Issue 4 (6), 2016

SUBSIDIARY IDENTITY

UNION COOPERATION REGION ORGANIZATIONEASTERN EUROPE ORGANIZATION INTEGRATION REGION TRANSFORMATION

EASTERN EUROPE UNITY BLACK SEA VISEGRAD FOUR IDENTITY INSTITUTIONS EUROPE REGIONALISMPOLITICS

BSEC ENVIRONMENTBSEC IDENTITY AMERICA NORTH

BALTICS COOPERATION

• REGIONS AND POLITICS • REGIONAL SELF-IDENTIFICATION • VISEGRAD FOUR AND THE BLACK SEA UA: Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 1 Issue 4 (6), 2016 BOARD OF ADVISERS

Dr. Dimitar Bechev (Bulgaria, Director of the Regionalism European Policy Institute)

Dr. Iulian Chifu Analysis and Early Warning Center) (, Director of the Conflict Editors Dr. Igor Koval (Ukraine, Rector of Odessa National Dr. Hanna Shelest University by I.I. Mechnikov) Dr. Mykola Kapitonenko Dr. Sergey Minasyan (Armenia, Deputy Director at the Institute) Publisher: Published by NGO “Promotion of Intercultural Stephan Meuser (Germany, Director of the Cooperation” (Ukraine), Centre of International Representation of the Friedrich Ebert Foundation in Romania) of the Representation of the Friedrich Studies (Ukraine), with the financial support Ebert Foundation in Ukraine, International James Nixey (United Kingdom, Head of the Russia Renaissance Foundation (Ukraine) and the and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House, the Black Sea Trust. Royal Institute of International Affairs)

UA: Ukraine Analytica Dr. Róbert Ondrejcsák (Slovakia, State Secretary, analytical journal in English on International Ministry of Defence) is the first Ukrainian Relations, Politics and Economics. The journal is aimed for experts, diplomats, academics, H.E., Dr. Oleg Shamshur (Ukraine, Ambassador students interested in the international Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ukraine to relations and Ukraine in particular. France)

Contacts: Dr. Stephan De Spiegeleire (The Netherlands, website: http://ukraine-analytica.org/ Director Defence Transformation at The Hague e-mail: [email protected] Center for Strategic Studies) Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ ukraineanalytica Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze (Ukraine, Vice- Twitter: https://twitter.com/UA_Analytica Prime Minister on European and Euroatlantic Integration of Ukraine) The views and opinions expressed in articles are those of the authors and do not Dr. Dimitris Triantaphyllou (Greece, Director of the Center for International and European Studies, Analytica, its editors, Board of Advisors or Kadir Has University (Turkey)) necessarily reflect the position of UA: Ukraine donors. (Norway, Research Director at the ISSN 2518-7481 Dr. Asle Toje Norwegian Nobel Institute)

UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 1 TABLE OF CONTENTS

BSEC IS ESTABLISHING A DENSE NETWORK FOR DIALOGUE AND COOPERATION . . 3 Interview with the Secretary General of the BSEC PERMIS H.E. Ambassador Michael B. Christides

THE EMPTY SHELL OF BLACK SEA REGIONALISM ...... 5 Dimitrios Triantaphyllou

EAST EUROPEAN REGIONAL IDENTITY: MYTH OR REALITY?...... 12 Olena Khylko

RUSSIA’S PARTICIPATION IN EUROPEAN REGIONAL ORGANISATIONS AT THE PRESENT STAGE...... 21 Olena Snigyr

NETWORKS AND NODES: EURASIAN REGIONALISM REVISITED...... 30 Viktor Konstantynov

THE BALTIC STATES AND THE EASTERN PARTNERSHIP: A STRENGTHENING FACTOR FOR REGIONALISM?...... 38 Dovilė Šukytė

THE IDEA OF EUROPEAN INTEGRATION AND THE CROSS-BORDER COOPERATION OF UKRAINE WITH THE EU...... 44 Olga Brusylovska

NORTH AMERICA CHALLENGES: NEW PROSPECTIVES FOR THE REGION?...... 51 Iryna Bochar

2 UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 EAST EUROPEAN REGIONAL IDENTITY: MYTH OR REALITY?

Dr. Olena Khylko Associate Professor at the Institute of International Relations of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv

