Blog Post 8
I really enjoyed Peter Mueser’s talk about economics. Economics is something that I am really interested in and have considered majoring in it. Instead of majoring in Econ, I am going to minor in it, but it something that fascinates me. Professor Mueser’s talk was informative as he talked about basic economic principles such as the invisible hand and comparative advantage. The invisible hand is something most students learn about in economic’s courses or in a history class because of Adam Smith’s book, The Invisible Hand. The invisible hand describes the benefits that society gets because everyone acts in their own interests. However, the theory of comparative advantage is what interested me the most in Professor Mueser’s talk because people often think that only one country can win from trade. The theory of comparative advantage means that a certain country can produce a certain good more efficiently than another country. It is important to note that if their are two countries and two goods, a country can not have the comparative advantage in producing both of the goods. Comparative advantage allows countries to specialize in certain goods, and thus increase the quality of goods in the economy. One thing that I find difficult about the talk though is the invisible hand is a very capitalistic approach. At the time of the talk I was 100 percent sold on capitalism, however, after some of the talks in class this semester I see some potential drawbacks of capitalism. We discussed in class how capitalism makes people look at other people based on what they can do for the economy, instead of looking at them as a human being. However, I still feel that capitalism is the best system that we currently have in place. We talked in class how democracy is not perfect but it is the best system we have, and that is how I feel about capitalism.
Another talk that I found interesting this semester was Sherry Mariea’s. Professor Mariea is a lawyer and she discussed some of the issues in relation to gender inequality that America faces. Something that I found fascinating was that she said every single female lawyer has been called “honey” at least once by a judge in court. This is disturbing because as Professor Mariea said it shows that judge has a lack of respect for woman. What I found most interesting from her talks was the two stories she told. The first story she talked about was how in law school she had a teacher that was giving many of the boys better grades than girls. So one day Professor Mariea decided to write like a boy and she noticed that she started to get better grades on her test. She explained this was interesting because it shows that the teacher was not purposely giving the woman lower grade, instead it was something that the teacher was not purposely giving girls bad grades, but instead it was something the teacher was subconsciously thinking about. The second story she shared was how she felt like she was not getting respect from some of her male colleagues, so she started to talk about the Yankees. After she proved she knew a lot about sports, those same male colleagues began to give her more respect. Once again, Professor Mariea said that she did not think her male colleagues were purposely disrespecting her, but instead it was something that they were doing subconsciously.
This semester I have learned a good amount of information on Ukraine. To begin, I never knew that Ukraine was ruled by the Soviet Union up until 1991. I learned a lot about the history of Ukraine and why there is tension of the Crimean Peninsula. I gained insight on how the Russian language is prevalent in Ukraine and why that has caused trouble. However, the biggest thing I’ve gained insight to in regards to Ukraine is the on-going humanitarian crisis. Before this course, I knew very little about Ukraine and I did not know that they were experiencing a humanitarian crisis. I remember seeing on the news that Russia took the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine and that resulted in conflict but I do not recall ever hearing about the impact that it has had on citizens in Eastern Ukraine. Overall, researching Ukraine has made me more aware of the problems that exist outside of the United States. Also, it has given me perspective in the sense that I need to be more grateful for the things I have, because there are many people with far greater struggles.
Blog Post 7
Equality Now states that “trafficking women and children for sexual exploitation is the fastest growing criminal enterprise in the world”. What is amazing is that trafficking humans is illegal in international law and the overwhelming majority of countries, but it continues to happen all over the world. This brings up major questions about human rights issues and gender equality. Before my Globalization course I had no clue how big of an issue sex trafficking was, but it is disheartening to see how many women are held as slaves for someone else’s personal gain. Unfortunately, sex trafficking is extremely prevalent in Ukraine, like the majority of the other countries in the world.
News Week reported since 1961 “more than 160,000 men, women, and children have been exploited for labor and sex, according to a report from International Organization for Migration”. Sex trafficking is a very disturbing issue and it is sad that people are taking advantage of woman and children that cannot protect themselves from these criminals. Ukraine’s ministry of Social Policy is working with international NGO’s to finalize their action plan to combat human trafficking (News Week.) Many citizens feel that the government is not doing enough to stop the human sex trafficking that is taking place. The issue of sex slavery in Ukraine is similar to Ukraine’s lack of environmental plan in the sense that the government states they are putting their focus on Russia right now. A member of the Ukrainian government stated “since the security situation started in eastern Ukraine, other things were blocked. All money went to subsidies, to the military, to IDP’s” (News Week). News Week notes how the money the government pledged to provide for the action plan has been reduced by 30 percent, causing foreign governments and aid organizations to have to come up with the other money. The vast majority of Ukrainian’s that are trafficked are women, however, a small percentage of men have been forced to go to Russia to work for the government. It is clear that the Ukrainian government needs to be more committed to stopping sex slavery if they are serious about human right issues. However, it seems that the only thing the Ukrainian government is worried about at the moment is settling their conflict with Russia.
