April 17, 2020. Ukraine World
On the surface, there is nothing interesting in Ukraine’s fight against coronavirus. Although we don’t know what will happen next, something in Ukraine’s reaction to the virus deserves a second look.
On the surface, there is nothing interesting in Ukraine’s fight against coronavirus. At this point, the country has been hit less by the virus than many other countries in Europe have. It does not even enter the top-30 in terms of the number of cases detected; its total death toll just passed 100 (with the daily toll mostly ranging between 5 and 10), compared to over 20,000 in the US, close to 20,000 in Spain, Italy and France, or over 3,000 in Germany.
Although we don’t know what will happen next, something in Ukraine’s reaction to the virus deserves a second look. The key thing: the country was incredibly fast to introduce a strict quarantine. It was introduced on March 11 when only 1 (!) case was detected. Ukraine closed its borders in mid-March, when the number of reported cases was below 10, with just 1 person dead from the virus.
This early action can be explained simply: Ukrainians are afraid of threats. They are used to them, they face them too often, and understand that sometimes you need to act quickly. Ukrainians enjoy little feeling of protection, a high feeling of a security vacuum and often prefer to act too early instead of too late.
Yevhen Hlibovytskyi, one of Ukraine’s most wide-thinking intellectuals, likes to repeat that Ukrainians are perhaps the world’s champions in survival. Security and safety values are those which Ukrainians share regardless of their region and which cross language, identity, religion and economic discrepancies.
According to World Values Survey‘s regular reports, Ukraine remains high in rational values, compared to traditionalist values; but low in terms of self-expression values, and much more inclined towards survival values. This means that Ukrainians, although more rational than we think them to be, will rather choose survival than development.
This is understandable given the peculiarities of Ukraine’s history. Ukraine lost about 4 million people in Stalin’s artificial famine in 1932-1933; about 1 million died in both the famines of the early 1920s and 1946-47. During World War II its population was reduced by a quarter: about 10 million people, of whom 3-4 million people died as Red Army soldiers; and out of 6 million Holocaust victims, 1 million come from Ukraine. Millions were also victims of the Soviet GULAG, as the Ukrainian intelligentsia was practically annihilated in the 1930s, and many prominent dissidents were sent to the GULAG after Khrushchev’s short-lived Ottepel.
Russian occupation of Crimea and parts of Ukrainian Donbas in 2014, and practically everyday news about deaths on the frontline ever since, merely added to this major feeling of insecurity that penetrates Ukrainian society. Add to this not only the coronavirus pandemic, but also recent forest fires in the Chornobyl area, during which Ukrainian society lived in fear that nuclear waste stores in the area would be affected.
The security vacuum is both external and internal. From outside as Ukraine lacks a security umbrella enjoyed (at least theoretically) by NATO member states, and from inside, as a Ukrainian citizen often sees law-enforcement services as an additional threat rather than protection.
There is a Ukrainian proverb that says it is better to overestimate a threat than to underestimate it. This was the logic behind the strict quarantine that was introduced so early.
Curiously, it is religion that could provoke spiraling in the number of coronavirus cases. Even more curiously, it comes from the Russian church in Ukraine (UPC-MP). Earlier, its Archbishop Pavel, head of Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, said that “one should not be afraid of” the epidemic and that the faithful should “hurry to church and hug one another”. Not surprisingly, Lavra became one of the hot spots of the virus in Kyiv. Just recently, Metropolitan Onufriy, the head of the UPC-MP, said its churches will hold Easter Sunday services on 19 April — contrary to quarantine measures and to calls made by other churches (including the newly-established Ukrainian autocephalous church) to stay home. If church attendance is not limited, crowds of people will go to churches on Easter Sunday and face huge risks of virus infection.
What happens this Sunday will also be a test as to how rational Ukrainians are, and whether survival instincts are strong enough to keep them at home.
However, if the security mindset succeeds, it might pose a global question for the future. Namely, should security logic dominate over liberty logic? Should “liberal” openness be victimized and blamed for the pandemic?
It is already being blamed by neo-authoritarian actors who see the pandemic as an additional argument to blame democracy and openness. It is increasingly used by Russian propaganda against the democratic world. With the coronavirus pandemic we are entering a new global debate, where liberal democracy will be brutally attacked.
In this situation, it is important that countries and communities make a clear distinction: more security does not mean less democracy. Limitations of freedom are tolerable when necessary for public health and public safety, but not as a tool to solve all other problems.
The need for a balance between security and freedom, which was stressed by many thinkers in Ukraine over recent years, needs to be real. A balance where freedom is the necessary and unavoidable pole, and security is regarded as the tool to protect our lives and our key values — including freedom itself.