The political and economic fragmentation of the EU, intensified by the migrant crisis, leads to the intensification of nationalism and regionalism. In this context, East European common historical heritage as well as current economic and security challenges encourage speculations that enhanced regionalization may bring additional resources to empower resilience capacity of the regional countries. Given that the European integration is a remote prospect, the ideas of subregional alliances are becoming popular among Ukrainian politicians and analysts, and the issue of the East European regional identity as a possible unifying factor arises. Analysing the origin and evolution of this perception and self-perception of Eastern Europe in the context of the regional identity, we come to a conclusion that it cannot become a crucial factor for subregion consolidation. This fact should be taken into account in Kyiv when shaping long-term foreign policy goals and developing relations with its neighbours and partners.

Eastern Europe is one of the most vulnerable regions in the world, a shatterbelt consisting threat to the common European identity and of relatively small nations, which try to intensified by the migrant crisis poses a withstand the pressure of neighbouring regionalism. powers while being fragmented into leads to the intensification of nationalism and several areas with inconsistent positions Regarding this, it seems rational to analyse and unpredictable perspectives. Historical the issue of common regional identity, which heritage and common problems as well as could be considered as one of the most security challenges encourage a generation fundamental and interlocking substances for of ideas that enhanced regionalization. This the regionalization. Anticipating the reveal of may bring additional resources to empower the regional identity issue, two conceptual resilience capacity for the countries of issues should be stressed and indicated. The the region. The regional security complex regional identity will not be considered in theory by Barry Buzan and Ole Waever1 is terms of primordialists and perennialists, yet again actual today within the Russian- who study identity as a given, something crafted security environment. The political inherent and immanent that existed from the and economic fragmentation of the EU very origin. We will apply the constructivist

1 Barry Buzan, Ole Wæver (2003) Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security, Cambridge University Press, 564 p.

12 UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 perspective of identity as a mental construct determinative factor for any collective identity that has been revealed in an intellectual and shaping should be the division into the Self political discourse of respective countries and the Other (alien, the one who differs from since the beginning of the 20th century. me). Identity can exist only in the “Self-Other” dichotomy and self-perception is realized via The approach to the East European regional identity has a dual nature. On the one hand, it is based on social constructivism and means that the East European regional identity is Historical heritage and a construct, an image, an idea that arouses common problems as well and is realized by the countries of the region, «as security challenges their political elites and academicians as well encourage a generation of ideas as other representatives of their intellectual that enhanced regionalization. sphere and aimed to perform a certain function. On the other hand, it is a result of some empirical experience that is a complex of different elements: common values and attitude to the Other. The markers of attribution interests shaped by common historical and of this or that subject to “Self” or “the Other” are cultural practices as well as their religious usually narrowed to the following similarities: heritage. locality, shared values, norms and traditions; articulated sense of belonging to this or that Herein, the boundaries of Eastern Europe will be referred to in the broad sense, with the group (region in our case) should be a including Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, sourcegroup thatof self-esteem is seen as and a single even pride; unit; affiliationcollective Hungary, Ukraine, , Moldova and historical memory with certain common myths and narratives, culture and religion; models set aside due to the unique Balkan identity of political and economic development. Such the Baltic states. The Southern flank will be markers in a very general form could be found Empire that should be a subject of separate in the Charter on European Identity (1995), analysis.significantly It should influenced be noted by that the up Ottoman to the initiated by Vaclav Havel2. Based on these middle 19th century both terms – Eastern markers, a group experiences self-perception Europe and Central Europe – were rather via attitude to “the Other”. The same should obscure. The latter one was used for a long be said about the regional identity. “The time to denote the territory of the Holy identities of regions are constructed through Roman Empire, and only after the World War their relationships with other regions”.3 In this I, it became a term to describe the countries sense, the representatives of a region consider between Germany and Russia. themselves as one group opposing the other group. Any type of collective identity derives from psychological analyses and should answer Eastern Europe as an “Invented” several key questions: Who am I? Where am Mental Construct I from? Which group do I belong to or which East European regional identity has group do I affiliate myself with? The central

