These keynotes are available to registered attendees. To register for the public part of the conference, please use the link below. Participants who register for digital attendance will receive access to the online keynote stream.
*If you have already registered for the academic conference, you are also registered for the public part of the conference.
Ukraine and the West: The “Failed State” Concept Has Failed, but Ukrainians Have Lost Their Illusions
Key note with Oleksiy Haran
Wednesday 11 november 09:30 – 09:50
Ukraine is defending the values that the West has promoted for decades — but values that the West is not able to defend effectively, constrained by Putin’s nuclear blackmail and the perceived ‘advantages’ of business as usual.
However, Ukraine needs more than Western military and economic support. It also needs continued international pressure on its authorities to pursue domestic reforms and strengthen accountability.
This creates a huge challenge: in the absence of elections, how can Ukrainian society, with international support, hold its authorities accountable for corruption and wrongdoing without undermining internal stability?
Oleksiy Haran is a Professor of Comparative Politics at the University of Kyiv‑Mohyla Academy, where he served as Dean and was the founding organizer of the Faculty of Social Sciences from 1991 to 1993. He is also a Research Advisor at the Ilko Kucheriv Democratic Initiatives Foundation. The Foundation’s 2004 exit poll revealed electoral falsifications and helped spark the Orange Revolution. Haran’s latest book is From Brezhnev to Zelensky: Dilemmas of a Ukrainian Political Scientist (2021).
In winter 2013-2014, Haran was a member of the Council of ‘Maidan’. In 2014-2017, as a political scientist, he spent two months at the frontline near Mariupol, Luhansk, and Donetsk airport. For fifteen years, he was a member of the Public Council under the Ukrainian MFA.
In 2021, US-Ukraine Foundation awarded Prof. Haran as one of “30 Stars of Ukraine”, representing the country on the world stage. In 2023, he was awarded British Empire Medal by King Charles III for contribution to the UK – Ukraine strategic partnership.
Understanding Democratic Resistance and Resilience in Wartime Ukraine: What does the data say?
Key note with Olga Onuch
Wednesday 11 november 10:55 – 11:15
Ordinary Ukrainians have proven to be the remarkable secret weapon against Russia’s autocratic war of aggression. Analysts thought Ukraine would fold in 3 days or a maximum of two weeks. Instead, even before Ukraine received military aid, it stood strong, survived an onslaught by the largest army in Europe, and pushed back Russia from the centre of its country within weeks. Since this time, Ukrainians have liberated large cities in the east and south and show a – for some surprising – ability to resist all while maintaining their devotion to democracy. What underpins ordinary citizens’ civilian engagement in the war effort? Is there social cohesion in Ukraine? How do they view their politicians, and what are the prospects for post-war elections? Taken together, are Ukrainians displaying democratic resilience even in the face of extensive war trauma? And finally, what do we know about civilian resistance under Russian autocratic occupation?
Professor Onuch, a world-leading expert on Ukrainian comparative politics, will answer these questions and present highlights from extensive empirical research based on 25 original wartime surveys (both cross-sectional and panel data) collected as part of three projects she lead/co-lead UCEPS, MOBILISEproject, and IBIFukraine and observational data as part of the DataForUkraine project. She will be drawing on two academic papers but will make the presentation, data, and findings accessible to all audiences.
Olga Onuch (DPhil Oxon, 2011) is Professor (Chair) in Comparative and Ukrainian Politics at the University of Manchester (UoM), making Onuch the first-ever holder of a Full Professorship in ‘Ukrainian Politics’ in the English-speaking world. She is the author of Mapping Mass Mobilisation and The Zelensky Effect.
Onuch is an internationally leading scholar of comparative Ukrainian and more broadly central and east European (CEE) and Latin American (LA) politics. She is particularly well regarded for her work on democratic engagement, quality, resilience, backsliding, and democratic duty and civic identity. Thus, her research combines themes from comparative politics, political behaviour, and public opinion on and citizen engagement in geopolitics and international relations.
In a recent series of works she has examined the pull and push factors associated with support for stronger relations with autocratic [Russia] and democratic [EU] powers in central and eastern Europe (Poland, Ukraine and Belarus) and Latin America (Argentina).