This material was first published by Ukraine VerstehenVOLODYMYR YERMOLENKOchief editor at UkraineWorld.org, director for analytics at Internews Ukraine
‘Ukraine lost about 4 million people in Stalin’s artificial famine in 1932-1933; about 1 million died in both the famines of the early 1920s and 1946-47. During World War II its population was reduced by a quarter: about 10 million people, of whom 3-4 million people died as Red Army soldiers; and out of 6 million Holocaust victims, 1 million come from Ukraine. Millions were also victims of the Soviet GULAG, as the Ukrainian intelligentsia was practically annihilated in the 1930s, and many prominent dissidents were sent to the GULAG after Khrushchev’s short-lived Ottepel.’
And there you have it. That is why I support Ukraine and why all decent people of the world should support Ukraine. Someone should show this article; in particular the above passage, to Trump. No nation in history has suffered so much and no nation in history has had to live under the shadow of such a filthy, pitiless tyranny for so long.
I agree with you but it cannot always be a US president that saves the world. Especially when their max term is 8 years. You need a sustained international effort….and focus on the REAL enemy which is not Trump…though he could certainly open his eyes and ears to the Putinazi disease. After the Democrats impeachment hoax, anything Trump does for or against Putin is still held to that false narrative.
Ukraine has only fair weather friends and not many of them. When it comes down to it, only America has the power to stop the tiny poisoner: a) by crushing sanctions, or b) with troops on the ground. If a US president decided on the latter, he could probably count on Canada, Britain, Georgia, Pribaltika and Poland to help, but they are too small to act alone. If any president, even including Trump, was made fully aware of the basic history lesson of this great article and made to understand fully the events of 2008 and 2014, maybe something might get done. But even then, only after the world has recovered from the chicom pestilence.
It is always going to be down to America to set the tone and unluckily for Ukraine, the current WH incumbent despises Ukraine and likes the tiny poisoner.
Marco Rubio would be my choice to turn things round.
Ted Cruz is my man. He’s busy fucking China at this moment.
He is no friend of Ukraine. Despite Trump absurdly accusing his father of being complicit in the assassination of JFK, he has bizarrely continued to support him. So much so that he backed the Trump/Giuliani bullshit claim of Ukraine interfering in 2016. Proof is here:
He was stuck in Trump’s ass for a while. But he’s coming back. I hope RSM will too. _😂
Unfortunately that interview is as recent as last December. It appears that he would rather contribute to the Kremlin propaganda machine and act as an enabler for Trumputin than incur the wrath of the putler-loving wing of the party; ie the ‘alt-right’, who read Breitbart, listen to Michael Savage and watch Fox. The latter of which employs not one, but THREE stone cold putler shills as star presenters. One is unfortunate, but three is outrageous.
Leftist propaganda. The Washington Post and CNBC pushed orgies of lies about him for years since he ran in 2016. That he can’t stab Trump in the back is clear, the Dems would benefit only so closely to the elections.
Maybe take a look at this: https://www.cruz.senate.gov/?p=news&id=1638
But he actually said it in the interview ‘there is no doubt that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election against Trump’.
The link you provide is from 2014, when he was a firm supporter of Ukraine. But he has done a 180° turn since then. There are other examples : in 2008, Viktor Orban condemned the invasion of Georgia but has since become an ardent putler shill. Alex Jones of infowars described putler as a ‘terrorist demon’ back in 1999. Since then he has become one of putler’s most reliable shills, proudly proclaiming that the tiny poisoner loves his show.
Comparing Ted with such filth is totally disgusting. Except for that election meddling crap i did never hear him saying anything bad about Ukraine. He’s a big fan of Ronald Reagan, and surely not an asslicker. He lost to Trump. The voters were wrong, not him. Maybe he thought for a while the voters don’t support a Reagan-style approach. Anyway, as of 2020 Ted returned to his roots. I follow him on Twitter. Now that you challanged me, i will post some of his Tweets concerning Russia and China on this site, if i find them relevant, to show everybody that Ted and Nikki are America’s next leaders, when the Trump era is over.
I would be glad to see any pro-Ukraine comments from him, especially after such an outrageous smear. I don’t want him to kiss Trump or putler’s ass. But the fact is he did slander Ukraine; a country under attack from a vile fascist power, as recently as last year. He could start by apologizing.
Ha! The ukrainian media was totally pro-Hillary in 2016. This pissed off many, including myself. Concerning an apology, i think the best apology would be supporting Ukraine. Wasn’t it Ted who pushed for sanctions on Piss-stream 2?…
I don’t know enough about Ukrainian media to know who they supported in 2016. But if they did, that is hardly comparable to hiring troll factories, useful idiots in media/politics and deploying KGB disinformation tactics to interfere in an election. Even if they wanted to, they would not and do not have the capability.
It could well be that Poro, on learning that Manafort, who hurt Ukraine almost as much as putler did, was working for Trump, would have been desperately concerned, but what could he do about it? As it happened, his concern was justified. Who could have predicted that a sitting US president would have bigged up a fascist invader and rubbished its victims?
Anyway, I look forward to seeing Cruz make up for the terrible damage he did in that interview from last year.