2 pdf] 3 JohnCharter Allen, of European Doreen Massey, Identity, Allan October Cochrane 28, 1995, (2002), [daten.schule.at/dl/Charta_europ_Identitaet_119142657213287. Rethinking the Region: Spaces of Neo-Liberalism, Routledge: New York, p.10.

UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 13 ambiguous nature. On the one side, its well as Ukraine. These indicators generated emergence was historically driven; on the by Larry Wolff from the works of writers, other side, it was shaped by the Western historians, philosophers of the Enlightenment Europe, in Edward Said’s Orientalism period were presented by him as an absence terms. The latter developed an idea of the of civilization. East / Orient as a concept designed by the West as its own opposite in the image, Immanuel Wallerstein, who analysed Eastern idea, individuality, experience, a symbol of Europe as a periphery region dominated by otherness (that is alien / external), and of Western European economic core since the the “Orientalism” as a style, with the help of 16th century, introduced its differentiation which the West suppressed, reshaped and from the economic perspective. It seems that colonized the East4. Larry Wolff, in his book nothing has changed in perception of the “Inventing Eastern Europe”5 developed the West up to the collapse of the Soviet system. idea of Eastern Europe as an image created It was 1985 when the Rockefeller Foundation in the era of Enlightenment as a “subsidiary hosted in Bellagio an international conference half” of the West, something “belated”, named “Origins of backwardness in Eastern “underdeveloped”, the edge of barbarism and Europe”. backwardness. This vision laid down the idea of Eastern Europe as a marginal zone, a belt A new vision of the region emerged in times that comprised features of the West European preceding or during the collapse of several civilization as well as barbarian features from empires at the beginning of the 20th century. the East. Therefore, Eastern Europe including Swedish and German scholars and civil Russia became that image, opposing which activists, primarily Rudolf Kjellen, Joseph the West shaped its own identity, it was a kind Partsch and Friedrich Naumann, introduced of “alterity making” process. In Western self- a notion of “the Middle Europe” as a kind of realization, Eastern Europe has never been Germany-dominated buffer with common an integral part of genuine Europe. geographic fate, located between Russia and Western Europe. Friedrich Naumann wrote The crucial indicators of the Eastern Europe in his “Mitteleuropa” (“Central Europe”)6 dissociation from the Western one, outlined about the need to shape, in between France in that discourse, were the following: social and Russia, the Baltic, Adriatic and Black and economic society structure; deep seas, a common economic, cultural and legal space that would embrace the peoples who between the nobility and the peasantry; lack have generally common historical, economic, ofstratification discipline in ofthe societies;army; absence sharp of attempts contrast cultural, and religious characteristics. These geopolitical in their essence concepts of education and knowledge; high level of resonated with ideas pursued by some diseases;to cultivate great national desolated culture territories, and art; deficitfertile regional activists like Tomas Masaryk who but uncultivated land (mismanagement), stood for a “Central Europe of small states” poor roads; special role of Jews in trade at the liberated from German, Austrian and territories of modern Poland, as Russian imperial domination.7

4 Edward W. Said (1995), Orientalism. Western Conceptions of the Orient, Penguin Books: London, p.2. 5 Larry Wolff (1996), Inventing Eastern Europe: The Map of Civilization on the Mind of the Enlightenment, Stanford University Press, 436p. 6 Friedrich Naumann (1916), Central Europe, P.S.King & Son: London, 388 p. 7 Timothy Garton Ash. History of the Present: Essays, Sketches, and Dispatches from Europe in the 1990s, Vintage Books, 1999. – p.350.

