ABSTRACT
Few issues are as politicized and mired in false clichés as Ukraine’s ‘civilizational choice’. There is an unfortunate tendency to discuss Ukraine’s future in terms of ‘either/or’, when an ‘and’ approach is also conceivable as part of a broader process of continental integration.1 Post-Soviet countries and the European Union (EU) largely misinterpret the meaning behind each other’s integration processes. Europe and the West see the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), and more recently the Common Economic Space (CES), as products of ‘Russian imperialism’. Europeans have difficulty understanding the depth of economic ties inherited from the USSR and their vital importance for economic modernization in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus. The disintegration of so huge a country and its economic complexity are without precedent in history. To understand the kind of incentives these countries have to reintegrate, imagine the collapse of the USA or the EU (not just the currency zone but the entire common market), and then triple the likely effects to reflect how much more interdependent the Soviet economy was. European and post-Soviet integration should not be seen as mutually
exclusive. The Customs Union (CU) of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan may become a stronger partner for the EU than its individual members. The choice Ukraine faces between these two unions is tearing the country apart, and the most rational long-term solution to Ukraine’s dilemma may very well be economic integration between the EU and the CU. Ukraine’s entry into the CU, followed by an agreement on preferential
trade and economic cooperation between the EU and CU (potentially home to 220 million people and a US$2.2 trillion economy), promises the most economic benefit and the least potential for conflict. Ukraine would achieve its main foreign policy goal of maintaining favourable relations with Russia and other partners in Northern and Central Europe, while reinforcing its own European choice.2 The agreement between the unions would serve as a universal foundation for the harmonizing of laws and ultimately visa-free travel. Another option is a triangular EU-Ukraine-CU free trade agreement (or agreements). Beyond trade, any agreement should also promote the free movement of people and capital, gradual unification of technical standards, and infrastructure integration.
