Politics Minus Crimea and Donbas

The Russian re-acquisition of Crimea in 2014 resulted in large gains for Ukrainian political parties. Since Crimea had declared independence, its largely Russian citizens could no longer vote in Ukraine, which meant that the political landscape swung much further for Ukraine and against Russia.

During the 2014 elections, the Russian language political party, the Petro Poroshenko Bloc, made huge strides in Southern Ukraine, running on a “Ukrainian Russians for Ukraine” ticket. The Ukrainian Communist Party was eliminated due to a lack of support. The pro-Russian Opposition Bloc came in last. It became clear that Russian Ukrainians in Ukraine, exposed for the first time to other-than-state media, were also tending to choose Ukrainian self-determination.

The battle for political opinion had been a key pre-conflict piece put in place by the Ukrainians. There was more cross-party solidarity than ever before. The vast majority of Ukrainian politics was now united by the idea of an independent Ukraine.