Transnational Ukraine? E-Book

• Herausgeber: ibidem
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Serie: Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 443

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017

Beschreibung

The Euromaidan protests highlighted Ukraine as a state between East and West European pathways. It became obvious that Ukraine’s search for identity and future is deeply rooted in historical fragmentations of the country which indicate Ukraine’s long-standing and multiple ties beyond its borders. In this volume, distinguished scholars provide empirical analysis and theoretical reflections on Ukraine’s transnational embeddedness which surfaced with an unexpected intensity in the recent political conflict. The contributions focus on such phenomena as the role of international media and of diaspora communities in the Euromaidan’s aftermath, on the transnational roots of memories and the search for collective identity, and on transnational linkages of elites within Ukrainian political and economic regimes. The anthology demonstrates the theoretical and analytical value of the concept of transnationalism for studying the ambivalent processes of post-Soviet modernization.

Leseprobe

 ibidem-Verlag, Stuttgart

Contents

Acknowledgements

List of Contributors

Part I: Introduction

Timm Beichelt and Susann Worschech

Transnational Networks in and around Ukraine: Theories and Practices

André Härtel

The "Novorossiya" Project and National Affiliations in Ukraine's Southeast: A Failed Attempt at Transnational Community Reconstruction?

Part II: Symbolic Transnationalism

Mikhail Minakov

Novorossiya and the Transnationalism of Unrecognized Post-Soviet Nations

Yuliya Yurchuk

Global Symbols and Local Meanings: The "Day of Victory" after Euromaidan

Part III: Practice-related Transnationalism

Alexander Clarkson

Coming to Terms with Odessa Ukraine: The Impact of the Maidan Uprising on the Ukrainian Diaspora

Andriy Korniychuk, Magdalena Patalong and Richard Steinberg

The Influence of Protest Movements on the Development of Diasporic Engagement: The Case of Euromaidan and its Impact for the Ukrainian Diaspora in Poland and Germany

Part IV: Socio-structural Transnationalism

Heiko Pleines

The International Links of Ukrainian Oligarchs. Business Expansion and Transnational Offshore Networks

Susanne Spahn

Ukraine in the Russian Mass Media: Germany as an Example of Russian Information Policy

Simon Schlegel

Ukrainian Nation Building and Ethnic Minority Associations: The Case of Southern Bessarabia

Veronika Borysenko, Mascha Brammerand Jonas Eichhorn

The Transnational "Neo-Eurasian" Network and its Preparation of Separatism in Ukraine 2005–2014

Part V: Conclusion

Susann Worschech and Timm Beichelt

Ukraine and Beyond: Concluding Remarks on Transnationalism

Acknowledgements

This book arose from a conference in November 2015 that was based on a challenging idea. Only shortly after the Euromaidan protests, the annexation of Crimea, the start of the war in Eastern Ukraine, scholars from various disciplines gathered at European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder), just a few steps away from the German-Polish border. Against this scenery of a symbolically charged border, about twentyfive scholars discussed how to conceptualize and analyze contemporary Ukraine. Our ambition was to acknowledge the huge and courageous societal change within that country, but also to include the multifold and ambivalent external links of a space that by definition seems to be a borderland:«україна».

In this context, the idea was born to edit some of the papers presented at the conference under the heading "Transnational Ukraine". We chose transnationalism as an analytical starting point because of a core research area at European UniversityViadrina on the interplay of borders and orders in contemporary Europe (https://www.borders-in-motion.de/). Transnationalist perspectives seem to be appropriate in constellations in which nation states and their borders retain importance, but are challenged and transgressed by actors, practices, and ideas. The conference led us to the insight that Ukraine represents a paradigmatic case when thinking about the porosity of borders in a world where some actors have more powers or resources than others to question these borders.

The conference was co-financed by the German Association for East European Studies and European University Viadrina. We like to thank both institutions greatly for having facilitated that debate. In particular, we want to express our special thanks to Ulrike Sapper and Gabriele Freitag for their excellent preparation and organization of the conference. We really enjoyed this great cooperation.

Further, we would like to thank Karoline Winter for her wonderful and diligent support in preparing the manuscript. Also, we would like to thank Maria Ugoljew for helping us to deploy a correct and coherent transliteration. Special thanks go to the editorial team atibidem, in particular to the editor Andreas Umland and to Valerie Lange who steered us through the publication process.

List of Contributors

Timm Beichelt is a professor for European Studiesat European University Viadrina.His research interests are related to regime developments in countries of Eastern, Central, and Western Europe. Among many other trips to Ukraine, he has undertaken a series of scientific field trips which are documented in a blog (https://viadrinagoesukraine.wordpress.com/). Recent publications cover German European policy, Civil Society and Democracy Promotion in Eastern Europe, and Legitimate Authoritarianism in Russia.

Veronika Borysenko is a master student ofthe program"European Studies"at European University Viadrina, Germany. She holdsa bachelor's and master's degree inInternationalRelations from Kyiv National Taras Shevchenko University.Since 2016 she is working as Project Assistant inEuropean Exchangewithin the project European Platform for Democratic Elections.Her main areas of research interestsare political developments in Post-Soviet countries and democracy support for countries in transition.

Mascha Brammerobtained her BA in Social Science and Literature Studies from the University of Erfurt. She is currently enrolled in the MA European Studies at European University Viadrina in Frankfurt/Oder. During her studies she spent two semesters at the Bosphorus University, Istanbul and gained working experience at the German Bundestag, a political youth education program and several NGOs.

Dr Alexander Clarkson is Lecturer for German and European Studies at King's College London. He holds a PhD in Modern History (University of Oxford). His research focuses onthe politics ofimmigrant communities includingthe Ukrainian diaspora,the impact of immigration on German society as well asEuropean security. He is author ofFragmented Fatherland: Immigration and Cold War Conflict in the Federal Republic of Germany(2013).