The Born Free article points out how the sex trafficking industry produces anywhere from 32 to 150 billion dollars of revenue every year and that more people are sold into slavery now then the Atlantic Slave Trade. It is amazing to me that this is something that is not constantly being talked about and governments are not putting a focus on. There is only one explanation and that is woman are not being treated as equals to men in today’s world. The Sustainable Development Goals came into effect in 2016 and the document included the issue of sex slavery. The issue of sex slavery being mentioned in the document is not going to put an end to human trafficking but it is a good first step because more people need to become aware of this problem. Second, the government of countries need to put more of an emphasis on stopping sex trafficking, particularity nations like the United States that have all the resources necessary to combat the problem. I cannot speak for other nations but it is clearly seen in Ukraine that the government is not focused on stopping the problem. Finally, society needs to combat the issues of gendercide and begin to treat woman as equals. If we did not have the issue of gendercide in today’s society then the amount of women in sex slavery would be reduced dramatically.
Sources
https://www.equalitynow.org/sex-trafficking-fact-sheet
http://www.newsweek.com/ukraine-human-traffciking-416319
Blog Post 6
In Linda Polman’s “The Crisis Caravan”, she discusses some disturbing issues that are going on in the humanitarian world. Polman gives many examples of what is wrong with the humanitarian world, and the best example from her book was the Rwanda Genocide in Goma. The primary concern in Goma was that the humanitarian’s were helping and feeding the Hutu extremists, who then went on to murder thousands of Tutsi after being constantly fed and taken care of. The idea of the humanitarians helping “the bad guys” is one of the primary concerns that Polman brings up in her book. Humanitarians can help benefit the wrong party by either supplying aid to soldiers or funding their campaign. In Chapter 5 of “The Crisis Caravan” Polman explains how humanitarian groups usually have to pay a tax to the warring party to enter a war zone. Polman explains that “warlords and regimes deluge INGOS with taxes, often invented on the spot (99)”. Later on in the book Polman says that Saddam Hussein’s regime gained nearly 250 million dollars from the UN in 1992 (99). Another issue with humanitarian aid according to Polman’s book is that many of the aid groups have “contract fever” and are helping for the wrong reasons. An American aid group stated “Its perhaps embarrassing to admit but much of the discussion between headquarters and the field on contracts (to implement donor projects) (37)”. In other words, aid groups are more worried about making money at the expense of a disaster, instead of helping people. In our class discussion it was brought up that agencies often leave one country if another disaster happens in order to secure a contract. Unfortunately, most journalists and news outlets only portray the positive things these humanitarian agencies are doing, which is why have such a misconception about humanitarian groups. Polman notes that most media outlets are financed by humanitarian groups so they have an extra incentive to show a bias towards the humanitarian agencies. The final problem with aid that Polman mentions is that people are doing things in countries that they would not be qualified to do in their country. Premed students are doing operations that they do not have the experience or training to perform. MONGOS (MY Own NGO) are typically more worried about spreading their message then helping people. Therefore, Polman comes to a conclusion they we must be careful when we decide if we should help or not and if we do we need to be aware of where our aid is going to.
Polman explains that “aid organizations are businesses dressed up like Mother Theresa (177)” to point out how they are deceiving the public and journalists. The journalists are not being deceived as much as the public, because journalists are being financed by aid organizations more times than not. The primary reason Polman makes the claim about Mother Theresa is because when people see the humanitarians, they are dressed up and portrayed in the media like people who really want to help others. However, most people do not understand that many of these agencies are like corporations and have many people working in a safe office zone back in their home country.
