War on the horizon. Infrastructural vulnerability in frontline communities of the Donbas
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Date
2023
Authors
Ryabchuk, Anastasiya
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Abstract
Post-Soviet deindustrialization and the economic collapse of the 1990s led to a decline in the signifi cance of the Donbas coal-mining region both economically and symbolically, while the start of the Russian war in Ukraine in 2014 aggravated the sense of isolation and fragmentation. Th e combined eff ects of these two forms of violence led to technocratic governance, in part promoted and encouraged by the international humanitarian organizations that entered the region aft er 2014. Where war and neoliberalism narrowed horizons for good life,
fragmented technocratic governance limited horizons for political engagement. It also ignored and neglected the potential strengths of inherited socialist state infrastructure that could off er a safety net and a point of reference for citizens’ engagement with the world and each other.
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Keywords
Donbas, emptiness, frontline communities, humanitarianism, infrastructural vulnerability, Russian war in Ukraine
Citation
Ryabchuk A. War on the horizon. Infrastructural vulnerability in frontline communities of the Donbas / Anastasiya Ryabchuk // Focaal : Journal of Global and Historical Anthropology. - 2023. - Vol. 96. - P. 46-56. - https://doi.org/10.3167/fcl.2023.960104