BY HANK REICHMAN
Despite ongoing and lively debate among scholars of the region about the nature and histories of Russian and Ukrainian nationalism, the origins and causes of the current crisis, and the appropriate role for the US and its allies in the conflict, a remarkable unanimity has emerged among scholarly organizations in Russian and East European studies in the US and Europe condemning the Putin government’s military action. In a useful Twitter thread, Matthias Neumann, president of the British Association for Slavic and East European Studies, has collected links to statements by a wide range of area studies groups. Here are excerpts from some of those statements:
Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (US)
The Board of Directors of the Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies condemns Russia’s military assault on Ukraine and President Putin’s use of historical distortions and cynical lies to justify Russia’s attack on Ukrainian sovereignty. We stand with all the people of Ukraine and Russia who oppose this war.
Association for Women in Slavic Studies
Russia and its authoritarian government, led by Russian President Vladimir Putin, launched an unprovoked invasion of the democratic and sovereign state of Ukraine. This invasion violates international law and the principles articulated in the United Nations charter. The members of the Association for Women in Slavic Studies (AWSS) are diverse and comprised of scholars from North America, Europe, and Eurasia–including many members hailing from and/or pursuing scholarship in Ukraine and Russia. AWSS categorically condemns this invasion and rejects any attempt on the part of the Russian government to justify their actions by misinterpreting and distorting Russian and Ukrainian history. We stand in solidarity with our colleagues across the region who seek to support or establish open societies that protect the rights of their citizens and are committed to challenging sexist, homophobic, transphobic, racist, classist, ableist, and ageist structures that reproduce injustice.
Association for the Study of Nationalities
The Association for the Study of Nationalities (ASN) expresses deep dismay at the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The unprovoked attack, egregiously rationalized by President Putin as negation of the very idea of a distinct Ukrainian nation and of a sovereign Ukrainian state, is a grave and dangerous breach of international order and law. The ASN is a scholarly association devoted to the promotion of knowledge and understanding of ethnicity, ethnic conflict, and nationalism studies broadly defined. Our organization brings scholars, students, educators, and analysts from all over the world to engage in discussions and intellectual collaboration. We, as an organization with membership and academic interests in both Russia and Ukraine, stand together with a number of other professional organizations that have openly condemned Russian violence and the invasion into Ukrainian sovereign territory.
American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages
The Executive Council of the American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages condemns the unprovoked Russian invasion of Ukraine as a direct violation of international law. As scholars of this region, we are appalled by the distortions of the situation circulated on Russian state media. We grieve for the victims of the ongoing attacks and for those killed over the past eight years. We stand with all those in Ukraine, Russia, and beyond who oppose this war.
Society of Historians of Eastern European, Eurasian and Russian Art and Architecture
The SHERA condemns in the strongest terms possible the unprovoked and unjustified Russian military attack on Ukraine. We stand in solidarity with our Ukrainian colleagues and all those who have been affected by this senseless war.
University of Michigan Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies
We condemn the Russian Federation’s attack on the sovereign state of Ukraine and stand in solidarity with the people of Ukraine and its democratically elected government. While our community of specialists represents a wide diversity of political views and policy preferences, we are unanimous in our support of democratic values, including the insistence on the rule of law and multilateral cooperation. Our collective missions and histories as centers that study Europe and Eurasia have led over the decades to strong connections with scholars and institutions across this broad region, and we urge Russian leadership to end this attack for the safety of the Ukrainian people.
University of North Carolina Center for Slavic, Eurasian, and East European Studies
The UNC Center for Slavic, Eurasian, and East European Studies condemns the egregious and unprovoked invasion of independent and democratic Ukraine by Russian military forces. Like the whole world, we are appalled by the Russian government’s flagrant violation of international law and Ukraine’s territorial integrity. Peace in Ukraine is essential to peace in all of Europe. Now more than ever, it is our collective responsibility to amplify the voices of Ukrainian citizens who are facing this existential crisis, to help get their stories out to the world, and to fight the absurd lies told by the Russian state. We stand too with those in Russia who oppose the violence and oppression of their own government and who seek peace and human rights in the face of authoritarian violence.
