Thread by @mattia_n

One of the interesting aspects of the war is the incredible Ukrainian cohesion as a whole and those of the local elites usually at odds with the central government.

From the Odesa mobster, to Kharkiv, Dnipro and the occupied Kherson and Zaporizhia no one switched sides. /1

That wasn’t the case in 2014/15, especially in Donetsk and Luhansk, where some of the local and regional elites were sitting it out (like Akhmetov) waiting to see how the tide would turn. Really recommend to read Portnov’s piece on how the east was lost /2
opendemocracy.net/en/odr/how-eas…

Essentially the state was unable to maintain its monopoly of violence shortly after the collapse of the Yanukovych government and the passivity of the local elite in Luhansk and Donetsk (unlike say in Dnipropetrovsk) played a crucial role- bud I digress… /3

Odesa mayor Trukhanov was extremely passive (to say the least) when armed pro-Russian thugs battled with pro-European protestors in April and May 2014. It took federal police to calm the situation. /4
time.com/87043/ukraine-…

Even the mayor of Kharkiv Kernes at the time was hedging his bets attending pro-separatists events.

But in total, preferences and actions of local political and economic elites played an important role in 2014/15 and was a subject of academic analysis /5
tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10…

Fast forward to 2022. Unlike Russia thought, there was no big pro-Russian local network ready to receive the “liberators”.

Quite the opposite: local, regional & national elites usually bickering with each other have showed a remarkable unity and work together against Russia. /6

Take Odesa’s mayor Trukhanov, who faces serious criminal charges by the central anti-corruption prosecutors now boasts: “I can tell you something about Odesa. We will fight until the end to protect every street and corner of the city.” /7
telegraph.co.uk/world-news/202…

Kharkiv’s mayor Terekhov showcases resolute and empathetic leadership while his city is pounded by Russian artillery. He regularly gives video updates on how the city continues to operate under the most extreme conditions and he is very outspoken about Russia’s war crimes. /8

As @christogrozev joked, Russia poured billions of dollars into the pro-Russian opposition only to find out that they simply embezzled the money without creating a meaningful electorate. /9

Jokes aside, for those dealing with local politics and regional elites in Ukraine, we knew that the pro-Russian label did not mean much.

Many of the local elites were first and foremost pro-themselves and the pro-Russia card was not a decisive factor in local politics. /10

Since 2015, local politics became increasingly competitive with more decentralization (healthcare and education reforms) came more funds for local elites to solve local problems (and to steal). /11

As unfinished as the decentralization (and healthcare) reform is, it yielded tangible results and enabled local self governance. If you scroll through the IRI annual municipal survey you see a satisfaction with local governments. /12
iri.org/resources/annu…

I say all this to make the case that 🇺🇦 in different parts of the country were more happy with their local government than many in Russia believed and understood. /13

Lastly, the local elites in the south & east had 8 years to observe how the Kremlin and its functionaries treated the old local elites in Crimea & the occupied Donbas (as well as Russia proper). /14

So, when the war is over, many paper’s will be written to decipher Ukraine’s overall resilience and mark my words, the local elites will feature in this prominently. Even the worst crooks understood that they are after all better off in a Ukrainian political systems. /end

PS: this is a totally incomplete analysis not mentioning a strengthened local and national identity, the local and central state general administrative capabilities (including bigger investments into police, intelligence and army) as well as less corruption…