ABSTRACT
Compared to Belarus and Georgia, Ukraine is considerably larger in territorial size, and this alone hampers both the initiation and, more importantly, the completion of reform processes. Regional cleavages pose a serious problem for national development. The new Ukrainian government included virtually no representative figures with whom the majority of citizens in the Eastern and Southern regions could identify. Russia's annexation of Crimean 2014 and its support for the separatists in Eastern Ukraine have led observers to the idea of a 'paradigm shift' in Russia's foreign policy: from state-driven foreign policy to one driven by ethno-nationalist ideas. Halling and Stewart draw attention to the Ukrainian dilemma: on the one hand, Ukraine's economy requires immediate assistance; on the other hand, there is a danger that such support would give the elite the impression that the West is placing virtually no conditions on the assistance provided, or that the danger from Russia is relieving the country of the need to observe conditions.
