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U.S. Sanctions on Rosneft and Lukoil: Pressure on Moscow, Strains on Europe

Posted on December 8, 2025 | Policy Brief

The U.S. sanctions on two Russian oil giants, Rosneft and Lukoil, came into effect on Nov 21, 2025. These sanctions affect not only companies per se but also their counterparties worldwide under the secondary sanctions clause. For the EU, these sanctions highlight a central trade-off: how to exert real pressure on Russia without fracturing political alignment among EU Member States. This brief discusses the consequences of the sanctions, including their immediate impact on the firms and Russia’s budget, the new tensions exposed in Europe’s energy policy, and the broader lessons for the next generation of EU sanctions tools.

The Threat of Secondary Sanctions

On 22 October 2025, the United States imposed sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil. At the time, the measures appeared symbolically significant: they were the first sanctions package introduced by the new Trump administration and were coordinated with the EU’s 19th sanctions package, giving the impression of renewed transatlantic alignment after a long period of fragmentation and uncertainty. The announcement reportedly caught Mr Putin off guard. This reaction highlights how unexpected the measures were, given President Trump’s rhetoric and the geopolitical positioning many observers had anticipated he would adopt.

Although, in retrospect, that initial sense of alignment appears more fragile, given other political developments during November, the sanctions that formally came into effect once the wind-down period ended on 21 November are likely to be consequential, both for the target companies and for the Russian federal budget. To understand this impact, it is essential to look at how U.S. sanctions operate in practice, especially the leverage created by secondary sanctions.

When the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designates an entity for sanctions, it warns that any financial institution dealing with that entity may itself become exposed to penalties. In particular, OFAC notes that foreign banks engaging in significant transactions for a sanctioned person risk the imposition of so-called secondary sanctions. In practical terms, OFAC can bar such a bank from accessing the U.S. financial system if it knowingly carries out, or helps carry out, a transaction for someone under U.S. sanctions. Losing this access means losing the ability to use U.S. dollar accounts and payment channels.

This is precisely why OFAC’s sanctions are so widely feared: almost every dollar transaction in the world ultimately passes through a U.S. correspondent bank. Even two foreign banks trading dollars in Asia or Africa must clear their payments through the United States. If OFAC cuts a bank off from that system, it is effectively locked out of the dollar economy, and in the global economy, losing access to dollars is like losing access to oxygen.

The power of secondary sanctions becomes visible in how different actors react to the risk. Swiss trader Gunvor abruptly withdrew, and later publicly denied, its bid to acquire Lukoil’s international business once the sanctions exposure became apparent. In Bulgaria, the government moved to take control of Lukoil’s Burgas refinery because, once sanctions took effect, counterparties were likely to refuse payments to a sanctioned entity, forcing the refinery to shut down. This temporary state takeover has been tacitly tolerated so far, as it was deemed necessary to maintain Bulgaria’s fuel security. The same logic drove Viktor Orbán to rush to Washington to secure guarantees for Hungary’s fuel supplies, resulting in a one-year exemption from U.S. measures. In short, the threat of secondary sanctions is real and shapes major commercial and political decisions alike.

Economic Implications for the Targets

Given the far-reaching implications of OFAC sanctions, the economic impacts are potentially significant. Following the announcement in October, financial markets reacted immediately. Lukoil’s share price fell by around 9.4 percent, while Rosneft’s declined by approximately 7 percent. This asymmetry reflects the companies’ different exposure profiles. Lukoil, as a more private and internationally exposed firm, is significantly more vulnerable than Rosneft, whose operations are more domestically anchored and politically protected.

The sanctions raise the prospect of forced divestments of Lukoil’s foreign assets, likely at significantly reduced valuations due to the limited pool of potential buyers willing to engage with sanctioned entities. Even when divestment is not formally mandated, the measures can make it effectively impossible for the companies to repatriate dividends from their overseas holdings, as financial intermediaries are unlikely to process payments involving sanctioned actors. This constitutes an immediate loss of income, besides the longer-term loss of strategic presence in Europe.

Figure 1. Map of Lukoil’s foreign assets

Source: Bloomberg. The map includes the headquarters of the international marketing and trading arm, LITASCO SA, based in Geneva.

Operationally, both firms face higher costs and greater frictions. Sanctions increase the risk for suppliers, banks, insurers, and logistics partners, who now must factor in secondary sanctions exposure when doing business with Lukoil or Rosneft. This narrows the pool of potential counterparties and scares away buyers.

These dynamics are already visible in the adjustment patterns of major international buyers of Russian oil, notably India and China. There, the adjustment is expected to be sharper for India than for China. This is because India is more dependent on the dollar, given the rupee’s status, while trade with Russia is not as diversified to allow for barter-like arrangements (as Russia reportedly resorted to with China). Several major Indian refiners reportedly began planning to halt or scale back purchases of Russian crude. However, the grace period allowed India to stock up: according to tracking firm Kpler, India’s Russian oil imports reached 1.855 million barrels per day (bpd) in November, a five-month high, reflecting a rush to secure barrels ahead of the sanctions deadline. But for December, the same sources project a drop to 600,000–650,000 bpd, a three-year low in Russian oil shipments to India.

About 40-45 percent of China’s oil imports from Russia are also affected by these sanctions, and Chinese buyers, especially the smaller independent refiners but even some state-owned ones, are being more careful.

By and large, though, export volumes are unlikely to decline significantly in the near term, given the extensive circumvention networks and practices already in place. Nevertheless, financial effects are increasingly visible, not least due to another effect of the sanctions – buyers being able to extract deeper discounts, further compressing Russia’s earnings. There are already multiple reports of Urals trading at its steepest discount in a year, sometimes several dollars per barrel below Brent. The discount widened from USD11–12/bbl (before Oct 22 sanctions) to USD19–20/bbl by early November, and reportedly as wide as USD20–23.5/bbl by mid-November.

Figure 2. Urals–Brent discount, widening after sanctions.

Source: TradingEconomics.com.

 

According to CREA’s fossil fuel tracker for October 2025, “Russia’s monthly fossil fuel export revenues saw a 4 percent month-on-month decline to EUR 524 million (mn) per day — the lowest they have been since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.” This corresponds to a 15 percent year-on-year drop in fossil fuel export revenues and resulted in a 26 percent year-on-year drop in tax revenues from oil and gas exports.

Over the medium to long term, these commercial pressures may accumulate and become consequential. Higher operating costs and lower revenues mean that both companies will have less capital available for investment. Because Russia’s upstream sector is both capital-intensive and dominated by Rosneft and Lukoil, with limited scope for independent or foreign producers to expand under current political and sanctions constraints, any sustained under-investment by these two companies is unlikely to be compensated by market reorganization. This raises the risk of faster production declines and a longer-term weakening of the entire industry.

Implications for the Russian State Budget

Lukoil and Rosneft are the two largest taxpayers in Russia, contributing through a broad range of fiscal streams and payments associated with state-owned infrastructure. In Rosneft’s case, where the state holds a majority stake, dividends are also a source of federal revenue. Any reduction in company profitability, therefore, translates directly into lower tax payments and smaller dividends.

Sanctions-driven increases in shipping, insurance, and compliance costs will further compress margins and reduce the tax base. The loss of foreign assets, or their sale at distressed prices, diminishes both current profit tax liabilities and future dividend streams.

