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Authors:

Gerard Toal (Professor of Government and International Affairs, Virginia Tech)

John O'Loughlin (Professor of Geography, University of ����ֱ�� Boulder)

Kristin M Bakke (Professor in Political Science and International Relations, UCL)

For historical purposes, a copy of the article:

A U.S.-Ukraine has put the notion of a negotiated end to the three-year war on the agenda, and in the hands of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

But even before Moscow responds, it’s pretty clear where the parties stand. Breaking a prior , the U.S. has suggested in any permanent deal, whereas has stated repeatedly that he will never yield sovereignty over Ukraine’s territory.

Meanwhile, Russia has demanded that and accept restrictions on its military. But at present, Kyiv looks it seeks from the U.S. before contemplating such terms.

What is talked about less is what the Ukrainian people are willing to accept for peace. And while any armistice will likely be dictated by guns, territorial gains and great power geopolitics, it will be in large part down to ordinary Ukrainians to shape what happens afterward. An ugly peace may be accepted by a war-weary population. But if it has little local legitimacy and acceptance, peace is likely to be unsustainable in the long run.

We have tracked public opinion in Ukraine and .

It is an ; most polling in wartime Ukraine is by mobile phone and depends upon those with service who are willing to participate. Many people, especially in the country’s south and east, do not want to answer sensitive questions out of concern for themselves and relatives, some in occupied territories and Russia.

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Those who do respond may give guarded responses. Some are mindful of , while others are patriotic or wish to present themselves as such to the stranger calling them. Meanwhile, many other Ukrainians are overseas and excluded. Similarly, those in Russian-occupied territories are left out of surveys.

Nonetheless, the responses still give insights into how opinions in Ukraine have evolved since the Russian invasion of February 2022. Here are five important findings from relatively recent public opinion polls that are relevant to any forthcoming peace negotiations.

1. Nearly all Ukrainians are stressed and tired of war

Unsurprisingly, three years of a brutal war of aggression has created tremendous stress among a population increasingly weary of war.

A December 2024 poll from the respected found that at least one stressful situation in the previous year. Large shares reported stressful experiences related to bombing and shelling (39%), separation from family members (30%), surviving the death of loves ones (26%) and the illness of loved ones (23%). Only 10% said they’d experienced no stressful situations.

In a related vein, surveys showed that by summer 2024, 84% of the population had experienced violence in some form – be that physical injury at the hands of Russian forces, displacement, loss of family member and friends, or witnessing attacks.

And consistent with a growing number of news reports, we found that Ukrainians were deeply worried about war weariness among their fellow Ukrainians – just 10% reported that they did not worry about war fatigue at all.

2. More Ukrainians want negotiations, but there are red lines

As the war has gone on, several polls show that . The share of the population in favor of negotiations varies depending on how the question is posed.

When given the choice between two options, a showed that 52% preferred that “Ukraine should seek to negotiate an ending to the war as soon as possible,” whereas 38% preferred that “Ukraine should continue fighting until it wins the war.”

Our earlier surveys similarly show a growing preference for negotiations, though at a lower level – from 11% in 2022 to 31% in 2024. In contrast to the binary Gallup question, presented respondents with different territorial compromises for a ceasefire. While about one-third wanted an immediate ceasefire, half wanted to continue fighting until all territories, including the predominately Russian-speaking Donbas region and Crimea, are brought back under Kyiv’s control.

But survey responses make clear that the for the public – even if defending it comes at a very high cost.

3. Ukrainians are more open to territorial concessions

In tandem with growing support for negotiations, – in line with – show growing willingness to cede territory. And among those most worried about war fatigue and more pessimistic about continued Western support, the willingness to cede territory is higher.

That said, most Ukrainians still want Ukraine to continue fighting until the country’s territorial integrity is restored and under Kyiv’s control, including Crimea. But that majority has diminished since the beginning of the war – from 71% in 2022 to 51% in 2024.

When we asked in July 2024 whether people agreed with the statement: “Russia should be allowed to control the territory it has occupied since 2022,” 90% disagreed. As such, there is very little evidence that Russia’s territorial annexations – or an agreement recognizing these, which is what Russia wants – will have any legitimacy among Ukraine’s population.

4. Ukrainians see Russia’s war goals in existential terms

Neither Zelenskyy nor most Ukrainians – hence there’s a strong preference for any agreement being accompanied by security guarantees from NATO states.

