Religious minority identities under pressure in Ukraine: between the war and europeanization

Le identità delle minoranze religiose sotto pressione in Ucraina: tra la guerra e l'europeizzazione

Abstract

In light of Russia’s recent invasions in 2014 and again in 2022, the present contribution discusses how religious minorities have perceived their Ukrainian-ness and what have been the implications of this war on religious minority identity protection in Ukraine. The analysis will first provide an overview of the recent changes in the legal and policy frameworks concerning religious minorities in Ukraine. At a second level, it will argue that religious minority groups have adopted diverse techniques of resilience, adaptation, and survival to respond to the double challenge of aggression from Russia but also from within Ukraine. Processes of othering and the elasticity of the space for individual groups to adopt (and maintain) multiple identities will be stressed as structural features in protecting minority identity in its cultural dimensions within the current circumstances. Finally, the analysis will engage with the effects of the war in Ukraine in relation to religious minority identity protection against the background and role of the Europeanization track of the country connected to the prospect of EU membership.