Suchergebnisse

The article provides a multidimensional analysis of the post-truth phenomenon from the historical aspect, as well as an instrumental means of achieving an informational-communicational goal; a way of positioning in relation to significant aspects of socio-political reality; and a political technology aims at ensuring competitive advantages, etc. Post-truth is conceived in the form of a specific information and communication product of the postmodern era, which arose in response to certain megatrends including criterion relativism, devaluation of meanings and values, and the simulation imperative of socio-political life activity. Priority research efforts are focused on the meaningful demarcation of the post-truth regarding truth and lies, since this subject field determines the prospects for the conceptual expression of post-truth. The narrative form of representation is essential for the instrumental and functional effectiveness of post-truth. Not polemics and discourse with their requirement of convincing semantic reliefs and hierarchies, but the narrative as a certain order of words and storytelling, not burdened by the requirements of convincing argumentation, provides the most comfortable conditions for the expansion of post-truth in the informational and communicational environment. An important feature is a striking difference between reality and its portrayal by post-truth instruments. An analysis of the challenges and threats of post-truth, which requires a priority response from the professional community and the public consciousness in general – shows that the avalanche-like use of post-truth tools in the informational environment leads to the increase of a disinformation level aimed at creating and spreading false perceptions of reality to serve political interests and needs. It is the post-truth toolkit that is a specific experimental platform for double standards, bias, prejudice, manipulation, and propaganda. The devolution of truth into post-truth objectively and naturally leads to symmetrical degradation and involution of politics into politicking, which is never guided by public interests, but always only by its own, de facto parasitizing on the opportunities and powers it has gained.

The article is an attempt to predict the probable lines of restructuring of the political field of Ukraine in the conditions of war in the paradigm of key problems that may become the subject of controversy between competing actors of Ukrainian politics. The list of such problems includes the conclusion of the war, the perspective of post-war Ukrainian-Russian relations, innovations in the socio-political system of Ukraine, the public's trust in the authorities, the place of national business in the political landscape of Ukraine, the preservation of national unity in the conditions of political competition, the likely arrangement of political forces, taking into account the factor of emergence of new actors. The perspective of influence of these lines in dividing the Ukrainian political field is analyzed taking into account the opinions that are currently present in the official and analytical circles of the Euro-Atlantic community. The assumptions offered by the article are based on a comparison of the positions of the ruling regime in Ukraine and the Euro-Atlantic analysts regarding issues that are fateful for the country – victory in the war, joining NATO and the European Union, legal punishment of the Russian Federation. In this regard, it is possible to predict the strengthening of the positions of the political opposition, which will be able to use the fact that the position of Western countries on the mentioned issues can sometimes be more moderate and less categorical than the official Ukrainian one, and also depends on the domestic political situation. The author suggests that the political opposition to the ruling regime will use the discrepancy between its concentration of power and the general trend of the establishment of democracy, which is concerned about the strengthening of authoritarian regimes. A very likely development of the political field of Ukraine will be the use by the opposition of the unpopular, although inevitable in the conditions of war, practices of the ruling political power to attack it, and this tactic will be accompanied by references to the position of countries on which the future of Ukraine now depends.

In the article, the author analyzes the development of the idea of the unity of Ukraine, contradictions and heterogeneity in interpretive and normative approaches, which were explicitly or latently aimed at forming the value orientations of the Ukrainian nation, starting from 1991 until 2014, when the Revolution of Dignity took place. It was revealed that the specified period was characterized by the relentless search and production of new meanings, which had a contradictory nature, on the one hand, they were aimed at the rehabilitation of national history, and on the other hand, they served as a manipulative tool for the formation of public opinion and had a disintegrating effect on Ukrainian society. Special attention was paid to the issue of highlighting the idea of unity in normative and legal acts, in particular those that regulated the rehabilitation of national history and the restoration in the public field of the country of the discourse on the Day of Unity of Ukraine as an event that directly symbolized the aspirations of the Ukrainian people for the establishment of a sovereign and independent state. The article also reveals modifications of the concept of unity in the context of the ideological foundations of the work of a number of public organizations at the national and local levels. It was revealed that the period 1991–2014 was fundamental for the production of new meanings and orientations in nation-building, which ideologically prepared the ground for the events of 2014, the Euromaidan and the Revolution of Dignity, as well as the annexation of Crimea and the occupation of part of Donbas, which marked a new stage a test of the stability of the Ukrainian nation, in particular its unity not only in the symbolic dimension, but also in the practical plane of a direct military conflict, when the context of previous worldview contradictions was removed for the sake of preserving the political unity of the Ukrainian nation, which was subjected to a direct external attack from кussian federation. It was stressed that speculative discussions, discriminatory rhetoric surrounding the concept of the unity of the Ukrainian political nation over time transformed into a political technology of undermining the unity of Ukraine, in particular at the level of popularizing the idea of "incompatibility" and "mutual exclusivity" of the West and East of Ukraine, their economic, cultural, and foreign policy orientations. Political manipulations, multiplied by significant financial and organizational resources, led to the emergence and strengthening of regional political regimes, the actualization of disintegrating separatist political projects.

