The First Session of the 15th-16th USPS programme

The First Session always focuses on values – we check our “compasses” with the group, introduce participants to the principles and format of the School and choose a vector for future work. Thus, for 16 years, USPS has gathered around itself the Community of more than 500 leaders from all over Ukraine. And this year, our Community has enlarged by 38 people.

Svitlana Matviienko, Executive Director of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives, and Olena Lytvynenko, Deputy Head of the Council of Europe office in Ukraine, congratulated the participants at the opening of the Ukrainian School of Political Studies. They told that USPS is one of the strongest programmes from the entire network of Schools of political studies that exist under the auspices of the Council of Europe, and alumni of the School are becoming a driving force for changes and reforms necessary to strengthen Ukraine.

People are the highest value. We began the First Session of USPS with a conversation about a person and his/her importance in the context of a state.

Ukraine is losing people. People leave and don’t come back. Why is this happening, how can it be changed, and do we need to fight migration? This is exactly what Ella Libanova, Scientist in the field of socioeconomics, demography and labor economics, academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, told the participants.

The Agency for Legislative Initiatives has always supported a course towards European integration, so this topic is crucial for us and USPS Community. And to discuss such an important topic, we invited Ivanna Klympush-Tsyntsadze, MP, chairman of the Parliament Committee on Ukraine’s integration into the European Union.

It is important that Ukrainians identify themselves as Europeans, that they speak the same “language” of values and principles that is understood in the Western world. However, to what extent is it possible for Ukraine to join the EU and NATO under current conditions? Does the voice of civil society encourage the authorities to adhere to the chosen course towards European integration? And how exactly do we want to see our membership in the EU?

Since the School is an educational and network project, the “network” part is no less important than the “educational” component. That is why, in order to bring our participants closer together and help them quickly join the group, we invited two people from theatre industry to work with them. They were Vyacheslav Zhyla, our alumnus and Artistic Director of “Actor” theatre, and Mykhailo Samarsky, an actor and trainer on actor’s skills in “Super task” theatre school.

For years Ukrainians have been fighting for their right to historical memory and truth. And now we should not allow that memory to be erased. History of Ukraine has many controversial points, which are often speculated on by neighbouring countries, so it is important to be able to talk about them and defend our national narratives.

What is the Ukrainian policy of national memory? How to talk about WWII and Babyn Yar? How to defend our history and take care of places of memory? Anton Drobovych, Chairman of the Ukrainian Institute of national memory, told the participants how to do that.

It is the 8th year now that Crimea is under Russian occupation, and Crimean Tatars are once again forced to fight for their rights. We cannot allow reconciliation with this situation, so we are constantly conducting an active dialogue on Crimea.

At the discussion panel dedicated to Crimea, participants were able to talk with Anton Korynevych, Permanent Representative of the President of Ukraine in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, Alim Aliyev, Deputy Director General of the Ukrainian Institute, journalist, co-founder of Krym_SOS, and Sevhil Musayeva, Editor-in-Chief of online publication Ukrainska Pravda.

Main topics of the discussion included: a strategy of de-occupation and reintegration of Crimea, situation on the peninsula, and aspirations of the Crimean Tatar people in returning Crimea.

COVID-19 pandemic has stirred up all areas of our lives. Of course, the economy is no exception. Even the most economically stable countries in the world have been affected by the pandemic. For Ukrainian economy, which is already facing many challenges due to the war and Russian aggression, the pandemic chaos has become a real test – instead of expected and necessary growth, we have got an economic downturn, consequences of which are not yet fully understood.

How is Ukraine adapting under the new normality? What can we do to make our economy “survive”?

Oleh Ustenko, adviser to the President of Ukraine on economic issues, shared his expert opinion on these issues with the participants of USPS.

New reality during the pandemic has completely changed our everyday life, but we still have many questions and misunderstandings about the whole situation regarding the disease.

How to increase the speed of vaccination? To what extent can Delta stop the disease? And what will happen to the suspended healthcare reform now?

Oleh Petrenko, the first Head of the National Health Service (2018-2019), independent director for Strategic Development in Dobrobut medical network, and Kateryna Bulavinova, a medical expert at the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF Ukraine), helped to destroy the most common myths around vaccination and explain why the healthcare reform should be continued, not postponed and “rethought”.

