of the
European type in Ukraine.
THE PARTY OF POWER IS BEING
CREATED, ABSOLUTELY DISINTERESTED
IN PUBLICITY AND DEMOCRACY
OF UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
Viktor CHUMAK,
Director, Ukrainian Institute
for Public Policy
Such assessments as stagnation and degradation may be
supplemented with one more word, “deformation”. I mean
deformation of not only the party system but also of the
political system as a whole, including the institutes of constitutionalism, parliamentarianism, presidency, local selfgovernment, etc. And since the party system is related with
those institutes, its deformation involves their deformation.
In its present form, the party system has become
the main hindrance for social development. Why main?
Because that system does not produce the product wanted
from it – development of society programmes making the
basis for inter-party competition. In such conditions, parties are identified solely on the basis of regional geopolitical preferences or personal attitude to their leaders.
• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
55
UKRAINE’S PARTY SYSTEM
Another serious problem is presented by the absence of
internal party competition and resultant inability to recruit
best representatives of society to the authorities. And the
absence of the critical mass of reform-minded people bars
their implementation.
Everybody understands that the main task of the parties
in power is to use that power for access to state resources
and participation in their redistribution. But parties exist
not in and of themselves, they exist in an environment that
influences them. Two points should be noted here. The first
is the inadequate and deformed election system discouraging internal party competition and the party system development in general. The second is the deformation of the
system of political party funding.
At that, the current situation entirely suits the party
and political elite. Unfortunately, I see no interested parties
that could push some changes, except maybe the regional
elite, currently underrepresented in power and therefore
interested in changing the rules of the game.
So, what should we do?
First, reform the election system by introducing preferential election lists.
Second, limit the “party market”. Participation in elections should be the main criterion of parties’ activity, while
non-participation should present a reason for liquidation
initiated by the state.
Third, take legislative measures encouraging internal
party competition (such as party “primaries”).
Fourth, provide for obligatory state funding of parties
taking part in elections (dependence of funding on election
results is a disputable issue), and introduce obligatory declaration of party funding by legal entities and individuals
and obligatory annual financial reporting of parties.
Such steps will pave the way for some changes,
but I do not think that this will happen in the nearest
future, since today, the party of power is being created,
absolutely disinterested in publicity and democracy of
Ukraine’s party system.
TO BE THE SWORD OF DAMOCLES OVER
PARTIES IS NOT THE TASK FOR
THE MINISTRY OF JUSTICE AND THE STATE
The party was not registered, and that had an effect, after
that parties became more accurate with document
preparation.
There is a problem of similarity of party names, when
a newly-established party or a new name of an active party
uses a known brand, for instance, with a different word
order. Formally, we have no right to refuse registration
of such party or approve changed names, even with a
conclusion of linguistic expert examination in hand.
Evidently, such party conduct should be assessed by voters.
Unification or merger of parties is another problem.
Analysis of the recent years’ developments in that field
shows that the process of party unification requires
legislative regulation: in what way this should be done,
how the names of merging parties should be preserved,
should they pass liquidation procedures, etc. So far, actually
all attempts of unification have failed, in particular, due to
the parties’ reluctance to reach a compromise.
Some problems of internal party life. In the recent years,
it became a usual practice that election of party leadership,
change of names, amendment of constituent documents are
executed at party congresses in presence of not less than
25 persons. At that, statutory norms are formally met, but
such minimum number of delegates arouses concern. When
checking powers of congresses and conferences of political
parties, we cannot find 30% party organisations at the
addresses specified in registers.
In pursuance of its controlling powers, the Ministry of
Justice annually monitors if territorial party organisations
have been established within six months from the
registration date. In 2009, suits were filed against eight
political parties that did not even set up regional
organisations within the prescribe term. Only one of those
suits has been sustained.
I wish to respond to the call made here: “to do
something with “inexistent” parties”. In pursuance of final
transitional provisions of the Law on political parties, in
2011, the Ministry will start a check of parties’ observance
of the Law concerning participation in elections in course
of 10 years after registration. But I wish to stress: the
Ministry of Justice has clearly specified powers to
control parties’ observance of the law and their statutes.
To be the sword of Damocles over parties is probably not
the task for the Ministry of Justice and the state. Rather, this
is the task for the voters.
IT IS NOT QUITE CORRECT TO SPEAK ABOUT
DEGRADATION OF THE PARTY SYSTEM
Olena SEMIORKINA,
Director,
Department of Legalisation
of Associations of Citizens,
the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine
Mykhaylo HRYSHCHENKO,
representative of the
Front for Change party
I would like to touch upon some aspects of the Ministry
of Justice observance of the legislation on political parties,
in particular, concerning their registration.
Before 1997, the Ministry considering party constituent
documents tried to establish their authenticity, later, that
practice was abandoned. However, in 2007, we had to
reapply it after the results of selective expert examination
of signatures submitted in support for establishment of a
political party proved that they were made with one hand.