Many Ukrainians share their leader’s distrust of Vladimir Putin.

interpret Russia’s war aims as an existential threat, comprising and destruction of its independent statehood. And 87% believe Russia will not stop at the territories it already occupies. Negotiating with an enemy bent on Ukraine’s destruction appears delusional to many Ukrainians.

5. Zelenskyy remains popular; his endorsement matters

As a defiant wartime leader, President Zelenskyy’s popularity was very high in the immediate months after the invasion. Indeed, from May 2022 show that 90% of the population expressed trust in him.

This has declined as the war has endured, but it has always remained above 50%. Recent polling puts it at 63%, an increase from 2024. Indeed, the very latest KIIS polls, from February through March of this year, show a 10-point jump in his trust rating to 67%, a finding widely viewed as .

Thus of any ceasefire and settlement will matter, though ceding territory is likely to be hazardous for him politically.

National security adviser Mike Waltz, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Saudi Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan and U.S. and Ukrainian delegates meet in Saudi Arabia on March 11, 2025.

Conditions for a lasting peace

While the U.S.-Ukraine accord on a ceasefire has “, it is unclear whether it will be enough to bring Putin to the table. And even if it does, given past precedent it is difficult to see him arriving as a compromiser rather than a conqueror.

What does appear clear is that whatever “peace” emerges looks set to hang more on Ukraine making concessions and accepting losses.

Such a peace can be negotiated behind closed doors. But without public support in Ukraine, whether it endures on the ground is another matter.

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Professors John O’Loughlin (Professor of Geography and Fellow, Institute of Behavioral Science), Terry McCabe (Fellow, Institute of Behavioral Science and Emeritus Professor of Anthropology) and Andrew Linke (Associate Professor of Geography at University of Utah and former PhD student in Geography) have been awarded $804,990 from the National Science Foundation programs in Human-Environment and Geographical Sciences (HEGS) and Cultural Anthropology for a study on the relationship between climate change and support for violence in Kenya. 

Using a geographically-stratified representative sample of 3000 rural Kenyan households in 11 counties (map) for a 5 wave panel survey, guided by in-depth interviews and focus groups of key informants, the project will examine how households adapt to environmental stressors caused by weather changes? Adaptions include the sources of incomes and household contributions, intentions to move, actual migration, increased sharing of scarce resources and political mobilization including protests and violence. The effects of seasonal changes in the weather on attitudes and behavior regarding cooperation or conflict with members of the same group/locale and with other ethnic groups will be examined by looking at the changing roles of formal institutions (national and local governmental), as well as informal institutions (traditional customs and the role of elders). Especially focusing on the levels of food insecurity that vary greatly between livelihoods and counties, the project will also map the level of both governmental and non-governmental aid reaching the communities.

The topic of the effects of climate change in the Global South continues to gain both public and academic interest as its consequences become more evident. Among the expected effects on human livelihoods are growing food insecurity, deteriorating health conditions, increases in migration, and pressures on scarce household resources. Less evident are outcomes that might lead to changes in traditional livelihood practices, including arrangements for sharing of resources; such outcomes could lead to more reliance on cooperative customs. This project on climate change effects will focus on the differential impacts across societal groups and across different ecological and livelihood zones since rural livelihoods in sub-Saharan Africa are highly vulnerable to climate and environmental change.

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See full article linked .

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An international team of researchers has released an exhaustive look at support for Russia’s autocratic President Vladimir Putin across several neighboring countries. 

The study,  was a massive effort. From 2019 to 2020, researchers led by John O’Loughlin at ����ֱ�� Boulder contracted with local polling companies to survey more than 8,400 people face-to-face in six nations: Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Moldova and Ukraine. 

The team’s findings give a deep look at the type of people who support Putin, a former KGB spy who once held a photoshoot of himself riding a horse shirtless. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the results reveal that Putin is more popular among men than women, and less popular among younger and more educated people. 

“Our research has shown that Putin’s machismo and his authoritarian personality appeal to people who have more close-minded personalities, hold traditional values and don’t trust science,” said John O’Loughlin, professor in the  and Department of Geography.

In the former Soviet Union, Putin remains a complicated presence.

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Sarah Posner and John O’Loughlin with Terry McCabe (Institute of Behavioral Science) interviewing a government official in the Isiolo office on the drought’s extent and effects on local livelihoods.

The purpose of the July 2022 fieldwork was to share the survey results with local stakeholders (government officials, NGO’s, etc) and to discuss the findings in light of their local knowledge.  Key results were presented at the National Academy of Sciences, Committee on Geographical Sciences annual in December 2022.  Current plans include preparing a research article on the Isiolo case study and write research proposals to extend the study in comparative work on sites across Kenya’s diverse ecological and livelihood zones. 