Some taxes, such as the mineral extraction tax (MET), are based on production volumes rather than profitability, which reduces the immediate fiscal impact. But as profitability declines, and especially if the sector’s investment levels fall, the medium-term fiscal losses become more substantial as reduced investment ultimately erodes production volumes.

All in all, Rosneft and Lukoil together produce between 40 and 50 percent of the national oil output. Although the share of oil and gas revenues in the federal budget has decreased from the historical 35–40 percent to 25-30 percent, the potential fiscal impact remains substantial. According to Reuters, projected oil revenues for the current month are roughly 35 percent lower than in the same month of 2024, marking the weakest level in two and a half years.

Uneven Burden-sharing in the EU

These sanctions also carry costs for the EU itself. Their impact is felt unevenly across Member States, largely reflecting differences in pre-war dependence on Russian oil and gas. This is why EU sanctions on Russian energy have consistently included exceptions for highly dependent Member States in Central Europe, notably Hungary and Slovakia (and, before, Czechia). The Council explicitly acknowledged these exemptions were justified on the grounds of security of supply and fairness, recognizing that certain countries faced structural reliance on Russian oil and lacked immediate alternatives (Council Decision (EU) 2022/879 and the EU’s 6th package). At the same time, the financial significance of these exemptions for the EU’s pressure on Russia is very limited. According to CREA’s data for October 2025, Hungary purchased EUR 258 million of Russian fossil fuels that month and Slovakia EUR 210 million. This constitutes less than 4% of Russia’s global fossil-fuel export revenues for that month.

However, these exemptions produced asymmetric outcomes within the EU, complicating EU unity. Countries that retained access to Russian crude, typically priced below global benchmarks and substantially cheaper than LNG-based alternatives, effectively enjoyed a cost advantage over Member States that had already diversified or lost access to Russian supplies. They have avoided abrupt supply disruptions but also benefited from lower-cost inputs, while others absorbed higher market prices and the capital expenditure needed to secure alternative supply chains (including LNG terminals, new interconnectors, or upgrades to refineries).

The sanctions on Rosneft, Lukoil, and their EU subsidiaries offer a good example of how uneven the impact of energy measures can be across Member States. Rosneft holds significant shares in three German refineries, together accounting for around 12 percent of Germany’s refining capacity, but these assets have been under German state trusteeship since 2022 — meaning that Rosneft is still the legal owner, yet it no longer controls day-to-day operations. Lukoil, by contrast, directly owns major refineries in Bulgaria (Neftochim Burgas) and Romania (Petrotel Ploiești), and has a large stake in a Dutch refinery. For years, the countries hosting these assets benefited from cheaper Russian crude and gasoline, slower pressure to diversify, and more lenient implementation of EU sanctions.

As sanctions tighten and divestment of Russian-owned assets in Europe becomes unavoidable, these states now face higher prices and costly adjustments. In this sense, the current phase can be seen as a rebalancing act: the advantages these countries once enjoyed are gradually diminishing as their energy prices converge with those of other member states. At the same time, their exposure to supply disruptions may even be increasing, given the lack of earlier investment in diversifying their energy import sources.

But the politics remain contentious. Hungary’s push for renewed derogations and Slovakia’s threat in March 2025 to block EU support for Ukraine unless gas transit via Ukraine is reopened to Slovakia and Western Europe show how differing energy profiles still shape national positions on sanctions.

In the long term, however, solidarity cannot mean accepting the structurally uneven burden-sharing of sanctions costs. EU solidarity principles (reflected in the Treaties, the Clean Energy Package, and crisis-response mechanisms such as the 2022 gas solidarity regulation) imply that Member States should support one another to withstand shocks, not that some should bear permanent disadvantages. As highlighted in the energy-security literature, especially in the work of Le Coq and Paltseva (2009, 2012, 2022, or 2025), solidarity can be viewed as a mutual insurance mechanism that is most effective when tied to interconnection and diversification, enabling states with asymmetric exposure to external energy suppliers to cope with disruptions without undermining collective action.

Following this logic, solidarity should be understood as doing as much as possible to ensure that the Member States most exposed to Russian oil and gas are sufficiently integrated into the EU system—through stronger interconnections, diversified supply routes, and access to alternative sources—so that they can sustain tougher sanctions without requiring permanent derogations. The EU’s challenge, therefore, is to ensure a more even sharing of the sanctions’ burden, preventing any Member State from systematically free-riding by shifting the costs of sanctioning Russia (or other common policies) onto others, while preserving political cohesion.

Conclusion

The analysis of this episode carries important implications for EU policy.

First, it underscores both the strategic potential and the political limits of secondary sanctions as a policy tool. Legally, the EU’s treaties constrain extraterritorial action and anchor the Union in a territorial understanding of jurisdiction; furthermore, this take is consistent with the EU’s long-standing identity as a regulatory—rather than coercive—power. Practically, the Union lacks the federal-level enforcement structures needed to police foreign actors across jurisdictions. Politically, the use of secondary sanctions remains divisive: they raise concerns about infringing third countries’ sovereignty, provoking retaliation against EU trade, constraining diplomatic flexibility, and straining relations with key partners in the Global South. Member States’ exposure to international trade and to specific partners such as China, India, Türkiye, and the Gulf varies widely, making consensus difficult. At the same time, EU firms are deeply embedded in global supply chains, and the euro lacks the dollar’s reach, increasing the risk that aggressive measures, such as secondary sanctions, could accelerate de-euroization.

Within these constraints, the EU has opted for more limited, quasi-extraterritorial tools—most notably the “no-Russia clause”, which requires that EU exporters include a contractual ban on re-exporting their goods to Russia —to approximate the effects of secondary sanctions without formally adopting them. This calibrated approach has so far allowed the Union to signal resolve while limiting geopolitical and economic risks. But as U.S. secondary sanctions increasingly shape global trade patterns in ways that affect the EU, the question of whether this strategy remains sufficient is becoming harder to avoid.

Second, the episode highlights the need to make burden-sharing within common EU policies, including sanctions, more transparent and more equitable. Derogations for highly exposed Member States were justified in the short run on security-of-supply grounds, but their continuation produced persistent asymmetries in costs and benefits across the Union. These disparities have shaped national positions on sanctions, complicated collective decision-making, and, in some cases, been leveraged as political bargaining tools. As sanctions become a more permanent feature of the EU’s external action, clearer mechanisms will be needed to ensure that no Member State can systematically shift the economic or political costs of common measures onto others. This may involve revisiting the design of derogations, considering compensatory financial instruments, or more closely integrating sanctions policy with energy, industrial, and fiscal planning.

Ultimately, the credibility of the EU’s sanctions strategy will depend on its ability to align legal constraints, geopolitical ambition, and fair burden-sharing into a single, coherent framework.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

Humanitarian Demining and Ukraine’s Recovery: Lessons Yet to Learn

Posted on December 1, 2025 | Policy Brief

This policy brief examines how land mine action underpins Ukraine’s reconstruction and economic renewal. It outlines the current scale of contamination and the national humanitarian demining strategy. The brief also reviews international experience from countries around the world, discussing the economic recovery driven by demining and the economic efficiency of mine action. It documents significant variation in direct mine action costs across countries and contexts, complicating the assessment of these costs in the case of Ukraine. The brief also discusses the indirect costs arising from systemic inefficiencies in Ukraine’s demining effort, including fragmented governance, shortages of qualified personnel, outdated standards, and security constraints. It concludes that Ukraine’s success in transforming demining into a catalyst for recovery depends on effective coordination, data-driven planning, gender inclusion, and the adoption of best international practices.