All anti-corruption bodies arouse public interest and are under close and constant supervision by the media. Artem Sytnyk, Director of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine, came to the session in order to describe how the system functions and to answer the most pressing questions about activities of the Bureau he is running. The conversation was moderated by Vitaliy Shabunin, Chairman of the board of the civic organisation “Anti-Corruption Centre”, a civic activist in the field of combating corruption, and a graduate of USPS in 2019.

What are real results of activities of anti–corruption bodies – NABU, the Supreme Anti-Corruption Court, SAPO, NACP? Is there coherence and a common vision between them to fight corruption? Why does Ukraine still occupy a leading position in the ratings on corruption? And when to expect suspicions of top corrupt officials?

Our participants discussed these topics with Artem Sytnyk and Vitaliy Shabunin.

The level of trust in the Ukrainian Parliament is critically low. Recent polls show that more than 75% of Ukrainians do not trust the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. Why is this happening?

Olena Kondratyuk, Deputy Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, is sure that the Parliament is a key link where decisions are made in Ukraine. However, the Ukrainian Parliament has lost its key role as a pillar of statehood, subordinating itself to the President. It is an imitation of parliamentarism.

How to restore confidence in the sole legislative body of Ukraine and strengthen its subjectivity? What to do with gender inequality in the Verkhovna Rada and how to destroy the “glass ceiling” for female politicians?

During the first session participants of USPS programme had a discussion with Olena Kondratyuk, Deputy Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, and Andriy Vyshnevsky, lawyer, Head-founder of the national system of providing free legal aid, Deputy Minister of Justice of Ukraine (2012-2017).

State budget is one of the most important documents for functioning of a state, which takes into account all state revenues and expenditures. In Ukraine, every year, expenditures more and more dominate over revenues as the national debt is growing. In addition, inflation is not kept at the same level, and populist decisions stopped debt refinancing.

Viktor Pynzenyk, PhD in Economics, state representative in the supervisory board of PJSC main gas pipelines of Ukraine, helped the participants to understand all the subtleties of economic problems that currently exist in Ukraine.

Cyber-terrorism is one of the top 3 threats to the country’s national security. We have long lived in a reality where the digital world often affects our lives no less than the real one. And while some people and countries reject this reality, others use it at various levels to enrich themselves, steal information and bully. And sooner or later, a question will arise: where to draw a line of digitalisation that the humanity does not want to cross? How to secure our private space? Can we trust our phones? Will emergence of artificial intelligence threaten humanity?

Yehor Aushev, CEO of Cyber Unit Technologies and 2016 USPS alumni, one of the best experts in the field of cyber-security in Ukraine, answered to those questions during the first session of the School.

A university is not a place to train for labour markets. It is a place where a person’s world-view is formed. However, until now, in Ukraine, higher education is perceived only as an institution where you can enrich yourself with knowledge in order to be more competitive in the labor market.

Mykhailo Vynnytsky, Head of the secretariat of the National Agency for quality assurance of Higher Education, recommends to get a bachelor’s degree in Ukraine and says that the quality of education in Ukraine is not as bad as they like to say – especially at the Bachelor’s level. However, at the level of Master’s and postgraduate studies, the quality drops sharply. What should we do about it? How does the National Agency propose to reform the higher education system and help universities? Mykhailo Vynnytsky answered those questions of our participants.

Since 2019, USPS annually awards a scholarship for civic position named after Kateryna Handziuk. Katya was an alumna of the School in 2015, and, together with her father Viktor, the Ukrainian School of Political Studies, after many consultations with representatives of civil society, granted the scholarship to Serhiy Filimonov.

Serhiy is a veteran of the Russian-Ukrainian war, awarded with Defender of Mariupol medal. He took part in liberation of Mariupol, Maryinka, in the battles for Ilovaisk and near Hranitne, defending Ukrainian territories from the aggression of the Russian Federation and winning back a right of millions of Ukrainians to live peacefully in their independent country.

Serhiy Filimonov’s activities are consistent with values and principles of the Ukrainian School of Political Studies. Serhiy, like Katya, defends interests of the democratic state of Ukraine.

That was the end of the First Session of USPS in 2021 However, we are already looking forward to a new meeting with our participants in Odesa at the next, no less interesting and eventful session.