Further accounts of the research were reported in ����ֱ�� Boulder Today in May 2022  

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In 2008 and 2009, a severe drought swept through much of Kenya and Tanzania. Nomadic herders, or pastoralists, such as the Maasai people in Tanzania, pushed south in search of greener expanses, bringing tens of thousands of cattle with them. 

What happened next was largely unprecedented: Locals from a region of Tanzania called Manyara, who were also Maasai, evicted the newcomers, beating some so badly they ended up in the hospital. 

Terrence McCabe, professor of anthropology at ����ֱ�� Boulder, has lived and worked with pastoralist groups in the region for more than 30 years. For him, that sudden and shocking violence was a symbol of a changing East Africa—a warning sign that people such as the Maasai  as freely as they used to. Survey results from the last two years in central Kenya show that life for pastoralist peoples may be getting even worse. Herders are struggling to feed their families in the midst of a pandemic, a historic locust invasion and drought after drought.

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Ukrainian servicemen get ready to repel an attack in Ukraine's Lugansk region on February 24, 2022. ANATOLII STEPANOV

In the early morning hours of February 24, 2022, Vladimir Putin launched his attack on Ukraine – or as Ukrainians put it, started the re-invasion of Ukraine. The first invasion dates from March 2014 when the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea was annexed by Russia and the fighting of the Donbas region resulting in over 14,000 dead by early this year. Both wars were reactions to the successful pro-West street protests that led to the overthrow of the Kyiv regime of Viktor Yanukovich that had tethered Ukraine’s future to Moscow.  

The scale and intensity of the 2022 attack on Ukraine that has quickly resulted in more than 50,000 estimated civilian and military deaths in two months is shocking. ����ֱ�� 30% of the pre-war population is displaced, including over 5 million refugees fleeing the country and another 7 million forced to move within Ukraine. While Putin’s speeches and writings on Ukraine and NATO were closely watched for the past year, the actions that he threatened to reverse the drift of Ukraine to the West were not considered likely, until they actually happened.

I have been doing research in Ukraine for the past three decades, first visiting the newly independent Ukraine in the early 1990s. I have interviewed officials, activists, and ordinary people in all parts of the country from L’viv in the west to Kyiv to the Donbas in the east and south to Crimea. Over the past few years, with National Science Foundation support, I have conducted seven large public opinion polls (with about 15000 respondents), both nationally and in the contested areas of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts, as well as in Crimea. While the questions focus on war experiences and outcomes, geopolitical preferences and reconciliation attitudes, my writings have stressed the complexity of the Ukraine story in terms of its regionally- and locally-based diversity of nationalities, orientations and historical legacies.   

The current conflict has definitely made Ukraine “more Ukrainian”. By that, I mean it has certified and concretized a trend since the 2014 EuroMaidan revolution of hardening anti-Russian feelings, promoting a sense of ‘civic identity’ separate from the ethnic affiliations, increasing attachment to Ukrainian institutions, broadening support for being part of the Western community, and speeding up an ongoing re-identification away from “Russian” to “Ukrainian”. This re-identification is clearly seen in the large numbers shifting their language use from Russian to Ukrainian and now stating that their nationality is Ukrainian when in the past, they would have answered Russian. Recent wartime polls have documented a remarkable consensus of pride in the actions of the Zelenskiy government, in the defense of country by the armed forces and volunteers, and in the resilience of ordinary people. 

While my research has tracked (geo)political developments, like most, I was initially hopeful that war could be avoided. But by mid-January, I was pessimistic enough based on the scale of the Russian military build-up on the borders that I predicted an attack between February 20-24 with a 70% probability to my Geography 3882 class (Geographies of the Former Soviet Union). Faced with student skepticism about the confidence of the prediction, I wrote this prediction on the board but hoped to be wrong. In pre-war interviews, I expressed deep concern for the huge casualties that I foresaw in the event of a Russian attack, a pessimism borne out by the events of the past two months.

My post-Soviet class this semester has frequently veered away from the syllabus to discuss current events in Ukraine. Students ask a lot of questions about Putin’s intentions, about Ukrainian resistance, about US/NATO actions and the efficacy of Western sanctions on Russia.  In answer to my questions about their information sources, it seems that few read newspapers and fewer watch television. The majority get their information from social media, with all the implications that has for funneled information and risks of disinformation.   