The article analyses the evolution of the institutions of the organization of the power system in Ukraine in general and the institution of parliamentary system in particular. The problems that, in the opinion of the author, determine the vulnerability of the institutional capacity of the political system are singled out. The attention is focused on the instability of the regulatory and legal framework - the repeated introduction of constitutional changes regarding the models of the organization of power, the transformation of certain norms of the Constitution of Ukraine, which determined the place and role of the parliament in the political field of the country. It has been proven that such variability of the "rules of the political game" has acquired signs of a threat to the institutional capacity of the Ukrainian parliament. It is emphasized that, despite the amendments to the Constitution of Ukraine, a number of legal conflicts remain. Among them is the unsettled nature of the institution of the imperative mandate, which gives rise to disagreements in the interpretation of the rules for depriving a people's deputy of his powers; inconsistency of the norms of the Constitution of Ukraine with relevant laws, etc. The author draws attention to the fact that many provisions of the Basic Law are adopted "advance" and regulation of certain norms is foreseen by special laws. At the same time, the adoption of these laws is either delayed, or they are not adopted at all. The author draws special attention to the problem of non-compliance with legally defined procedures in the process of adopting constitutional amendments. The thesis about the presence in Ukraine of the practice of instrumentalizing the Constitution by some political agents, whose activities are not aimed at optimizing the state administration system in the interests of the main source of power - the people, but in order to satisfy their own political and economic interests, is substantiated. The conclusions of the study are the identification of possible directions for strengthening the institutional capacity of the Ukrainian parliament, harmonization of constitutional norms and overcoming challenges along the way.

The number and scale of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the Russian military in Ukraine since the start of the all-out invasion in February 2022 have prompted many experts and politicians to define this brutality as genocide and seek prosecution of the perpetrators under international law. Ukrainian investigators and prosecutors, in cooperation with foreign colleagues, are carefully documenting relevant facts, while lawyers and diplomats are looking for optimal ways to administer justice within existing or newly created international judicial institutions. At the same time, many express a warning that among the four types of crimes recognized by the UN as the most serious and those that do not have a statute of limitations, the crime of genocide is the most difficult to prove in judicial practice, because the number of war crimes in itself, however brutal and large-scale, does not make them genocide from a legal point of view, if the most important and necessary for such a formal and legal qualification is not proven: genocidal intent on the part of the military and/or political leadership of the aggressor country. Politicians usually do not give such orders in writing, and even make them orally, as a rule, in a veiled form. Therefore, it is necessary to prove genocidal intentions in court on the basis of indirect evidence - an analysis of the entire sum of the statements of high-ranking officials of the aggressor country, who ideologically justify and encourage genocide, using various euphemisms at the same time (calling, for example, for the extermination of the fictional "Nazis" in Ukraine, under which they have meaning all self-conscious Ukrainians), as well as - on the basis of a comparison of veiled genocidal statements with the corresponding systematic actions of the occupying forces and the administration, which clearly translate the ideological instructions of the leadership into the practical plane. The author of the article shows that the genocidal intentions of the Kremlin, despite all their rhetorical veiling, can be proven if the corresponding anti-Ukrainian rhetoric of Russian government officials, experts and propagandists is systematically analyzed, deconstructed and contextualized as a certain integrity, in close connection with the specific actions of the occupying army and administration.

