Left Parties in Ukraine

INTERNATIONAL POLICY ANALYSIS Left and Center - Left Parties in Ukraine OleXiy Haran & Vasyl BelMEGA November 2010 n Ukrainian politics lacks a genuine and strong social democratic party. The formerly influential Social Democratic Party of Ukraine (united) represented oligarchic interests and was marginalized since the Orange revolution while several other social democratic parties are insignificant. n Despite electoral successes in 1990s, support to non-modernized Communists declined from 20 per cent in 2002 to 3-5 per cent in 2006-2010. Most of the Com- munist electorate was seized by Party of Regions which represents large business groups but simultaneously plays with populists slogans. n In contrast to the orthodox Communists, the Socialist Party gradually evolved to the left social democracy but it was discredited by its 2006 defection from the Orange camp to coalition with Party of Regions. n The Left claimed they would »defend ‘workers’ rights«. However, their programs contain only slogans. Therefore, the left also actively exploit cultural, language, and foreign policy slogans which serve as a »marker« to attract their non-orange electorate. n The active use of traditional »left«, social slogans by all mainstream parties in electoral campaigns indicates that the current crisis of the Ukrainian left is not one of social-democratic ideology but of the left parties. OleXiy Haran & Vasyl BelMEGA | LEFT anD Center - LEFT Parties in UKraine What does »left« mean in the Ukraine? Ukrainian parliament (where the Communists were in majority) declared independence on 24.8.1991. When In the Ukrainian political lexicon, the term »left« usu- the CPU was banned in August 1991, many relevant ally refers to parties that are to the left of both social members had already left the party along with their democracy in its traditional understanding and to the inside knowledge and contacts to pursue their private left of several Ukrainian social democratic parties. In interests. The Communists had tacitly agreed to the ban fact, Ukrainian politics lacks a genuine and strong so- of the party in exchange for individual retention of key cial democratic party; the formerly influential Social positions in the bureaucracy and economy. Therefore, Democratic Party of Ukraine (united), SPDU(o), has been the bulk of the former Communist elite remained in marginalized since the Orange revolution. It represented power after independence. They formed informal net- oligarchic interests while several other social democratic works and constituted »the party of power« which was parties are insignificant. The main left parties after 1991 later formed into various versions of centrist parties, in- were the Communist Party of Ukraine (CPU), re-legal- cluding Party of Regions (created in 2000-2001 by large ized in 1993 (after the 1991 ban), the Socialist Party of business groups associated with authorities). These new Ukraine (SPU) established in fall 1991, the Peasant Party centrist parties lacked a clear ideology. of Ukraine (SelPU) established in 1992 and the ultra- populist and extremely pro-Russian Progressive Socialist Comparing the situation of the left flank in Ukraine with Party of Ukraine (PSPU) that broke away from the SPU in that in other former Soviet republics, the Communists 1996. (As PSPU harshly criticized »opportunistic« CPU had a strong partner and rival in the Socialists. They had and SPU, it was actively used by administration of presi- also emerged as a communist »successor party« but dent Leonid Kuchma to split and weaken the left, espe- which was politically to the right of the Communists. cially the Socialists). The SelPU and Progressive Socialists There are no leftist parties with historical roots. That is, had become marginalized by the 2002 elections, thus, no parties that were destroyed by the Soviet regime and leaving only two main parties on the left, the Commu- then reemerged, thereby making Ukraine more typical nists and the Socialists. of other post-Soviet countries than the Baltic states or Central-Eastern Europe. All four leftist »successor par- All these parties of the Ukrainian left were connected ties« had their base within the banned Communist historically and, to a great extent, ideologically to the party, but the term »successor party« can only partially CPU which was a sub-section of the Communist Party be applied to them since material and organizational re- of the Soviet Union (CPSU). After World War II, Ukraine’s sources of the former Communists went to that part of communist elites were among the most conservative of the nomenklatura that became the non-institutionalized the Soviet Union and strictly controlled by Moscow be- »party of the power« and transformed into centrist par- cause of Ukraine’s vital importance for the USSR. Only ties in the late 1990s1. According to Herbert Kitschelt’s with perestroika, three groups emerged within the CPU: classification, the Communist party combined both ide- pro-Soviet imperial, national-communists and the so ological (party program) and clientelistic types. A similar called »democratic