Journalists, the government, and the public all have a role in making humanitarian aid more successful. Journalists need to be more concerned about letting the public know what is going on in areas with humanitarian organizations. The Journalist’s employer should be the one financing trips so that there is no reason for a bias. The government needs to make sure that the aid is reaching the right party and not be persuaded by bribes. If the government of the country that is receiving aid is not stable or known to be corrupt, agencies need to reconsider if they should be helping knowing that some of their aid will be going to the warring party. Finally, the public needs to do their research when they decide to give to aid organizations. As Polman notes, if you are going to be giving aid, you better be sure as to where the aid is going to be going.
Click to access Crisis%20Caravan%20-%201-35.pdf
Click to access Crisis%20Caravan%20-%20172-179.pdf
Click to access Crisis%20Caravan%20-%2036-94.pdf
Click to access Aid%20as%20a%20Weapon%20of%20War.pdf
Blog Post 5
Ukraine is contributing to climate change in a negative way. According to Climatelink.org, Ukraine uses the fifth most amount of energy in the world. There are several reasons as to why Ukraine is not using energy efficiently, Climatelink.org explains that the primary reasons are: “its inefficient energy structure, historically low energy prices and high industrial and agricultural energy sector demands”. A humanitarian crisis in 2015 and the conflict with Russia has caused Ukraine to not put a lot of focus on global warming. It is easy for an outsider to say that Ukraine needs to do more to prevent climate change, however, if one looks into what has been going on in Ukraine the past three years, they would understand why climate change has not been a primary focus in Ukraine.
A ClimateChangenews.com article stated “Ukraine is using conflict with Russian-backed rebels to justify lackluster climate proposals”. The article makes it sound like Ukraine is using a bad excuse, however, I think this is a legitimate “excuse” as Ukraine is looking out for their Civilians. Now, I agree that Ukraine should still put some effort into climate change as the article points out that many countries and the National Ecological Centre of Ukraine (NECU) proposed a plan to help reduce climate change but the Ukrainian government denied it. I think this is wrong, as the world was coming together to help Ukraine and they refused the help (Climatechangenews.com). The director of NCU made a valid claim “We think it is an excuse. War is war, but actually to reduce dependency on Russia we think Ukraine desperately needs energy efficiency the development of renewable resources”. By taking aid from other countries to help the environment, Ukraine could solve two problems. First, they would have more efficient energy which would help the environment. Second, Ukrainian would not need help from Russia, and thus more of the government would realize Russia taking over the Crimea is a violation against their people’s human rights and something needs to be done about it.
The main human rights issues in Ukraine deal with the following: Crimea, lack of legal enforcement, lack of freedom of expression, and corrupt government officials. The main problem is that the Ukrainian government is not doing a whole lot to solve these issues, so instead the people of Ukraine are relying on other countries such as France and the United States for help (https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2017/country-chapters/ukraine). According to the World Report of 2017, the United Nations has done a lot of monitoring in Ukraine and has stated that their have been thousands of innocent people killed due to the conflict in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe sent members to talk to the Ukrainian government about the issue of Human Rights. The world report article states “the UN high commissioner expressed concern over lack protection for civilians living in conflict areas, access to basic services and humanitarian aid, and limited accountability for human rights violations”. It is clear that there are major issues in regards to human rights in Ukraine, unfortunately the government is not taking appropriate action to eliminate these issues.
After explaining climate change and human right issues in Ukraine, it is important to see how climate change is related to human rights. In 2012, an Oregon State Professor stated “Climate change is damaging food supplies, spreading diseases and creating refugees, and it is poised to become the most massive human rights violation the world has ever seen” (http://www.aljazeera.com/humanrights/2013/12/how-climate-change-destroys-human-rights-20131217174532837148.html). As I have mentioned in class, I am taking an environmental studies course and that has helped me better understand the relationship between climate change and human rights. As the world becomes hotter, farm land becomes dryer, but the ocean levels also rises, which is the cause in the increase in natural disasters. Thus, climate change is causing a lack of food supply and an increase in natural disasters, which is causing people to go hungry and have to find new places to live. Both of these issues are major human rights violations as all people deserve access to food and shelter. Also, since climate change increases the temperature of water, that makes it more likely that there will be water borne illnesses in our water. Climate change is something that all governments need to start doing more about if they are serious about humans rights.
