Changes in the Ukrainian economy after the Maidan
Those Ukrainians who feel optimistic, can celebrate the growth of the national economy. The State Statistics Service of Ukraine has finally reported that the gross domestic product exceeded the level of the first quarter of 2015 by 0.1%. This is a remarkable achievement, and the Ukrainian media are highlighting it as a confirmation of the […]
The Ukrainian Government as the Point of Balance between Domestic and Foreign Capital
This article was written a couple of months ago while the future of Ukrainian government was still unsure. I am happy to report that the ensuing events mostly confirmed my predictions: Groisman did take the seat of Prime Minister, Avakov and Petrenko entered the Cabinet and Yatsenyuk gained one more victory over the Parliament, forcing […]
The causes of Ukrainian crisis
This article explores the origins of the Ukrainian crisis in several historical developments that came together in 2014. The first development, and the condition necessary for activating all the others, is the situation that has unfolded inside Ukraine itself since 1991 with the establishment of a new nation state simultaneously with the return of capitalism. […]
The origins of the offshore model of Ukrainian economy
Ukraine is one of the top ten countries with the most massive outflow of capital abroad. As the Tax Justice Network estimated, in 1991-2012 only, this sum was $167 billion, which is comparable to the annual GDP of Ukraine [Вєдров, 2013]. Globally, offshores contain sums that are equivalent to 30-45 percent of the global GDP. […]
Recipes of curbing the crisis. Review of an international conference
Denys Pilash, Vitalii Dudin On the day of the October Revolution, November 7, left-wing academics and activists in Kyiv proved their ability to carry out socially critical activities of international level. The renowned Kyiv Polytechnic Institute (KPI) hosted researchers from Ukraine, France, Great Britain, Russia, Belgium, Germany, and Greece. The “Economic Crisis or Crisis of Neoliberalism? […]
Nuclear war: more real than it seems
Recently, the American magazine “Vox” has published a lengthy article about the military conflict possible scenarios between the US and Russia. Interviewing a number of both Russian and Western military experts, the publication came up to a very disappointing conclusion – the conflict node will keep on lasting, which means that at some point the […]
The origins of Ukraine’s debt dependence
The global economic system is increasingly characterized by the dependence on financial capital, which has been becoming dominant and determinant in the global resource distribution system. At the same time, global financial flows are based on disproportionate economic development and uneven balances of payment. Within this framework, the development of indebted Third World countries is […]
War in Ukraine and the politics of the left (international conference)
The war in Ukraine and politics of the Left International Conference 6-7 September 2014, Kyiv Organizers: Commons: Journal of Social Criticism, Center for Social and Labor Studies As a result of military operations in Ukraine many industrial and infrastructure facilities have been destroyed. Dozens, if not hundreds thousand people, have lost their jobs, even more […]
Ukraine’s Fractures
First published in: Ukraine’s Fractures. An interview with Volodymyr Ishchenko. In: New Left Review 87, May-June 2014 Since the start of the Maidan protests six months ago, Ukraine has been at the centre of a crisis which has exposed and deepened the fault-lines—geopolitical, historical, linguistic, cultural—that traverse the country. These divisions have grown through the […]
Ukraine has not experienced a genuine revolution, merely a change of elites
Volodymyr Ishchenko Two popular labels are being ascribed to events in Ukraine: it was either a democratic – or even social – revolution, or it was a rightwing – or even neo-Nazi – coup. In fact, both characterisations are wrong. What we have have seen is a mass rebellion, overwhelmingly supported in western and central Ukraine […]