Understanding the Scale and Current Need for Humanitarian Demining in Ukraine

As of mid-2025, approximately 137,000 km² of Ukrainian land remains potentially contaminated by mines and unexploded ordnance (UXO). While this is a reduction from 174,000 km² at the end of 2022, Ukraine remains one of the most mine-contaminated countries in the world (Ministry of Economy of Ukraine, 2023; UDA, 2025).

The problem of demining is multidimensional, encompassing both humanitarian and economic consequences. More than six million people currently live in at-risk areas, and the number of mine incidents has already exceeded one thousand. Without addressing the problem, the number of victims could rise to more than 9,000 by 2030 (Ministry of Economy of Ukraine, 2023). Contamination affects some of the world’s most fertile agricultural regions, as well as energy, transport, and residential zones.

The funding needs are substantial. According to UNDP (2024), Ukraine’s total demining bill could reach USD 34–35 billion, requiring tens of thousands of trained specialists. As of early 2025, Ukraine has more than 4,500 sappers and deminers, but this number remains far below national needs. Experts emphasize that the workforce must increase significantly to ensure the timely clearance of contaminated territories. At present, approximately 87 mine-action operators are active in Ukraine, encompassing government bodies, private companies, humanitarian organizations, and international partners (UN Women Ukraine, 2025).

At the same time, the potential economic benefits of demining are immense. According to the TBI (2024) estimates, Ukraine loses about USD 11.2 billion each year (compared to 2021) due to mine contamination. Frontline regions such as Kharkiv, Mykolaiv, Sumy, and Chernihiv are particularly exposed, experiencing a reduction in exports of USD 8.9 billion and a loss of regional tax revenues of USD 1.1 billion annually.

In addressing the problem, the government has recently adopted a National Mine Action Strategy until 2033, which aims to clear about 80% of the de-occupied territories within 10 years (Ministry of Economy of Ukraine, 2024). However, this ambitious plan faces serious systemic challenges, including the dispersion of power among government agencies, insufficient and inconsistent funding, and delays in public procurement and tender processes (UDA, 2025). Thus, humanitarian demining stands at the crossroads of Ukraine’s security and economic recovery, affecting how quickly the country can restore farmland, rebuild infrastructure, and attract investment. Its success depends on efficient resource use, data-driven planning, and the adoption of proven international practices. The following sections examine global experience and economic efficiency in mine action, as well as the key challenges Ukraine must address to achieve tangible and sustainable recovery.

Evidence and Lessons from Global Experience

The problem of humanitarian demining is widespread globally, affecting dozens of post-conflict states across Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Europe. Many of these countries, such as Afghanistan, Mozambique, Eritrea, Sudan, Sri Lanka, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Croatia, have already undergone large-scale clearance operations and provide tangible evidence of how demining drives economic recovery and social stabilization.

In Afghanistan, humanitarian demining produced wide-ranging socio-economic benefits. It vastly improved mobility and access to resources and markets, served as a prerequisite for broader development initiatives, restored agricultural productivity and employment, and positively influenced mental health and community relations by reducing fear, enabling return, and rebuilding trust within affected populations (UNMAS, 2021).

In Mozambique, large-scale railway clearance reopened a key regional trade corridor, creating more than 400 jobs. The operation restored transport connectivity, enabled the renewal of coal exports, and stimulated agricultural and industrial recovery in the surrounding areas (Lundberg, 2006). In Eritrea, humanitarian demining enabled the return of more than 20,000 refugees within a year, which allowed about 29 villages to resume crop cultivation and schooling; casualty rates for both residents and livestock fell to zero, restoring local food security and rural incomes (Lundberg, 2006).

Sudan offers a contrasting case, where political and logistical barriers pushed costs to nearly USD 45 per m² (Bolton, 2008). Despite high costs, the reopened transport corridors and access to markets demonstrated substantial humanitarian and trade benefits, underscoring that elevated expenditure in complex terrains can still deliver strong socio-economic returns.

Post-war European experiences reinforce these findings. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, humanitarian demining has served as a foundation for sustainable socio-economic recovery, enabling the rebuilding of housing and infrastructure, reducing flood risks, restoring agricultural and forest productivity, improving access to water, and ensuring safe mobility essential for trade and community development (GICHD & UNDP, 2022). Similarly, mine clearance in Croatia has been pivotal to national recovery, restoring access to agricultural and forest land, enabling infrastructure and EU-funded development projects, and supporting tourism and investment in previously contaminated regions (Mine Action Review, 2021).

Collectively, these cases demonstrate that the economic dividends of demining are consistent across contexts. Clearing mines enables agricultural revival, facilitates transport and trade, lowers accident-related health costs, and strengthens confidence in governance. However, incomplete data and fragmented decision-making might delay land release and inflate costs.

For Ukraine, where contamination covers more than 137,000 km² of high-value farmland and industrial zones, these global lessons confirm that mine action must be integrated as a central pillar of the reconstruction process.

Measuring the Economic Efficiency of Humanitarian Demining: Indicators and Limitations

The Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining, in its recent report, defines efficiency in demining as “a measure of how economically resources or inputs are converted to results” (GICHD, 2023, p. 6). In humanitarian demining, this means achieving the maximum area of land safely released or the largest number of explosive items cleared using the least possible resources, without compromising safety. Efficiency, however, differs from effectiveness which is defined in the report as “the extent to which the intervention’s objectives were achieved, or are expected to be achieved, taking into account their relative importance” (GICHD, 2023, p.6).

Yet, the quantitative framework developed by GICHD primarily focuses on efficiency indicators, particularly cost-based metrics such as cost per square meter of land released, cost per square meter of land fully cleared, and cost per explosive item found. This narrow focus allows for financial comparison but risks overlooking effectiveness dimensions such as the humanitarian, developmental, and social outcomes of mine clearance.

To operationalize this concept, the GICHD study developed a framework of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to measure economic efficiency across 17 mine-affected countries between 2015 and 2019 (GICHD, 2023, pp.14-17). Three indicators are identified as central for assessing the financial efficiency of mine action operations:

  1. Cost per square metre of land released – measuring the overall cost of returning territory to productive use, encompassing land cleared, reduced, and cancelled. A lower value indicates greater cost efficiency in land release and better-targeted survey and clearance operations.
  2. Cost per square metre of land cleared – reflecting the technical cost of full clearance, which is higher due to intensive labour, equipment, and safety requirements.
  3. Cost per explosive item found – linking financial inputs to tangible outputs, i.e., the average expenditure needed to locate and neutralize one explosive ordnance.

These metrics allow analysts and policymakers to assess how funds are transformed into measurable clearance outcomes. However, as GICHD (2023) stresses, they should be used for internal evaluation and planning, not for direct comparison between countries. Differences in contamination types, topography, labour costs, access, and national data systems make cross-country benchmarking misleading. The report explicitly cautions that “no country should be considered as having a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ performance in terms of operational efficiency purely on the basis of the KPI values” (GICHD, 2023, p.21). Even similar indicators can yield different implications depending on whether operations are clearance-driven (activity-based) or survey-driven (decision-based). To illustrate the scale and variation in demining costs globally, Table 1 presents key indicators of humanitarian demining costs as of 30 November 2022.