56
Since I speak on behalf of a political party, please treat
my presentation as kind of snapshot of problems mentioned
today and concerning our political force, too.
The first problem lies in building party social base,
or, as it was said here, everyday work for the sake of
• RAZUMKOV CENTRE • NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010
PARTY SYSTEM OF UKRAINE AND ITS FUTURE: STABILISATION, PRESERVATION, (R)EVOLUTION?
community and society interests. It is much more difficult
to organise such work than to build a “media pyramid”
where the central office generates messages for end users.
For instance, we applied a project approach: people who
consider themselves experts in local problems send to us
their proposals of local changes, and persons appointed
on a competitive basis take part in local party policy
making.
The wish to set up a true Christian democratic party led
to the establishment of the Christian Popular Union, and in
2003, after unification processes, the Christian Democratic
Union party. Two years ago we again proposed unification
with other parties, Christian by name, but unfortunately,
they refused. The reasons for that have already been
mentioned here, parties are merchandise that may be well
sold before elections.
The second problem, the essence of political activity.
Our local coordinators, as in most political parties, are
originates from business or public figures. That is why they
too often understand political activity as charity: to paint
fences, to plant trees, to see children in a boarding house,
etc. To solve that problem, we set up the Front for Change –
a specific project that enables continuous analysis of the
authorities’ policy, contacts with expert circles.
We had no other way but to be strong, to assert
ourselves, to reach all strata of society. The tasks of
building party social base, protection of its interests are now
topical for any party. We undertook to protect Ukrainian
believers and succeeded in that – pushed a number
of legislative acts that facilitated the exercise of their
religious rights. At the 1998 elections our party that did not
serve big capital collected more than 4% of votes and was
to come to Parliament. But our votes passed to the “party of
power”. Such were the historic developments.
Third, parties’ non-performance of the programme
function, their lack of ideology. What complicates
discussion of the programme in our party? First, it is very
difficult to find organisational forms making it possible to
draw up a party programme not as a document prepared by
a few experts, adopted by a congress and communicated
“from top downward”, but as a result of efforts of the
entire party. It is hard to find formats of interaction among
representatives of different regional organisations, combine
different, sometimes opposite opinions in course of
communication. Second, people in principle are not used to
take part in such discussions, they prefer to wait for a party
programme delivered to them “from the top”.
Fourth, the problem of communication with voters
and supporters. There are traditional communication
means, and there are new ones we use. They include
work on the Internet, in social networks, and direct
communication “door-to-door”. Watching other national
democratic parties, we see similar activities. That is why
it is probably not quite correct to speak about degradation.
I believe that the party system is going through evolution.
On the remains of parties built for 20 years, new projects
meeting present-day challenges are being built.
TASKS OF BUILDING PARTY SOCIAL BASE,
PROTECTION OF ITS INTERESTS ARE NOW
TOPICAL FOR ANY PARTY
Our today’s discussion is a good development: we
should improve the party system. This is a duty of the
state, too. That is why I appeal to the Ministry of Justice
and support the idea that there should be no formally
registered but inactive parties. According to Article 37 of
the Constitution, parties are to take part in elections, protect
political interests. If they do not perform those tasks why
over 180 parties then? Then, the party system stagnates
instead of flourishing.
SOCIAL DEMOCRACY IN UKRAINE WILL BE
REVIVED BY THE YOUTH
Vitaliy SHYBKO,
Director, Institute of Democracy
and Social Processes,
Member of the SPU
Political Council (1998-2008),
National Deputy of Ukraine
of the 2nd, 4th, 5th convocations
I don’t know if parties of liberal, conservative or communist trends also suffer a crisis. But I dare say that social
democracy in Ukraine is indeed in crisis. Still, this is no
tragedy, since this crisis is to lead to a revival.
Volodymyr STRETOVYCH,
National Deputy of Ukraine,
Deputy Head of Our Ukraine –
People’s Self-Defence
Bloc faction,
Leader of the Christian
Democratic Union party
In 1994, when I came to Parliament having won in a
majority constituency, I was non-partisan. But I realised
that the one-party system in Ukraine should yield to
the multi-party system, and the country with strong
Christian traditions should have a party protecting and
implementing them. This led me to Christian democracy.
RAZUMKOV CENTRE
Social democratic and socialist parties active in Ukraine
have done a useful thing. They promoted social democratic ideas in society, drew the attention of the world social
democracy to Ukraine. And the crisis means that those parties are now rejected by society for a number of reasons.
Today, many parties in Ukraine declare social democratic ideas. Social democratic parties in wider Europe and
the world look for partners in Ukraine. Hence, despite the
current crisis, the basis for social democracy development
has been created in Ukraine. This will give the youth an
opportunity to spread that idea and promote that movement.
I believe that social democracy in Ukraine will be
revived by the youth, simultaneously with European
transformations in this country.

• NATIONAL SECURITY & DEFENCE • No.5, 2010 •
57