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Unfortunately it does seem increasingly like the Ukraine government has used the war as an excuse to tighten its grip on power and tamp down on democracy. I hope these changes can be reversed but I’m not overly optimistic.
That doesn’t mean a Russian puppet government would be any better though.
To be fair, it is hard to hold a proper democratic election with part of a country occupied. Either you hold an election in which people in those areas cant vote and while risking division during a time of crisis, or you dont hold an election and in doing so risk democratic backsliding. Im not really sure that there's a good answer to that situation
Not only is it "hard," it is spelled out in the UA constitution that this is what happens when there's a war going on in Ukraine.
Wow! Looked that up and seems you are exactly right, kicks in with a declaration of martial law.
Yup. So when you hear people hollering about how "Zelenskyy halted elections!" - it's because that's what the constitution demands.
Human rights and democracy are above the law. If the law contradicts them, then the law is wrong.
You know what created the situation where Ukraine had to pause elections? Russia's invasion. You know when elections will resume in Ukraine? When Russia fucks off.
But, sure, blame Ukraine for that.
What a pointless comment. I’m not blaming them for being invaded, that’s absurd. They are responsible for their own actions. No more, no less. Why do you think the invasion means the Ukrainian government no longer has agency in the territories it controls?
I disagree. Ukraine does not have direct control over those territories. So it does not seem a major issue that people there cannot vote for a government that does not govern them.
If Ukraine is able to retake these territories then they can allow people to vote in the next election. If Ukraine retains or expands its democratic ideals then it would only be a short period where they would be controlled by a government they did not vote for.
I could see a case for postponing elections if the country was in such a total state of disarray that it was not practical to hold them. But it’s clear that this is not the case outside of the eastern front lines and occupied territories.
It's in their constitution to do this. They have to do it this way.
They could modify it or end martial law. They don’t have to.
It’s just a bad law, constitution or not.
But doing so will just give propaganda fodder for the occupying country
"See, your country doesn't care about you, come to our side blah blah blah"
It's a tight rope to walk for sure, but I haven't seen anything out of Ukraine to suggest they've fallen off it
As we can see, not holding elections is also creating propaganda for Russia and its defenders. I don’t think this is a major problem enough to deny people a voice in decision-making.
Propagandists gonna propagandize regardless. Stop blaming the victims.
Yeah that was my point… Nobody is blaming the victims but you’re saying they shouldn’t have a voice in their own government.
Why don't you spend all this energy you're putting into ignorant takes into criticizing the actual problem and aggressors here - Russia
So the invader only has to conquer the places that support their puppet candidate the least. Good job, you made it easier for them.
Try thinking things through next time
How has it tightened its grip on power? I'm genuinely asking, I don't know.
Lincoln did the same thing, for what it's worth, arresting people who published secessionist newspapers and detaining civilians without due process who he said were "dangerous to the public safety." What he said about it was that, in war people get murdered on a massive scale, property gets stolen, cities burn, all the rules go out the window. If that's what we're doing, we might as well do it and try to win.
“Are all the laws but one to go unexecuted, and the Government itself go to pieces lest that one be violated? Even in such a case, would not the official oath be broken if the Government should be overthrown when it was believed that disregarding the single law would tend to preserve it?”
I'm not saying I agree as pertains to Ukraine. Like I said I really don't know what has been happening with them. Ukraine has famously had a pretty corrupt government as all the post-Soviet states tended to do, and I am in favor of the upsetting story of them trying to replace it with something decent, all the while at the mercy of massive powers on all sides which don't have their best interests at heart.
Canceled elections and tamping down freedom of speech: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/18/world/europe/ukraine-press-freedom.html
War obviously poses challenges and some changes may be necessary but Lincoln did hold elections during the civil war and I believe it is perhaps the most important time for people’s voices to be heard, despite the challenges. The war is primarily confined to eastern Ukraine so I see no practical reason elections could not be held. Other than that they may not be in the interests of ruling powers.
Power always corrupts and wartime powers are no different.
- War is not confined to eastern regions, it never was, even in 2014.
- Elections and freedom of speech, also freedom of movement, freedom of association and a lot of other freedoms are suspended for the duration of martial law being in effect, that's part of the law. Changes to constitution, referendums, strikes are prohibited as well. Law #389-vii (may 12, 2015) itself is powered by Constitution (article 64 part 2 mentions what freedoms can't be suspended during martial law). All previous iterations of the law starting from 2000, I think, have +- same conditions and change mostly in wording.
- Civil war was civil as in not against outside threat and it wasn't an existential threat. Stated r*ssian goals include genocide.
I never said it was completely confined there, just primarily. I think contextually it should be clear that what I mean is that war has not affected the government or society away from the front so dramatically that elections could not be held.
I am aware of the law. But I think the law is wrong. Ukraine has never been a particularly democratic country so its laws were a product of that context, even before the war. They open the door to autocracy and should be changed.
Your last point isn’t relevant. They could and still should hold elections regardless of Russias intentions which they have no ability to bring about outside of their area of control.