As shown in Table 1, costs per square meter of released territory range from USD 0.02/m² (Thailand) to USD 5.87/m² (Lebanon), i.e., a 293-fold difference. Similarly, the cost per explosive item ranged from USD 274 (Sri Lanka) to USD 13,450 (Croatia) (Rohozian, 2024). Such disparities illustrate that comparing “price per m²” without context or establishing the “benchmark” in the field is quite problematic.

Table 1. Key indicators of the cost of demining across countries, as of 30 Nov. 2022

State  Cost per square meter of territory released from the local socio-economic system, USD Cost per square meter of territory that has been cleared in the local socio-economic system, USD Cost of a single found explosive item in the local socio-economic system, USD
Angola 0,32 7,88 9042
Afghanistan 0,79 1,48 911
Bosnia and Herzegovina 0,36 19,06 6059
Vietnam 0,28 0,65 500
Western Sahara 0,41 0,51 2183
Zimbabwe 1,89 4,49 289
Iraq 0,81 1,32 4437
Cambodia 0,22 0,37 678
Laos 0,99 0,99 356
Lebanon 5,87 10,65 2204
South Sudan 0,49 4,07 5667
Serbia 1,07 1,96 9757
Sudan 2,89 5,78 457
Tajikistan 1,29 1,98 1721
Thailand 0,02 2,25 281
Croatia 1,03 1,23 13450
Sri Lanka 2,26 3,65 274

Source: Rohozian, 2024.

Moreover, the study acknowledges limitations in data standardisation and completeness. Variations in how organisations record and report costs affect comparability. Aggregated national averages can obscure contextual factors such as contamination density or security conditions. For these reasons, GICHD recommends interpreting efficiency metrics in conjunction with qualitative information, including terrain, contamination type, and labour structure, and always balancing cost-efficiency with safety and effectiveness.

However, drawing on global patterns and Ukraine’s official USD 34–35 billion cost estimate, we can expect Ukraine to fall within the middle range of international demining costs. It will likely be more expensive than low-cost cases in Asian contexts but substantially below the extreme-cost cases, such as Lebanon, due to its terrain, institutional capacity, and ability to scale mechanized clearance.

Challenges in Ukraine’s Humanitarian Demining

In addition to the substantial direct costs of humanitarian demining, it is essential to understand the indirect costs generated by systemic inefficiencies, i.e., costs that arise not from clearance itself, but from delays, duplication, weak coordination, and different shortages.

A review of Ukraine’s current mine-action landscape allows us to identify the main structural challenges that contribute to elevated indirect costs. These include fragmented governance, incomplete and inconsistent data, security-related access constraints, and a shortage of trained personnel.

One of the most pressing challenges is the fragmentation of coordination and governance. Responsibilities remain dispersed across numerous actors, including the Ministry of Defence, the State Emergency Service, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Economy, the National Mine Action Authority, and over 20 accredited NGOs and private contractors.

According to the UDA (2025), this overlap of mandates and inconsistent prioritisation frameworks frequently results in duplicated surveys and delayed task approvals, reducing efficiency and transparency. At the same time, the idea of consolidating all authority within a single centralised body would risk excessive concentration of power and reduced accountability. A more effective path forward would be to strengthen the existing Mine Action Center’s coordinating role while maintaining clear institutional separation between policymaking and operational implementation, ensuring transparency, competition, and sustained donor confidence.

A persistent shortage of qualified personnel represents one of the most critical challenges to scaling up humanitarian demining in Ukraine. According to UNDP (2025), the country currently employs around 4,500 trained deminers, while full national recovery will require at least 10,000 professionals over the next decade (TBI, 2024). The workforce is under pressure from wartime mobilization, which diverts potential recruits to defense roles, and from a shortage of experienced supervisors and explosive ordnance disposal (EOD) specialists, limiting the number of teams that can safely operate simultaneously. The National Mine Action Strategy for the Period up to 2033 (Ministry of Economy of Ukraine, 2024) further acknowledges that Ukraine’s training system is inadequate for the sector’s needs.

Current state-level training for the profession of “Sapper (demining)” follows military-oriented standards that demand extensive time and resources but offer limited relevance to humanitarian operations. Only ten educational institutions are licensed to train deminers, and only a few conduct active courses. To close this capacity gap, the Strategy calls for expanding domestic training infrastructure, establishing accredited qualification centers, recognizing informal and partial training, and developing new professional standards tailored to humanitarian demining.

Another set of pressing challenges in Ukraine’s humanitarian demining effort concerns data deficits and security limitations. Incomplete and inconsistent mapping of hazardous areas continues to undermine planning and coordination. According to the Ministry of Economy (2023), Ukraine inherited multiple legacy databases using different coordinate systems and lacking harmonized metadata, resulting in duplication and delays in verifying “released” land. The absence of a unified digital mine-action information management system constrains both operational oversight and donor transparency. As Rohozian (2024) observes, such imperfect information leads to “erroneous management decisions” that increase total costs and prolong recovery.

In addition, large areas in the east and south remain off-limits due to ongoing hostilities, unexploded ordnance, and damaged infrastructure. Fluctuating front lines, dense contamination, and logistical barriers raise insurance and hazard-pay costs, shorten fieldwork periods, and cause rapid equipment deterioration.

Thus, addressing these interconnected challenges is essential to accelerate Ukraine’s reconstruction and ensure that mine action effectively supports the safe return of communities, the revival of agricultural production, and the broader recovery of the national economy.

The Role of Women in Humanitarian Demining

The role of women in Ukraine’s humanitarian demining sector deserves special attention, as they have become an integral part of the national workforce serving as deminers, team leaders, and technical-survey dog handlers. Their growing participation reflects both professional competence and the importance of gender-inclusive recovery efforts (UN Women Ukraine, 2025).

However, until 2017, Ukrainian legislation classified demining as a “dangerous profession,” barring women from formal employment in this field (Ministry of Health of Ukraine, 2017). Following sustained advocacy by international organizations, this restriction was lifted, granting women official access to mine-action professions. Since then, the number of women in operational and leadership roles has grown steadily.

Nevertheless, persistent stereotypes suggesting that demining is unsuitable for women have been disproved by practice, as reported by UN Women Ukraine, 2025. In practice, modern safety protocols and technologies such as drones and remotely operated vehicles allow women and men to perform tasks under equal safety conditions.

Following the lifting of the employment ban in 2017, which opened demining professions to women, mine-action organizations began reconsidering how to better meet women’s practical needs in the field. Recognizing that protective gear and uniforms had long been designed for men, many operators are now adapting equipment to fit women’s bodies, enhancing both comfort and operational efficiency.

These findings further demonstrate that gender-inclusive employment contributes to a reconstruction process that benefits all citizens and fosters social recovery based on principles of equity and shared responsibility.

