Carnegie Moscow Center

In early May, the Luhansk authorities in eastern Ukraine publicly unveiled a monument named They Defended Their Motherland. The monument features a Cossack, an Afghan war veteran, and a young separatist militia fighter protecting a woman. Such self-representation highlights a new, unexpected picture of revolution.

The early picture was more conventional. The first protesters who came out on Kiev’s Maidan Square in the fall of 2013 were largely middle-class, civic and community activists, and intelligentsia. But they were soon joined by other groups and this caused the whole profile of Maidan to change. In keeping with the general trend in the post-Soviet space, endless economic crises have prevented the emergence of a formidable middle class and in any event the elites are deliberately trying to make the middle class part of state bureaucracy so that it becomes dependent on the state and indifferent to democratic transformations.

Our study of Ukraine’s volunteer battalions sheds some light on how revolution has become about social mobility, not democracy.

Formed in an instant, the battalions did not take long to find their niche in the existing state structures while remaining relatively independent. Along with their commanders and combatants, they quickly gained importance thanks to their involvement in combat operations in southeastern Ukraine. By the summer of 2014, the battalions had become one of the pillars of Ukrainian statehood alongside the police and the army, but they essentially managed to remain independent.

Similar processes were taking place in the self-proclaimed separatist republics. Armed militias led by pro-Russian activists also appeared there. Our research into volunteer battalion commanders on both sides of the conflict provides a snapshot of this social group.

First, commanders on either side have no connection whatsoever to the intelligentsia. Unlike most revolutionaries, they do not promote emancipation. Their educational level is rather low; in most cases, they got their college degrees from non-prestigious, provincial schools. Few of them were employed in cultural or scientific spheres. About 25 percent of the commanders come from the military-security sphere; another 25 percent were small business owners; the numbers of hired workers and public-sector employees are not as significant.

Secondly, affluent people do not become volunteer battalion commanders. For the most part, these people were not particularly successful in life. But they did possess the social skills and talents necessary to assemble and run their battalions. In other words, these commanders represent a Ukrainian counter-elite of sorts—they would be able to stake a claim to a higher social status under different sociopolitical conditions. Representatives of this group were able to take advantage of a sudden chance to drastically elevate their social status.

Thirdly, almost half of the commanders had some political or civic experience before the 2014 events. But they hardly come across as human rights, civic, or democratic activists. Instead, their ranks include Cossacks, army veterans, and nationalist leaders.

The commanders of volunteer battalions and militia detachments are an excellent example of instantaneous social mobility. True, some of them died in combat; others lost their lives through internal strife; some returned to their pre-war affairs after just a few months. Nevertheless, a number of these commanders became parliament members and ministers. One of them even went on to become the head of an unrecognized republic.

These commanders probably saw the revolution as a chance to finally move a few extra steps up the social ladder. In this respect, they resemble the Soviet intellectuals who played a key role in the changes of the 1990s. The intelligentsia was discriminated against in the Soviet Union and thus had no access to positions of power. But the Soviet collapse created a window of opportunity for this segment of the population, making them leaders of revolutionary movements.

A cohesive leadership contingent that attracts a large following makes these closed public organizations effective at a time of crisis. Leaders discuss their collective efforts among themselves first and then mobilize the rest of the group.

These social groups will exert a growing influence on the political landscape of post-Soviet states in the future. There is an excess of military-security personnel in the region. Failing to find a job in their field, they are looking for alternative employment and do not always find it. This means the number of frustrated young and middle-age men that are trying to find their place in life will keep growing, and they will explore riskier alternatives during crises.

But even those who have jobs in the military-security sphere are not always happy with where they are. These careers are quite common but not very prestigious, which may create a serious problem: instead of protecting the state and the regime, these people will cater to their personal interests at a time of crisis.

The latest police reform, military and drug enforcement personnel cuts, and the gradual extinction of the conflict in southeastern Ukraine, with combatants returning home, will make matters much worse. Not being able to find their calling in peaceful times, they will grope for alternatives. The recently created All-Russian National Movement is just one of them.

The growing number of disenchanted and frustrated segments of society is not unique to post-Soviet states. Inequality could seriously distort social demographics in both developing and developed countries in the coming decades. The ever-increasing income and status gap and uncertainty about the future for the grown lower segment of the middle class may usher in more than one revolutionary upheaval.