You do understand law as a concept? Especially constitution as a basic law that can't be violated unless every other law becomes invalid?
As for not being particularly democratic that's either extremely uninformed or completely detached view. I would love to hear what is not particularly democratic about ukrainian state.
As for president and safety council being autocratic, and holding dictatorial power, that is the whole point of martial law and any kind of emergency powers that granted to elected or not elected officials during emergency.
I acknowledge that laws exist. I don’t respect or follow the bad ones. The laws were written, as in many countries, to prevent self governance by the people. This is always and everywhere the greatest fear of the powerful.
Your comment is self-contradictory. A dictatorship that governs with emergency powers and no elections is in no way democratic.
It’s clear from your comment that you think this kind of dictatorship is a good idea. I think you should defend this idea instead of acting confused about what I mean when you clearly understand what I’m talking about here.
I sincerely doubt that you don't follow "bad" laws. Dictatorial powers are granted as part of emergency, with conditions that must be met. Conditions that were explained earlier, again, you can't ignore laws like your country constitution (if there is one) unless the next step planned is dissolution of your nation.
My personal opinion on granting or not granting whatever powers are irrelevant. That's how laws work.
Your claims of there being a lack of democracy weren't explained, enlighten me. I can't understand your position on elections because you have a very warped idea what war means. At best there are multiple air raid alerts in every big city, at best every day hundreds of people are being either killed or being injured. Every industry is either completely destroyed or partially destroyed, absolute majority of critical infrastructure objects are at least partially destroyed. At least a million people are in armed forces with more than a half being on the front lines, they can't drop everything and go vote. Ballistic missile can arrive in 1-2 minutes after being detected, some can in less then a 1, and public events are usual r*ssian targets, you don't want your election start with multiple places being struck with ballistic missisles with cluster munition. Can you explain how to hold elections in this situation, the logistics of the operation and a purpose?
Hm. Interesting, thank you, I hadn't known they had cancelled the election.
Presidential elections were scheduled to be held in Ukraine in March or April 2024. However, as martial law has been in effect since 24 February 2022 in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, no elections were held because Ukrainian law does not allow presidential elections to be held when martial law is in effect.
Apart from the legal prohibition, both government and opposition politicians in Ukraine questioned the feasibility of a 2024 election, citing concerns over security and displaced voters[2][13] as the Russian invasion continued. Russia controls 18% of Ukraine's territory as of October 2024,[14] and nearly 14 million Ukrainians have either fled abroad or been displaced internally.[2][13][9] Other challenges identified include danger to voters and likely disruption of the voting process[9] due to Russian bombardment;[15] the inability of citizens in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine to vote;[15] the inability of soldiers to vote or run as candidates;[13] damaged polling infrastructure;[13] an outdated voter registry that has not been updated to reflect millions of displaced voters;[9] expanded state powers and restricted rights under martial law that would limit campaigning[9] and prevent fair competition for opposition candidates;[16] and the lack of funds.[13]
A poll released by KIIS in October 2023 reported that 81% of Ukrainians did not want elections until the war was over,[17] and more than 200 civil society institutions, NGOs, and human rights groups have formally opposed wartime elections.[15] In November 2023, Zelenskyy said "now is not the right time for elections", in response to a claim by European Solidarity MP Oleksiy Goncharenko that Zelenskyy had decided to hold elections on 31 March 2024.[18] Later in November, all political parties represented in the Verkhovna Rada signed a document in which they agreed to postpone holding any national election until after the end of martial law[19] and agreed to work on a special law that would regulate the first post-war election, which would take place no earlier than six months after the cancellation of martial law.[20]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Next_Ukrainian_presidential_election
The situation during the civil war was a little different. They didn't attempt to count votes from the "occupied" territories, meaning it was basically an election of the union states only, and almost all the still-alive voting population was either still at home, or deployed in the military and findable. Almost all the fighting and destruction was inside the CSA, not on union territory, so there wasn't the same massive scale of destruction and disruption in the union that Ukraine is under. The union cancelling elections would have been more like Russia cancelling elections because of the Ukraine war.
I'm not trying to debate about it, I just don't know much about it. The infringements on press freedoms sound pretty real. And, the CSA did have congressional elections during the war, although they didn't last long enough to have a second presidential election.
The infringements on press freedoms sound pretty real.
From the reporting that I see from Ukraine it's not actually an issue. Journalists (that aren't right-out Russian agents) aren't told what to write, or to not be critical, or to not ask tough questions, but to put reporting about military things on time-release and blur others. You don't want pictures out there that would allow the Russians to locate command centres and such.
Oh yes and you can't condone the invasion. Newsflash: Condoning crimes is a crime pretty much anywhere also in peace times, and believe it or not it's not legal to wage wars of aggression.
Another critical tool in the bully's toolbelt is to whine that the attacked person is being way unreasonable in how they're conducting themselves, in the defense.
And I am sure that it is pure coincidence that whatever press-freedom incidents are being played up and spun out as the corruption and hostility to democracy of the current Ukranian government, in consistently dishonestly half-true ways from any number of various scattered sources.