Jonas Eichhornis amaster student of the programCulture and History of Central and Eastern Europeat the European University Viadrina in Frankfurt (Oder)and at Charles University in Prague.Previously, hestudiedSlavic Studies and History in Heidelberg and St. Petersburg. Jonas Eichhorn wasasa volunteer forAction Reconciliation Service for Peaceand workedin the archive ofMemorialin Moscowfor one year.He holds a scholarship of theHeinrich Böll Foundation.

DrAndré Härtel (born in 1979) currently works as DAAD Associate Professor forGerman and European Studiesat the National UniversityKyiv-Mohyla Academy in Ukraine. Before,he has been Political Advisor at the Council of Europe's Directorate of Policy Planning (Strasbourg, France) and a Lecturer in International Relations at Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Germany. He was educated in Political Science and International Relations at Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, the University of Virginia (US) and Oxford Brookes University (UK). Aside from being a regional specialist for the Post-Soviet space his research interests cover foreign policy analysis, international organizations, democratization, and state-building.

Andriy Korniychuk is an Analyst in European, Migration Policy, Democracy and Civil Society Programs attheInstitute of Public Affairs (Warsaw, Poland). He graduated in European Public Affairs (M.A.) from Maastricht University and Society and Politics from Lancaster University/Centre for Social Sciences (M.A.). Currently,heis doing his doctoral researchas a member of the European Studies Unitat the Graduate School of Social Research of the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences (research area: democratic legitimacy beyond nation-state, case of EU).

Mikhail (Mykhailo) Minakov is an Associate Professor of the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies of the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy (Ukraine) and Editor-in-Chief of the Ideology and Politics Journal. He graduated in Philosophy (M.A.) from Kiev-Mohyla Academy, defended his Candidate (2000) and Doctoral (2007) dissertations at the Kiev Institute of Philosophy. Mikhail's main interest is dedicated to political modernization, theories and practices of revolutions, political imagination and ideologies.

Magdalena Patalong is Research Assistant at the Institut für Europäische Politik (IEP) Berlin. She studied political science at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich and Eastern European Studies at the Free University of Berlin. Magdalena Patalong's academic focus includes civil society and think tanks in Ukraine, the Eastern Partnership and EU-Russia Relations.

Heiko Pleines is head of the Departmentof Politics and Economics,Research Centre for East European Studies and Professor of Comparative Politics at the University of Bremen. He has been conducting research on the political role of Ukrainian oligarchs since 2004, leading to numerouspublications.

Simon Schlegel obtained his PhD in SocialAnthropology from the Martin Luther University in Halle, Germany in 2016. His doctoral research was funded by the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, where Simon Schlegelis part of the research groupHistorical Anthropology in Eurasia. His thesis is based onfifteenmonths of fieldwork in rural south-western Ukraine during which he experimented with combining research methods from ethnography and historiography. His main researchinterests are the Post-Socialist transition, new forms of nationalism, clientelism, and emerging civil societies. He currently teaches social anthropology at the Martin Luther University.

Susanne Spahn (PhD) is an East European historian, politologist and journalist based in Berlin. Spahn completed her degree in East European History, SlavonicStudies andPoliticalSciences in St. Petersburg and Cologne. In 2011, she received her doctor's degree and published her thesis on the topicState Independence—the End of the East Slavonic Unity? Russia's Foreign Policy towards Ukraine and Belarus since 1991.In 2010 and 2011, Spahn worked in Moscow with, among others, Dow Jones News, die Welt, Deutsche Welle, Zeit online, Magazin Außenwirtschaft.She conducts research onRussia's foreign policy in the post-Soviet area and Russian information policy. Her latest bookThe Image of Ukraine in Germany: The Role of Russian Mass Media. How Russia Influences the German Public Opinionwas published in July 2016.

Richard Steinberg is Research Associate at theUniversity ofHamburg and the Institut für Europäische Politik (IEP) Berlin. He studied recent history and social sciences at theUniversity of Erfurt, the Humboldt UniversityofBerlin and the Université de Toulouse II—Le Mirial. He is currently working on his PhDonCrises in European Integration. Further research interests are the history of the European integration process, social European integration and EU-Ukraine-relations. Richard Steinberg is alumnus of the Foundation of German Business (sdw) and of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C. (Junior Scholarship 2010).

Susann Worschech is a post-doc research associate at European University Viadrina.Her research interests include political sociology of Central and Eastern Europe, civil society and social movements, as well as methods of empirical research.She graduated from the Humboldt University of Berlin with a diploma in Social Sciences. Her doctorate at European University Viadrina focused onnetworks ofexternal democracy promotion andthe structuringof civil society in Ukraine.

Yuliya Yurchuk got her PhD in History from Stockholm University.Her dissertationReordering of Meaningful Worlds: Memory of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army in Post-Soviet Ukrainewas defended in 2015. She is currently working at Södertörn University, Sweden. Her main field of interest includes memory politics in East European countries, remembering of the Second World War, nationalism, state- and nation-building in Ukraine. Hercurrent research is focused on popular history writing in post-MaidanUkraine, the role of religion and churches' activities in formation ofpublic representations of history and the applicabilityof post-colonial theory in the analysis of culturalmemory.She iscurrentlyworkingon the projectInformation Management in Ukraine-Russia CrisisandReligion and Memory in Ukraine, both funded by theBaltic Sea Foundation.

Part I:Introduction

Transnational Networks in and around Ukraine:Theories and Practices

Timm Beichelt and Susann Worschech

The text deals with different objects and perspectives of transnationalism research and their attribution to Ukraine. Starting from a typology from Steven Vertovec, we identify three approaches to border-transgressing phenomena: socio-structural, symbolic, and practicerelated transnationalism. These approaches are then crossed with spatial, social, and temporal aspects of transnationalism and applied to the Ukrainian case. From this framework of analysis, several expectations with regard to the character of transnationalism in Ukraine are developed. First, we expect that migration will most likely bear the character of transmigration, which fuels a re-nationalization of identities. This means, second, that national symbols will become even more relevant, but in contested ways. Third, we expect practices of transnationalism to be fuzzy, volatile, and liquid. The chapter closes with an outlook on the other manuscripts of this book.