14 UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 The academic substantiation of East Europe Central Europe from what has been a concept, evolved in post-Versailles Europe, mainly historical and spiritual phenomenon was especially followed by the establishment into a political phenomenon. We have an of the of historical communities opportunity to take this wreath of European of Eastern Europe (1927). A Polish historian states – so recently colonized by the Soviet Oscar Halecki, in his speech at the Congress of historians (1923), stated that Eastern Europe was merely a geographical notion and in civilization terms, it was divided into The terms Middle Europe/ Central a Western part as an organic compound of Europe were obliterated after the Western world, and an Eastern part «the World War II, when Western under civilization domination of Russia with Europe began to call the region under immanent Byzantine and Tatar tradition. Soviet domination as Eastern Europe Oskar Halecki coined the notion of East- Central Europe that according to him was situated “between Sweden, Germany and Italy, on the one hand, and Turkey and Russia Union ... and fashion it into a special body. on the other”.8 His ideas were followed by Then we can approach the richer nations other historians, including well-known Piotr of Western Europe, not as poor failures Wandycz.9 or helpless, recently amnestied prisoners, but as countries that can make a genuine The terms Middle Europe / Central Europe contribution.”11 This was the very case were obliterated after the World War II, when the representatives of the region were when Western Europe began to call the themselves the authors of the construct region under Soviet domination as Eastern named Central Europe. Since the early Europe. The term Central Europe was 1990-s, the term Central Europe emerged in revived and further coined by Hungarian, diplomatic turnover as applicable to Poland, Polish and Czech writers10 as an alternative Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. to the Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe notion. This split was actively exploited The emergence of the term Central-Eastern in political discourse of these countries as well as East-Central Europe is associated aimed at implementation of the “Back to with the Polish political discourse. These Europe” concept and gaining pace of their geopolitical notions embrace the Visegrad recognition by the Western world as its Four (V4) countries as well as the Baltic compound, alternative to space in the East. In 1990, Vaclav Havel called to the Polish the Polish dubious historical perception – : “We have an opportunity to transform Polandstates, belongs Ukraine to and the Belarus,Western andcivilization reflect

8 Oscar Halecki (1923), L’histoire de l’Europe orientale. Sa division en époques, son milieu géographique et ses - saw: Comité National Polonais, 1924, pp.79-94. 9 Piotrproblèmes Wandycz fondamentaux, (2006), The [in:] Price La of Pologne Freedom: au AVe History Congrès of International East Central Europedes Sciences from theHistoriques, Middle Ages Bruxelles.; to the Present, War Routledge Press: New York, 335 p. 10 Scientiarum Hungaricae, Vol. 29, No. 2/4, pp. 131-184; Czeslaw Milosz (1984), The Witness of Poetry, The Charles EliotJenő Szűcs,Norton Julianna Lectures, Parti 128 (1983), p.; Milan The Kundera Three Historic (1984), RegionsThe Tragedy of Europe. of Central An Outline, Europe, Acta The HistoricaNew York Academiae Review of Books, Vol. 31. 11

