Scholars Discuss Origins of Ukraine Crisis, Int'l Reaction

Scholars from across the U.S. and the U.K. came together to discuss the origins of and the international response that followed the crisis in Ukraine at the Center for European Studies Thursday.

Panelists first explained the initial conditions under former Ukrainian President Viktor F. Yanukovych’s rule that left Ukraine susceptible to Russia’s influence.

“While Yanukovych’s authoritarian regime was strong by Ukrainian standards it was weak by global standards,” said Lucan A. Way, associate professor of political science at the University of Toronto.

Way continued that characteristics of Yanukovych’s regime led it to be inherently weak and susceptible to instability.

Way explained that the “incredibly brittle character of the Yanukovych authoritarian regime” was one of the major factors that led to the regime’s downfall. While the regime was unwilling to compromise, it was also not strong enough to effectively suppress mobilization, he said.

The regime’s weak response to popular protest was initially characterized as moderate, with some low-level violence, but not a lot of large-scale public repression, Way said.

When Yanukovych engaged in more widespread repression in the form of sniper attacks in February of this year, killing 100 Ukrainian citizens, the regime immediately collapsed, and the state itself disintegrated, opening the way for war, the panelists explained.

Having discussed the origins of the war, the panel then moved on to an extensive question and answer period, during which the scholars fielded questions from the audience of around 30 people. Many of the questions focused on the power dynamic between Russia and the West. The panelists responses were generally critical of the responses of international stakeholders.

The panelists first noted Russia’s role in escalating regional tensions.

“There is a villain in this story, and Putin is the villain,” Way said. “This crisis began in Ukraine, but the discussion has moved almost entirely to Russia.”

Paul J. D’Anieri, provost and executive vice chancellor of the University of California at Riverside, said that Putin seemed to reject the usage of factual statements in his diplomatic and domestic action.

“It’s scary stuff,” D’Anieri said.

Some panelists directed criticism towards the West as well.

“On the one hand it is easy to point to Russia as the villain, but the story is more complicated. The West is part of the build-up to the conflict,” said Gwendolyn Sasse, professor of comparative politics at Oxford University.

The U.S. had established a poor precedence for respect of international law through its campaigns in Iraq and Syria, while a lack of Western humanitarian aid for Ukraine was also an issue, D’Anieri and Sasse said respectively.

Despite these shortcomings, attendees remained optimistic about the future.

“I see there is a way out. There is still room for at least frozen conflict, if it’s not peace,” said Luise Druke, a former visiting scholar at the Harvard Law School’s Institute for Global Law and Policy.