VITALY TIMOFEEV (Kharkiv, Ukraine and Portland, ME, USA) REX A
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VITALY TIMOFEEV (Kharkiv, Ukraine and Portland, ME, USA) REX A. WADE (Fairfax, VA, USA) KHARKIV IN THE POST-PERESTROIKA DAYS: SOME POLITICAL TENDENCIES "There is only one thing left - to punch someone's snout...! (Kharkiv post-Communist press ascribes this phrase to A. Zdorovyi, Deputy Head of Kharkiv regional administration.) . One of the most important,. yet most puz?.??tg, features of the post-Soviet era is the political life and configuration of the larger cities. As the cities of Russia, Ukraine and the other republics struggle with the new phenomenon of multi-party politics in a constantly shifting political arena, even identifying the major groupings and issues is a complex task. Political par- ties tend to be small, often transitory, and suffer from a generalized public distrust of political parties as such. Indeed, it can be enormously difficult even to be precise about what is political. Trivial things in some circum- stances become political, while at the same time key political figures some- times suggest that political life does not exist at all in their cities. Still, a better sense of the political landscape of the large cities of the post-Soviet world is important to understanding what is happening there and where the future might lead. We will try to contribute to understanding this important feature of the new order by looking at political tendencies in one major city, Kharkiv (Khar'kov).1 the sixth largest city of the former Soviet Union and the second largest of the Ukrainian Republic. Our essay focuses especially on the situation in the summer of 1993, with some observations 2 about earlier and later developments. 1. We use the Ukrainianspelling (Kharkiv) for the city rather than the Russian(Khar'kov) or the common Othernames are or as seems Englishspelling (Kharkov). in' Ukrainian Russian, most appropriatein each case. 2. This article is a mix of contributionsby its two authors.The core discussionof the parties and political tendenciesin Kharkivin 1993 draws primarilyupon Vitaly Timofeev's research and interviews with political figures in Kharkivduring the summer of 1993, as well as his experience as a resident of the city. He also provided an early written version, prepared for delivery as a public talk. The final written form, much of the historical sections,conclusions and generalizations,as well as some other information,have been done by Rex A. Wade, based on researchand impressionsgathered during visits to Kharkivin 1990and 1992. 86 The political life of Kharkiv is closely tied up with its nationality mix and its geographic and economic situation. These require some explanation. Founded in the seventeenth century as a military outpost of the expanding Russian Empire's drive south, in the late nineteenth century it became a large industrial and commercial city, with a vibrant cultural life and major univer- sity as well as other higher educational institutions. Traditionally the unoffi- cial capital of Left Bank Ukraine, it was the actual capital of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic until 1934. By 1991 Kharkiv city had a population of 1,622,800, and with its suburbs in 1993 had a total population of 2,520,000.3 Geographically, Kharkiv lies near the Russian border on the northeastern edge of the modem Ukrainian Republic, but at the heart of its main industrial and scientific region. In addition to Kharkiv's industrial production, its loca- tion on the route from Moscow south to the Crimea and the important south- ern mining and industrial regions makes it a major trade and communications center (both legitimate commerce and the more questionable economic opera- tions that have sprung up recently). The Kharkiv region's economic ties to Russia are very important; in the late Soviet era about 80 percent of its in- dustrial and agricultural produce was transported to Russia, while Russian regions sent to it an approximately equal amount of produce, especially "goods of primary-necessity," i.e., consumer items.4-At the same time Kharkiv's industrial-commercial base is critical to the economic vitality of an independent Ukraine. Kharkiv is a mixed city by official nationality, but somewhat less so by language. An in-depth analysis of nationality, language and other population characteristics, based on 1959 data, showed that 48.9 percent of the popula- tion identified themselves as Ukrainian by nationality, 40.4 percent as Rus- sian, 8.7 percent as Jewish and 2.5 percent other.s At the same time, linguis- tically Kharkiv is primarily a Russian-speaking city, the language heard most on the streets and in public use. Indeed, by the same data only 31.2 percent gave Ukrainian as their native language, while 67.2 percent gave Russian and 1.6 percent other; about one-third of those identifying themselves as Ukrainian gave Russian as their primary tongue.6 Most residents, however, can understand Ukrainian and can speak it to some degree, whatever their ethnic background. Those whose native language is neither Ukrainian nor 3. The first figure is from Chislennost' naseleniia soiuznykh respublik po gorodskiim poseleniiam i raionam, na I ianvaria 1991 g. Statisticheskiisbornik (Moscow: Informtsentr GoskomstataSSSR, 199I), and.the 1993figure from Slobids'kyi krai (Kharkiv),1 June 1993. 4. Vremia (Kharkiv),8 Dec. 1992. 5. M. V. Kurman and I,.V. Lebedinskii,Naselenie bol'shogo sotsialisticheskogogoroda 122. Thisbook is a statistical of the of Kharkiv. (Moscow:"Statistika," '1968), p. study city 6. Ibid., p. 125. .