Васильченко Олена Анатоліївна
Functional readiness of leading political actors for integration into the European community is of utmost significance among political conditions of success of Ukraine's pro-European advancement. In the peculiar political system that has developed in Ukraine in the second five-year period of its existence initial political roles are played by political subjects, which with certain conventionality could be interpreted as interest groups. We should make a reservation, however, that namely the groups, exerting the most powerful and steady influence upon the authorities, slightly resemble associations and organizations of individuals, which develop in a civil society and which in fact are considered as interest groups in the traditional discourse of political science.
Domestic influential groups represent a rather narrow segment of organized interests; they have a designated hierarchical structure and are based on the principles of corporatism. Formal existence of group entities pertaining to civic initiatives, i.e. trade unions, environmental, cultural and other organizations, is practically inconspicuous at the level of real policymaking. Neither the "third sector", nor employers' organizations or trade unions, or political actors proper, i.e. political parties and leaders, do not exert organized influence on decisionmaking centers, and most of them cannot be considered independent social phenomena at all. Under such conditions socium as a whole cannot develop steady requirements from political system, and the latter is unable to articulate the whole body of social interests. Absence of dynamic and sanguineous correlation between the authorities and society practically reduces the political process to administration, and political activities - to participation in functioning of the State machinery at its top levels. Existing interest groups position themselves at the intersection of spheres of activities of top levels of the State machinery on the one hand, and private business based on big capital, primarily financial one, on the other hand. Hereinafter such groups are referred to as politico-economic interest groups.
Special role of big politico-economic groups in the existing system of representation is determined, first of all, by absolute domination of administrative and market mechanisms of distribution of public goods. The very process of distribution of available public resources has become a dominant of social and political relations in post-soviet Ukraine. The administrative market model, synthesized in the soviet times, has undergone appreciable changes during last fifteen years, consisting in establishing a stable regime of converting administrative positions into financial capital and private property. The current model has inherited the whole number of characteristics from its predecessor: multidimensional hierarchy, syncretism, initial role of "statuses" as a socio-economic characteristic. Purely administrative and market mechanisms in Ukraine are supplemented with and intensified by other phenomena, similar in essence: large-scale shadow economy; criminalization of politics and social space in general; virtualization of economic processes; extensive corruption of the State machinery.
Politico-economic groupings have become not only the most significant subject, but also an instrument of effective participation of their members in the permanent redistribution of constantly diminishing public goods. Before acquiring current oligarchic forms, the relationship between administrative machinery and private business went though a number of separate stages without loosing symbiotic correlation, however. The ratio between the "administrative" and "business" components is different in each of the present-day groups, as is subordination between them, but it is the former component that can be regarded as initial and structurizing.
Two major types of influential groups, fostered in administrative market of late socialism, are still authoritative in Ukraine: sectoral lobby and regional groups. Whereas the former are getting increasingly marginalized, the latter, with certain metamorphoses, have fully adjusted themselves to the new conditions. Regional groups are increasingly claiming to represent interests of entire population of "their" regions, in addition to political and economic merely corporative interests.
The latest electoral cycle (the parliamentary election of 1998, presidential election of 1999, and all-Ukrainian referendum of 2000) became critical stages in the genesis of the present-day interest groups. Whereas in the period prior to the parliamentary election campaign the dominating role of administrative patronage for determining group positions at administrative market was indubitable, the very course of election-98 and especially its outcome demonstrated certain emancipation of private business activities. The numerous "business landing party" in the highest legislative body obtained a certain area for developing its own initiatives. Business-capitals began to master the sphere of public politics by taking part in activities of the existing political parties or establishing new party organizations. This was accompanied by concentration and buildup of positions: the most powerful influence centers in business milieu expanded by developing their clientage hierarchies, party structures, and mass media networks under their control.
In this way, in 1997-1999, rather amorphous and often situational coalitions of businessmen and top bureaucrats evolved into fully organized groups of an oligarchic type with established dynamic interaction between administrators and businessmen, the latter now developing a general strategy.
Among the existing groups the closest one to a typical notion of a post-soviet group entity is the politico-economic grouping, which in public politics is represented as the Social-Democratic Party of Ukraine (united), or SDPU (u). The group has stable positions at profitable agricultural, petroleum and hard liquor markets, in power industry, metallurgy, and shipbuilding; it controls influential banking structures and a whole number of central and regional printed and electronic mass media. It has been politically formalized into a party, which has got over the 4 per cent threshold at the parliamentary election, formed its rather numerous group in the parliament and developed a ramified regional network. Finally, group leaders and representatives hold significant posts both in the legislative and executive branches of power, such as the Supreme Rada, regional state administrations.
Typologically similar, although less structured, are politico-economic entities "Trudova Ukrayina" ("Labor Ukraine"), "Demokratychny Soyuz" ("Democratic Union"), "Batkivshchyna" ("Motherland"), "Solidarnist" ("Solidarity"), "Tsentr" ("Center").
A number of tendencies in development of politico-economic interest groups and their environment were exhibited during the first six months following L. Kuchma's re-election.
