7
“Orange Revolution” in Ukraine: Transitological Interpretation
In his next publication devoted to the reconstruction of L. Kuchma’s plans to remain
in power, S. Kulchytsky notes, that “The Orange Revolution is only an episode, let it be even
the most important in a 200-day marathon of presidential elections in 2004. The opinion
about the revolution should be formed during the analysis of these elections” [7].
Political scientist Anatoly Galchynsky expressed his opinion about the dramatic events
at the end of 2004 on the pages of the newspaper “Den’” (“Day”). Referring to the work of
P. Sorokin “Revolution and Sociology” in which the maestro of sociology singles out three
phases of revolution, namely, emotional, destructive and constructive, A. Galchynsky em-
phasizes, that “it is very important for “the crowd” of the Orange Revolution to realize the
specificity of logic conformity and for the period of leaving the revolutionary condition
and penetrating of society into a constructive phase to come as soon as possible” [8].
The thesis that Ukraine has really gone through a revolution, was developed by A.
Galchynsky in the book “Pomarancheva revolutsija i nova vlada” (“Orange Revolution
and New Power”. Using the division of revolutions borrowed from the Soviet social sci-
ence into political and social ones, the scientist claims that November events in 2004 in
Ukraine were the beginning of a social revolution, and inherently make the second, demo-
cratic stage of public transformations [9]. The first stage lasted from 1991 up to 2004 and
consisted of the dismantling of the command system basic attributes and formation of in-
stitutional bases of a new political regime in the country. Such a statement, however, raises
a question: whether it is correct to speak about revolution as a stage or a phase of transfor-
mation? One shall admit that certain researchers, naming the overthrow of authoritarian
regimes “velvet revolutions” positively answer this question. But at the same time they
depart from the explanation of the revolution essence as a public phenomenon.
A thorough analysis of “the Orange Revolution” against the background of preced-
ing and subsequent events in Serbia, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan was carried out by Kharkiv
researcher Anatoly Romanjuk. The author carefully studies preconditions and dynamics
of political transformations in four countries, however does not go deep enough into the
problem of revolution as a political phenomenon.
On the basis of a “non-violent”
change of power in Serbia, Georgia,
Ukraine and Kyr-
gyzstan O. Romanjuk considers it appropriate to classify the given processes as “a special,
post-communist type of revolutions” [10]. Similar arguments create a methodological
problem of the frame of the “revolution” concept application, using it in a too wide sense.
Besides one shall keep in mind that the change of power in Georgia and Kyrgyzstan was
accompanied actually not by armed but by political violence. Capture of the governmen-
tal buildings took place in Georgia, while in Kyrgyzstan along with this there were mass
collisions of Protestants with militia groups. That is why, in my opinion, it is not quite cor-
rect to identify the events in these countries as non-violent or “velvet” revolutions.
A serious attempt to prove that it actually was a revolution in Ukraine was undertaken
by two well-known academic political scientists Antonina Kolody and Valentin Jakushik.
Independently of one another these scientists claim that at the end of 2004 a political
revolution took place in Ukraine. Unlike a violent social revolution which is a characteris-