Conclusions

In conclusion, humanitarian demining represents a strategic prerequisite for Ukraine’s reconstruction, food security, and long-term economic recovery. International experience demonstrates that mine clearance delivers substantial socio-economic dividends by restoring access to land, enabling trade, and rebuilding local livelihoods. However, the economic efficiency of mine action cannot be measured through simple cross-country comparisons. Costs per square meter or per explosive item differ widely depending on terrain, contamination density, labor costs, and institutional frameworks. Therefore, efficiency should be evaluated in context, i.e., by how well resources are transformed into measurable recovery outcomes without compromising safety or inclusiveness.

For Ukraine, transforming demining into a genuine driver of recovery requires addressing several domestic challenges. Fragmented governance and overlapping mandates continue to reduce coordination and transparency, while limited training capacity and workforce shortages constrain operational progress. Inconsistent data systems and incomplete mapping impede strategic planning, and security conditions still restrict access to large contaminated areas in the east and south of Ukraine. Overcoming these barriers will require strengthening the coordinating role of the National Mine Action Center and expanding professional education and certification programs.

Equally important, the growing participation of women in mine action deserves special recognition. Since the 2017 reform that lifted employment restrictions, women have become active as deminers, team leaders, and survey specialists, demonstrating both competence and leadership in this traditionally male-dominated field. Promoting gender-balanced participation will strengthen Ukraine’s mine action capacity and align reconstruction with broader principles of equality and social inclusion.

Thus, ensuring that clearance efforts are efficient, transparent, data-driven, and inclusive will determine how effectively Ukraine can restore productive land, rebuild infrastructure, and regain investor confidence.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

Saving Lives During War: How to Make Evacuation Messages More Effective

Posted on November 26, 2025 | Policy Brief

When war threatens civilian populations, effective evacuation messages can mean the difference between life and death. Drawing on a controlled survey experiment conducted with 2,006 Ukrainians during the 2022 Russian invasion, we find that providing clear evacuation plans dramatically improves a message’s perceived effectiveness, while sophisticated message framing makes little difference. Our results indicate that people facing war are not naive about dangers—they need practical information on how to escape, not persuasion about why they should leave. This is especially true for those who do not have the means to evacuate autonomously. These findings offer guidance for authorities and humanitarian organizations: focus on providing concrete evacuation logistics rather than crafting perfect messaging.

The Life-or-Death Challenge of Wartime Evacuations

Each year, tens of thousands of civilians die in armed conflicts worldwide. Many of these deaths could be prevented through timely evacuations from danger zones. Yet despite imminent threats, many civilians hesitate to leave their homes. Understanding how to increase the effectiveness of evacuation messages has become a critical challenge for saving lives.

In July 2022, five months into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, we conducted the first experimental study testing the effectiveness of evacuation messages during an active war. Working with 2,006 Ukrainians from regions directly affected by combat, focusing on areas that experienced occupation, shelling, and ground fighting, we tested two fundamental approaches to improving evacuation messaging.

Figure 1. Surveyed regions with the relative share of respondents.

Source: Martinez et al. (2025)

 

Testing What Works: Plans vs. Persuasion

Our experiment compared two strategies:

Strategy 1: Persuasive Nudges

We tested different message framings inspired by behavioral economics, emphasizing either the gains from evacuating (saving lives) or losses from staying (risking death), and highlighting either deteriorating living conditions or benefits to military effectiveness. These techniques have proven effective in other contexts, from increasing vaccination rates to promoting energy conservation.

Strategy 2: Practical Evacuation Plans

We tested whether adding concrete evacuation instructions improved message effectiveness. Half of our messages included specific details: free buses available at designated locations, phone numbers for reserving seats, and clear departure times.

Participants evaluated how effective each message would be in convincing residents of their city to evacuate, using a scale from 0 (completely ineffective) to 10 (very effective).

Key Finding: People Need Logistics, Not Persuasion

Our results deliver a clear message for policymakers and humanitarian organizations:

Providing evacuation plans works

Messages that included concrete evacuation plans were rated approximately 5% more effective than those without. This improvement is both statistically significant and practically meaningful—in Donetsk oblast alone, where 350,000 civilians remained in Ukrainian-controlled areas during our study, a 5% increase in evacuation rates could mean 17,500 additional lives moved to safety.

Message framing makes little difference

Surprisingly, none of our carefully crafted persuasive messages performed better than a simple, standard evacuation notice. Whether we emphasized gains or losses, living conditions or military benefits, the framing made no significant difference to perceived effectiveness.

Different groups respond differently

The evacuation plan’s effect was strongest among those who had not previously evacuated, which is exactly the population authorities most need to reach. This particular segment of the population is characterized by lower financial means and, therefore, a lower likelihood of owning a car, which turned out to be a crucial factor when it comes to timely evacuations. Finally, women responded more strongly to evacuation plans than men.

Figure 2. Experimental Treatment Effects.

Source: Martinez et al. (2025)

Understanding the Psychology of War Zone Evacuations

Why do practical plans matter more than persuasive messaging? Our findings suggest that people experiencing war are far from naive about the dangers they face. Among our respondents:

  • 82% perceived real risk of death or injury from missile strikes
  • 40% had already evacuated at least once
  • 50% of those who stayed had considered evacuating

Which seems to suggest that the barrier is not understanding risk—it is knowing how to act on it. Our correlational analysis supports this interpretation: those offered transportation during the early invasion were 12-18 percentage points more likely to evacuate, while simply receiving evacuation information showed weaker effects.

Policy Recommendations

Based on our findings, we recommend that authorities and humanitarian organizations prioritize the following:

  1. Focus resources on logistics, not messaging

Instead of investing in sophisticated communication strategies, dedicate resources to organizing concrete evacuation support: transportation, clear meeting points, advance booking systems, and designated evacuation routes.

  1. Provide specific, actionable information

Every evacuation message should include: exact locations for transportation pickup, specific departure times, contact information for coordination, clear instructions for what evacuees can bring, and confirmation of free transportation.

  1. Target messages strategically

Prioritize delivering evacuation plans to those who have not previously evacuated, women who show higher responsiveness to organized evacuations, and areas where residents lack personal evacuation plans, that is most likely in the lower socio-economic status neighborhoods.

  1. Act on timing

Our research captured a relatively stable period in the conflict. During acute escalations, rapid deployment of evacuation logistics likely matters even more than message optimization.

Implications Beyond Ukraine

While our study focused on Ukraine, approximately 50 active conflicts worldwide threaten civilian populations. Our findings suggest a fundamental shift in how international organizations approach emergency evacuations: from persuasion to facilitation.

The lesson is sobering, but actionable. People facing mortal danger do not need convincing that threats are real. They need practical help escaping them. This insight should reshape how humanitarian organizations allocate resources, how militaries plan for civilian protection, and how governments prepare for crisis scenarios.

Conclusion

Effective evacuation during war is not about finding the perfect words; it is about providing clear paths to safety. Our research suggests that even simple additions of logistical information can meaningfully improve an evacuation message’s perceived effectiveness. In contexts where every percentage point of improved evacuation rates translates to lives saved, focusing on practical evacuation support over persuasive messaging represents both an evidence-based and morally imperative policy choice. For the millions of civilians who may face evacuation decisions in current and future conflicts, the message from our research is clear: authorities must move beyond telling people to leave and start showing them exactly how.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

The Case for a Transport Ban on Russian Oil

Posted on November 24, 2025 | Policy Brief

In this policy brief we discuss the effects that would arise if the EU imposed a full transport ban on Russian oil. The transport ban would imply that any oil tanker transporting Russian oil would be prohibited from any oil trade involving the EU and from entering EU ports. We argue that such a transport ban would achieve the intended objectives of the EU’s oil sanctions: to reduce Russia’s oil income without risking surging oil prices.