Leon Trotsky, the Bolshevik revolutionary who was commander of the Red Army in the Russian Civil War, was (incorrectly) reported to have said that “You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.”  This aphorism resonated in the United States in February as oil price rises became evident at the pump and inflation gathered pace. In many of my twenty-plus interviews with local and national media, the impact of the war on Americans far removed from the conflict was often the focus. I maintain a focus on the terrible destruction in Ukraine and the sanctuary of distance from Europe, a region much more affected by the war’s consequences. I avoid policy assertions as there are far too many prognosticators with agendas who do so without detailed background information on the “Crush Zone”, as the British geographer James Fairgrieve named it in 1915. A pleasant surprise has been the emails that I have received from former students in my Political Geography class, some from 25 years ago, who remembered my lectures on the geopolitics of West-Russia competition in the post-Cold War period and the continued relevance of classic ways of geographic conceptualizing in this current environment.

In recent academic and public seminars, as well as in multiple articles in the Washington Post’s Monkey Cage blog – most recently about based on a large January 2022 survey, I have stressed the complexity of the local geographies of geopolitical aspirations. The dissonance between the views of ordinary people and the political figures, both in the region and beyond, who treat these beliefs with either distain or blind ignorance remains a source of deep frustration to me. We should renew attention to the that showed that most people, living either in the Kyiv-controlled or the separatist regions, cared less about which flag flew over their community than their ability to live a normal life, free from violence and with a quality of life that offers minimal security for their family’s future.

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Reprinted from , April 15, 2022

Women wave to relatives as they are about to leave by train at Slowansk central station, in the Donbas region on Tuesday, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP via Getty Images) (Afp Contributor#afp/AFP/Getty Images)

We surveyed people in Ukraine’s contested eastern region to see what they wanted. Here’s what we found. 

The war in Ukraine is officially in its second month. But Russia’s attack on Ukraine’s territory began in 2014. That’s when Russia  and intervened to prop up separatists who sought to create Russian proxy states in part of what’s called “the Donbas,” Ukraine’s two easternmost regions of Luhansk and Donetsk, which border Russia. Ukraine has been fighting against these proxy states since. Russian President Vladimir Putin provocatively escalated that conflict right before the latest invasion, declaring in February that  — the Donetsk Peoples Republic (DNR) and the Luhansk Peoples Republic (LNR) — as independent states, including supporting their claim to all the territory of the Donbas.

The Russian military has  a new war strategy, focusing “on the main goal, the liberation of the Donbas.” But do ordinary people living in the Donbas actually want what “liberation” probably means: violent conquest, followed by independence or annexation to Russia?

Our research just before the February invasion suggests some answers.

How we did our research

In January, we conducted a large, computer-assisted telephone public opinion survey of people living in the two regions on both sides of the military line of contact. To enable cross-checking of the survey data, we used three companies: the U.K.-based agency R-Research and the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology calling from Ukraine, and Levada Marketing Research calling from Russia. In total, 4,025 people were interviewed, with equal numbers on both sides of the line of contact dividing the Donbas. Data are weighted proportional to current population estimations separately in the Kyiv-controlled and separatist areas.

The opinions of those forcibly displaced are thus absent. Estimates are that up to 3 million of the 6.5 million people who lived in the Donbas region in early 2014 had left by early 2022, with many more fleeing since the invasion began in February.

What do the people of Donbas want?

Because of the fiercely contested nature of the Russian proxy “republics” in Ukraine, when asking people what status they preferred for the region, it proved impossible to use the same wording on both sides of the Donbas divide. In the areas controlled by the Ukrainian government, respondents were asked: “In your opinion, what should be the status of the regions of the Donbas temporarily uncontrolled by the Kyiv government”? In the separatist-held areas, the question ended, “…of the Donetsk Peoples Republic (DNR)/Luhansk Peoples Republic (LNR).” Each respondent could choose from five answers, as you can see in the figure below.

When the responses are weighted by the estimated total population on either side of the line of control in the Donbas before the war (1.7 million in the Kyiv-controlled zone and 2.1 million in the separatist republics), more people preferred to remain in Ukraine (42 percent) than be annexed to Russia (31 percent). Just 9 percent opted for independence. For this sensitive question with a high degree of uncertainty about Kyiv’s and Moscow’s actions, the “don’t know” ratio is high at 18 percent.

