Russians As The New Minority by Jeff Chinn Robert Kaiser

Author:Jeff Chinn, Robert Kaiser [Jeff Chinn, Robert Kaiser]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, General
ISBN: 9781000310603
Google: nAeiDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2019-07-11T15:56:09+00:00

Indicators of Russian Opinion in Ukraine

Russians were first confused by the Ukrainian independence movement because of their difficulty in accepting Ukrainians as a distinct nation and Ukraine as a distinct homeland. Public opinion then evolved to the point where perhaps as many as half of Ukraine's Russians favored independence for the Ukrainian state. This support then declined as economic realities replaced earlier hopes. Evidence from polls and votes, culminating in the 1994 parliamentary and presidential elections, underline the growing differences in perspective between the eastern and western areas of the country.

Little evidence can be found of governmental anti-Russian behavior, though the more nationalist wing of RUKH has tended to be anti-Russian as well as anti-Russia. The Ukrainian state has taken steps to secure independence, but independence for all groups living in Ukraine. Many Russians, however, perceived Ukrainian independence itself to be a threat. "Inter-nationalism," a term (from the Soviet or Russian perspective) connoting cooperation among nations, was often used as the banner for Russian mobilization against indigenous assertiveness.

One of the first Russian groups to coalesce was the Donbas Inter-movement. The initial catalyst was language legislation, though this law put little pressure on Russians to learn Ukrainian. In fact, the oblast center, Donetsk, did not have a Ukrainian-language school until 1990. Russian groups opposing Ukrainian nationalism, supporting the union treaty, and favoring ties to Russia and the USSR were also developing in the southern area of Ukraine known as Novorossiya (Odessa, Nikolaev, Kherson, and Dnepropetrovsk oblasts) and in Crimea.90 Such regionally based sentiment, along with that developing in Transcarpathia (with its Ruthenian/Rusyn population) and in nationalist western Ukraine, has led to talk of federalizaton.

On March 17, 1991, a poll was held on the union's future throughout the USSR. Some republics substituted their own referenda, while others added additional questions. Ukrainian voters, in addition to the all-union question, were asked: "Do you agree that Ukraine should be part of a union of sovereign states on principles of the declaration on state sovereignty of Ukraine?"91

An overwhelming 80.2 percent voted "yes," thus qualifying the similarly positive result of the all-union referendum on Union preservation. Though somewhat contradictory, the results likely meant that the majority favored continuation of the Soviet federation, though with greater sovereignty for its constituent parts. In this early vote, Donbas and Crimea strongly supported both Moscow's statement of union and Kiev's statement of sovereignty.

In contrast, Moscow's referendum on union continuation was rejected by over three-fourths of the voters in the western oblasts of Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, and Ternopil. Together, the West showed only 15 percent in favor of the union as defined by Moscow, 19.3 percent in favor of staying in the union even on the limited terms defined by the republic, and 89.9 percent for complete independence.92 These more nationalistic western regions from the beginning of the independence movement have taken a political approach distinct from that of the left bank.

The August 1991, coup was decisive for Ukraine as well as for the other republics. Kravchuk at first took a "wait and see" position, not challenging the Emergency Committee as did Yeltsin and Nazarbaev.

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