Is Ukraine a Political Community?¹

The effects of divergent historical experiences, of differential exposure to the world outside the former Soviet Union, and of divergent industrial structure–all point in the direction of enormous attitudinal and evaluative cleavages across the regions of Ukraine. When we compare regional differences in perspectives on the political economy in Ukraine and views about whether Russia and Ukraine should be separate states, these differences are readily discernible. By extending the scope of items examined and by making explicit comparisons between data from Ukrainian and Russian samples, however, we achieve a somewhat more optimistic view about the prospects for community building in Ukraine. The relatively consensual assessment of citizenship conditions and the wide range of foreign policy matters about which dispositions of Ukrainians are separable from those of persons from regions reported in this paper provide some evidence of an emerging Ukranian political community.