Speech by Vaclav Havel before The Polish Sejm and Senate, , January 25, 1990, [http://www.vaclavhavel.cz/ showtrans.php?cat=projevy&val=324_aj_projevy.html&typ=HTML] UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 15 world, but the boundaries of Rzeczpospolita, parts of Poland, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Croatia. A in Polish self-perception as a part of its famous Hungarian novelist György Konrád13 identity.stretched Polish far to intellectualthe east, affiliate heritage this favours space presented Central Europe not as a compound the term East-Central Europe because it: 1) of Western Europe, but as an autonomous separates Poland from German Friedrich Neumann’s Mitteleuropa, and 2) indicates Jenö Szücs named Central Europe as one at Rzeczpospolita and Polish-Lithuanian ofunique the “three unit with Europes”, its own14 specificplaced between identity. Commonwealth legacy. A special place in Western and Eastern Europe (mainly advocating East Central European regional Russia). Distinguishing Central Europe identity via Polish-Lithuanian state legacy from the Eastern continental part, the belongs to the representatives of the Hungarian authors stated that in the Middle “Jagiellonian” concept,12 who stated that the Ages this territory experienced a profound impact of Rzeczpospolita became a decisive Westernization, which laid down structural factor for culture and mentality of Ukraine, changes not shacked by any following Belarus and Lithuania, and endued them changes and transformations. with Central European features. According to this concept, there is no Eastern Europe; The abovementioned examples illustrate the instead, there is Central Europe and Russia, efforts of the V4 countries to escape from which is associated with Eurasia. Europe during the Cold War period towards The Czechs and the Slovaks quite evidently distinguishingthe broad inclusive Central definition Europe ofas Easternbeing feel no connection to nations of the former different from the Eastern Europe space. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and its line in distinguishing Central Europe from eastern borderlands. They bear in their Eastern Europe lies in its involvement into historical memory a cultural space of the the Renaissance and Enlightenment cultural Austro-Hungarian Empire that stipulates processes. As Milan Kundera states15, their adherence to the Central European Bohemia, Poland, Hungary and Austria have concept. For Czechs, their identity never been a part of Eastern Europe. Central (illustratively described by Tomas Masaryk) Europe gave the world its rich cultural

as Protestants (posed as carriers of second part of the XXth century led to losing progress)was tightly opposing connected to withthe Austria-imposed self-affirmation itsheritage, gravity butcentre the by Soviet Western influence culture. in Milan the Catholicism (considered as alien to Czechs). Kundera considers that Central Europe lacks the centre and the feeling of belonging; it is One of the most popular approaches in torn between West and East, “culturally it is Hungary is to identify Central Europe in the West and politically in the East”.16 with the former territory of the Austro- Hungarian Empire that embraced Austrian With this, as it was shown above, even the and Hungarian lands, the Czech territory, V4 countries lack a common interpretation

12 Illya Prizel (2004), National Identity and Foreign Policy: Nationalism and Leadership in Poland, Russia and Ukraine, Cambridge University Press, p.57. 13

14 ScientiarumGyörgy Konrád Hungaricae, (1985), Does Vol. the29, DreamNo. 2/4, of pp. Central 131-184. Europe Still Exist?, [http://www.konradgyorgy.hu] 15 MilanJenő Szűcs, Kundera Julianna (1984), Parti The (1983), Tragedy The of Three Central Historic Europe, Regions The New of Europe.York Review An Outline, of Books, Acta Vol. Historica 31. Academiae 16 Ibid, p.1.