The article examines the influence of the mass pilgrimage of representatives of the foreign Hasidic communities on the dynamics of the development of Ukrainian-Jewish relations in particular, and, on the ethnopolitical processes of modern Ukraine in general. The relevance of the research determined, firstly, by insufficient study of the specified phenomenon in domestic science; secondly, the fact that the number of pilgrims who visit our country every year significantly exceeds the number of parishioners of local Jewish communities. The specificity of the Hasidic creed requires that believers have to regularly visit the burial places of their leaders. Therefore, since the mentioned religious movement originated in Ukraine, the connection with it of many foreign Jewish religious communities is maintained at a high level, regardless of the circumstances. Neither the pandemic nor the war significantly reduced the number of visitors to the places of burial of the teachers of Hasidism. The facts provided by the author reveal two contradictory trends in the reaction of local residents to the arrival of numerous followers of the Jewish religious-mystical movement: 1. The spread of hostile attitudes and actions directed against foreigners; 2. Growing interest in the development of pilgrimage and increasing of the tolerance. The first trend is caused by significant differences in worldview, culture, and everyday habits. It is also a result of corruption problems, since the municipal authorities enter only a small part of the funds obtained from the pilgrims into the local budgets. The second trend is determined by the interest of local residents in earning money related to the service of pilgrims and tolerance, which is spreading more and more in society. The conclusions note that the development of friendly relations between the local population and Hasidic pilgrims contributes to the positive dynamics of the image of Ukrainian society not only in the Jewish environment, but also in numerous communities of the modern Western world that are not directly involved in Judaism. This, in turn, will help Ukrainian post-war reconstruction. For solving problems related to pilgrimage the author recommends a number of educational activities for the local population, regional officials and the pilgrims themselves.

The article examines the etymology of the word "unity", the genesis of the idea of unity in Ukrainian political thought and scientific discourse, proposes the theoretical and methodological foundations of the research, and analyzes the evolution of the idea of unity in the discourses of political parties and presidents of Ukraine. It is about the evolution of the idea of unity throughout the entire process of Ukrainian state formation. Historical realities were of great importance for the formation and affirmation of the idea of unity, namely, the fragmentation of lands, foreign rule, the loss of the religious oneness of the people, and national oppressions. The evolution of the idea of the unity from the princely era to the present, from the idea of a united Rus to the idea of a free Independent United Ukraine, is traced, based on the research of domestic and foreign authors. Attention is focused on the symbolism of unity, markers of unity, traditions of holding "living chains" of unity as the main symbol of the Day of Unity, which Ukrainians build, symbolizing the unification of Ukrainian lands and state unity and the nationwide celebration of Unity Day. The Day of the Unity of Ukraine is characterized by the actualization of three dimensions of political meaning – past, present and future. The idea of unity was determined, first of all, by the unity of values, ideals and interests of the citizens of Ukraine. In the political discourse, emphasis was placed on the fact that the unity is a symbol of the unification of the country, as well as a reference point for the future as a territorial and spiritual unity of the people. In the addresses and speeches of the Presidents of Ukraine, the evolution from the idea of unity to the idea of oneness was traced. Presidents of Ukraine appealed to the lessons of the past and historical figures of Ukraine; they emphasized that the unity is an indivisible whole of all Ukrainian lands; noted that unity is not only about the territory, but also about oneness, cohesion, community. Preserving the territorial integrity of Ukraine, strengthening the unity of its regions, the diversity and distinction of which have developed as a result of objective historical circumstances, will continue to be a relevant, but also an urgent task of today.

In the center of the article is an analysis of the transformation of Ukrainians and our civil society during the first year of the full-scale Russian-Ukrainian war, conducted by the author with the aim of determining the possible limits of the format of the post-war normalization of the defects of Ukrainian democracy. Among the defects is the functioning of power, which gains the influence due to the electoral procedures of electoral democracies, but does not receive final legitimation due to the lack or even absence of public trust. The political product of the crisis of legitimacy of power in transit Ukrainian democracy is a weak state with dual institutions and an asthenic state of Ukrainian society with a dual national identity. The full-scale Russian-Ukrainian war created unique grounds (for the first time in 30 years after the renewal of Ukrainian independence) for the localization of the influence of the crisis of the legitimacy of power on the Ukrainian political system. The value evolution of Ukrainians, the active formation of national and civil identities, the unification of society, the formation of high level of trust of Ukrainians to the authorities, and the acquisition of new experiences by civil society – all these factors give hope for the formation and implementation of conventional instruments for overcoming crises and, accordingly, for the active promotion of Ukrainian democracy towards consolidation. The author notes that the qualitative construction of anti-crisis policies for the nearest future requires avoiding voluntarism when assessing the modernization potential of society, which determines the reforming potential of civil society. An objective look at modern Ukrainians forces us to recognize the fact that we have preserved a certain value dichotomy, certainly in much smaller sizes than on the eve of February 24, 2022. The axiological specificity of modern Ukrainians will also determine the post-war opportunities of civil society. Therefore, civil society will be active in the areas of supporting reforms, resuming all democratic procedures and processes after the end of hostilities, and actively formation of a new culture of discourse within the country. Advocacy of liberal democracy requires the participation of an exogenous actor.

