The Power Vertical Podcast by Brian Whitmore
Sep 4, 2026 · 1 hr 8 min · 11 segments
On The Power VerticalPodcast this week, host Brian Whitmore speaks with Serhiy Kudelia, a Professor of Political Science at Baylor University, and the author of the recently published book, Seize the…
Serhii KudeliaGuest
Marta DyczokGuest
Brian WhitmoreHost
But throughout this whole time, there's, you know, society is not standing still.
So I've got this creation of a political system, but there are regular elections.
And as this is happening, a generation is now coming of age, a post-Soviet generation, which I think it's going to be absolutely pivotal.
But I think this kind of, if 93-94 set the stage that elections are supposed to matter in Ukraine, the people's will is final, it did so in this environment of kind of, it created an oligarchy.
And 2004, effectively established almost like oligarchic pluralism into the into the system i mean the orange revolution had had backers had finances right uh poroshenko was one of them for example um kolomoisky was one of them and the anti-orange factions had backers the donbass oligarchs what to me 2004 established was oligarchic pluralism right it was this this it established this thing that kind of came out of the Kuchma period.
2004 kind of almost solidified that it said, yes, elections are going to matter.
I think the fact that Ukraine had a competitive political system and political race in 2004 was largely because we had a wider distribution of wealth than, for example, Russia, where wealth was concentrated among six, seven individuals, whom Putin, once he comes to power, either captures or kicks out of Russia.
And then pluralism is over, right? In Ukraine, it was much more difficult to achieve that, exactly because wealth became more widely concentrated, and you had these minigarks, as they were called back in 2000s, who were multimillionaires, but probably did not have as much money as Rinat Akhmetov had, for example, or Kolomoisky had at that time.
And let me go back to Marta's argument, which is essentially that oligarchy saved Ukraine.
Primarily because, yes, of course, economy was declining in Ukraine, but oligarchy and the system that Kuchma created made things worse, not better.
Ukraine was one of the last, if you compare Ukraine across Central and Eastern Europe, Ukraine was one of the last countries to start growing.
But throughout this whole time, there's, you know, society is not standing still.
So I've got this creation of a political system, but there are regular elections.
And as this is happening, a generation is now coming of age, a post-Soviet generation, which I think it's going to be absolutely pivotal.
But I think this kind of, if 93-94 set the stage that elections are supposed to matter in Ukraine, the people's will is final, it did so in this environment of kind of, it created an oligarchy.
And 2004, effectively established almost like oligarchic pluralism into the into the system i mean the orange revolution had had backers had finances right uh poroshenko was one of them for example um kolomoisky was one of them and the anti-orange factions had backers the donbass oligarchs what to me 2004 established was oligarchic pluralism right it was this this it established this thing that kind of came out of the Kuchma period.
2004 kind of almost solidified that it said, yes, elections are going to matter.
I think the fact that Ukraine had a competitive political system and political race in 2004 was largely because we had a wider distribution of wealth than, for example, Russia, where wealth was concentrated among six, seven individuals, whom Putin, once he comes to power, either captures or kicks out of Russia.
And then pluralism is over, right? In Ukraine, it was much more difficult to achieve that, exactly because wealth became more widely concentrated, and you had these minigarks, as they were called back in 2000s, who were multimillionaires, but probably did not have as much money as Rinat Akhmetov had, for example, or Kolomoisky had at that time.
And let me go back to Marta's argument, which is essentially that oligarchy saved Ukraine.
Primarily because, yes, of course, economy was declining in Ukraine, but oligarchy and the system that Kuchma created made things worse, not better.
Ukraine was one of the last, if you compare Ukraine across Central and Eastern Europe, Ukraine was one of the last countries to start growing.
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