Different views on Ukraine are voiced in the world press. For some Ukraine is a corrupt polity with a dubious political and economic orientation.
For others this country is quite paradoxical where striking misery coexists with exotic, exaggerated luxury, a multitude of controversial laws, and outright lawlessness. Still others believe that Ukrainian reforms are blocked by the conservative Parliament with a large portion of the Deputies on the Communist side. All, however, agree that Ukraine is very important in the world in general and Europe in particular.
On the other hand, the Ukrainian man in the street, statistically, has a vague idea, if any, about how his country is regarded elsewhere in the world (disregarding, of course, statements made by foreign VIPs visiting Ukraine, knowing it is just protocol).
Maryna Pyrozhuk of the Journalist Studies Center interviewed a man who has traveled across the world and knows what he is talking about. His name is Roman Kupchynsky, a Ukrainian American born 1944 in Vienna who immigrated to the United States with his family in 1964, then enrolled in the Political Science Department of the local university. He was drafted in the middle of his studies and found himself in Vietnam. He served for a year as an infantry platoon leader. Later he worked in the Prolog Publishing House, which among other things, published the journal Suchasnist. Since 1990 he has been director of the Ukrainian Service of Radio Liberty. Ironical and self-critical, Mr. Kupchynsky believes that Ukraine has created many of its own problems and has to rely on its own resources and determination to solve them.
Q.: What do you think of the political situation in Ukraine?
A.: It can’t be viewed as so many points or angles but as a single sophisticated whole. Considering what is happening in the former Soviet republics, one becomes convinced that there is more chaos in Russia than Ukraine. At the same time, Russia shows more active so-called reforms. I say “so-called” because no genuine market reforms have ever taken place in either Russia or Ukraine. The Russian political situation has been more complex than that in Ukraine. Take the war in Chechnya killing thousands of Russian soldiers and innocent civilians. Thank God, nothing like that has happened in Ukraine (one should also thank the Ukrainian leadership for that), not in the Crimea or when there were attempts to take away Ukraine’s eastern territory. Even the language and ethnic issues are more tranquil. In this sense, the Ukrainian situation is more stable than that in, say, Russia or Belarus.
Q.: So what is Ukraine’s actual position in the international community?
A.: Quite dubious so far. The international community closely follows Ukrainian domestic developments and is still uncertain whether it can trust this country as an equal partner. This is only natural. Ukraine’s political and economic elite is now least of all concerned about straightening out the economy – and the economy is the basis of stability and reliability. Top bureaucrats are fighting for possession of public funds, each all out to get the lion’s share in terms of command and control. This drawn-out competition is incompatible with a genuine desire to revive and develop the economy. All these bureaucrats talk about the crisis and no one does anything about it. If this situation continues any longer Ukraine may well become a hazardous country. The IMF, which has until recently treated Ukraine with kid’s gloves, bending a willing ear to all kinds of excuses and arguments like the ongoing devastating crisis and being thus unable to comply with IMF requirements, may well turn away from Ukraine, once and for all.
Q.: We constantly hear about Ukraine having a tremendous geopolitical importance in the world in general and Europe in particular. The European Community, however, seems in no hurry to accept Ukraine as a full-fledged member. Do you think Ukraine stands a real chance of becoming one?
A.: Yes, I do. Even Russia stands a chance. To become one, however, serious efforts have to be made. And I mean making such efforts in an effective healthy manner. There is no future for Ukraine without finally realizing that the land must be made private property. Otherwise any plans and programs are absurd. Almost everywhere in the world it is generally recognized that the land must be subject to purchase and sale. It was that way even in Poland under the Communists, so that country never experienced such agrarian crises as Ukraine and Russia. To become a truly European polity, Ukraine must take a number of steps forward, not just on paper but in reality. Ukraine must convince the international community that it does play an important role in the world. To do so, Ukraine must specify its orientation: to become a full-fledged European partner, it must assert its European vector of evolution, the way the Czech Republic, Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary did, rather than bank on unstable Russia. This is a matter of principle. If Ukraine can surmount this barrier it will stand a real chance.
Q.: What about the new Parliament? Would you consider it professional? Who do you think is at the political helm now?
A.: Different people, and I think that some of them are decent and sincerely dedicated. Of course, there are others interested in getting their seats in Parliament to pursue their selfish goals. No, I do not consider the present Parliament professional. There are too few trained lawyers to produce adequate laws. Most Ukrainian People’s Deputies know nothing about law or lawmaking.
Now the emphasis is on the Ukrainian Parliament being mostly Leftist. Personally, I think that this is not the problem. The Ukrainian Left mostly suffer from the janissary complex; they are not Ukrainian and still consider themselves members of some “all-Union Communist Party.” Most of the Leftist legislators speak Russian in Parliament. Remember when a Ukrainian delegation visited Russia to negotiate Ukrainian-Russian relationships not so long ago? Russia’s Left declared that Ukraine does not exist as a polity and their Ukrainian counterparts said nothing to the contrary, meaning they did not mind the notion. This is absurd!
And the top-level Ukrainian leadership? They are going through the motions of doing something to maintain their image in the international public eye. The Ukrainian President issues edicts and makes statements geared to portray him as a creative reformist, time and again complaining that Parliament is throwing a monkey wrench in the works. Elsewhere in the world sober-minded people see that the actual situation is a bit different. The absence of rapprochement between the Chief Executive and Legislature is artificial. It is purposefully induced. Everyone wants power and no one wants to put it to good use. Everyone is criticizing everyone else and no one is proposing specific solutions to pressing problems. Everyone is actually concerned about serving his own interest. I think that the Ukrainian Parliament’s ratings are rather low in Ukraine.
Consider this. A German newspaper carried a list of the richest people in Donetsk oblast the other day. The list is topped by Yukhym Zviahylsky. This man spent most of his nomenklatura life in the coal industry. How does this fit in with Ukrainian miners going on hunger and sit-down strikes, demanding back wages unpaid for months on end?
Q.: Politics aside, what do you think most amazing about the current Ukrainian mentality from your own American standpoint?
A.: Ukrainians still expect social protection from the state. They are on waiting lists for government-subsidized apartments and demand that the government do something to help them live better. You won’t find this in any developed country. Once, talking to a man in charge of a so-called “nongovernment” publishers’ association, I asked how come few books were published in Ukrainian. He said the state is to blame because it is not supporting the publishing business. Wrong! If you are boss you must rake your brain to find sponsors and means to keep your business going.
On another occasion, I visited Ukraine just as Rukh was demanding that the government allocate the capital’s House of Teachers (seat of the Ukrainian Central Rada in 1917-18-ed.) for its office. To think that an anti-Communist political force is demanding anything from the state! They should have earned enough to purchase the place. They just wanted to get something free.
Of course, you have many social problems and solving them in Ukraine is much harder than in any other country, anywhere in the world. Here people cannot receive bank loans, say for a term of 25 years, to buy housing, offices, or other property. At the same time. Ukrainians are very free now. The Ukrainian man in the street is more liberated in his thinking than, say, anyone in the Baltic states or in the Czech Republic. Another thing is that what Ukrainians think has very little in common with the official views formed by certain political figures who present them as public opinion.
Q.: What Ukrainian newspapers do you read?
A.: Zerkalo nedeli and The Day.






