Dr. Constantinos Filis Dimopoulos Dimosthenis, Karagiannopoulos Petros-Damianos

European Union orientation

Among all of the post-Soviet countries, with the exception of the Baltic countries, Ukraine seemed the most promising candidate for a speedy integration into the European community of nations. Instead, a transition proved a long and bumpy road. The transition to a western type economy had been slow and the covert criminalization of economy was the sad outcome of the first years after independence. The oligarchic regime that has run the country since mid-nineties has ruined the country’s economy, crippled its social structure and tarnished its international reputation. Additionally, Ukraine has been asking for EU membership since 1995, but for years the European Union was too occupied with incorporating the 10 Central and East European countries, which was completed in 2004 and 2007, respectively. All these factors, combined with any geopolitical implications and Russian interventions mentioned above hampered for years Ukraine’s European perspective. [10]

Nevertheless and as a result of the past few months’ rapid events, on 21 March 2014, European Union Heads of State and Government and Ukrainian Prime Minister H.E. Mr. Arseny Yatsenyuk signed the political provisions of the “EU-Ukraine Association Agreement”. At the same time and in order not to wait for the entry into force of the Association Agreement’s provisions it was also signed a “Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area”. This way was decided to start the unilateral reduction or elimination of the EU’s customs duties on goods originating in Ukraine. [11]

The Association Agreement is the first agreement based on political association between the EU and any of the Eastern Partnership counties. The key parts of the agreement focus on support to core reforms, economic recovery and growth, and governance and sector cooperation in areas such as energy, transport an environment protection, industrial cooperation, social development and protection, equal rights, consumer protection, education, youth and cultural cooperation. It also emphasis on values and principles: democracy, the rule of law, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, good governance, a market economy and sustainable development. [11] [12]

For the Ukrainian elite, in its vast majority, the only rational choice is the European one, even when we are referring to the opulent businessmen of Eastern parts of the country which recently declared their will of following the Crimean example of joining the Russian Federation. Their “European choice” is an attempt to preserve power in its hands inside the country. Many might call this choice an illusion, based only on their fear of increasing antagonism with Russian oligarchs and the hope of a more caring Europe, which will protect them against malicious attacks from Russia.

Although what must be made clear is that in every way, every final choice Ukraine shall make, local elite’s exploitation of Ukrainian people and corruptive tactics always jeopardizing the economic and political future of Ukraine are close to an end. As far as it concerns EU, the proposed reforms are to be done on the Ukrainian behalf might be difficult for the Ukrainian people and cause a high increase of poverty levels, though if any implementation of those reforms takes place, local elite would not be able to influence any government’s decision making process the way it did before. Even if it is difficult for the Ukrainian elite to give up its dirty political tricks, in the end, it will happen. The implementation of changes and reforms will surely take place sooner or later, because of the country’s horrendous economic situation and the EU is the only international actor that could provide Ukraine with the necessary enforcing measures of such an implementation.

As we can understand, at the very moment, EU provides Ukraine the possibility of an associated membership. Although, the question to be made is whether Europe is willing to transform this membership into a full membership one day, when all necessary reforms take place and produce results. [9]

Furthermore, even if the EU road is followed – and EU remains true to their policy – this is not going to deliver Ukraine from Russian pressure. As it will be explained with details later, Russian pressure tactics above Ukraine is not something that can be easily overcame neither by Ukraine itself, nor by any western allies the country might have at the moment. That is for the same reasons a Russian deterrence was not possible until now, even during the successful attempt of Crimean annexation.

In addition, if Ukraine finally follows the route of integration into the EU, it will fall, beyond any doubt, into the category of the poor periphery, since there is a very long way far from reaching any of the Copenhagen criteria. Thus, it is questionable whether such a choice would be wise, since Europe high standards of reforms combined with a continued self-comparison with other European people’s standard of living, could cause further unrest in Ukrainian already divided society. Other problems that may arise are the strengthening of the already significant migration of Ukrainians to the EU, jeopardizing the very future of the country taking into consideration the significant low birth-rates and an intensification of the process of deindustrialization. [13] Furthermore, economists affiliated with the Eurasian Development Bank present analytical scenarios and make negative assumptions about the possibility of Ukraine’s worsening the terms of trade in the post-Soviet area and reductions of Ukrainian exports. [14]