Civil protests of Ukrainian citizens during winter 2013–2014 were accompanied by an intense informational campaign, which had not always corresponded to the reality. In the course of this campaign, Maidan’s activists, the political opposition — and, correspondingly, the new government that was formed after the revolution ended in victory — were depicted as ultra-nationalistic, extremist, and xenophobic. Under these circumstances, it is extremely important for both Ukrainian citizens and foreign observers to understand the real role of national-radicals in the Maidan protests and the events that followed. What were the reasons for the Ukrainian people to begin the protests? Is it true that the “banderovtsy” made up the bulk of the protesters? Is the victory of the Maidan also the victory of the political ultra-right? Does the Ukrainian ultra-nationalism have a strong support in the society, according to the results of the elections? What kind of future does the far right have in the new Ukrainian political reality?

In this article the author examines the political development and activities, ideological and political positions, networks and relationships of the Social-National Party of Ukraine (SNPU) since 1990 to 2004. The party’s successor, the All-Ukrainian Union “Svoboda” (VO Svoboda), joined the Ukrainian parliament since 2012 to 2014. VO Svoboda was part of the opposition to the Party of Regions and former pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych. The SNPU has ethnocentric and nationalist positions that are expressed in political statements and documents published by the leadership and functionaries of the party. Much attention is paid to the party’s ideology and the way it positions itself. The official and disparate ideological views of SNPU functionaries will also be illustrated. These views became consolidated due to the changes within the party leadership, and the party finally changed its name and image, in order to appeal to the wider masses.

This article traces the on-the-ground mobilization and recruitment strategies of Ukraine’s radical right party, Svoboda (Freedom) in the years prior to its 2012 electoral breakthrough. Ethnographic fieldwork and in-depth interviews with Svoboda party leaders and activists in Galicia show how party leaders strategically created an organizational structure aimed at recruiting young people, making linkages with pre-existing nationalist groups, and shifting the ideological focus away from cultural and toward economic issues. Interviews with party activists reveal how personal networks were key in the recruitment and radicalization process, showing that radical right activists were radicalized, or “made,” through political participation. Consequently, Svoboda’s organizational capacity allowed the party to take advantage of a political opportunity — Yanukovych’s unpopularity and weakened national democratic parties — in the 2012 parliamentary elections.

Increasingly, European radical right parties have capitalized on citizen dissatisfaction with the European Union institutions. As a new EU member, to what extent have supporters of the radical right in Romania turned away from Europe? I evaluate this question by tracking the evolution of radical right parties in Romania. I find that supporters of the radical right in Romania are generally do not support or do not trust the EU. The Greater Romania Party is well-positioned to expand its electoral base in the foreseeable future if it can widen its appeal to those Romanians who are ambivalent to the EU.

Do contemporary Bulgarian and Romanian radical right movements represent a legacy of interwar fascism? We argue that the key element is not that interwar movements provided legacies (of structures, ideologies, or organizations) but rather a symbolic “heritage” that contemporary movements can draw upon. The crucial legacy is, rather, the Socialist era, which in asserting its own definitions of interwar fascism created a “useable past” for populist movements. The Peoples’ Republics created a flawed historical consciousness whereby demonized interwar rightist movements could be mobilized after 1989 as historical expressions of “anti-Communist” — and, ergo, positive symbols among those of anti-Communist sentiment. Although radical right parties in both countries may cast themselves as “heirs” to interwar fascism, they share little in common in terms of ideology. Their claims to a fascist legacy is, rather, a factor of how their respective Socialist states characterized the past.

A central topos in the study of Central and Eastern European contemporary politics in general, and of its radical right politics in particular is the emphasis on the extraordinary relevance of history and geography. In fact, the entire transformation process after 1989 is often clothed in terms of historical and geographical categories, either as a “return of history” or a “return to Europe”, or both. In these various scenarios, the radical right claims a prominent place in this politics of return, and the study of this current echoes the more general concern, in the analyses of the region, with historical analogies and the role of legacies. Sometimes analogies are drawn between the post-1989 radical right and interwar fascism, in terms of a “Weimarization” of the transformation countries and the return of the pre-socialist, ultranationalist or even fascist past e the “return of history”. Others argue that since some Central and Eastern European party systems increasingly resemble their Western European counterparts, so does the radical right, at least where it is electorally successful e the “return to Europe”. According to yet another line of thought, the radical right in the region is a phenomenon sui generis , inherently shaped by the historical forces of state socialism and the transformation process and, as a result and in contrast to Western Europe, ideologically more extreme and anti-democratic while organizationally more a movement than a party phenomenon. In all these approaches, the key concepts of “legacies” and the radical right are often underspecified. This volume takes a closer look at the intersection of history or particular legacies, and the mobilization of the radical right in the post-1989 world of the region, while attempting to provide a sharper focus on key concepts. Regardless of the different approaches, all contributions show that with the radical right, a peculiar “syncretic construct” (Tismaneanu) has emerged in Central and Eastern Europe after 1989, which is derived from both pre-communist and communist legacies.