1.Introduction

The so-calledRevolution of Dignityand the subsequenteventsin Southern and Eastern Ukrainepropelled a new self-perception of Ukraine as a nation of unity and togetherness, on the one hand. On the other, the de-facto break-off process of some Donbass regions fuels a different a narrative of Ukraine as anation between two alternative orientations: Europe or Russia.Within the first narrative, the European Union (EU),and sometimes NATO,areportrayed as guarantorsof Ukrainian independence. The counter-picture presentsUkraine as an entity with limited self-determination because of the country's intertwinement with Slavonic culture and, ultimately, because of its subordination to Russian power.Both narratives of unity and bipolarity, we argue, are far too schematic to grasp the character of the huge transformation of Ukrainian society since 2014.

The contributions to this volume have the aim to break withbothnarratives. The manuscriptswerefirst presented at a conference at European University Viadrina in Frankfurt/Oder (Germany)thatfocused on Ukraine's historical and contemporary interlockings. During this conference, a nuanced perspective on Ukraine during and after Euromaidan evolved. The argument was developed that Ukraine, despite its status as a nation with newly gained political independence, is characterized by multiple fragmentations and belongings that link the country—its society, its regions, its culture—to different areas andpowers at different points in time. These fragmentations and belongings underline Ukraine's long‐standing and multiple ties beyond its borders. In this book, the conference's findings are reformulated into the argument that contemporary Ukraine can be better understood by focusing on its transnational characteristics. Accordingly, concepts and theories of transnationalism are used to analyze a country that is not situated between two blocks but that draws its richness from roots that go beyond national categories.

For many scholars of contemporary Europe, these findings should not come as a surprise. For several decades, the political structure of Europe has been characterized as part of a postnational constellation in which nation states alone lack autonomy and are subject to both European integration and globalization(Habermas 1998). This situation was and is not a property solely of Western Europe or member states of the EU. Many sources indicate that Eastern Europe has also become a part of globalization in cultural, economic, and social termssince1989(Kovacs 1999; Janos 2000). Therefore, on the one hand,placing Ukrainewithinthecontext of a Europe of increasing permeability of national borders and reference areas does not constitute a scientific breakthrough.

On the other hand, at least since the rise of the inner-soviet independence movements in the late 1980s, scholarship on Ukraine has constantly referred to a national framework. Major contributionsregardingpost-soviet developments in Ukraine turned to issues that contrasted with the idea of an ever closer Europe as—idealistically—attributed to the European Union. Ukraine was analyzed with regard to nation building and to the dilemmas in Ukrainian-Russian relations that followed from that nation building(Wolchik&Zviglyanich 2000; Kuzio 1998; Motyl 1993). The Orange Revolution of 2004 was celebrated as a landmark that separated a Ukrainian way of transformation from most, if not all, other post-soviet transitions(Christensen et al. 2005; Karatnycky 2005). The hithertolargestprotest movement of independent Ukraine highly benefitted from training and organizational support provided by Western civil society organizations. This fact was interpreted by many observers as a legitimate form of international cooperation that strengthened Ukrainian independence vis-à-vis Russia and its ambitions of influencing Ukrainian politics(Wilson 2006; McFaul 2007).

SinceUkrainian independence,the geographic areaoutlined by Lviv, Prypyat, Kharkiv, Luhansk, Sevastopol, and Odessahas been characterizedas a'nation',althoughthis'nation'has been portrayed as an entity with varying sources, aspects, and serious ruptures.In social and economic terms, Ukraine has been analyzed as an area that is heavily interlinked with Russian history. Political developments, however, only partially reflecttheseculturaland economicoverlaps. Political and economic elites in the EU as well as in the United States advocated a simultaneous democratization and capitalist marketization of Ukraine—a political aim thathasbecomeincreasinglyincompatible with the course Russia hastakensincePutin's coming to power in 1999/2000.

In the years after the Orange Revolution, Ukrainian elites tried to close ranks with the West andfosteredthe narrative of Ukraine as an independent nationin orderto facilitate Western support, following the pattern of the Central European transition countries. The argument of a coherent Ukrainian nation turned into a political tool to secure the success of democratization.It would be an interesting endeavor to analyze to whatextent scholarshave beenpart of the epistemic drift from (inherently open) democratization to (inherently teleological) nation building. We have the impression that very few experts on Ukrainian politics and its transformation havenot—at onetime or another—been part of the supervising business around Ukraine, its democratization and/or Western integration. Many scholars involved in thisdiscourse are part of civil society organizations, think tanks or agencies that depend on grantsfromthe EU, the USA or other Western governments.

However, it is not our main point to criticize scholars for an alleged lack of impartiality.[i]Politically, we sympathize with the argument that an aggressive and authoritarian Russia plays a destructive game of destabilization in Ukraine. At the same time, we also want to argue that this normative position bears the danger of an epistemological dead corner. While sympathizing with the political goals ofmostelites and civil society organizations, we run into the danger of overlooking important conjunctions in Ukraine.Within the context of this book, this meansthatwhile it may be politically questionable toadopt(Russian) narratives thatcastdoubtonthe teleology of coherent nation building in Ukraine, it is scientifically necessary to insist that the heterogeneity of Ukraine may also point to different directions than a stable nation state. This heterogeneity mainly concernsUkraine'scontemporary and historical intertwinement with Russia, but also Poland, Lithuania, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the Soviet Union.