16 UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 more intense, more important one, until the culture itself becomes the living value around With this, as it was shown above, which all people rally. That is why, in each of even the V4 countries lack a the revolts in Central Europe, the collective «common interpretation of the cultural memory and the contemporary regional identity, and they in different creative effort assumed roles so great and so ways interpret their own “otherness”. decisive. These were writers, philosophers, historians, political activists and dissents, who stood for the liberation of the small of the regional identity, and they in different nations from the imperial domination and ways interpret their own “otherness”. Their later from the Soviet control. idea of belonging to Central Europe turned out to be not so much a unifying concept of The authors from the region emphasized regional identity, but rather a technology of the Western character of their countries, “fellow travellers” to jointly escape from the such as the tradition of democracy, Latin Soviet legacy and integrate into the Western Christianity, Western art, architecture and regional security, political and economic literature etc. According to them, only due to structures, namely NATO and the EU. After a political misfortune their countries came reaching these goals, the Visegrad Four reduced their activity within the V4 sub- whose values were foreign to Central regional format as well as the level of foreign Europeans.under the influenceFor the of theCentral Eastern European empire, policy coordination, and now they show countries, Russia / USSR was posed as different approaches even in such sensitive issues as their policy towards Russia after its with such principal criteria of otherness aggression against Ukraine. asthe the Other following: or even synthetic the Significant (not analytical) Other thinking, the extensive way of economic Negative Identity – Who Is the “Other” development, low density of population, low For Eastern Europe? level of culture materialization, collective forms of relations in the societies, neglecting The crucial feature of the East European law, recognition of egalitarianism but not identity is its negative nature stipulated by historically driven processes of self- “brotherhood”, offensive and expansionist foreigndemocracy, policy. wars A Polish not foressayist profit Kazimierz but for the external pressure of the Other. The Brandys says that “the fate of Russia is not nomadaffirmation tribes’ via invasions opposing orin eventhe Middle confronting Ages, a part of our consciousness; it’s foreign to European and Ottoman empires domination, us; we’re not responsible for it. It weighs on Soviet subjugation, permanent division, us, but it is not our heritage. That was also shifting and redistributing territories and my response to Russian literature… I do peoples, assimilation and imposition of alien know it is different: Russia knows another values – all of this determined turbulent (greater) dimension of disaster, another times for Eastern European nations’ image of space (a space so immense that statehood development. As Milan Kundera entire nations are swallowed up in it), states,17 when the identity is threatened, the another sense of time (slow and patient), cultural life grows correspondingly into a another way of laughing, living, and dying”.18

17 Ibid, p.2. 18 Ibid, p.4.

UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 17 Milan Kundera’s argues that “the Czechs and and helpless stories ... All its history is a the Russians have never shared a common non-stop, continuous series of uprisings, world, neither a common history nor a common culture. The relationship between military coups, intrigues, quarrels and the Poles and the Russians, though, has wars, conflagrations, famines, invasions, never been anything less than a struggle of and the Polish state anthems indicate the life and death”.19 permanentplots.” Even strugglethe first linesof these of the nations Ukrainian for survival.

syndrome of victimization and trauma in Region’s Function, Destination and self-consciousnessDifficult historical of legacythe nations brought of the a the Issue of Identity region. Milan Kundera brightly describes this negative self-identity: “Central Europe Eastern Europe in a broad sense has always as a family of small nations has its own vision of the world, a vision based on a deep limits of the Western world in Eurasia, the bordersbeen a of European the Western frontier and Eastern that empires defined and later a zone of political and ideologies rivalry. From a geopolitical perspective, The negative self-identity is Eastern Europe is a large strategically also immanent to Ukraine, located region consisting of a number of «the historical and literature relatively small countries placed between heritage of which is a history of permanent struggle for survival. Great Powers. It is an area from which the conflictingHalford John interests Mackinder’s of neighbouring Heartland might be controlled, a Crush Zone in James Fairgrieve’s terminology or a Shatterbelt in distrust of history. ... The people of Central Saul Cohen’s language. Europe are not conquerors. They cannot be separated from European history; they After the collapse of the , the cannot exist outside it; but they represent countries of the region exerted efforts to the wrong side of this history; they are its change a notion of the barrier / buffer victims and outsiders. It’s this disabused region through their integration into the view of history that is the source of their EU and NATO – and nowadays they actually culture, of their wisdom…”20 perform a function of the EU and NATO eastern borders, the edge of stability and The negative self-identity is also security. With this, the function attributed immanent to Ukraine, the historical and to the countries of the region was not literature heritage of which is a history of always an external construct, but their permanent struggle for survival. In 1918, own perception as well. It is a sense of a famous politician and thinker Volodymyr national mission that became an object of Vynnychenko wrote: “Ukrainian history pride and self-esteem. The Czechs had a should be read only with taking bromine as belief in a special national mission rooted it is one of the most unfortunate, senseless in Hussite movement. The Polish and