Background

In its ambition to protect Ukraine and itself from Russia, the EU has two toolboxes at its disposal: military defense and economic warfare. The purpose of economic warfare is to “reduce the economic strength, hence the war potential, of the enemy relative to [one’s] own“ (Wu, 1952, p.1). It essentially boils down to the dual goal of harming your opponent without harming yourself too much (Snidal, 1991; Spiro, 2023).

Following the full-scale invasion in 2022, the EU and other countries significantly ramped up the oil sanctions against Russia as part of this economic warfare. Among them, the import embargo on Russian oil has been the most consequential; the G7 price cap on Russian oil, while being more politically salient, quickly lost much of its initial efficacy (Kilian et al., 2024; Spiro et al., 2025). Sanctions are like a cat-and-mouse game where Russia has now managed to circumvent the price cap to a high degree. The question for the EU, therefore, is how to revise the price cap sanction or what to replace it with. This policy brief analyzes one option: a full transport ban on Russian oil. To understand why and how such a sanction would work, it is, however, important to understand why the price cap does not.

The Price Cap: In Theory and Practice

Theoretically, the price cap sets a maximum price for Russian oil exports. Initially, the G7 cap was set at $60/bbl, while the EU later lowered it to $47.60/bbl. The practical implementation of the price cap was through the tanker and insurance markets. Any tanker transporting Russian oil at a price above the cap would not be able to get access to Western insurance or services. Since a very large part of the tanker fleet was, at the time of implementation, insured in the UK, this was consequential. Eventually, an additional constraint was added: tankers not following the price cap would not be allowed to access European ports.

The rationale for the price cap, at the time of its implementation, was that the G7 wanted to achieve the dual goal of economic warfare: it wanted to harm Russia by limiting its oil income while minimizing the harm to the global economy by ensuring Russia would not reduce oil exports. It was believed that a price cap set at 60 $/bbl would achieve that dual goal. With a world oil price at $80-100/bbl, the cap would severely reduce Russia’s oil profits; but since Russia’s cost of production is $5-15/bbl, it would have economic incentives to continue exporting oil (Gars et al., 2025; Johnson et al., 2023; Wachtmeister et al., 2022).

The price cap initially worked as intended: combined with the EU import embargo, it drove significant discounts on Russian oil while export volumes remained steady (Babina et al., 2023; Spiro et al., 2025; Turner & Sappington, 2024). Over time, however, the price cap’s efficacy eroded (Cardoso et al., 2024; Kilian et al., 2024; Spiro et al., 2025). This was for two main reasons: 1) the expansion of the “shadow fleet” of tankers willing to transport Russian oil without Western insurance or services; 2) fraudulent paperwork, allowing some tankers to appear compliant while actually transporting Russian oil at a price above the cap (Hilgenstock et al., 2023).

By early January 2025, only 15% of crude-oil tankers departing Russia used Western insurance (CREA, 2025), with the remainder being part of the shadow fleet. After the implementation of large-scale vessel sanctions later that month by the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the share of tankers using Western insurance increased. This indicates the shadow fleet can be affected by countermeasures. Yet, despite the strengthened sanctions, by October 2025, around 65% of shipments still used the shadow fleet, even as a large portion of that fleet now consisted of sanctioned vessels. A large part of the remaining 35%, while officially compliant, likely circumvented the price cap by use of fraudulent paperwork.

Extensive additional monitoring and enforcement capacity would be required to eliminate such fraud. To restore the full intended function of the price cap, or make a lowering of the cap meaningful, the shadow fleet would also need to be substantially reduced. But given recent estimates putting the shadow fleet at around 18% of global tanker tonnage (The Maritime Executive, 2025) this seems hard to achieve.

Given the challenges involved in re-establishing this system, an alternative approach is to replace the price cap altogether. So, what could serve as an effective replacement?

A Full Transport Ban

We here consider a transport ban on Russian oil.  In practice, under such a transport ban, a European coalition of countries would ban any tanker carrying Russian crude oil or refined products from entering European ports and using European services, either permanently or at least for as long as the ban is in place. Consequently, such tankers would be banned from any European oil trade, including, for instance, oil sold by OPEC countries to the EU, as well as any European maritime services in the future. This restriction would apply regardless of the sale price or whether the shipment formally complied with the G7 price cap.

Notably, in 2022, one of the sanctions planned by the EU and discussed within the G7 was a “service ban” that would be akin to the transport ban proposed here. The EU and G7 eventually decided not to implement it and to introduce the price cap instead, due to fears that such a sanction would come at a great cost to the world economy. Since Russia at the time only had access to a small tanker fleet of its own, a service ban would have resulted in an export reduction and an oil-price spike (Gars et al., 2025). This fear may have been well-founded there and then. However, as argued below, it is not a major concern today.

How a Transport Ban Would Work Today

The economic harm to Russia from a transport ban would come through the tightening of the tanker market that Russia can access. A tanker owner would essentially need to decide whether they want to transport Russian oil (around 10% of all seaborne oil trade) or have access to trade involving the EU countries (around 23% of seaborne oil trade). This, in essence, constitutes a trade-off between the short-run gains from transporting Russian oil and the longer-term consequences of the tanker being permanently sanctioned. Since the transport ban would be aimed at the tanker, it would also reduce the tanker’s value if sold. Plausibly, tanker owners would then only agree to transport Russian oil if they receive a sufficiently large premium compared to the income from transporting other oil. This would translate into higher transport costs for Russia, squeezing its profit margins (Spiro et al., 2025). How much Russian transport costs would increase is hard to say, but it should be noted that even an increase of $5 per barrel in these costs for crude implies Russian losses equal to 0.5% of GDP (Spiro et al., 2025).

Since Russian profit margins are very large, they would likely be willing to pay that premium. Furthermore, given that export reductions would inflict losses on Russia itself and on its key partners (China and India, see Gars et al., 2025), it is unlikely that Russia would reduce its exports as a sort of retaliation. The risk of a Russian supply disruption and an oil-price spike is thus low under a transport ban.  In other words, a transport ban would inflict costs on Russia without risking major costs to the EU.

Other Advantages

Importantly, under the described transport ban, paper fraud would become a non-issue. The sanctioning coalition would only need to monitor whether a tanker has entered a Russian port. Any such vessel would be placed on the banned list, regardless of whether it belongs to the shadow fleet, is Western-owned, or claims compliance with the price-cap regime. Given that a large share of Russian oil exports goes through European waters and chokepoints (e.g., the Danish Straits), it should be possible for the EU to identify such tankers, in particular those transporting Russian oil through the Baltic Sea (46% of all seaborne Russian crude and products).

Furthermore, this EU-led transport ban would not depend on coordination with the United States. The effectiveness of this sanction stems from geography, where a large share of Russian oil transits EU-controlled waters, and from the EU’s position as a large oil importer (13.7 mb/d). That said, if more countries joined the sanctioning coalition, the cost of ending up on the sanctioned list would be higher. Similarly, the premium required by the tanker owners would be higher. Hence, the sanction would be more effective if other major importers, such as Japan and South Korea, or major exporters, such as Canada and Norway, joined the coalition. US participation would, of course, also add weight, but would not be essential for the core mechanism to work.