Farish Noor says euro centrism is the idea that many people believe that their ideals and culture is much superior than other cultures. One of the main points that Noor makes is that the West is always trying to help other cultures and tell them their way of doing things about human rights, when in reality the west has major issues in regards to class division and racism. Noor explains how “we need to learn to see through the eyes of the other and see what the main concerns are from their viewpoint”. This is a good quote from Noor because instead of listening to other people from different cultures the west tends to do what they believe would be best. Noor adds to this by saying that we need to become aware of other people’s cultures if we are going to be able to help them.
https://www.climatelinks.org/resources/climate-change-risk-profile-ukraine
https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2017/country-chapters/ukraine
Blog Post 4
I am currently taking an environmental study course and we have discussed climate change for the past three weeks. We have done many peer discussions and the general consensus is that we all have a moral obligation to do our part in helping the environment. Now the next question is always: What can I do in my everyday life to make a difference? People can do small things everyday to prevent climate change, such as: carpool with people, ride a bike, switch to energy efficient electric, and consume less meat. An NPR article discussed what went into making a quarter pound hamburger and I was amazed. The NPR article stated that it takes 6.7 pounds of grain to feed the cattle, 53 gallons of water, and 74.5 square feet of land. If we as a society could decide to consume less meat, that would have a big impact on the environment. The more people eat meat, the more deforestation will take place, which is bad for the environment because trees help absorb some of the Carbon Dioxide and other greenhouse gases that are released into the environment.
If society as a whole consumed less meat, the environment would be better off, however, the biggest change can come from world leaders. Unfortunately, some world leaders, such as Donald Trump, dismiss the idea of climate change. A CBS News article cited Trump calling climate change “a Chinese hoax”. World leaders need to become more educated on climate change, so they can inform society about dangers associated with climate change. If world leaders do not all have a general consensus that climate change is a serious issue, then this may be a problem that we are still discussing centuries from now. The Moral Ground book by Watt and Cloutier points out that governments need to “develop technologies that limit the pollution, that limit the greenhouse gases that are the root of the problem”. I feel the biggest issue is that many of the governments want companies to develop these technologies, however, it is obvious corporations are not going to try and develop new technologies when they are profiting millions of dollars. Some governments, as Watt and Cloutier point out “are so damaged by global warming and climate change that relocation is the only option” (26). It is a shame that some governments have to resort to this option, but this shows how serious of a problem climate change is in today’s world.
The biggest environmental issue that is effecting Ukraine is a lack of clean drinking water. Until about three weeks ago, I did not know the link between clean drinking water and climate change. However, my environmental studies professor made it simple for me to understand. The basic idea is that as the temperature increases due to global warming, the sea and river water becomes more contaminated with bacteria and viruses, thus there is less access to clean drinking water. This past June, over 400,000 people were cut off from their water supply in Ukraine due primarily to shelling but also due to infection reaching their water supply (UN.org). In response to this, the United Nations went into Ukraine to deliver clean drinking water. The United Nations article points out that the United Nations appealed for 31.3 million in aid, to help families throughout Ukraine.
Ukraine relies heavily upon its own agriculture, and increasing temperatures could possible hurt there economy and food supply. A Climatelinks.org article points out that the Ukrainian government is not spending much money or giving much support to helping climate change. However, as I mentioned in a previous post, Ukraine has a lot of internal problems along with their conflict with Russia, therefore climate change is not their highest priority right now. The majority of the countries that are putting a lot of focus into climate change, do not have nearly the amount of conflict that Ukraine has.
Sources
http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2012/06/27/155527365/visualizing-a-nation-of-meat-eaters
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/president-trump-to-withdraw-from-paris-climate-agreement/
https://www.climatelinks.org/resources/climate-change-risk-profile-ukraine
Click to access Moral%20Ground%20-%2021-31%281%29.pdf
Blog Post 3
Nationalism is the idea that people think their country is superior to others and they will always be loyal to their country. Their are many positive things about Nationalism and there is nothing wrong with one being loyal to his or her country. Many people think that Nationalism is something that has existed for a long time. However, Nationalism is a relatively knew phenomenon. Before Nationalism people generally identified by their religious affiliation, however, because of the rise of nations, Nationalism slowly begin to form in the early 1900’s (in class notes). In Steger’s book he says ” the modern nation state system found its mature expression at the end of World War I in US President Woodrow Wilson’s famous 14 Points based on the principle of national self determination. In my opinion this happened because there is a lot of passion that goes into war and individuals all believe that their countries were fighting for the right cause.
In Zakaria’s book he gives a few potential problems with Nationalism. Zakaria claims “while economics, information, and even culture might have become globalized, former political power remains firmly tethered to the nation state, even as the nation states are become less able to solve these problems unilaterally. And increasingly, nation states are becoming less willing to come together to solve problems” (34). I think that what Zakaria is saying is that countries believe they are superior to other countries and thus do no need their advice or help with problems. Another problem with Nationalism is that those who are nationalists identify with other nationalists, and can often time demean those who do not identify with them.