Both the R.F. Byrnes Russian and East European Institute and the Center for Refugee Studies at Indiana University condemn in the strongest terms the Russian military attack on the state of Ukraine. We express our deep concern for the safety and welfare of the Ukrainian people and call on international agencies and surrounding countries to ensure the welfare of Ukrainians fleeing the conflict. The unprovoked, unjustified attack on an independent state by the Russian Federation is an affront to international law and jeopardizes the post-World War II international order. We uphold Ukraine’s sovereignty and its right to choose its own alliances, and call on Russia and the EU to respect the rights of non-combatant citizens.
NYU Jordan Center for Advanced Russian Studies
Like many of you, we at the Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia are dismayed by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. While we are a community of interdisciplinary scholars who study a variety of topics and countries, today all of our thoughts are first and foremost with the people of Ukraine. We stand with all the people of Ukraine, Russia, and the rest of the world who oppose this senseless, unprovoked war.
As each of us ask ourselves what we can do, we at the Jordan Center will be continuing our mission of supporting scholars and scholarship around Russia and its impact on the world. Like most Centers, we have speakers scheduled in the coming weeks and months who are not focused on the war. While these events will now all occur under the shadow of this war, we believe this is an important way that our Center can contribute at a time when the need for high-quality information about Russia, Ukraine, and their neighbors is so acute. We hope you will continue to join us, but we understand that this may be a difficult time for many of you.
Ohio State University Center for East European and Eurasian Studies
The Center for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies condemns the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As scholars and students of this region, we are concerned and will offer resources to our community to help understand the issues around the conflict. We stand with all those in Ukraine, Russia, and beyond who oppose this war.
British Association for Slavic and East European Studies
The BASEES committee wishes to express its horror and deep sadness over this morning’s news from Ukraine. We condemn utterly this unprovoked act of aggression by the Russian government that defies the principles of co-existence of democratic nations, championed also by Russian leaders post-1991, and wish to express our solidarity with the Ukrainian people, whose democratic freedoms and right to self-determination are now under direct attack. We also wish to express our solidarity with the Russian people, who long ago lost the same freedoms Ukrainians now stand to lose and who bear no responsibility for the actions of their leaders.
As a scholarly organisation devoted to the study of Eastern and Central Europe, BASEES includes many members in both Ukraine and Russia who will be directly affected by the unfolding situation, and we wish to place on record, in particular, our support for them. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will do untold damage not just to the Ukrainian people and the international security situation, but to cultural ties between Russia and other countries of continental Europe and the UK (including academic collaboration) at the precise moment when they are most needed.
We reiterate that genuine intercultural dialogue and understanding offer our best hope of a more peaceful world, and we commit to doing all we can to preserve them in this dangerous moment.
The Royal Historical Society is shocked and horrified by the invasion of Ukraine. This is an attack on an independent country, on democracy, and on the history and culture of Ukraine.
We wish to express our deep solidarity with the Ukrainian people. We condemn utterly the unprovoked act of aggression by the Russian government, justified by historical myths, distortions and lies, attacking the right to self-determination of a European nation.
This war, as every war, will cause enormous human losses and tragedies, and it fundamentally undermines the foundations of the established international security system. As a scholarly organisation with many members from eastern Europe, we stand with all those who oppose this war.
Our thoughts are with the people of Ukraine, and especially those members of the Society from Ukraine or with family, friends and colleagues in the country and wider region.
Association for German Studies in Great Britain and Ireland
The AGS condemns Russia’s act of aggression against the Ukraine and supports the statement released yesterday by our colleagues in the British Association for Slavonic and Eastern European Studies
The American Association for Ukrainian Studies (AAUS)
The Shevchenko Scientific Society in the U.S. (NTSh-A)
Writers for Democratic Action (WDA)
Association for Women in Slavic Studies (AWSS) (Joint Statement)
We condemn the decision by the President of Russia to invade Ukraine. Unarmed civilian populations in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Odessa and other cities across Ukraine are currently under attack in what is the largest military operation in Europe since the end of World War II. We are shocked and appalled by this unprovoked war of aggression.
