Read the full essay here.
The Ukrainian events of late 2013 and the first half of 2014 reflect the flowing together of several different crises. The first is the crisis of the post-Soviet political model; the second is the crisis of soft authoritarian rule in Russia; and the third is the normative crisis that besets the liberal democracies and their policies. In addition, these events have not only revealed liberal civilization’s failure to defend Ukrainians’ “choice for Europe,” but have also laid bare that civilization’s inability to stand in the way of attempts to undermine the existing world order.