In this book, we try to replace thenarrativesof nation building, democratization, and capitalist marketization by perceiving contemporary Ukraine as a transnationalist entity. Applying transnationalism as a scientific paradigm is not without problems because of its inherent fuzziness and its one-concept-fits-allappeal. However, while the approach"seems to be everywhere, at least in social science"(Vertovec 2009:1), a coherent transnational perspective on Ukraine has not really been established yet. Transnationalism generally refers to situations or processes in which borders of nation states are transcended by social activities(Pries 2010:9). A major motivation of transnationalism studies is and was to escape the"methodological nationalism"inherent in much social science(Amelina et al. 2012). By applying categories that have been developed to analyze social practices taking place within nation states, there is a danger of tacitly taking over assumptions that are exclusively linked to nation states. One such assumption, for instance, is to imagine political activities and practices predominantly in relation to national governments or institutions that depend on central governments. In this introduction and the subsequent texts, we want to show that a more open view on political, economic and societal practices and their interrelationscan further ourunderstanding ofcontemporary Ukraine.

2.Transnationalismas aToolforRegime Analysis:Three Different Methodological Perspectives

Transnationalism serves many scientific goalssimultaneously. It hasserved asa real-world diagnosis to overcome the focus on nations(Marjanen 2009), it has been used as a political tool in order to give a voice to personswhodo not fit neatlywithin the framework ofmethodologicalnationalism(Brettell 2003), and it has been employed as a mind-map to differentiate economic, political and societal globalization(Pries 2008). With regard to Ukraine, all these approaches seem useful and maybe even necessary. Ukraine isbothless and more than a nation because of its long-term, intense and formative historical entanglements with Russia in the north, east, and south, with Poland in the west,withRomania in the southwest, andwithmiscellaneous empires in the past.Contemporary political processesaretransnationalas well. The internal refugees from thetrans-borderwar in Donbasandthe millions of semi-forced Ukrainian migrants heading to the EU or North America during the post-soviet economic crises certainly deserve more attention. Hence, there is more to Ukraine's blurring of boundaries than mere globalization—in fact, the country could serve as a blueprint for societies that have for one reason or another transcendedpolitically given borders.

Yet, howcanwe proceedtosystematizethe various approaches of transnationalism? Steven Vertovec has suggested differentiatingsix different"takes"on transnationalism(Vertovec 2009). The first is the most general and concerns"social formation[s] spanning borders"(ibid.:4). This approach focuses on networks of various kinds: social, cultural, economic, and political. The strengthening of border-transgressing networks goes along with an alteration of pre-existing interactions, thus"calling into question the traditional definition of the state"(ibid.:5). Some authors who follow this way of defining transnationalism seem to be quite confident that the evolving networks lead to new transnational communities(see some contributions in Schiffauer et al. 2005). In this case, the state would somehow be replaced by one or several alternative entities that develop or even enforce new societal rules. However, there are other authors who are more pessimistic and insist on the necessityofbuildingup genuine transnational, international or supranational institutions in order to compensate for the loss of political steering capacities(Castells 2000; Zürn 1998).

Inthesecond dimension, Vertovec(2009: 5)identifies transnationalism asa "type of consciousness"thatis specifically linked to diasporas. Diasporas show that border transgression alone is only one necessary condition of transnationalism. Another condition is the persistence of a reference community, for example,Jewish or Armenian. While such communities are formed by social ties, there also exists a strong subjective elementthatperpetuates the idea of the givenness of a community. As Brubaker (2005) argues, diaspora communities often share hybrid collective identities, thus blurring boundaries. Therefore, transnationalism as consciousness goes along with termssuch asidentity, collective memory,andshared imagination. Insofar as identities are open and live in limited conflict with their respective environments, the term"cosmopolitanism"is used to characterize a productiveapproach toconsciousness creation(Vertovec&Cohen 2002;Beck&Grande 2004).

Third, transnationalism can be seen as a"mode of cultural reproduction"(Vertovec 2009:7). This take focuses on practices that are employed to create or uphold the new transnational imagined communities—to paraphrase the title of Benedict Anderson's famous book on nationalism(Anderson 1983). Such practices consist in the memory-enriched creativity of fashion, movies, fiction, and visual arts. The digital age is held liable for theemergingintensity of the new transnational culture production. Easy access to transnational communication and networks is seen as one precondition for multiple practices of mixing elements from different cultures, leading to"syncretism, creolization, bricolage, cultural translation, and hybridity"(Vertovec 2009:7). Transnationalism in this mode is therefore marked by creativity of the unexpected.

The fourth dimension of transnationalism refers to economics. Specifically, economic transnationalism is associated with corporations that operate massively beyond borders. It is therefore quite closely linked to economic globalization and its inherent transnational business companies,such as Google, Goldman SachsandeBay. The differencefrominternational business consists in focus: Transnational corporations have developed routines that cannot be reduced to the national origins of a company and that involve practices rooted in a"transnational capitalist class"(ibid., 8)of its own right. Economic transnationalism is driven by economic motives and comprises actors involved in petty trade, micro-transactions and temporary labor migration. In a way, the approach is used as a sociology of border-transgressing economic activities and is demarcated against the approach of global economicsthatdeals with open financial markets, international flows of trade, and foreign investment(a scholarwhouses the globalization paradigm in this sense is Scholte 2000).

Fifth, Vertovec speaks of transnationalism as a site of political engagement (Vertovec 2009:10). This dimension refers to actors that have political aims and pursue them by operating beyond borders. Again, the dimension is best understood by thinking of competing concepts. Transnational politics are not international politics (this would be the arena of international organizations like the United Nations),and they are not supranational politics (these would involve a powerful political center like in the EU). Transnational political actors are international NGOs, butthey arealso the often self-claimed political representations of diasporas or other sub- and transnational social groups. All kinds of nationalisms without a given"homeland"(Brubaker 1997)can beaddressedwithin the framework of political transnationalism. Because of the lack of a central political authority in this highly politicized field, transnationalism is closely linked to the paradigm of international governance(Rosenau&Czempiel 1992).