19 Ibid, p.5. 20 Ibid, p.8. 21

Володимир Винниченко (1918), Щоденник (Diary), p. 285. 18 UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 etc., turned out to be by far less popular than the perspective to melt down in the After the collapse of the Soviet Western world, and these ideas failed to Union, the countries of the region «exerted efforts to change a notion genuine regional identity. of the barrier / buffer region through become a sufficient substratum for shaping their integration into the EU and NATO Conclusions

Thus, the issue of the East European regional Hungarian peoples perceived themselves identity turns out to be more a matter as a frontier or “a pivot wall” of Christianity of speculations than a fact of reality. The against pagans and Muslims. This sense geographical location and the realization of of national mission was embodied in its own otherness from the West and Russia literature, national myths and narratives is not enough for shaping a certain common and gave a rise to national ideology. regional identity, it cannot become a crucial A Polish ideological project known as factor for region consolidation; and one “Prometheism” also shaped a vision should not be misled by the temporary of Poland’s civilization mission among coincide in the foreign policy goals of the neighbouring Slavic nations. Besides, Polish countries in the region. Jagiellonian concept and geopolitical construct exploit the legacy of This should be taken into account in Kyiv, Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to create when shaping long-term foreign policy a new kind of sub-regional consolidated goals and developing relations with its area.22 neighbours. The decisions on strategic partnership and possible regional alliances The function of a buffer at peacetime and should not be guided by misleading an area of clashes at wartime could not illusions of a common regional identity. Ukrainian historical tradition exploits the notion of Central Eastern Europe that but influence to a certain degree the self- includes Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, leadidentification to the domination for the countriesof the concepts, of the Hungary, Baltic States, Ukraine, Belarus, whichregion. promoted However, thisthe influenceidea of regional did not and Moldova as well as Balkan peninsular exceptionalism and unicity for the sake states. The speculations on the extended of any unique regional mission. Peoples V4 with the inclusion of Ukraine (V4+1 disregarded the region’s functions and role formula), of Intermarium and other in the international relations, and preferred sub-regional integration projects are to integration into the Western projects to some extent popular in Ukraine, but they get rid of their own past and geopolitical often do not properly consider the actual fate. The concepts exploiting the ideas geopolitical situation, differences in power of regional exceptional mission, from status of the countries of the region, and Mitteleuropa to Prometheism, Intermarium non-conformities in national interests.

22 Prometheism, a concept elaborated by Jozef Pilsudski and Edmund Charaszkiewicz, stated that Poland by virtue of its history was called to civilize and emancipate countries oppressed by Russia, which were crucial for Polish independence. Jozef Pilsudski endorsed the Jagiellonian concept according to which the Jagiellonian period of the Polish history was the ideal for Poland, and should have been replicated. The concept considered Ukraine, Belarus

and Lithuania as a zone of Polish cultural influence and in this sense rivaled the Piast concept, which advocated politicalwestern spaceorientation opposing of Polish Russia. foreign policy. The Jagiellonian concept influenced the emergence of the Intermarium or Międzymorze geopolitical concept regarding unification of Poland, Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania into a single

UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016 19 It is highly probable that the latest events in Europe including the migrant crisis may Dr. Olena Khylko, Associate Professor at the Institute challenge the idea of European identity of International Relations at Taras Shevchenko National as a holistic phenomenon, and the issue University of Kyiv, Senior Research Fellow. She is also an of regional identities will be shadowed by the return of national identity factor. In expert at the East European Security Research Initiative this regard, it would be more pragmatic for Foundation. Being the author of more than 50 academic Kyiv’s foreign policy to pay more attention and analytical publications, she focuses her research to consideration of common coinciding interest on international relations and security in interests with the partner countries than to Eastern Europe, identity issues, foreign policy of Ukraine the search of common identities or common and geopolitics. fate.

20 UA: Ukraine Analytica · 4 (6), 2016