The End and the Beginning: The Revolutions of 1989 and the Resurgence of History

Peter Voitsekhovsky: In the Footsteps of 1989: Ukraine’s “Orange Revolution” as a Carnival of Anti-politics

PeTer VoiTsekHoVsky In the Footsteps of 1989: Ukraine’s Orange Revolution as a Carnival of Anti-politics “Whereas we defeated a communist regime, you have defeated a post-communist regime and thus have started a new page in the global democratization.” Václav Havel addressing Viktor Yushchenko in Washington, D.C. on April 6, 2005 There was a flavor of carnival in the atmosphere of the joint session of the U.S. Congress on April 6, 2005. Vice President Dick Cheney presided wearing an orange tie, while some of the congressmen came with orange scarves on their shoulders or orange bows pinned to their lapels. On that day, Victor Yushchenko, Ukraine’s new President, was the guest of honor on Capitol Hill. Members of Congress gave a standing ovation to their foreign invitee; with much enthusiasm, they waved the orange scarves, kerchiefs and ribbons—just like the crowds of Ukrainians did in the famous scenes that had been televised from Kiev’s central square. The enthusiastic legislators seemed eager to partake in Yushchenko’s fascinating victory that had turned him into a world icon.1 The imagery of Ukraine’s Orange Revolution—eighteen days of peaceful and spirited mass protests on cold and snowy streets, in standoff with riot police squads—fascinated millions of people around the world and “irresistibly reminded” them of the revolutions of 1989.2 1 Time Magazine listed Viktor Yushchenko among the “heroes and icons of the year” on April 18, 2005. 2 Timothy Garton Ash and Timothy Snyder, “The Orange Revolution,” The New York Review of Books vol. 52, no. 7 (April 28, 2005). 544 THE END AND THE BEGINNING Some went even further suggesting that the Orange Revolution was “a classical liberal revolution, like 1848.”3 Several years later, there is much less certainty and more controversy about the meaning of these events. Were they truly a “people’s revolution” or rather a “revolutionary coup”?4 Or were they, perhaps, a “revolt of millionaires against billionaires,” with an element of conspiracy?5 And how accurate or analytically meaningful is it to categorize these events in the group of “colored revolutions”6 or “electoral revolutions”7 —in implicit contrast to the revolutions of 1989? The label “colored revolutions” was coined by Russian adversaries of the revolutions in Ukraine and Georgia. It was intended as a derogatory nickname and initially employed the adjective “flower” (цветочные), which was later replaced by “colored” or “color” (цвет- ные).8 The substitution was apparently made because the mocking connotation of “цветочные” disappears in the English translation. Today, 3 Anders Åslund, “What I Saw at the Orange Revolution,” The Weekly Standard vol. 10, no. 15 (December 27, 2004). 4 “The Orange Revolution: ‘People’s Revolution’ or Revolutionary Coup?,” British Journal of Politics and International Relations vol. 10 (November 2008): 525–549. 5 This label was widely used in Russian-language media starting from late November 2004. Its coinage is attributed to Dmitry Vydrin (in an interview with Ukrainian Public Radio, transcript posted on Ukrainska Pravda (December 31, 2004). URL: http://www.pravda.com.ua/articles /2004/12/31/3005907/). 6 See for instance: Joshua A. Tucker, “Electoral Fraud, Collective Action Problems, and Post-Communist Colored Revolutions,” Perspectives on Politics vol. 5, no. 3 (September 2007): 535–51. 7 Valerie J. Bunce and Sharon L. Volchik, “Favorable Conditions and Electoral Revolutions,” Journal of Democracy vol. 17, no. 4 (2006): 5–18. 8 One of the earliest uses of “цветочные революции” (“flower revolutions”) was in a news report on vesti.ru dated November 24, 2004—the third day of the Kiev protests—entitled “Flower Revolutions. Scenario Unchanged” that was saying, in part (translated from Russian): “Everything looks very similar [to the events in Georgia], even in details … Russian specialists who professionally investigated this matter claim that dozens of millions of U.S. dollars from various overseas organizations have recently been delivered to Ukraine … In the U.S. and Europe there are forces that would like to turn Ukraine into a front-line state, a bridgehead for making pressure on us.” Available at http://www.vesti.ru/doc.html?id=106711&tid=25004. 545 In the Footsteps of 1989 a suggested Russian-language definition of “colored revolutions” is as follows: “Mass street disturbances and protests, typically resulting in a political regime change … without military involvement.”9 This definition is politicized in the manner of “reactionary rhetoric”10 and thus compromises the term itself. In English-language academic writing, the term...