The sixth and final take on transnationalism concerns a"(re)construction of'place'or locality"(Vertovec 2009:12). This reconstruction is, in the first place, undertaken by persons who move between places and face difficulties with a"growing disjuncture between territory, subjectivity and collective social movement"(ibid.). In contrast to the third type developed by Vertovec ("cultural reproduction"), transnationalism can also be associated with a kind of homelessness—a state that can creatively be transformed into new kinds of identities but also into a consciousness of lacking completeness. Persons or groups that live under the auspices of transnationalism may develop actions that relate to an (imagined) past or future in which collective consciousness was allegedly more coherent. As can be seen with regard to Kurds in contemporary times, such a feeling of incompleteness may well relate back to traditional nationhood and,therefore,to stateness(Østergaard-Nielsen 2003). This example shows that transnationalism is, after all, a concept that is marked by ambivalence. While the mind map of nationalism may be too narrow to understand certain contemporary developments of blurred boundaries, the framework of transnationalism may sometimes be re-focused on nations after all.

The discussion of Vertovec's work has revealed that scholarshipontransnationalism may be useful for the focus of this book in several regards. It hasbeenshown that the term transnationalism is used in demarcation against other competing concepts—particularly the concepts of globalization(Scholte 2000), cosmopolitanism(Vertovec&Cohen 2002), and approaches of state-driven international politics(Keohane&Nye 1977). Transnationalism does not refer to anonymous forces that drive globalization but to clearly identifiable actors as subjects who aredoingtransnationalism. In this perspective, Vertovec's accounts of transnationalism can be systematizedintotwo categories: transnational interaction patterns on the one hand and actors of transnationalism on the other.

Transnational interaction patterns, on the one hand, include networks as social formations that span borders, the construction of border-transgressing identities such as diasporas, the practices of transnational cultural reproduction, and the symbolic construction of certain transnational localities. These interactions may consist of symbolic or communicative interactions,theexchange of resources or information, or direct cooperation. Hence, one aspect of transnationalism studies isafocus on border-transgressing orborder-blurring interaction patterns. Within these patterns or networks, cultural codes, interpretations, roles and positions of actors are negotiated and attributed. Thus, transnational interaction patterns open up new social spaces.

On the other hand, actors of such transnational sociation processes are identifiable subjects that may switch to new roles and positions in a transnational social space. These actors exist in different spheres of action—Vertovec mentions culture, economics, and politics. These may shift when issues are transferred from a regional or national to a transnational dimension. In the process ofbeing transnationalized, actors may undergo significant transformation when they seek to adapt to new roles and positions in a transnational network.

The emerging transnational spaces are thus built upon interaction patterns that already exist on national, regional or local levels but that create new institutions, orders and norms once they are transferred to a cross-border dimension. Hence, transnationalism can be referred to as processes of constructing normative, institutional, economic, political or social orders beyond rather than between nation states(Bernhard & Schmidt-Wellenburg 2014:137). These interactions of groups, persons, social movements, companies and other individual or corporative actors thus constitute emerging transnational fields as"recognized areas of institutional life"(DiMaggio&Powell, 1991:65). Consequently, transnational fields are made up of social ties and interlinkages between the actors in the field; the symbolic meanings and interpretations actors contribute to the field; and finally, the agency of actors that generatesnew symbolic orders and frames.

Within these demarcations, we can see that transnationalism focuses on different dimensions of analysis and,hence,requires different methodological approaches. The making of transnational spaces or fields (and the respective analysis thereof) may rest on social ties, on symbolic interpretations,oron active practices of (re)construction, each focusing on transnational actors, interaction patterns, and meanings. While we underline that social analysis may well pursue a strategy of methodological triangulation, we suggest distinguishingamongthree broad approaches in order to attain conceptual clarity. These approaches of transnationalism are socio-structural, symbolic, and practice-related transnationalism:

·Socio-structural transnationalism studiesare interested in detectable social linkages, particularlywithin networks that reach beyond borders. One goal of pertinent research consists in spotting and characterizing such networks. Due to an inherent lack of formal institutions of transnationalism (if they existed, we would be employing an international politics approach), research is oriented at communication and at the emergence of informal institutions and networks (Wellman & Berkowitz 1988; Mayntz 1998:56; McAdam et al. 1996; Bröchler&Grunden 2014). Methodologically, this means that actors, their discursive practices and the re-structuring of social patterns need to be taken into consideration.

·Symbolic transnationalism studiesconcentrate on the symbols and codes that hold together communities thatcannot beclearly placed with regard to nation states. These codes, which can be transported through all sorts of cultural artifacts, are in need of symbolic interpretation(Berger&Luckmann 1966; Esser 2001). Interpreters are not to be foundsolelywithin diasporas or other forms of transnational communities. Rather, a statement of belonging to a transnational communitydependson differential cultural codes. For example,"Russians"or"Ukrainians"havedifferentviews on Crimea as a symbol: both entities can bring forward meaningful reasons for the claim that the region belongs"to us, not them". Symbolic transnationalism is interested in such symbols and enquires into the different and dynamic meanings attributed to them across borders.

·Practice-related transnationalism studiesreflect on the production side of symbols and culture in interaction. The creation of symbol-carrying artifacts such as movies and art bears a strategic element; an example would be the political engagement of the Ukrainian diaspora in Berlin during and after Euromaidan. Therefore, the approach can never disregard questions of agency. It does not come along in a latently post-structural form; rather, it tries to be aware of transnational actors and their motives. Since agency is included, practice-related transnationalism is also accompanied by the question of to what extent intentional action is successful or not. Thus, ideational frames that define the conditions of rationality are of importance as well(Goffman 1980; Benford & Snow 1988; Apter 2006; Polletta & Ho 2006). In that sense, symbolic and practice-related transnationalism stand in a complementary position to each other: border-transgressing practices only make sense with regard to the symbols demarcating these boundaries, but symbols need to be produced in order to unfold their relevance.