Firstly, the "rules of the game" (models of influence on the decisionmaking process) were fixed, with the game being generally developed during the presidential election campaign. The major characteristic of this model is monocentrism of general politico-administrative patronage, personified by the President. Disorientation of essential part of politico-economic groups that used the tactics of "stakes" on alternative candidates running for presidency, or financially backed several candidates at a time became a thing of the past. The groups that were oriented at the alternative candidates (P.Lazarenko, O.Moroz, Ye.Marchuk) either came under patronage of the President, or became marginalized. Competition is now oriented at a single supreme boss. The role of the President reminds that of an arbitrator of either the whole nation or, at least, the part of it that stands closest to distribution of national resources. In the post-election period, all party and political superstructures of the most influential groups have demonstratively declared their loyalty to the President's line.
On the other hand, the range of spheres that used to bring economic super-profits is being exhausted, as is the resource potential as a whole. This circumstance has catalyzed aggravation of conflicts between individual groups. It should be noted however that until summer 2000 there has been nothing similar to real oligarchic conflicts like the "banking wars" in Russia in 1997.
Thirdly, the increasing significance of administrative resources in social regulation, proved by most experts, is reinforced by intensifying influence of the institutions that directly control their use: the Administration of the President, Ministry of Internal Affairs, State Tax Administration, and, to a lesser extent, Security Service of Ukraine. In this sense, it is appropriate to predict increasing aggravation of tension between the already established politico-economic groups and structural forms that may develop in the administrative machinery. Probability of the latter will increase along with growing expectations of a "successor" - a runner for presidency backed by the current President at the next elections.
Fourthly, political and economic groups that supported L.Kuchma at the recent elections failed to secure their success and gain expected dividends from their pre-election "investment".. Forcible re-submission of the parliament to the pro-presidential majority turned out to be Pyrrhic victory: the status of the parliament and its decisions was lowered, while realization of private and group interests of group members of the majority became dependent on the necessity to preserve technical unity. The leading interest groups did not have any essential influence on the formation of V.Yushchenko's government, and lost control over holding the April 16 referendum. More successful was only the cooptation of their representatives to regional power structures, and SDPU (u) succeeded in that better than others.
Fifthly, in certain regions (Donetsk and Dnepropetrovsk regions, the Autonomous Republic of Crimea) there is active structuring of local regional groups, which on the whole replicate Kyiv models of "advancement" of their interests. This tendency will evidently dominate in gradual but confident molding of regional political processes in the near future.
Therefore, within first months following L.Kuchma's re-election as President of Ukraine, a certain balance was established between the big groups of the so-called oligarchic type, in which major initiatives are generated by a business segment, and the groups in the administrative machinery that practice patronage in respect of business. Such balance became possible in the context of general consolidation of the political system in the form of syncretic combination of a number of system elements.
In view of the fact that big politico-economic groups will continue to be among the most powerful subjects of influence on the power centers' decisionmaking we shall attempt to consider Ukraine's European prospects.
Evidently, the available model of Ukraine's development is qualitatively different from the country's image, which the all-European structures (EU, PACE, NATO) regard as optimum. The question is not just the value assessment, but also the doubts concerning functional ability of the Ukrainian authorities to be a consistent partner under such conditions. In many cases such approach is quite reasonable, as the political and economic groups:
For political and economic groups there are many reservations as well in respect of Ukraine's integration into the European structures. First of all, it concerns serious socio-political changes entailed by Ukraine's hypothetical accession to EU. Such changes may well undermine the "oligarchic" system of representation being oriented exactly at that objective. The loss of the optimal model of social and political participation may well result in depreciation of groups of this type. It could be prognosticated in general that in the near future Ukraine's "European option" will be used by some of the groups at the level of public rhetoric as a means of legitimatising their political subjectness. Declaring support of the European integration in this way may fill the vacuum of ideological orientations, being a sort of an attribute of political prestige. In practice, this course will be selectively pro-European, at best.
Among the "fears" of Europeanization for politico-economic groups significant is the fact that they realize their inability to compete with Western capitals as well as with Russian ones. Coming of the latter may be perceived as a lesser evil: they are cognate, having emerged in the conditions of the post-communist administrative market.
A more probable outlook of participation of the groups in question in the European integration is their activities in interstate projects. Pragmatic assessments of the internal political situation in Ukraine compel leadership of a number of EU countries to recognize the existing groups according to their functional roles as an influential actor of the political process, which can be neither avoided, nor ignored. In their turn, the leading groups, while realizing interstate projects, may attain favorable conditions in interaction with foreign (including the European) partners relying on their administrative potential. However, such projects cannot change the basis of the internal system of political representation significantly without extensive involvement of various social actors into international communication in the "European vector".
In general, the domination of the "oligarchic" structures among other leading interest groups makes the background for Ukraine's integration into the European structures negative. We dare to observe, however, that such role is not obligatory. Abandonment of demonization of this phenomenon, development of pragmatic criteria of cooperation with Ukraine on the part of the European structures may promote more progressive participation of politico-economic groups in the European direction. On the part of Ukraine, the prospects of integration depend on its ability to bring the advertised reforms to realization of the old-declared objectives.