Patriotism is defined as vigorously supporting one’s country. Right now, there are many patriotic people in Ukraine who want what is best for their country. That is why we have seen so much conflict in regards to Russia taking over Crimea. Ukraine has recently said they will increase their defense spending by 26 percent in response to the threat from Russia. This is a good sign for the Ukrainian people because it shows that the government is going to support their efforts in stopping Russia.
On the other hand, Nationalism is something that is not widely supported in Ukraine, as only about 4 percent of people voted for the nationalist party in their last election. Marko Bojcun explains how the Ukrainian people for the most part of very tolerant of different backgrounds, however, more people are becoming turned off by Russian culture because of the conflict that they have had with them. Also, Bojcun explains how the far right nationalist party has talked a lot about anti-immigrant laws. This is a perfect example of a negative effect of nationalism: people believe they are superior to another group of people so they do not let them in their country, and if they do they will be stereotyped. There has been some forms of anti-semitism in Ukraine in the past few years but that has been dying out of lately.
Ukrain’s GINI score is 24.9, and remember a countries GINI scored represents its income distribution. Ukraine, along with Norway and Slovenia have the best GINI scores, which means that income distribution is not much of a problem at all in Ukraine.
However, although Ukraine has a good GINI score, that does not necessarily mean everyone is enjoying a large amount of income. The score just means that there is not that big of a gap between the rich and the poor. Ukrain’s GDP per capital is only 2200 U.S dollars, which is not a lot of money for an individual to live off.
Right now the biggest problem with equality deals with the Ukrainian government. There legal system is not perfect in Ukraine, government officials have been known to take bribes, and their have been procedural violations of the law. Many Ukrainian’s believe laws that have been passed are only so the government elite can be segregated from the common people. The biggest response to inequality in Ukraine has been through protest, many of which have been peaceful, but there has also been a fair share of violent protests. I think this is interesting because in America we see many peaceful protests about the inequality that exists and a few violent ones. I think something interesting to consider is maybe there are violent protests in both countries because the groups of people who are feeling the inequality feel this is their only option to change things when a group has been repressed for so long.
Sources
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nikolas-kozloff/interview-what-will-it-ta_b_5606413.html
https://www.kyivpost.com/ukraine-politics/ukraine-increase-defense-spending-quarter-2018.html
Click to access Causes_and_manifestations_of_social_inequality_in_Ukraine.pdf
https://tradingeconomics.com/ukraine/gdp
Ukraine- Current Events
In Europe, Ukraine is the second largest country by area, second to Russia. There has been much conflict between Ukraine and Russia in the past 200 years. Ukraine and Russia had a period of peace until the reign of Joseph Stalin, which led to many people from Ukraine starving to death. After Stalin’s reign, the Crimea was given back to Ukraine, however it was still primarily a Russian speaking region. In 2010, Yanukovych was elected the 4th President of Ukraine. During his reign, he said that Ukraine would become a closer ally to Russia. However, many Ukrainians, harbored ill feelings towards the former USSR government which led to many riots and forced his fleeing as President. This is what led to Russia annexing Crimea and invading part of Ukraine. I thought that it was very important to give some historical context in regards to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine to better understand current events of today.
The biggest current news in Ukraine right now deals with Russia. Russia and Ukraine have a lot of conflict because of the Crimea peninsula. There has been a lot of conflict throughout the last hundred years because of Crimea. In 2014, Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine because of fear of a Revolution. This may in part be true but many think Russia’s interest in Crimea comes down to two factors: black gold and Putin’s desire to have more power.
Just within the past week, Russia has finished off a key part of a bridge that they are building that connects Russia to Crimea. The bridge is over 12 miles long and is expected to open for road traffic in 2018 and trains in 2019. People in Ukraine have access to Crimea by an isthmus. However, in Russia there is no easy access to Crimea, with the only way being by ferry. Therefore, this bridge will allow much easier access to Crimea for the Russians. This act by Russia will clearly irritate the people of Ukraine because they still feel that this land was taken from them.
It is reported that Russia is said to be building up military forces to display their army and power to the rest of Europe. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is said to be monitoring the situation. A NATO official told the media “We have increased our military presence in the eastern part of the alliance in response to Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea and its military buildup in the region”.
