EXPLANATORY POTENTIAL OF THE POSTCOLONIAL APPROACH FOR UNDERSTANDING THE RUSSIA–UKRAINE WAR

Abstract

Abstract. The escalation of the Russia–Ukraine confrontation into a fullscale war in 2022 reinforced questions about the deficiencies of the mainstream IR theoretical paradigms in exploring and explaining the development in Eastern Europe. In this article, we examine the explanatory potential that the postcolonial approach in IR can contribute to elucidating Russia’s aggressive behaviour and, no less importantly, Ukraine’s desperate resistance to the invasion. This includes examining the coloniser–colonised dichotomy within the historical context of Russia–Ukraine relations, the Russian neocolonial agenda in independent Ukraine, and the applicability of the concepts of the Other and Subaltern to Russian perceptions of Ukrainians. We offer substantiation of the premise that, although
the status of Ukrainians within the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union differed from the experiences of overseas colonies, there are still common features — such as predatory exploitation of human and natural resources, enslavement and forced relocations, and cultural suppression and marginalization of indigenous people — that support the application of a postcolonial approach. The perspective highlighted with the help of the postcolonial lens fills in the gaps inherent in other theoretical approaches, 
addressing the coloniser’s tendency to use power to retain hegemony and revealing how Russian hybrid perception of Ukrainians as the same people to Russians, but subaltern, shaped Ukrainian culture of resistance to oppression.
Keywords: International Relations, Postcolonialism, Neocolonialism, Ukraine, Russia–Ukraine war.