Eastern Ukraine does not differ much from the rest of the country; it mirrors the overall challenges of rule of law and captured governance. A study of the city and region of Kharkiv demonstrates how adaptation to the country’s post-Maidan political and economic reality has been painful but rapid.
Kharkiv, the name of Ukraine’s second-biggest city and the surrounding region, has a collective population of almost 2.7 million people. Four years ago, it nearly turned into a Russia-backed separatist enclave like neighboring Donetsk and Luhansk. The anti-government Russian Spring protests of 2014 were supported only by a minority of Kharkiv’s citizens—as was the case in these neighboring regions. Nevertheless, pro-Russian views were more prevalent in Kharkiv than almost anywhere else in Ukraine besides the conflict-torn Donbas region. After Russia annexed Crimea in March 2014, a group of aspiring separatists unsuccessfully attempted to establish a Kharkiv People’s Republic, but loyal special security troops from western Ukraine, with the support of the regional elites, prevented them from doing so. Kharkiv lived through a turbulent 2014 and 2015, with shooting incidents and explosions causing casualties on both sides of the political dividing line.
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