The article analyzes the process of formation and the role of the president's institution in the structure of the executive power of Ukraine. The activity of the Institute of the President of Ukraine, as well as the specifics of its functioning in the conditions of a hybrid and full-scale Russian-Ukrainian war, were studied. It has been proven that in the course of the establishment of the presidential institution, a number of problems arose regarding the limits of presidential powers, as well as the spheres of responsibility of the head of state. The adoption of the Constitution of Ukraine in 1996 ensured the establishment of presidentialism in Ukraine – the personified power of the president. The institution of a strong president provoked a permanent conflict both in the structure of the executive power along the "president-prime minister" line, and between the president and the parliament. After the Orange Revolution of 2004, the presidential-parliamentary republic was transformed into a parliamentary-presidential one. However, the strengthening of the role of the prime minister and the parliament did not become the reason for the impossibility of conflict between the branches of the Ukrainian government, which became the trigger for the restoration of authoritarian tendencies with the coming to power of V. Yanukovych and the return to the so-called presidentialist model of executive power. As a result, this led to the uncontrolled growth of the influence of a narrow group of representatives of pro-presidential financial and industrial groups and became the cause of a social explosion in 2014 – known as the Revolution of Dignity. The return of the parliamentary-presidential model of the Constitution optimized the powers of the president, balancing his influence with strengthening the role of the parliament. However, the provision of constitutional reform regarding the optimization and balancing of presidential powers was made impossible both by the lobbying of the personal interests of the president and his entourage, and by the start of a full-scale war between Russia and Ukraine in February 2022.

The article deals with the question of the persuasiveness of the explanation of socio-economic crises in transitional societies in the paradigm of the exclusive responsibility for this of the so-called political order. The analysis of the most well-known concepts about the causes of decline in transitional societies, on the one hand, confirms the dependence of the economic situation on the effectiveness of political governance, but, on the other hand, shows that focusing only on political institutions limits the hermeneutic ability of a one-factor approach. Excessive emphasis on the role of political order leads to ignoring other factors of development — geographical, cultural, ethnic and others. The author of the article assumes that the political order as a mode of functioning of the political system is carried out through the activity of political and administrative institutions filled with a social substrate with a certain identity, including cultural and ethnic, and these identities often guide his actions. On the one hand, the level of public welfare depends on the presence of inclusive political and economic institutions. On the other hand, the development of institutions of this type is restrained by the parochial political culture of the population of transitional countries. Such a culture emerges from the pre-modern culture of social connections and is its rudiment, embedded in social psychology. It became the basis of the neopatrimonial economy, when public resources are distributed by a group of "big men". The paradigm of the sole role of political order in the economic development of the country is correct in a sense, that order is impossible without national unity. At the same time, the basis of national unity is a much wider range of issues than just the creation of effective political institutions. Even when the explanation of socio-economic decline is reduced only to political rule, the last is formed by the will of the population and is a product of its choice, which is determined not only by political, but also by other identities of people.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, was actually a threat to the existence of the Ukrainian state and the activity of the entire democratic world, and also had an impact on the settlement and socio-professional structure of the entire Ukrainian society. The war has led to the migration of the Ukrainian population, which is taking place against the background of destroyed Ukrainian industries and depleted human resources. The analysis of the settlement and socio-professional structure helps to find out not only the weaknesses and strengths of social changes in society, but also allows analyzing the existing potential in the form of opportunities and threats according to the SWOT-analysis. A special place is occupied by the methods of empirical research, methods of mathematical and statistical analysis and analysis of the All-Ukrainian census of Ukraine in 2001. To identify the ethnic conflict potential, several conditional multi-ethnic territories of Ukraine were compared: South Ukraine (the most multiethnic region of Ukraine), the Carpathian region, where 97% of the Hungarian national minority is concentrated, and the Ukrainian Northern Pryazov'ye region of Donetsk and Zaporizhzhya regions, where 95% of the Greek national minority lives (according to the 2001 census). The article answers the question of how to use the strengths of social interaction of national-civic and ethnic in the socio-professional sphere of Ukraine, analyzed and grouped by the author on the basis of statistical and sociological data, in order to take advantage of internal and external opportunities and to minimize the impact of internal and external threats. The conclusions contain recommendations for public authorities in the field of domestic and foreign policy.