3.Three Dimensions ofTransnationalism

In which way can these three approaches be made fruitful for the analysis of contemporary Ukraine? Certainly, socio-structural, symbolic and practice-related elements of transnationalism can be found in many areas of Ukrainian regime development. Pertinent research has already identified several of them. For example, the socio-structural composition of Ukraine has been profoundly analyzed with regard to elections(Kurth&Kempe 2004)and to the geography of language speakers(Kulyk 2010). In addition, migration flows have been studied systematically(Chindea et al. 2008). The symbolic composition of Ukraine and its diverse regions has been researched with a special focus on state symbols(Jilge 1998, 2014). Practices of transnationalism have been addressed as well, for example,in terms of the establishment of (state and non-state) institutions of the EU's Eastern Partnership(Stegniy 2012), the bonding potential of football(Halling 2013)and the making of national identities in a transnational space(Brudny&Finkel 2011).

While it is possible to subsume much research on Ukraine under our different approaches of transnationalism, we still have to deal with the problem that the categories seem quite incoherent—they contain very different research objects. We therefore propose an additional differentiation that is sometimes used in border research(Bossong&Carrapico 2016; Bossong et al. 2016). It builds on a comprehensive research framework developed at European University Viadrina Frankfurt/Oderanddeals with the permeability, durability and liminality of borders in contemporary Europe(Schiffauer 2011).[ii]One aspect of this framework distinguishesamongspatial, temporal, and social aspects of orders and their limitations. We proposethatthis additional distinctionshould be includedtoisolatedifferent aspects of transnationalism in Eastern Europe and beyond.

Spatialelements concern all aspects of transnationalism thatrelateto territory. Obviously, migration—often across borders—is one major object of territorial transnationalism. Nevertheless, the relevance of borders is not restricted to persons or groups crossing them,in the sense that different territories are involved.Today, weknow of the existence of borders in collective memories:"phantom borders"continue to exist in people's minds long after their territorial existencehasceased(Löwis 2015; Janczak 2015). Spatial belonging therefore derives from two sources: (1) from places where social beings actually live, have lived or have passed by and (2) from imaginations of affiliation that are inspired by symbols. This pointstowardthe necessityoftakinginto consideration (3) the production of territorial symbols through which intermediate—transnational instead of national—spaces are created.

Social, or better:societalaspects have to do with social affiliations, cultural codes and/or practices of community creationwithin transnational contexts. Again, these three elements are marked by different properties. (1) Social affiliations concern population strata of transnational groups, for example,with regard to certain professions or age groups. (2) These transnational communities are held togethernot onlyby the space they settle in (or through which they pass) but also by symbols that (re-)constitute them as cultural entities. With regard to the imaginational dimension of societal belonging across borders, (3) the process of the construction of transnational consciousness again deserves special attention.

Temporalaspects form a third dimension for research on transnationalism. Time-related elements are important to understand the transformation of social groups, symbols and/or practices that evolve around border transgressions. In fact, the whole terminusoftransnationalization pointstothe fact that transnational networks are,as a rule,instablerather than stable(Pries 2008). Again, we canmakedistinctionsusing the approaches developed in the previous section. (1) Minorities or diasporas may change their social position within their host societies. The typical representative of this or that group may turn from a dishwasher to a white collar employee, or the simple fact of ageing in transnational networks may change the configuration of certain social groups(Pries 2010:48–56). Furthermore, (2) the symbols accompanying such change may be subject to change. One example would be the relevance of the Koran to Muslim communities in Western Europe(Schiffauer 2002; Kaya 2012).Again, the configuration of such symbols and their meaningas well as(3) their construction should be seen as anintegralfield of research in transnationalism studies.

If we take the discussion in sections 2 and 3 and then apply it to contemporary Ukraine, we arrive at table 1. With a focus on theory and methodology, three approaches have evolved that stand for different meta-perspectives of the social sciences: societies and their structure, cultures and their meanings,andpractices and their consequences. These meta-perspectives can becombinedwith different properties of boundaries: in our context,with the territorial, societal, and temporal aspects of the (partial) dissolution of these boundaries. Transnationalism is, in this perspective, both an implication and a result of a growing fluidity of different kinds of lines of distinction between territories, cultures, and practices.

Table 1: Objects and phenomena in transnationalism research

Dimensions of transnationalism

Spatial/Territorial

Societal

Temporal

(1) Socio-structuralapproach

Scholarly object

Migration of individuals or groups across (state) borders

Social affiliations of persons/groups living in more than one national context

Dynamic social developments in (trans)migrant groups

Expected phenomenon within the context of Ukraine

Transmigration

Equal distribution of migration experience across social classes

Increase of"national"affiliation (de-sovietization)

(2) Symbolic approach

Scholarly object

State- or geography-related symbols of belonging and their interpretations

Cultural codes of transmigrant communities

Dynamics of (geographic or cultural) symbols and their meanings over time

Expected phenomenon within the context of Ukraine

Importance of symbols that delimitUkrainefrom other Slavonic entities

New codes of (post-imperial or national) belonging

Reconfiguration of formerly Soviet codes

(3) Practice-oriented approach

Scholarly object

Creation of intermediate spaces through border transformation

Practices of transnational community re-construction

Emergence of diasporas and/ or minorities

Expected phenomenon within the context of Ukraine

Emergence of liminal zones and/or clearly visible diasporas

Diaspora politics

Growing visibility of post-soviet diasporas over time

While much of the literature on Ukraine deals withtheconditions of constructing a nation against the background of a previously non-national context, we suggest analyzingUkraine as an object with very relevant transnational properties that go along with the country's intermingled society, culture, and practices.

