Ukraine and Russia are heirs to a shared civilizational space, yet they have chosen opposite trajectories: one defined by refusal, the other by reproduction.
Ukraine: Refusal, Emptiness, and Mobilization
Ukraine emerged from the Soviet Union without a positive image of itself. Its political identity was constructed on negation: not being part of Russia, not being heir to the USSR, not continuing the empire. This was freedom without structure, sovereignty without content.
Instead of a positive ontology, Ukraine embraced postmodernism: identity as flexible construct, statehood as administrative function, nationhood as procedural space rather than historical continuity. Postmodernism offered normality — to be a country without messianism, without metaphysics, without role. The pragmatic aspiration was to enter Europe as an institutional shell, lacking Catholic sacrality, Orthodox imperiality, or Soviet universality.
But postmodernism offered no defense. In the moment of crisis, it proved hollow. Its language failed in the face of a power that had not renounced truth. Ukraine was left without foundations — no sacred center, no historical myth, no philosophical framework. Everything it had rejected — empire, mission, canon — turned out to be necessary once war began.
To fill this void, Ukraine turned to figures that might serve as symbols of “authentic Ukrainianness”: Bandera, Mazepa, Petliura, the Cossacks, the UNR. These names were meant to serve as sacred markers. But they did not work. Their integration appeared artificial: historically insufficient, culturally fragmented, politically divisive. They offered no universal language — and thus failed to consolidate. These figures belonged to a different historical rhythm, and their return was more a gesture of panic than an ontological act. They were not foundations, but temporary constructs, not load-bearing structures.
Since 2014, and especially after 2022, a shift has occurred. Ukraine can no longer remain within the logic of postmodernism. It is returning to symbolism, to exceptionality, to the nation as sacred body. War generates a new ontology — no longer as choice, but as reaction. Belief in self becomes obligatory, as the only alternative to disappearance. Where there was plurality, there is now unity. Where there was plasticity, now there is boundary. Ukraine no longer negates — it attempts to assemble, under conditions of violence.
I will refrain from evaluating how successfully this is being done.
Russia: Universality as Violence
Russia never exited the empire. It inherited its structure, language, ambition, and style. It is not constructing a new ontology — it reproduces the old one. Russia remains a space in which truth is possible and necessarily singular. Those nearby are not others — they are distorted versions of the center. They are not to be recognized, only corrected or removed.
Soviet ontology did not disappear. Within it, the subject does not exist as value in itself. It is a means. Ethnos is raw material. Geography is a function of ideology. The state is a transmitter of meaning — not subject to debate. In this context, Ukraine is not merely alien. It is a logical error. To acknowledge it undermines the very concept of Russia.
Russia does not merely reject Ukraine — it cannot permit its existence. Recognizing an independent Ukraine would imply acceptance of plurality, which contradicts Russian universalism. This is why Russia’s denial of Ukraine will never be pragmatic. It is sacral.
Chauvinism — in what Dzhokhar Dudayev termed “Russism” — is not aggression but institutional indistinction. The other is not someone else; it is you, gone astray. It does not evoke fear, but irritation — like a systemic fault. Ukraine’s insistence on difference is perceived not as partnership but as heresy.
Cosmism and Long-Term Immortality
Imperial Russian philosophy is not only about Orthodoxy or politics. It still contains residues of Soviet cosmism — the idea that both the individual and the nation are merely instruments in the movement of matter toward immortality. Hence, a readiness for self-sacrifice — and indifference to individual fate. Hence, the universal language — not spoken for one’s own, but on behalf of all.
Russia speaks in the name of humanity. Even in acts of barbarism. Even in destruction — it formulates its actions as a mission. This is what makes it dangerous: it sincerely denies the other’s legitimacy, yet feels no guilt, because it acts within a logic of salvation — as it understands it.
Instead of a Conclusion
Ukraine seeks to be itself. Russia cannot allow it. For Ukraine, difference is a matter of political survival. For Russia, it threatens structural continuity. Recognition of Ukrainian subjectivity undermines Russia’s ontological model.
Ukraine exited empire but failed to find a new center. Postmodernism offered safety without meaning — and delivered neither. Ukraine is now returning to meaning — through blood, sacrifice, and exclusion.1
Russia never lost meaning — and will continue to fight, even without rational grounds.
This is not a war for control. It is a war for being — over who has the right to be oneself, or to be everyone.
The structural incompatibility of such conflict with a postmodern framework is most evident in the persistent failure to articulate even basic political positions: both sides used a language fundamentally inadequate to the nature of the confrontation — and are still searching for the right words. ■
Ukraine increasingly defines itself through boundary — through “not-Russia,” through the exclusion of internal otherness. This implies growing intolerance toward internal disagreement and the necessity of hard consolidation.