A sociologist on the changes in the “portrait of a Ukrainian” during the war

The website of Ukrainian Radio has published an interview with the Director of the Institute of Sociology of the NAS of Ukraine, Corresponding Member of the NAS of Ukraine, Doctor of Philosophical Sciences, Professor Yevhen Golovakha under the title “Four years of the great war: how has the ‘portrait of a Ukrainian' changed?”

The presenter Svitlana Mialyk opened the conversation with a question: what has changed most in us over the past four years of Russia's full-scale war of aggression against Ukraine?

First of all the scholar recalled the enormous losses Ukraine has suffered in the course of the war — material losses and, above all and most tragically, human ones. And against the background of those vast losses, astonishing and paradoxical changes have taken place in the structure of people's expectations and assessments — in how they see their society and how they regard its prospects: “Since independence our institute has been running a monitoring survey of social change. In 2021 only 19% of respondents assessed Ukraine's prospects positively. Yet in the first year of the full-scale invasion, in 2022, more than 70% did so. In general 2022 is a record year for positive indicators, even for the economy, although objectively speaking we lost a great deal then, a third of the economy. I call this phenomenon shock euphoria. Since then the share of positive assessments has fallen somewhat, which is natural, but even today more than 60% take that view. And only a handful of per cent assess it negatively.”

The professor named as fundamentally important the fact that a majority of Ukrainians have finally settled the geopolitical vector of the country's development. The former ambivalence of views, which meant that part of society was oriented towards rapprochement with the East (Russia) and part towards the West, has as a result of the war given way to a predominantly Euro-Atlantic orientation. The eastern vector of Ukraine's development is now unpopular even in those regions that used to support it.

The traditional narrative of Russian propaganda about Ukraine's supposed lack of agency has also been overcome. Frankly speaking, the sociologist noted, there were certain grounds for it: “About 15 years ago I developed a test of a country's agency, and at that time only 30% of respondents believed that Ukraine was a subject of world politics. But now everyone sees that Ukraine is at the centre of world politics and is an important player in the dominant European and global processes. This is confirmed even by the current fighting in the Middle East, when a number of Arab Gulf states, which the President of Ukraine has visited several times, took an interest in Ukraine's experience in producing and using drones. And Ukrainians' respect for their own country, as surveys show, is enormous.”

Another important change in public consciousness, the professor said, is Ukrainians' perception of the leading stratum of society. Before 2014, according to surveys, Ukrainians considered that stratum to be the mafia, the criminal world. Politicians, officials and so on came after them. Later the assessments shifted: first politicians, businesspeople and officials, and only then the mafia. And after the war began the priorities changed radically: Ukrainians consider the army to be the most influential force, followed by businesspeople, workers, farmers and the intelligentsia — that is, the bulk of the people — while the mafia has slipped to second from last.

Incidentally, only 12% of the businesspeople surveyed said they had suffered no losses during the war; all the rest had losses of varying degree and scale. Ukrainians' view of the social structure of their own society has thus changed considerably, and integrative processes have intensified.

As for the cohesion of society, the sociologist named a factor that in Ukrainians' view stands in its way — the problem of mobilisation through the military enlistment offices, the so-called “busification”. Here people's opinions are sharply divided.

Of late society has been gradually arriving at a stern realism and a moderate optimism. Although the number of those who do not believe in Ukraine's victory has risen from 4% to 17%, a majority — two thirds — still believe in it in one form or another. There are also those who, because of their individual make-up, have not merely grown tired of waiting but are experiencing considerable psychological difficulties and problems. According to our most respected survey centre, KIIS, 62% are prepared to endure for as long as it takes for the sake of victory. Seventeen per cent are prepared to endure for a limited time. That is, Ukraine is holding on. “In 2025 we studied stress states among the population under war conditions, and the results appeared as a book authored by S. Dembitskyi, V. Stepanenko and myself. Only 12% were found to have a level of stress high enough to lead to complex and even painful psycho-emotional states and disorders.” In other words, the psycho-emotional resilience of Ukrainians remains high.

The journalist asked her guest about the transformation of the notion of “victory” and its parameters, and about changes in the way Ukrainians, journalists included, use it. The sociologist agreed with the view that society is now inclined to give this fundamentally important notion the following content: for Ukraine victory will mean preserving independence and statehood. At present, according to KIIS, a majority of Ukrainians, somewhere around 52%, are ready to accept what they would not accept back in 2022 — namely, to stop the war along the line of contact and to settle everything further through negotiation. A significant share of Ukrainians, around 40%, are not yet ready to agree to this. Capitulation the overwhelming majority of Ukrainians categorically refuse to accept.

Despite the evident tragedy of the war, Ukrainian society has gained many positive shifts in its assessments and orientations, and it is important not to lose them but to strengthen them in the course of the country's post-war recovery.

Asked by the journalist about Ukrainian women and men with children who have relocated abroad, the sociologist, drawing on comparable situations after the Balkan wars, suggested that those who could not or did not want to adapt in other countries may return to Ukraine. At the same time the active part of those who relocated, who have found work there, are learning the language and have enrolled their children in local schools, are more likely to decide to adapt, or even to assimilate, and not to return to Ukraine for good. A clear state programme of return is therefore urgently needed, one that would give people a real prospect of employment and of building a life here, in Ukraine.

So this whole global situation, with its risks and threats, objectively demands an end to the war and active efforts by the state and by the whole of Ukrainian society to restore peaceful life and to develop Ukraine.

To the journalist's closing question — what is needed for us to hold on and not give up — the scholar pointed to Ukrainians sustaining their own resilience and endurance, social cohesion around the idea of victory as the preservation of state independence, trust in the authorities and the preservation of Ukrainian identity. According to the Institute's surveys, in 1992 only 42% considered themselves first and foremost citizens of Ukraine. The others identified themselves primarily as residents of a particular village, city, oblast, region, of the world, or even of the USSR, which by then no longer existed. Now three quarters feel a Ukrainian identity.

The journalist thanked the scholar and the Institute he heads for their work, which helps to understand important social processes in Ukraine. This interview with the leader of Ukraine's academic sociology once again showed that the country's sociologists keep a finger on the pulse of Ukrainian society and are ready to provide research-based recommendations for decisions of national importance.

The full interview:

Watch the video on YouTube