According to the world power rankings, Ukraine is ranked 166th. The rankings are based upon many factors, with the main four being: rule of law, government size, open market, and regulatory efficiency. Countries are then grouped into the following categories: free, mostly free, moderately free, mostly unfree, and repressed. Unfortunately, Ukraine is currently sitting in the repressed category. Ukraine’s economy has taken a big hit in the last few years and is in a very fragile state right now. The world ranking website has stated, “Ongoing disruptions of the country’s productive and export capacities and significant capital outflows have put increasing pressure on the currency, severely undermining monetary policy”. It is important to note, that it would be extremely hard for a nation to have control over these issues when they are worrying about being invaded by another country (Russia).
The Fragile States Index aims to report a states vulnerability to fall apart. The scale is based from 0-120, with 0 being the most stable. Ukraine’s FSI scores comes in at 74, which is ranked 90th out of 178 countries. From 2007- 2014, Ukraine had a score in the high 60’s, however, that score has risen because of their conflict with Russia. In order for Ukraine to get this score back in the 60’s they must solve their conflict with Russia, hopefully in a peaceful manner.
Sources
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/17/ukraine-sues-russia-crimea-annexation-on-going-war/
http://www.heritage.org/index/country/ukraine
http://fundforpeace.org/fsi/country-data/
BLOG POST 2
What language is spoken in Ukraine is something that is relevant to what is going on in Ukraine today. There has been a lot of conflict in Ukraine, and in 2012 there was riots about rather or not the Russian language should be official recognized in Ukraine. A law past that made Russian a regional language, which meant that it could be used in schools and court. Ukrainian is the official language of Ukraine, however, this law made Russian much more prevalent. This only heightened the tension between Ukraine and Russia as most Ukrainian’s have been trying to get rid of their “post Soviet identity”. A member of Ukraine’s government said ” With this law, the Russian language will become a de facto government language for eastern Ukraine. Its very dangerous for Ukraine. It can lead to the division of the country”. The Russian language is spoken by a good majority of the country, here is an image that shows how what percent of people in different regions of Ukraine speak Russian.
In most countries, many different languages are spoken, but there is not a lot of conflict because of it. For instance, In America, English is the primary language but Spanish is also widely used. There is not any conflict with this because there are not as bad relationships between people who speak Spanish and English, like there are with Ukraine and Russia. I feel that for many Ukrainians, this law was sort of a tipping point for them. My previous post talks about how much conflict the Crimean peninsula has caused, so this law about schools and courts being able to speak Russian only furthered these tensions. I feel where the Ukrainian people are coming from because they are trying to have their own identity and their own government approves a law that they knew would upset their people. I would be extremely upset too if my government did something to help a country that my nation was not at peace with it, it almost feels like betrayal in a sense.
There are 22 languages that are listed as being spoken in Ukraine. Out of those 22, 10 of them are indigenous languages. These indigenous languages do not cause much problems in Ukraine because the overwhelming majority of people still speak Ukrainian. As mentioned, the main problem in Ukraine in regards to language is the law that was passed about Russian usage in schools and courts.
Ukraine is a member of the UN, IMF, and WTO. Ukraine is one of the founding members of the United Nations (UN) along with the United States of America. Ukraine has been a member of the UN since 1945. There are 5 permanent members of the UN’s security council, and 10 non permanent members that are elected for two year terms, with Ukraine being one of those non permanent members. The primary role that the UN’s security council members do is try to make sure there is peace with between other countries. The International Monetary fund (IMF) is an organization that provides finances to member countries when they are in need of it. The IMF was first started because of the effects of the Great Depression. Ukraine has been a member of the IMF since 1992 and recently received a billion dollars from the IMF. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an agency that regulates foreign trade between other nations. Ukraine has been a member of the WTO since 2008. Ukraine does the same thing that the other members of the WTO do: agree to laws and rules in regards to foreign trade.
The GINI coefficient measures income equality in countries. Ukraine has a GINI coefficient score of 24.9. This number has been a lot lower than it has been in the past for Ukraine. A score of 100 would represent 100 percent inequality, so a score of 24.9 is a pretty good number.
Sources:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jul/04/ukrainians-protest-russian-language-law
https://www.ethnologue.com/country/UA
http://www.investopedia.com/articles/03/030703.asp
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/SIPOVGINIUKR
https://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/whatis_e/whatis_e.htm
EUROPE PEACE STUDIES! 