Potential Problems and Interactions with Other Sanctions

One problem that a transport ban would likely not solve and could even exacerbate is the environmental risks posed by the poor condition and risky operations of the shadow fleet. The cost of being on the sanctioned list would be the loss of future earning potential of the tanker. Tankers closer to being scrapped would more likely choose the short-run premium over the future earning potential. The fleet transporting Russian oil could therefore end up consisting of even older, less safe tankers than today. Furthermore, the value of servicing the tankers would likely decrease, possibly reducing the quality and safety of the tankers further. While it is hard to ascertain the strength of these effects, by our judgment, it is likely small compared to the current situation and condition of the shadow fleet. The transport ban would not increase the amount of Russian oil shipped through European waters. The transport ban would, furthermore, provide another reason to monitor the movements and doings of tankers in European waters (on top of the current monitoring due to environmental risks and sabotage).

The EU today has a list of shadow tankers that are banned from European trade and services (EU Council, 2025). That is a good start, but the list is only partial. It has most likely missed a large share of vessels serving Russia using fraudulent paperwork. The proposed tanker ban would make the list longer and easier to administer. Prohibiting specific tankers from entering European ports and being involved in the European oil trade should be within the EU’s capacity. If secondary sanctions could be imposed consistently, that would give even larger effects, since the costs of breaking the sanction would increase further. That is where coordination with the US would be particularly impactful, as OFAC has a much better capacity for such measures. This said, given the current geopolitical situation, there are strong reasons for the EU to build up its own capacity for secondary sanctions.

While the proposed transport ban would simplify the monitoring compared to the price cap, there could still be potential for evasion. Monitoring whether a tanker has been in a western Russian port should be feasible, but following its movements all the way to the destination may not be. Potentially, Russia could then partly evade the sanctions using ship-to-ship transfers. Here, one tanker could transport the oil from Russia out of European waters, then transfer the oil to another tanker, which would transport the oil to the final destination. If the transfer is not detected, that second tanker could transport the Russian oil part of the way without facing sanctions. We cannot rule out that some such evasion could happen. But due to the risk of detection, the second tanker would also likely demand a higher premium, and Russian transport costs would still increase, albeit by somewhat less. Importantly, the EU should be able to detect and block these ship-to-ship transfers when they occur in European waters.

The US recently implemented sanctions on the two Russian oil companies Rosneft and Lukoil, by which anyone who does business with them is subject to secondary sanctions. In a sense, these US sanctions are similar to a transport ban, as they make it more difficult for Russia to export oil. In another sense, they are more of a complement to it. The US sanctions are targeted at specific firms, opening up for evasion by changing corporate structures and selling off assets, while the transport ban would be targeted at the physical tanker. It cannot be taken for granted that the US will uphold or keep its current sanctions, not least because they are intertwined with other motives (such as a trade war). It is, furthermore, not obvious that OFAC will have the capacity (or be allowed) to sanction entities within China and India. So, while the US sanction has touch points with the transport ban discussed here, the EU may need to construct its sanctioning regime independently.

In Summary

A transport ban implemented by the EU would serve the purpose of its economic warfare and has the potential to fill a gap in the current sanctions regime that has been opened by the eroding efficiency of the price cap. A transport ban would increase Russia’s oil-transport costs with low risks of oil-supply disruptions and price spikes. The requirements of monitoring for upholding a transport ban are much lower than for the price cap. The transport ban is not entirely immune to evasion, but the problems are likely small and would only partially reduce the effect of the sanction. The main concern is the environmental risks, but the sanction is unlikely to meaningfully increase the risks already posed by the current shadow fleet built up in response to the price cap. It is also feasible to implement a transport ban by the EU on its own, although the effect will increase if the sanctioning coalition is enlarged.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

Between Progress and Pushback: Latvia and the Istanbul Convention

Posted on November 17, 2025 | Policy Brief

Protester holding a sign during a nighttime rally addressing Latvia Istanbul Convention Withdrawal.

On 25 September 2025, the Latvian Parliament voted to begin the process of withdrawing Latvia from the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence (Istanbul Convention). This vote has been met with growing mass protests. We provide some background to understand the political and societal movements that underlie these events. Survey data shows that (a) violence against women is prevalent in Latvia and (b) there is public support for legislation aimed at combating a major expression of gender-based violence, such as intimate partner violence. However, the Latvian public appears polarized on perceptions about women’s and men’s roles in society, which might conflict with the Convention’s call for States to combat gender stereotypes. The vote’s significance in terms of Latvia’s geopolitical positioning between the EU and Russia also contributes to making the Convention a polarizing issue.

Introduction

Latvia ratified the Istanbul Convention in November 2023. The Convention entered into force on 1 May 2024. Since then, significant political debate has emerged around its continued implementation, with strong calls from some political parties and civic groups to withdraw. On 25 September 2025, the Saeima, Latvia’s parliament, considered withdrawal. On 31 October, Saeima voted to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention (56 in favor, 32 against). President Edgars Rinkēvičs, noting the potential harm to Latvia’s international standing, returned the law to the Saeima. Lawmakers then postponed further action until after the October 2026 elections. Mass protests erupted in the Latvian capital against the possible withdrawal. If the next Parliament pushes the withdrawal process to completion, Latvia will be the first EU country to withdraw from the Convention and the second among the original signatories to do so, after Turkey.

This policy brief outlines the background to the parliamentary vote and subsequent mass protests, traces the political process behind them, assesses their geopolitical significance, including Russian influence in Latvian politics, and considers whether the vote reflects a wider societal move away from the Convention’s core principles.

“We Don’t Say Gender Here”

The debate in Latvia centres primarily on concerns around the term “gender”  and how social roles are defined under the Convention, rather than its core aim of preventing violence and protecting victims. Specifically, Article 3(c) of the Convention defines gender as “the socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for women and men.” This definition is instrumental in understanding violence against women as a fundamental expression of patriarchal norms that assign rigid roles in society to men and women. Such understanding is, in turn, considered a precondition for a holistic approach in combating gender-based violence (GBV) that includes legal protections but also profound cultural transformations. The controversy in Latvia surrounding this definition of gender, as opposed to biological sex, sits within a broader Latvian paradox. On the one hand, Latvia has a strong representation of women in the labour market and leadership – it ranks second in the European Union in terms of women in managerial positions (although this representation is weaker for political leadership; see Gerber, 2021, for more details). On the other hand, gender-role attitudes remain traditional: Latvia has one of the highest shares in the EU of respondents who believe caregiving is primarily a woman’s responsibility and consistently shows one of the largest gender gaps in time spent on care-related unpaid work (Ministry of Welfare of the Republic of Latvia, 2024; Statistics Latvia, 2024; European Institute for Gender Equality, 2023).