The article explores the approaches to interpreting the concept of political participation. The research is based on the scientific works of western political thought theorists, who made a significant contribution to the study of this socio-political phenomenon. It was proved that socio-economic changes, rapid democratization, the development of information and communication technologies along with many other factors have influenced society, changing its attitude to politics in general and the role of the citizen in political decision-making. Therefore, there appeared a need for scientific study of the category of political participation; factors influencing the involvement of citizens; forms and types of participation; reasons for political apathy and mistrust. Despite the fact that currently, there is no unified definition of political participation, as new forms of citizen activity that encourage scholars to view them as a form of political participation are increasingly emerging, the article analyzes the genesis of the subject of study and the modern forms of political participation within western political thought. At the same time, traditional and modern forms of political participation are distinguished. It has been determined that in the mid-twentieth century, the concept of political participation goes beyond the usual approaches. If earlier, when researching forms of political participation, first of all were singled out voting, now they emphasize that it is non-electoral forms of participation that give citizens more opportunities to control politicians. According to the conducted research, the author comes the conclusion that non-institutionalized forms of political participation are becoming increasingly popular, especially among young people, while information and communication technologies make it possible to convert them into an online space, increasingly blur the line between consumer and creator of information, leading to the displacement of traditional forms of political participation.

The article analyzes the dynamics of public perceptions of the role of religion and religious institutions of Ukraine in the processes of social changes during 2014–2021. The empirical basis of the study is the results of the constant sociological monitoring of the state and trends of religiosity of Ukrainian society, the level of public trust in the church as a social institution, as well as public opinion on the role of religion and the church in public life, which has been carried out by the Razumkov Center since 2000. The topicality of the problem is argued by the natural dynamism and changeability of the religious environment, its constant and obvious institutional and identificational changes, on the one hand, and the traditional influence of the religious complex on the course of socio-political transformations in modern Ukraine, on the other. Attention is focused on the importance of diagnosing public reflections on the role of religion and religious organizations in the processes of social changes as a prerequisite for scientific analysis of existing practices of socio-religious interactions and their further forecasting. It is emphasized that religion and religious organizations rarely act as independent agents of social changes, and are only one of several active ones because the social behavior of individuals is determined not only by religious motives. Factors that had a decisive influence on the formation of public perceptions in the post-war period were the results of transformational changes in the domestic religious complex, which occurred primarily under the influence of the Revolution of Dignity (2013–2014), the annexation of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, the ongoing armed conflict in the East of the country, the large-scale war against Ukraine launched by Russia (since February 2022) and, of course, the processes related to the granting of autocephaly to Ukrainian Orthodoxy and the election campaigns of the President of Ukraine to the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (2019). It is proved that the above-mentioned processes determine the obvious variability and ambivalence perceptions of citizens about the role of religion and the church in public life. Traditionally, the high level of declared religiosity of Ukrainian citizens is combined with a low degree of their real religious activity. The relatively high and stable level of trust in the church is discordant with the steady decline in recognition of its role as a moral authority. Remaining generally tolerant of the practice of different religions, Ukrainian citizens declare rather different assessments of their attitude to the most widespread religions and religious organizations in Ukraine. Despite a certain increase in the positive assessment of the role of religious institutions, more than a third of respondents emphasize the absence of their significant role. Public opinion also declares significant reservations about the adequacy of the response of the largest churches to current challenges and problems of society. It is argued that the definition of the role of religion and religious institutions in the processes of social changes in Ukraine does not have an unambiguous dimension and under certain circumstances, religion can act both as a factor of national and social reconciliation and consolidation, and as a catalyst for social upheaval.

The foreigner of Ukrainian origin (Ukrainian diaspora, autochthonous Ukrainians, Ukrainians with the status of a foreigner of Ukrainian origin, labor and educational migrants, and their family members) are an important demographic, intellectual, socio-cultural, and informational resource of the country. The tectonic shifts that have been taking place recently, especially after the start of Russia's war against Ukraine in 2014, lead to significant changes in the process of forming the composition and structure of the foreigners of Ukrainian origin, not only as an ethnic, but also as a national-civic phenomenon. Considering the fact that in the conditions of the full-scale attack of the Russian Federation on Ukraine, millions of Ukrainians were forced to go abroad and integrate into the societies of the host countries, there is a threat of their assimilation, and thus the loss of Ukrainian national identity. The latest trends of a drastic increase in the number of refugees from Ukraine (here we are talking about millions of citizens and stateless persons) and the likely transition of some of them to the category of foreigners of Ukrainian origin require a serious rethinking of the ways and mechanisms of preserving their national identity. It is also important to take into account the correct approach in the combination of ethnic and national-civic in the process of improving state policy regarding foreigners of Ukrainian origin. A deep and systematic rethinking of the main approaches and tasks of interaction with the foreigners of Ukrainian origin and the development of an optimal balance between ethnic and national-civil in the process of preventing the assimilation of the foreigners of Ukrainian origin and preserving their stable connection with Ukraine is necessary. The article analyzes the main factors affecting the formation of Ukrainian identity and processes that can lead to assimilation, and also identifies the latest trends, problems and offers solutions to issues related to the preservation of the national identity of foreigners of Ukrainian origin.