For the time being, the supporters of Ukrainocentrism continue heated though mostly unsuccessful debates amongst each other on what the national idea should be and cannot agree on the hierarchy in the nation’s pantheon and determine what is more important – Cossack legacy or the rockets of PivdenMash. Meanwhile, ideologists of the Pax Russia continue to inflate the most enduring and prevalent Soviet myths in Ukraine
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| PHÎÒÎ: PHL |
It was believed that the presidential election in 2004 was the turning point of the years’ long resistance of the Ukrainian idea with the post-Soviet ideology. Viktor Yushchenko’s victory was perceived among other things as a civilization choice of Ukrainians, the majority of whom rejected the pro-Russian vector of development.
Popular enthusiasm was largely based on expectations of Ukraine’s prompts integration into Europe, which turned out to be premature. Back in 2006, social studies conducted by the Razumkov Center confirmed the assumption that there was a small number of Ukrainians who in their minds already integrated into Europe. Only 6.6% of the polled associated themselves with the general European cultural tradition. The study also showed the total prevalence of the Ukrainian tradition in society with 56% of the polled attributing associating themselves with this tradition. The other figures in the study were equally interesting: it turned out that the Soviet mentality is more widespread in Ukraine (16.4%) than is the purely Russian mentality (11.3%). Also worth noting is in the same study both pro-Russian segments of the population displayed great pessimism as to the prospects of the spread of outlook doctrines professed by them. To the question of what cultural tradition will dominate in Ukraine in 20-25 years, only 2.1% of the polled said Russian and negligibly few (1.3%) responded Soviet.
It would seem that considering such a deterioration of the Pax Russia worldview in Ukraine (it is a fact that there are few young people among supporters of Soviet and Russian cultural traditions, while pensioners account for the lion’s share of that segment), Ukrainians should not be talking about a fundamental growth in the popularity of the Pax Russia philosophy that is essentially an upgraded version of Russian imperialism cultivated by the Kremlin. On the other hand, the persistent efforts of the Russian authorities successfully multiplied by the contradictory humanitarian policy of President Yushchenko produced a certain result. For example, Ukraine again quite noticeably started to emerge into the Soviet myth about WW II. The Great Patriotic War is in fact at the top of the pyramid of Soviet mythology and is the first stage of Moscow’s ideological onslaught. The second stage involves the transformation of homo Sovieticus into an “ordinary Russian person”. It is already being implemented in Crimea, Luhansk and Odesa are next in line. Incidentally, the Crimean experience of recent years is quite telling. The trends in the identity issue are changing right before our eyes. This is quite evident in the results of the opinion polls conducted by the Razumkov Center: nearly 37% of Crimeans considered themselves Ukrainian patriots, while only 9.2% of Crimeans described themselves as patriots of the Ukrainian nation at the end of 2008.
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