Since independence in 1991, Ukraine has declared it a state priority to integrate with the EU and the West. After the Orange Revolution of 2004, when Ukrainian citizens rejected the results of a rigged election, the Russian government has grown increasingly belligerent. In remarks intended to justify this invasion, President Vladimir Putin indicates that he considers Ukrainians to be part of the Russian nation and Ukrainian statehood to be illegitimate. To turn back the clock and destroy the Ukrainian state, he has compiled “kill lists” and made broader plans of repression to rein in what he calls “Nazism and extremism.” In reality, he is targeting the democratically elected Ukrainian government, the independent media, and various civil rights activists, including LGBTQ rights advocates. He also seeks to silence scholars who have researched Stalinist atrocities such as the Holodomor, the complexities of World War II, and other subjects that do not correspond with Putin’s affirmative view of Soviet history. His plans for repression in Ukraine reveal that Putin will use this military invasion to destroy groups and institutions that have fought hard for human rights, media freedom, and other democratic advances in Ukraine, just as he has done at home, where he has used violence against reformers and activists attempting to promote human rights and civil society in Russia.
Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (University of Alberta)
As the democratic world is watching in disbelief at the Russian army’s full-scale military assault on sovereign Ukraine, the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Alberta stands united with Ukraine and Ukrainians in these critical times. . . .The military aggression against Ukraine is simultaneously an assault on democracy and the values that Ukraine embraced during its development as a sovereign state since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The authoritarian regime that Vladimir Putin has built in the Russian Federation has global ambitions and is inspired by long discredited policies that drove empires to conquer peoples and expand their territories at huge human costs. The recent speech in which Mr. Putin denied Ukraine the very right to exist contradicts the modern democratic principles the world adopted after World War II. Indeed, the invasion of Ukraine should serve as a warning to the rest of the world that Ukraine may not be the end goal, and that there may be other sovereign nations that Mr. Putin may label as historical fiction and then proceed to invade.
Unprovoked, the Russian Federation, under the leadership of an authoritarian government, invaded Ukraine in 2014. The Russian Federation illegally annexed the Crimean Peninsula and backed “separatists” in the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.
Overnight on February 23, 2022, the Kremlin’s war of aggression against Ukraine, a sovereign and democratic state, escalated. The Kremlin bombed cities throughout Ukraine, targeting both military and civilian locations. Putin’s regime has since illegally and violently occupied sovereign Ukrainian territory, including the Chornobyl nuclear power plant and exclusion zone. This most recent escalation in Russian aggression has already resulted in the deaths of well over one hundred and thirty Ukrainian soldiers and one hundred and fifty civilians. The Kremlin’s violent attacks on peaceful Ukrainian citizens, overt disregard for Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty, and continued distortions of history are reprehensible.
The H-Ukraine editorial staff and board members unequivocally condemn the Russian Federation’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, which started in 2014 and violently escalated on February 23, 2022. We stand in solidarity with Ukraine and our colleagues throughout the world who recognize Ukrainian territorial sovereignty and the Ukrainian people’s right to a peaceful existence. We reject Putin’s distortions of both Ukrainian and Russian histories and decry the Kremlin’s continued disinformation campaigns and mass arrests of internal protestors and dissenters in Russia.
Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute
Irish Association of Russian, Central, and East European Studies
Statement of the Irish Association of Russian, Central, and East European Studies on Ukraine @iarcees
#Ukraine pic.twitter.com/ilECUL7B5t— IARCEES (@iarcees) February 24, 2022
CERCEC, Centre d’études des Mondes Russe, Caucasien & Centre-Européen
Le CERCEC exprime sa profonde solidarité avec les chercheurs et étudiants, et avec l’ensemble de la société ukrainienne, victimes de l’intervention militaire de la Russie. L’entrée des forces armées russes et les bombardements sur l’Ukraine, engagés ce 24 février 2022, constituent une tragédie historique qui fait écho aux drames du passé. Nul ne sait quand et comment finira cette guerre mais nous connaissons déjà son coût pour la paix en Europe. Face aux usages belliqueux de l’histoire et à l’étouffement du pluralisme politique, les chercheurs doivent plus que jamais élever la voix pour refuser une instrumentalisation infondée de l’histoire et faire valoir la raison critique. En partenariat avec les chercheurs ukrainiens, le CERCEC continuera à porter la parole des sciences sociales contre la violence armée et la négation des crimes du passé. Il apportera aussi son soutien aux voix indépendantes et courageuses qui tentent de se faire entendre en Russie et partout dans l’espace postsoviétique.
Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies
The Board of Directors of the Association for the Advancement of Baltic Studies condemns Russia’s aggression against Ukraine and calls on President Putin to immediately withdraw all Russian forces from Ukraine.
Czechoslovak Studies Association
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum strongly condemns Russia’s outrageous attack on Ukraine and is deeply concerned about threats to civilians and loss of life. In justifying this attack, Vladimir Putin has misrepresented and misappropriated Holocaust history by claiming falsely that democratic Ukraine needs to be “denazified.” Equally groundless and egregious are his claims that Ukrainian authorities are committing “genocide” as a justification for the invasion of Ukraine.
“We strongly condemn this unprovoked attack and are greatly concerned about the loss of life. The Museum stands with the Ukrainian people, including the thousands of Holocaust survivors still living in the country,” said Museum chairman, Ambassador Stuart E. Eizenstat. “These survivors are remnants of one of Europe’s largest pre-war Jewish populations that was almost completely decimated by the Germans in World War II. Having suffered terribly as victims of both Nazism and Communism, Ukrainians today are seeking to fulfill their democratic aspirations.”
The Holocaust, the genocide of European Jews, entered a new phase in June 1941 with Operation Barbarossa, Nazi Germany’s massive military assault in the East. Mobile killing squads began systematically murdering Jewish men, women, and children, including well over one million Ukrainian Jews. In one of the single largest mass shootings during the Holocaust, in September 1941, the Germans and their collaborators murdered more than 33,000 Jews in the ravine at Babyn Yar outside Kyiv. During World War II, many non-Jewish Ukrainians also lost their lives and were subjected to brutal forced labor by the Nazis.
British Association for Holocaust Studies
To all our Ukrainian colleagues, students and friends – we stand with you.
The Wiener Holocaust Library condemns both Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the Holocaust distortion used to justify it. As the world’s oldest institution devoted to the study of the Holocaust and genocide, created and supported by refugees from Nazism and their descendants, we call upon international and national organisations to support those fleeing Vladimir Putin’s violence. The history and memory of the Holocaust should never be abused to justify militarism and oppression.
Willy Brandt School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt
We at Brandt School are utterly shocked and extremely saddened to see the war in Ukraine unfold. As a School with numerous ties to Eastern Europe and several students and colleagues from Ukraine, we feel directly affected by it. Our thoughts and feelings go out to the people of Ukraine, but also to all those Russians who do not accept this form of needless and outrageous aggression. They also deserve our support.
The war ushers in a new and very dangerous time for Europe and the World. It also puts in sharp relief, once again, how important it is to educate university students and citizens in general how to think independently and critically. How important it is to be wary of nationalist historical narratives. How important checks and balances are in a political system. And how relevant it is to address global challenges as a global community.
In addition, the following is the text of an open letter signed by Russian scientists and science journalists, published two days ago by the EU Reporter.
“We, Russian scientists and scientific journalists, declare a strong protest against the hostilities launched by the armed forces of our country on the territory of Ukraine. This fatal step leads to huge human losses and undermines the foundations of the established system of international security. The responsibility for unleashing a new war in Europe lies entirely with Russia.