The gray bars represent the average of the values on both sides of the line of contact weighted according to the respective population sizes. Figure: John O’Loughlin, Gerard Toal, Gwendolyn Sasse

But the figure in which we averaged data from all the survey firms summary data hides some big differences. While the Ukrainian and Russian pollsters found similar opinions in areas controlled by the Ukrainian government, in the breakaway area, pollsters calling from Russia found higher support (70 percent) for joining Donbas with Russia than did the pollsters calling from Ukraine (16 percent). (Some respondents may have decided whether to answer the call or participate in the survey according to whether it originated in Kyiv or Moscow, or may have replied with answers that they thought the interviewers wanted to hear.)

In the Ukrainian government-controlled areas, almost 3 in 4 respondents (72 percent) wanted the breakaway territories back within Ukraine. These residents were twice as likely to say the Donbas should not have any special status as to say it should have special autonomous status within Ukraine.

In the separatist-held areas, opinion was more splintered. Forty-nine percent said they wanted to be part of the Russian Federation, with a roughly equal proportion saying they wanted to be a special autonomous region or just an ordinary part of Russia. On both sides of the line of contact, fewer than 10 percent supported independence. Almost 1 in 5 respondents — on both sides of the line of control — said they did not know.

All this largely echoes our findings . In other words, beliefs about where the contested territory belongs were stable before Russia’s latest invasion.

Who will get to vote in upcoming status referendums?

Among Donbas residents, the debate is between those who want to be annexed by Russia and those who do not; the independence that the Kremlin recently recognized isn’t desired. Leaders of both the “” and ” have declared that they will hold referendums on joining Russia, announcements possibly approved by the Kremlin.

These referendums are likely to be modeled on one held in  in March 2014, in which pro-Ukrainian activists and journalists were detained while the local government aired Russian programming and citizens voted while Russian soldiers watched.

Our research suggests that in a free and fair referendum held throughout the Donbas — under international supervision and with impartial, transparent and inclusive voting rules that allowed those displaced since 2014 to vote — the majority would be likely to vote to remain in Ukraine. However, a vote restricted to just those remaining in the Donbas would be likely to endorse joining Russia. Either way, war has hardened attitudes, so any such referendum would be bitterly contentious.

John O’Loughlin, professor of distinction at the University of ����ֱ�� at Boulder, is a political geographer with research interests in the human outcomes of climate change in sub-Saharan Africa and in the geopolitical orientations of people in post-Soviet states.

, professor in the  at Virginia Tech’s campus in Arlington, Va., is the author of “” (Oxford University Press, 2017).

Gwendolyn Sasse is director of the Center for East European and International Studies (ZOiS), professor in the department of social sciences at Humboldt University of Berlin and senior research fellow at the University of Oxford’s Nuffield College. She researches the dynamics of war, identities, protest and migration and is involved in survey projects in Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.

The authors acknowledge funding for this work from the National Science Foundation and from ZOiS (Center for East European and International Studies), Berlin. The survey protocol was approved by the University of ����ֱ�� Human Subjects board.

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Those who live in the Donbas region care more about bread-and-butter issues, our latest surveys reveal.

At the heart of the  is the long-standing conflict in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, divided since 2014 into separate territories controlled by the Ukrainian government and by Russian-backed separatists. On Tuesday, the Russian  to recognize separatist regimes there as independent states. Putin also declared that .

We have researched  on both sides of for the past six years. Our largest research survey there, which concluded just two weeks ago, reveals a dimension of the crisis that many may overlook: economic despair. Ordinary people on both sides of the conflict line hold similar attitudes about their well-being and current conditions, despite their wartime experience or geopolitical orientation.

Ukraine’s economy has not flourished

It is now 30 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union, but Ukraine’s gross national income per capita has stagnated at  of the level in 1990. Neighbors such as Poland, relatively poorer at independence than Ukraine, are now , with per capita incomes that greatly exceed those of ordinary Ukrainians. Living standards in the Donbas, once an industrial powerhouse, .

We’ve tracked public opinion in the Donbas since 2016

The Donbas region today comprises Kyiv-controlled parts of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts (government-controlled areas), and the separatist Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics” (DNR/LNR). Both parts have experienced war and forced population movements within and beyond the region, and the war has cost more than 14,000 lives. The Donbas front line remains an anxious divide as mass at various points on Ukraine’s eastern, southern and northern borders.

Our prior surveys on both sides of the contact line in 2016, 2019 and 2020 reveal  about the preferred final status for the separatist republics. Conflict zones are difficult environments for public opinion research. Sample design, mode of surveying (telephone, online or face-to-face) and question framing all require considerable care.