This, however, does not lead to a general hypothesis of contemporary Ukraine evolving into an all-liquid, all-relational, or all-transcending entity. There is no such general proposition. Instead, the transnational properties of Ukrainian society and politics have to be seenwithin the specific context of post-soviet transformation. Ukraine, with regard to both its territory and its population, is strongly embedded in a post-imperial setting in the aftermath of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. The properties of multi-ethnic empires are quite specific: they are marked by a mix of ethnic populations, by a confrontation of cross-national public affairs in relation to national or regional identities, and by asymmetric relations of different sub-entities to the imperial center (Leonhard &Hirschhausen 2010). With aperspectiveon Ukraine as part of the post-soviet world, this translates into a few specificexpectations with regard toUkrainian transnationalism (again, see table 1):

·A long-lasting history of permeable borders between the sub-regions of the Russian empire and/or the Soviet Union makeslinear processes of migration less probable than transmigratory processes. Migration is—again,because of the long-lasting legacy of ethnic and national mixture—likely to include persons from all strata of society. Migration is not restricted to labor and/or poverty migration but includes other motives,such aseducation or private bonds. Conflicts over the autonomy and independence of its national republics not only markedthe end of the Soviet Union but werepresent during its entire history (Carrère d'Encausse 1978).Sincethe breakup, a socio-structural expectation is thatthetendencies of (re-)nationalizationwillbreak their ground, at least in the initial phase. Newly patriotic or nationalist movements and politics are, in that sense, a typical post-imperial phenomenon.

·Therefore, the importance of symbols representing"new"nationalisms is likely to increase rapidly during and after regime transformations and the decomposition of multi-national states.Nationalism isneeded initsfunction to clarify cultural and political identities. However, the fact thatnationalsymbols increase in relevance does not determine their interpretation. Nation-related symbols can become very strong in their demarcating function (for example,with regard to the Ukrainian flag during Euromaidan), but they do not have to (examples would be the shared pridein Soviet sports or the Soviet space program).

·In light of transmigration (instead of linear migration) and of multi-vectoral symbols (instead of a clear symbolism of demarcation), the practices of transnationalism in post-soviet Ukraine should be expected to be fuzzy, volatile, and liquid. Border zones,whetherwithRussia or neighboring EU member states, are likely to be liminal rather than offer clear-cut"Ukrainian"or"non-Ukrainian"social action. Transmigration is likely to lead to diasporas (with a transnational identity) rather than to minorities (with a national identity).

As our discussion in section 2 has shown, all these expectations go along with central findings of transnationalism research (again, see Vertovec 2007; Pries 2008; Schiffauer 2011). They add up to a central argument of the given book—contemporary Ukraine is not only better understood by including a transnational focus, it also presents a most interesting case to understand fragmented and multi-vectoral processes in a world of (post-soviet) transformations.

4.Structure of the Book

The proposed analytical framework of transnationalism as a group of socio-structural, symbolic and practice-related phenomena in its spatial, societal and temporal manifestations will be illustrated and implemented in the following chapters. The specific compilation of the following chapters in this volume emphasizestwo analytical aspirations: First,byselectinga broad range of empirical issues and aspects of Ukraine's cross-border interrelations, we seek to underline our presumption that state building and the formation of society in Ukraine are characterized by transnational processes. Again, our presumption does not fall in line with the claim of recent Russian political propaganda, which declares that"Ukraine is not even a state".[iii]Quite the contrary, we argue that Ukraine's stateness and society can be seen as an emergent product of border-transgressing entanglements and interdependencies in history andthepresent. Second, the empirical studiesofthis volume exemplify how transnationalism as an analytical concept and tool can be spelled out and deployed in order to reveal the making of structures, symbols and practices of societies beyond methodological nationalism.

Directly following this introduction, the contribution byAndré HärteltitledThe"Novorossiya"-Project and National Affiliations in Ukraine's Southeast: A Failed Attempt at Transnational Community Reconstruction?gives background information on the most important aspects of spatial, societal and temporaltransnationalism in Ukraine. Härtel focuses on the role of conflicts and crises in the emergence of new symbols, boundaries and collective self-conceptions,especiallyin the wake ofthe events of Euromaidan in 2013/2014. The author sketches Novorossiya as a counterframe (see Benford&Snow 2000) to Ukrainian national identity that sets free latent disloyalties. At the same time, however, the Russian attack on Crimea and Eastern Ukraine gavebirth to Ukraine as a civil nation, including identity narratives based on political inclusion. These findings shed light on Ukrainian society as being made up of identical transnational interlinkages and diverse, if not fluid,loyalties.

Part 2:Symbolic Transnationalism

Thesecondpart of the volumepresentsour symbolic transnationalism approach by focusing on the narrative and symbolic construction ofthenation and national myths.

The first article of this section sheds light on the famous ideational concept of"Novorossiya".Mikhail Minakovdiscusses the re-framing of national myths and belongings in a manuscript titledNovorossiya and the Transnationalism of Unrecognized Post-Soviet Nations. Focusing on the evolution of the concept of Novorossiya, Minakov analyticallydisentangles its myth from the political installation of the so-called people's republics of DonetskandLuhansk. The text deploys a content and intention analysis of debates within web-based pro-separatist communities with regard to the motives for supporting the separatist forces. The author argues that the myth of Novorossiya is accepted and supported by local people because of its utopian strength,which makes possible demandsfor social and political change. In the analysis, Minakov finds evidence that the Novorossiyan myth is shared and supported by two russophone groups:"transnationalists"and"imperialists". The first group imagines Novorossiya as a socio-political utopian alternative to the existing political order,while the imperialists hope for a re-establishment of Soviet rule and glory.

A second contribution that addresses symbolic transnationalist practices isYuliya Yurchuk's essay on the realignments of Ukrainian national remembrance and symbols to strengthen a new transnationally oriented collective identity. In her textGlobal Symbols and Local Meanings:"Day of Victory"after Euromaidan, Yurchuk explains the shift within Ukrainian official remembrance politics of World War II and the discursive conjunction with the recent political communication regarding Ukraine's state sovereignty prospects and the war in the east. The reformulation of symbols and meanings as well as the introduction of new holidays dedicated to more-genuine Ukrainian historicalinterpretations indicate an intrinsic reframing of national and regional history, emphasizing Ukraine's autonomy within the post-soviet space.

Taken together, these two contributions underline our argument that the importance of symbols and meanings for the formation of new identities increases in times of transformation and crisis. However, the very manner of how actor groups tackle, promote or counter these symbols in their everyday life and how multi-vectoral symbol systems are translated into practices remains in question. Therefore, thethirdpart will shed lightonpractice-oriented approaches oftransnationalism.

