Papers by Tatyana Malyarenko
Lex Portus, 2021
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercialShareAlike 4.0 Internatio... more This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercialShareAlike 4.0 International License the second part, I consider what smart leadership would look like if Ukraine were to escape its current dual entrapment of positioning of a small state in the geopolitical competition of great powers.
Post-Soviet Affairs, 2018
The crisis in Ukraine since late 2013 has seen four successive internationally mediated agreement... more The crisis in Ukraine since late 2013 has seen four successive internationally mediated agreements that have been at best partially implemented. Drawing on extensive fieldwork and 42 key informant interviews sides, we explain this outcome with reference to the logic of competitive influence-seeking: Russia is currently unable to achieve a friendly and stable regime in Kyiv and thus hedges against the consolidation of an unfriendly pro-Western and stable regime by maintaining its control over parts of eastern Ukraine and solidifying the dependence of local regimes there on Russian support. This gives Russia the opportunity to maintain the current status quo or settle for re-integration terms through which Russia can sustain long-term influence over Ukraine’s domestic and foreign policy. We conclude by reflecting on the consequences of competitive influence-seeking in the post-Soviet space: the likely persistence of low-intensity conflict in Ukraine; the further consolidation of territorial divisions in other post-Soviet conflicts; and the need for policy-makers in Russia and the West to prioritize the management of the consequent instability.
A common theme in historical and contemporary warfare is the role of militias. Militias, both pro... more A common theme in historical and contemporary warfare is the role of militias. Militias, both pro-government and rebel, act beyond their sponsors or else they would be understood as part of the armies that go to war. We think of militias as being paramilitaries, para-meaning approximate but not collocated with the military. Paramilitaries are ordinarily recruited and resourced differently. They are also ordinarily tactically different, playing a role in front line warfare where the intensity may be high, but were the position is fast changing or distributed in local areas. As the conflict literature will show, militias, or paramilitaries, are a common feature of any conflict and thus it is no surprise that we see their use in Ukraine. For the conflict in Ukraine, we use the term paramilitaries to indicate those forces that are fighting at the front line for both the Kyiv government and rebels in Donetsk and Luhansk, with these being considered 'pro-Russian' and even include Russian citizens. Relying on the pro-government militias literature, we show how militias on both sides play an important role in the conflict but also pose the biggest threat to a sustainable peace.
This article is based on my field research in Donbas in spring-summer 2014 and summer 2015. I tra... more This article is based on my field research in Donbas in spring-summer 2014 and summer 2015. I trace the escalation of conflict in Donbas with particular focus on the contribution of var-ious parties to the escalation of violence. I first briefly describe the chronology of conflict escala-tion in Donbas and identify, analytically and empirically, different stages in the process in rela-tion to the strategies employed by the main actors. Second, I explain why ordinary competition among Ukrainian elite groups has transformed into full-scale war and how both Moscow and Ky-iv stoked the escalation. I argue that the Russian operation in Ukraine got stuck in the middle of its implementation. Now it requires critical re-thinking and re-shaping at all levels, starting from priorities and concepts to concrete measures due to mistakes, miscalculations and wrong assump-tions that Russia made when it began the war in Donbas. However, even if Russia made mistakes and miscalculated local support, it is very difficult to undo things now and go back to the status ante in Ukraine because of the mistakes that Ukraine made that exacerbated pre-existing social divisions and increased the distrust of Kyiv in Donbas. The greatest benefit for Russia is the con-tinuing instability in Ukraine. And with Western leaders currently occupied with other matters, Ukraine and Russia may well be heading into another bout of armed conflict.
Донецьк, 2013 УДК 330.101.339 (292.464) ББК 65.5 М 21 Маляренко Т. Безпека людини у мінливому сві... more Донецьк, 2013 УДК 330.101.339 (292.464) ББК 65.5 М 21 Маляренко Т. Безпека людини у мінливому світі : [Монографія] / Тетяна Маляренко. -Донецьк: ТОВ «Східний видавничий дім», 2013. -200 с.
Books by Tatyana Malyarenko
Routledge, 2019
What are the causes and consequences of the crisis in Ukraine, and what has been the nature of lo... more What are the causes and consequences of the crisis in Ukraine, and what has been the nature of local, national, and external actors’ involvement in it? These are the questions that the authors examine in this comprehensive analysis of the situation in Ukraine.
The crisis evolved from peaceful protests to full-scale military conflict and to an unstable ceasefire frequently interrupted by, at times, intense clashes between government forces and separatist rebels. Tracing the emergence of two new de-facto state entities in the post-Soviet space—the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics—from the chaos of the early days after Russia’s annexation of Crimea in Spring 2014 to the second Minsk Agreement in February 2015, and focusing on the actions of the immediate conflict parties and their external backers, the authors investigate the feasibility and viability of several prominent ‘scenarios’ for a possible future settlement of the conflict.
As an in-depth case study of the complex dynamics of the conflict at local, national, regional, and global levels of analysis, the book complements and advances existing scholarship on civil war and international crisis management and also provides insights for the policy community and the wider interested public.
In this chapter I identify and explain the critical junctures at which events in Ukraine could ha... more In this chapter I identify and explain the critical junctures at which events in Ukraine could have taken a different turn depending on the choices (actions and reactions) of the main conflict parties. I argue that at the very beginning of the conflict escalation all sides made incorrect assumptions about one another’s intentions, resources and potential. As a result, competition between Ukrainian elite groups has transformed into full-scale war. Due to the ‘zero-sum’ strategy to which every side adheres, the confrontation has evolved from peaceful protest through violent protest and low-intensity conflict to open warfare with the employment of tanks, heavy artillery, multiple rocket systems, and airpower. This chapter demonstrates that we have witnessed the employment by Russia of a novel form of warfare that combines destabilisation with ‘creeping’ indirect occupation (hard power) and effective propaganda (soft power). In the meantime, the crisis in Ukraine has been moving along a scenario of protracted conflict. Any delay in its settlement favours the continuation of tensions.
Drafts by Tatyana Malyarenko
Uploads
Papers by Tatyana Malyarenko
Books by Tatyana Malyarenko
The crisis evolved from peaceful protests to full-scale military conflict and to an unstable ceasefire frequently interrupted by, at times, intense clashes between government forces and separatist rebels. Tracing the emergence of two new de-facto state entities in the post-Soviet space—the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics—from the chaos of the early days after Russia’s annexation of Crimea in Spring 2014 to the second Minsk Agreement in February 2015, and focusing on the actions of the immediate conflict parties and their external backers, the authors investigate the feasibility and viability of several prominent ‘scenarios’ for a possible future settlement of the conflict.
As an in-depth case study of the complex dynamics of the conflict at local, national, regional, and global levels of analysis, the book complements and advances existing scholarship on civil war and international crisis management and also provides insights for the policy community and the wider interested public.
Drafts by Tatyana Malyarenko
The crisis evolved from peaceful protests to full-scale military conflict and to an unstable ceasefire frequently interrupted by, at times, intense clashes between government forces and separatist rebels. Tracing the emergence of two new de-facto state entities in the post-Soviet space—the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics—from the chaos of the early days after Russia’s annexation of Crimea in Spring 2014 to the second Minsk Agreement in February 2015, and focusing on the actions of the immediate conflict parties and their external backers, the authors investigate the feasibility and viability of several prominent ‘scenarios’ for a possible future settlement of the conflict.
As an in-depth case study of the complex dynamics of the conflict at local, national, regional, and global levels of analysis, the book complements and advances existing scholarship on civil war and international crisis management and also provides insights for the policy community and the wider interested public.