platform«, but there were few sys- combination characterizes the Socialist Party of Ukraine, tem reformers in the leadership of the CPU. although ideological principles were not clearly outlined for a long period of time. The Socialists had a charis- Institutional pluralism emerged when the CPU’s sec- matic leader, Oleksandr Moroz, who was parliamentary ond secretary Leonid Kravchuk became chairman of the speaker from 1994 to 1998. Ukrainian parliament (Verkhovna Rada). Kravchuk in- creasingly shielded the parliament from party influence 1. For more on »successor parties«, see Zimmer, K., and Haran, O. »Un- and adopted several key points of national-democratic friendly Takeover: Successor Parties in Ukraine«, Communist and Post- opposition’s program. In fact, the collapse of central in- Communist Studies, N 41, 2008, pp. 541-561.Olexiy Haran is thankful to Kerstin Zimmer for permission to reproduce parts of this joint article. stitutions and the survival strategies of republican elites See also, Haran, O. »Can Ukrainian Communists and Socialists Evolve to led them to fall back on a variant of »national commu- Social Democracy?«, Demokratizatsiya. The Journal of Post-Soviet De- mocratization, V. 9, 4 (Fall 2001), pp. 570-587; and Ukrainian-language nism« to remain in power but they never fully became book Ukrainian Left: Between Leninism and Social Democracy /Ed. by national communists as did their counterparts in the Haran, O., Maiboroda, O. (Kyiv, 2000) published with support of Friedrich Ebert Foundation. Baltic states. After the failed putsch in August 1991, 1 OleXiy Haran & Vasyl BelMEGA | LEFT anD Center - LEFT Parties in UKraine The Communists The SPU has experienced some »social-democratization«, beginning in 1993, after the more radical mem- In contrast to newly founded parties, the Communists bers led by ultra-populist Natalia Vitrenko had left the did not have to start from scratch their local branches party creating Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine. An- which to a certain extent remained intact despite the drew Wilson claims that social-democratization came 1991 ban. Hence, after it was re-legalized in 1993, the after nationalization, i.e. after the SPU’s commitment to CPU enjoyed the advantage of not having to engage in a Ukrainian statehood, which became obvious during the simultaneous development of both ideology and organi- adoption of the 1996 constitution. Unlike the CPU, the zation. Furthermore, the left’s electoral successes in the Socialist Party opted to expand its social base at its 2000 1994 and 1998 (during a period of massive economic congress. There it adopted a new version of its program downturn) contributed to the fact that unlike the forced and the SPU described itself as a »left-centrist« force. reform of the left »successor parties« in Romania and The SPU claimed that it was in solidarity with entrepre- Bulgaria (following their electoral defeats in 1996 and neurs and managers who obey the law and work »on le- 1997) the CPU remained ossified in its ideological ori- gal grounds«. By its own self-identification, the Socialist entation, a factor that contributed to its decline in the party placed itself in an intermediate position between 2006 and 2007 elections. the orthodox Ukrainian Communists and the European social democratic parties, tending more towards »dem- The Communist Party of Ukraine formally adheres to ocratic socialism« than »social democracy«. Marxism-Leninism. In spite of its own program supporting small and medium business, the CPU placed emphasis on safeguarding the state ownership of basic The Performance of Left and Center - branches, land and on the monopolization of foreign Left Parties between 1999 and 2004 trade. Only in its 1999 electoral campaign platform was its stance on »nationalization of the banking system« During the 1999 presidential elections, the left candi- removed. Also, the CPU adheres to the traditional Len- dates (Symonenko, Moroz, and Vitrenko) obtained 44.5 inist interpretation of the relationship between national per cent of the votes in the first round. However, in the self-determination and class struggle. Yet only a small second round incumbent Leonid Kuchma achieved a number of extreme leftists in the Communist party landslide victory over Communist leader Petro Symon- called for the restoration of the Soviet Union. The ma- enko attracting many negative voters against the »Com- jority leaned de facto toward a union of Eastern Slavic munist threat« (56.25 against 37.8 per cent). After 1999, countries supporting the Belarus-Russia union which de- Symonenko never gained such an electoral harvest. veloped in mid-1990s. The Communists claimed to advocate ethnic Russians and Russian speakers in Ukraine. In the 1999 elections, The SPU however, ethnic Russians were almost equally divided between Kuchma and Symonenko (48 to 46 per cent). But In contrast, SPU leader Moroz’s statement on the Kuchma led among ethnic Ukrainians (63 to 32 per cent) eve of the 1994 presidential elections succinctly ex- and minorities (62 to 35 per cent).

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