“There is no rational justification for this war. Attempts to use the situation in Donbass as a pretext for launching a military operation do not inspire any confidence. It is clear that Ukraine does not pose a threat to the security of our country. The war against her is unfair and frankly senseless.
“Ukraine has been and remains a country close to us. Many of us have relatives, friends and scientific colleagues living in Ukraine. Our fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers fought together against Nazism. Unleashing a war for the sake of the geopolitical ambitions of the leadership of the Russian Federation, driven by dubious historiosophical fantasies, is a cynical betrayal of their memory.
“We respect Ukrainian statehood, which rests on really working democratic institutions. We treat the European choice of our neighbors with understanding. We are convinced that all problems in relations between our countries can be resolved peacefully.
“Having unleashed the war, Russia doomed itself to international isolation, to the position of a pariah country. This means that we, scientists, will no longer be able to do our job normally: after all, conducting scientific research is unthinkable without full cooperation with colleagues from other countries. The isolation of Russia from the world means further cultural and technological degradation of our country in the complete absence of positive prospects. War with Ukraine is a step to nowhere.
“It is bitter for us to realize that our country, which made a decisive contribution to the victory over Nazism, has now become the instigator of a new war on the European continent. We demand an immediate halt to all military operations directed against Ukraine. We demand respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Ukrainian state. We demand peace for our countries. Let’s do science, not war!”
As I indicated at the start of this post, while very few scholars in this field support the Russian military action — and perhaps I should be clear that I personally condemn this unprovoked invasion by an increasingly ethnonationalist and plutocratic regime — there continues to be often intense debate and legitimate disagreement among scholars about the causes of the conflict, the distribution of responsibility for it among various actors, including the US government, and about what may come next. Without endorsing any particular viewpoint, here are links to some materials that I have found useful and which may offer perspectives not often found in our mass media.
1) From February 14 (pre-invasion) by Jack Matlock, US ambassador to Moscow in 1987-91 and disciple of George Kennan:
https://usrussiaaccord.org/
2) Two pieces by Anatol Lieven, senior research fellow on Russia and Europe at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft and author of The Baltic Revolutions: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and the Path to Independence and Ukraine and Russia: A Fraternal Rivalry:
https://responsiblestatecraft.
https://responsiblestatecraft.
3) This interview with Lieven, which appeared yesterday in the American Prospect:
https://prospect.org/world/
4) This piece from the conservative National Interest, a publication that advocates for a “realist” approach to foreign policy, may raise the hackles of some for its acerbic critique of both Ukrainian and US policy. But consider this quote from it: “I have steamed for twenty years at the lies the American government has told about its ill-conceived and illegal interventions. It is good to know that Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, spokesperson Maria Zakharova, and their whole crew at the United Nations lie with even greater aplomb.”
https://nationalinterest.org/feature/how-west-got-russia-and-ukraine-wrong-200845
Lastly, I cannot help but mention here the work of the late Stephen F. Cohen, whose controversial views on US policy toward Ukraine led him to be unfairly targeted as “Putin’s lackey” and provoked a disturbing controversy in the Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies that long-time readers of this blog may recall (see here, here, here, here, here, here, and here). When it came out I found Cohen’s final book, War With Russia? From Putin and Ukraine to Trump and Russiagate, a collection of his political commentary over the preceding decade, eye-opening, but surely unduly alarmist. Maybe I should read it again.
Contributing editor Hank Reichman is professor emeritus of history at California State University, East Bay; former AAUP vice-president and president of the AAUP Foundation; and from 2012-2021 Chair of AAUP’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure. His book, The Future of Academic Freedom, based in part on posts to this blog, was published in 2019. His Understanding Academic Freedom has recently been published.
Very useful Thanks.
See also this statement:
https://jewishjournal.com/news/worldwide/345515/statement-on-the-war-in-ukraine-by-scholars-of-genocide-nazism-and-world-war-ii/
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