Social Contract

By Walter Kish

In my last column, I related some of the cultural adjustments I had to make upon returning to Canada after having lived for several years in Ukraine. For the most part, they dwelt mostly with the practical side of day-to-day life such as driving or eating habits. 

However, there is a more fundamental dissonance that I have had to deal with that is more in the realm of the overall ethos that distinguishes life in the two respective societies. Living in Canada, one takes for granted that the various infrastructures that support our way of life, namely the various levels of government, our economy, the business world, the health services and educational sectors, the media, and the legal system, all function with a high level of integrity and are dedicated essentially towards ensuring fair and equal opportunity as well as quality of life for the majority of the population.  To be sure, there are times when problems, inequities and injustices occur; however, for the most part, there are adequate controls and correctional mechanisms to ensure that these never become more than temporary exceptions.  Canadian society is based on an equitable balance of power between its three key constituent components – business, labor and government – and that has given us a quality of life that is amongst the highest in the world.  By corollary, this has imbued within Canadians a certain sense of confidence, moral values, work ethic and altruism, that are both respected and admired throughout the world

Ukraine, unfortunately, is at the far opposite end of the quality-of-life scale and it will be a long time yet before it approaches Canadian norms.  In Ukraine, the corresponding infrastructures that are supposed to serve the needs of the Ukrainian citizen are, for the most part, neither effective nor fair and they are not geared towards providing real service.  Although Ukraine is theoretically a democratic country with a “free-enterprise” based economy, the structures and mechanisms are far too underdeveloped as yet to provide much benefit to or earn the confidence of the average Ukrainian.  To date, virtually all of the benefits of Ukraine being freed from its communist straightjacket have flowed to a small clique of opportunistic former Soviet apparatchiks who have usurped most of the power and wealth within this new state. 

Because this clique controls both the business and government structures, the labour component has been left virtually powerless and no equitable balance of social forces exists to provide the fundamental underpinning of a successful and equitable nation state. This has had a corrosive effect on the basic values and perceptions of most Ukrainians.  There is little trust or respect for any political or governmental structures, particularly subsequent to the failure of the recent Orange Revolution.  Business is viewed as a cut-throat game where money rules and anything goes so long as you have the money and the connections.  Basic social services such as health and education are available only to those that have sufficient quantities of American dollars. There are few controls or self-correcting mechanisms, and the average Ukrainian trusts no one outside of his own personal small circle of relatives and friends.  Where there is so little trust or cooperation, and where there is no tacit social contract between the various elements of the body politic, you cannot build either a strong society or a successful nation state.

This is why most of the focus of foreign aid to Ukraine in the past decade has been on building what is called a strong civil society.  Although the academics and professionals have many involved definitions for what “civil society” means, essentially it devolves down towards creating that tacit social contract I mentioned earlier.  All the elements of Ukrainian society must come together in a consensus on the sharing of wealth, power and responsibility for the greater good of the whole nation.  This will only come about when the majority of Ukrainians feel genuinely involved and empowered in the managing all aspects of their country’s affairs, and secondly when they have the trust and confidence that they are receiving their fair share of the country’s wealth, resources and potential.

This is the biggest difference between living in Canada and living in Ukraine.  In Canada, I have always felt that my efforts and my opinions, combined with those of other Canadians like myself, made a difference, and that this resulted in a better life for all.  I doubt that few Ukrainians today could make a similar claim.  It is also why the nations of the Western world must continue to pressure the Ukrainian government to make the creation of a “civil society” and the establishment of an equitable and workable social contract between business interests, government and labour a top priority.