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Announcing | UDI Visiting Fellow Program at UTS (Australia)
The Ukraine Democracy Initiative (UDI) Visiting Fellow Program enables research students at MA, PhD levels and early career researchers from UTS’s Ukrainian partner universities to travel to Sydney to collaborate on projects of mutual interest with UTS academics.
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How to Apply for UDI Visiting Fellow Program at UTS
Applications for the 2020 (round 1) are now open. See ‘Key Dates’ below for more information.
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ARTICLE | NATO’S NUCLEAR STRATEGY: CHANGING CONCEPT OR CHANGING CIRCUMSTANCES?
The article focuses on different internal and external variables that influence the strategy‐making process at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Research is based on the declassified documents from 1949 to 1968 and non‐classified strategies from 1991 onwards. Cold War and post‐Cold War are usual ways of referring to years after the end of the Second World War.
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ARTICLE I E-Participation Waves: A Reflection on the Baltic and the Eastern European Cases
E-participation often experiences rise and decline, thereby the study aims to identify causes and outcomes of e-activism upturns. The research is based on expert interviews, content analysis, and self-reported statistics. It became evident that the studied European countries – Belarus, Moldova, Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania – follow different trajectories, but still reveal common patterns. In particular, election campaigns, political and economic crises, and new policies can facilitate e-participation, which can institutionalize, frame an agenda, draft a policy proposal, and lead to a policy change or a government change.
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ARTICLE | Ukraine Turns to Blueprint That Transformed Ex-Communist Europe
After clinching the first parliamentary majority in Ukraine’s modern history in July, Zelenskiy’s party will form a government in August. Control of the legislature allow it to pursue market-based economic policies that the likes of Poland and Hungary introduced two decades ago, even as those nations now seek more state sway.
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ARTICLE | “We Want To Simplify Ukraine”: Olga Onuch on Language and Political Preferences in Ukraine
“We keep focusing on language and we want to simplify Ukraine, draw this awful neat line that separates the country into two spaces,” Dr Olga Onuch says. “It hasn’t been that way for a while.”
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VIDEO | Dr Olga Onuch on Ukraine’s Parliamentary elections 2019
Dr. Olga Onuch, Associate Professor in Politics at the University of Manchester, Associate member of Nuffield College shares her expertise on Ukraine’s parliamentary elections 2019. According to the preliminary results, 5 political parties were elected to the 9th Convocation of the Verkhovna Rada – in particular, Servant of the People Party, the Opposition Platform – For Life, European Solidarity, Batkivshchyna and Holos.
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ARTICLE | Zelenskiy’s Golden Opportunity to Challenge the Oligarchs and Bring Real News to Ukraine’s Airwaves
Ukraine’s recent presidential election demonstrates that the country needs an effective independent public broadcaster more than ever. Presently, an overwhelming majority of Ukrainians get their news from TV, but all of the country’s biggest channels are owned by oligarchs.
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ARTICLE | Ukraine’s Hard Road to Europe
On the Maidan in 2014, demonstrators waived the Ukrainian flag and also the EU flag, even as they were being attacked and shot at. What did this mean? As Ukrainians explained to me later, the demonstrators were expressing their commitment to their nation, Ukraine, and simultaneously to Ukraine’s future as part of an undivided Europe.
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NEWS | UDI Director on 2019 Ukraine Elections at ABC News
Ukraine Democracy Initiative Director Dr Olga Oleinikova appeared in ABC News Weekend Breakfast Show, where she was interviewed about the 2019 Presidential Elections and the future of Ukraine.
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ARTICLE | Zelenskiy in charge – When reality goes beyond fiction
Ukraine is going through a transformation. Zelenskiy is only a part of it. Regardless of how long it takes, the critical driver of that change are the people: civil society activists, reformers, and ordinary citizens. Ukrainian citizens are not giving up on change and the international community needs to continue to support them and invest in civic education and local empowerment to support the momentum for reform.
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ARTICLE | A Comedian, a President, and a Prime Minister: The 2019 presidential election in Ukraine
Ukrainian politics has been dominated by debates over whether to align with Russia or the EU, but Elena Korosteleva says the latest election proves that might be changing. Zelenskiy’s victory may symbolise a closure of the (post-)Maidan spirit, which was ripped apart by the West/East ideological divide in Ukraine.
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