This year, we used three reputable companies — one from Ukraine, one from Russia and one based in the U.K. — to conduct a computer-assisted telephone survey of 4,025 people Jan. 14-17. Simultaneous double surveys on each side of the contact line provide an additional check on potential biases introduced by different survey companies. The Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) and U.K.-based agency R-Research each surveyed in the government-controlled areas while KIIS and Levada Market Research in Moscow surveyed in the non-government-controlled area (the Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics).

All three companies used the same questionnaire and methodology and conducted the same number of interviews in each location, allowing us to compare the responses between the two parts of the Donbas. The survey included questions about war experiences, forced relocation, blame for the conflict, plans in case of a Russian invasion and trust in political leadership. Our respondents expressed many different views on geopolitical questions — but particularly striking were the answers to a question asking them to prioritize their economic well-being or the identity of the government in charge.

What do ordinary citizens want?

Reporters often remark that ordinary Ukrainians appear . In 2014, British journalist  a 27-year-old woman in Sloviansk, in Donetsk oblast, who reported, “It does not matter if I live in Russia or Ukraine. All I want is a good salary.”

We’ve adapted this sentiment in our research surveys in Ukraine and in other parts of the former Soviet Union — as a way to gauge whether ordinary economic well-being, not the identity of the government in charge, is a primary concern. We modified the statement slightly, adding pensions along with a salary to make the survey question relevant for older respondents.

In our January Donbas surveys, half of the respondents, regardless of whether they lived in either government- or non-government-controlled areas of the Donbas, agreed that it does not matter where they live, whether in Russia or Ukraine (51.8 percent agree in the government-controlled area and 52.6 percent agree in the separatist republics).

Those who disagreed with the prompt, apparently putting politics over economic well-being, totaled 37.9 percent (16.1 percent disagree and 21.8 percent strongly disagree). Fewer than 1 percent of respondents refused to answer the question and 8 percent said they could not give an answer to this tough choice. As seen in the figure, these patterns are consistent on both sides of the contact line and also evident in the results collected by each of the various survey companies. These answers are similar  in the same Donbas regions in late 2020.

How is it that citizens appear little invested in the territorial outcome of the ongoing Donbas conflict? The survey responses point to a socioeconomic answer: 11.5 percent of the overall sample reported they did not have enough money for food, and 30.2 percent indicated they could afford food but no other expenditures. Over half (54 percent) of the residents of the Donbas as a whole report that their families have been directly affected by the war, either suffering casualties or being forced to move.

While poorer residents (54 percent) and younger people (59 percent) are more likely to agree that they don’t care what country they live in as long as they have a decent salary, those most affected by the war are less likely to agree with the statement (46 percent) — suggesting they prioritize which government is in control over their family’s well-being.

It’s understandable that the current crisis diplomacy and  are preoccupied with the risk of a large-scale war,  and de-escalation options, and narratives of geopolitical spheres of influence.

This crisis, however, has a long backstory. Ukraine’s uneven economic development since its independence, especially in devastated industrial regions like the Donbas, is a crucial part of that story. Geopolitics and territorial belonging certainly matter, but economic stagnation has a powerful effect on the lives of ordinary people in conflict zones. What flag flies overhead matters less than material stability in their lives, our research suggests.

, professor of distinction at the University of ����ֱ�� at Boulder, is a political geographer with research interests in the human outcomes of climate change in sub-Saharan Africa and in the geopolitical orientations of people in post-Soviet states.

, director of the Center for East European and International Studies (ZOiS), professor in the department of social sciences at Humboldt University of Berlin and senior research fellow at the University of Oxford’s Nuffield College, researches the dynamics of war, identities, protest and migration. She is currently engaged in a series of survey projects in Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.

, professor in the at Virginia Tech’s campus in Arlington, Va., is the author of “” (Oxford University Press, 2019).

Article reprinted from The Washington Post, Feb 17, 2022.

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This week, the Pentagon announced that it was placing roughly 8,500 U.S. troops on “heightened alert”—a step toward potentially deploying them to friendly European nations near the Russian border.

The move is the latest escalation surrounding Ukraine, an Eastern Europe nation home to about 44 million people. Late last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin sent 100,000 troops to the Ukrainian border, sparking fears that the strongman was setting the stage for an invasion.

“It could very easily generate a massive conflict, and once a war starts, it’s hard to know where it will end,” O’Loughlin said.

He’s traveled to Ukraine since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 to survey people across the country about a wide range of topics—from their hopes for the future to their anxieties over military buildups along their border. O’Loughlin said that one thing that often gets lost in the discussions over Cold War-style brinksmanship in Eastern Europe is the feelings of these real people. 

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