Part 3: Practice-relatedTransnationalism

In thethirdpart of the book, two essays provide insights intotransnational diaspora dynamics and the making of the Ukrainian diaspora with respect to different identity narratives and protest mobilization.

Alexander Clarksondescribes the evolution of distinctive predominant identity narratives within Ukrainian diasporas in Western Europe and Northern America. In his contribution,Coming to Terms With Odessa Ukraine: The Impact of the Maidan Uprising on the Ukrainian Diaspora, he presents an overview ofthe different diasporic waves since the early 20thcentury and their specific manifestations of national identities. The analysis highlights howtheidentity construction of diasporas is heavily linked to transnational social interaction. The example of the Canadian Ukrainian Diasporademonstratesthe difficulties and potential cleavages diasporas face when they are insulated from cultural shifts in their country of origin: The entanglement of identity, (West-)Ukrainian language and culture made it difficult for the diaspora to accept the more recent russophone foundation of modern Ukrainian identity. However, the active support of the Euromaidan protests accelerated a cultural and political process of realignments within the global Ukrainian diaspora—showing that transnational interaction is most relevant for reframing processes.

The contribution ofAndriy Korniychuk,Magdalena PatalongandRichard Steinbergdisplays how Ukrainian diaspora structures changed during Euromaidan. Based on a large empirical study, their manuscript,titledThe influence of protest movements on the development of diasporic engagement: the case of Euromaidan and its impact for the Ukrainian diaspora in Poland and Germany,shows that Ukrainian communities outside Ukrainewereunified and largely homogenized during their active support for the protest events in the'homeland'. Following a broad and open understanding of relations and networks, the authors present both digital and non-digital media as social hubs that helped establish a transnational diasporic civil society. In thisperspective, digital and social platforms contributing to diaspora structuration can be regarded as locations and facilitators of externalization processes of social conflicts and protest movements, as Della Porta and Tarrow (2004) have shown in another context.

Both studies present empirical evidence for our main argument on practice-related transnationalism: the liminal and permeable character of boundaries (rather than borders) is mirrored in the evolution of diaspora groups with multiple transnational roots and influences. This points to thefourthpart of our book, which addresses some of those networks and agency patterns that deploy symbols to establish new groups and forms of cooperation across borders.

Part 4: Socio-structural Transnationalism

Thefourthpart of the volume focuses on networks and transnational agency in the economy, in local patronage systems based on ethnicity, in the media and in the formation of conflict groups in Eastern Ukraine.

Heiko Pleinespresents a detailed analysis of the transnational embeddedness of oligarchic business empires. In his text onThe international links of Ukrainian oligarchs. Business expansion and transnational offshore networks, he displays the entanglements of Ukrainian Big Business with offshore networks and international economic structures. The transnational ties of Ukrainian oligarchs arenot asestablished and diverse as onewouldexpect, but they follow a specific rational, goal-oriented pattern that corresponds to the peculiarities of the Ukrainian macro-economic situation. In fact,thetransnational engagement of Ukrainian oligarchs'businessisnot targetedat making money in international affairs. Rather,itaimstosecurecompetitive advantages and improverent seekinginthe domestic market. Thus, the internationalization strategy of Ukraine's Big Business stands for re-domestication and adaptation to local rules.

Patterns of transnational action targeted at local advantages and adaptions are alsothesubject ofSusanne Spahn's analysis of Ukraine-related Russian media campaigns in Germany. Her contribution onUkraine in the Russian Mass Media: Germany as an example of Russian information policyreveals the multitude of Russian media outlets in Russia and Germany, including prominent individual persons in certain positions of trust within the German public. The analysis unfolds relevant actorsinthis transnationally orchestrated media landscape and their contribution to the creation of a biased image of Ukraine.

The essay written bySimon Schlegeldiffers from the other contributions inthat itaddressesthe boundaries of ethnic minoritiesrather thanthe transgression of national borders.Histext, titledUkrainian Nation Building and Ethnic Minority Associations: The Case of Southern Bessarabia, discussestransnationalism in the sense of a multi-ethnic composition of the society. The study focuses on the Ukrainian region of Southern Bessarabia, a region of extraordinary ethnic diversity. Here, clientelism based on ethnic affiliations, loyalties and storiesof identity that refer to theheartland can be observed as a proactive strategy of mobilizing political support. Thereby, national identities are being created and promoted in a setting that allows for multi-ethnicity.

The linkamongidentity creation, the promotion of new affiliations, and political mobilization through purposive action is also analyzed in the empirical study presented byJonas Eichhorn,Mascha BrammerandVeronika Borysenko. Based on the theories on Transnational Advocacy Networks (Keck&Sikkink 1999), the authors focus on mobilization processes that precededthe establishment of the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics.Supported by anetwork analysis, the text discloses organizations, debates, ideological alignments and trainings that happened in Eastern Europe long before the conflict in Eastern Ukraine began. The analysis provides evidence that the idea of andthe political mobilization for Novorossiya had a long and explicitly transnational forerun.

Conclusion

Is transnationalism in its symbolic, practice-related and socio-structural perspectives a seminal analytical concept? Does it contribute new approaches and offer new insights intocomplex processes of nation building and societal evolution in the post-soviet space in general and in Ukraine in particular? Is Ukraine—although probably unintentionally—a role model for transnational state formation? Attheleast, transnationalism is an empirical phenomenon that has shaped the dynamics of the post-soviet societies after 1989/91,when it became much easier for citizens to cross borders than ever before.

In theirconclusion,Susann WorschechandTimm Beichelttry to sum up the empirical findings of how transnationalism occurs asareal-world phenomenon in Ukraine. We also intend to refine our above-discussed concept andlook for findings which might hold beyond the Ukrainian case. The example of Ukraine may provide hintsregarding thebenefits, dangers or unintended effects ofthetransnationalization of societies, and itwillhopefullyencouragefurther studies to apply the concept of transnationalism.

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