The concept of “gender” as a social construct has entered Latvian public discourse only recently, and there is no widely accepted everyday equivalent for the English word in the Latvian language. The term used in institutional and policy contexts, sociālais dzimums (literally “social sex”), is technical and unfamiliar to many Latvians. In general usage, “dzimums” refers to biological sex, and historically, Latvian policy and legal frameworks have operated under this binary understanding (Kalnbērziņa, 2023). Proponents of withdrawal, largely from conservative and nationalist political parties, argue that the Convention introduces ideas about “gender” that conflict with Latvian cultural values, family roles, and existing legal frameworks. For these actors, the Convention is perceived, or framed, less as a tool for protection against violence and more as a vehicle for social change initiated from outside, which, as such, allegedly undermines sovereignty.

Parties’ Positioning on the Convention

Against this background, political parties’ standing on the Convention has defined new fractures within the Saeima and in society more broadly, quickly becoming an increasingly polarizing matter with high significance for government stability, democratic representation, and alignment with EU core values. Although public debate has focused on ideological disagreements over gender, political dynamics played a significant role in the 2025 vote on withdrawing from the Istanbul Convention. New Unity, the largest party in the Saeima, led by Prime Minister Evika Siliņa, previously broke with its government coalition partners, the National Alliance and United List, to form a new coalition with the Greens and Farmers Union (ZZS) and The Progressives, partly to ensure the ratification of the Convention. The resulting government was sworn in September 2023 without new Parliamentary elections. The National Alliance and United List, long opposed to the treaty’s gender terminology, viewed this shift as a betrayal by New Unity and have since aligned more closely with Latvia First and For Stability! to push for withdrawal. Meanwhile, ZZS, a major player in Latvian politics, first supported ratification but later backed withdrawal, raising questions about policy consistency as its deputies effectively voted against their own earlier decision.

The result has left the governing coalition – still composed of New Unity, The Progressives, and ZZS – weakened and politically divided, with opposition parties exploiting the moment while the 2026 budget process remains critical. The situation also placed pressure on President Edgars Rinkēvičs, who eventually decided to return the withdrawal law to parliament, mentioning concerns over potential harm to Latvia’s international standing as a key factor behind his decision. He recommended that the issue should be reconsidered after the elections in 2026. Overall, political repositioning and coalition instability have become deeply intertwined with a key human-rights commitment. One side, mirroring ultra-conservative rhetoric across Europe, criticized the treaty as promoting “gender ideology,” encouraging sexual experimentation, and harming children. Supporters countered that these claims amounted to anti-EU rhetoric.

At the same time, public mobilisation has been significant. Over ten thousand people have gathered in multiple peaceful demonstrations in Riga to oppose withdrawal, expressing concern about potential setbacks to women’s rights and victim protection (Meduza, 2025; Hivert, 2025). International organisations have also highlighted that withdrawal would place Latvia in a unique position within the European Union, as no other EU member state has sought to leave this treaty (Amnesty International, 2025).

Geopolitical Significance

The Saeima’s vote to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention risks undermining Latvia’s long-built reputation as a Nordic-style liberal democracy with strong human-rights standards. If the withdrawal decision becomes law, Latvia would stand as the only country in the Nordic-Baltic Eight (NB8) outside the Convention, while Lithuania continues toward ratification. The move prompted an unusual diplomatic intervention: parliamentary speakers from several NB8 states and ambassadors from 15 close partners urged Latvia to remain in solidarity on violence prevention (Collier, 2025). These appeals were ignored. Internationally, Latvia would be grouped with Turkey as the only states to exit the treaty, raising concerns among partners about backsliding on women’s rights and domestic-violence protection. Observers warned that this decision could (and may still in 2026) reverse decades of work to portray Latvia as a modern, progressive European state, instead reinforcing outdated “post-Soviet” stereotypes. Rebuilding credibility requires diplomatic effort and clear, effective national action to protect victims.

It is also significant that the disagreement with other NB8 countries occurs at a time when, otherwise, there is growing cooperation between the NB8 members, in part in response to the geopolitical realities that make Latvia’s relationship with other EU and NATO members arguably ever more critical.

Geopolitics also matter because monitoring and survey data indicate that gender-related policy debates in Latvia are susceptible to wider geopolitical narratives. Approximately one-third of Latvian respondents believe that gender equality policies are “imposed by the EU,” a sentiment that is significantly more common among Russian-speaking residents (EC, 2017, 2019). Analyses of Latvian media ecosystems show that narratives opposing “gender ideology” are regularly amplified in Russian-language outlets, linking such policies to moral decline and loss of national identity (CEEPS, 2023). These framings align with broader Kremlin messaging, which positions European human-rights norms as threats to cultural sovereignty (EUvsDisinfo, 2024), though there is no evidence of direct Russian intervention. However, the Latvian State Security Service has noted that debates on gender and family values are used as entry points for polarisation and for undermining trust in Latvia’s Western partnerships (Latvian Security Service, 2024).

Taken together, this suggests that the controversy surrounding the Istanbul Convention does not occur in isolation. Rather, it intersects with information influence efforts that exploit pre-existing societal tensions around identity, norms, and Latvia’s European orientation.

What about Incidence and Perceptions Around Gender-based Violence in Society?

Meanwhile, survey data indicate that gender-based and domestic violence remain a significant and often under-reported problem in Latvia, suggesting that improvements in gender equality in the workplace have not yet translated into safety within households.

Estimates based on a 2021 survey on gender-based violence by the European Institute of Gender Equality (EGEN) show that one quarter of Latvian women aged 18-74 have experienced physical or sexual violence since the age of 15, and 16% have experienced violence from their intimate partner (IPV). 23% of these women had not told anyone about the violence before the survey interview. Notably, in 2022, Latvia also reported the highest femicide rate in the EU, with 2.9 women being intentionally killed by their partner, former partner, or family member per 100,000 inhabitants. The survey also depicts a culture not fully responsive to relatively subtle forms of gender-based violence and permeated with significant stereotypes. For instance, 53% of Latvian women and 41% of Latvian men believe or tend to believe that women who share their opinion on social media should expect sexist, demeaning and/or abusive replies (EU averages are 18 and 23% respectively); 45% of women and 47% of men believe that a woman who suffers sexual violence under the influence of alcohol or drugs is at least partially responsible (respective EU averages are 13 and 20%).

Nevertheless, a large majority of Latvians seem to support the notion that IPV should be legislated in some way. A FREE Network survey of a representative (based on age and gender) sample (around 900 individuals) of the Latvian population shows that, as of September 2021, nearly 90% of respondents thought that the State should have specific legislation addressing IPV, a key tenet of the Istanbul Convention. This average masks heterogeneity by gender, with relatively fewer men (81% vs. 97% of women) expressing support for such legislation. Consistently, more Latvian men (14%) than women (9%) appeared to think that a woman beaten by her partner should not seek any help, because it is a private matter. For comparison, in Sweden, a country that has long ratified the Convention (2014), these percentages are 4% and 3%, respectively. The same survey also confirms that the Latvian society is relatively less attuned to more subtle forms of IPV, namely, psychological violence. For instance, while the percentage of respondents in Latvia who believe that harmful beating is a form of IPV matches the percentage in Sweden (98%), only 77% of Latvians believe that the prohibition to dress as one likes is a form of IPV, against a Swedish percentage of 95%.

Finally, the FROGEE survey depicts a public opinion permeated by stereotypes about women and men’s roles in society: nearly 30% of Latvians appear to believe that if a job is scarce men should be given more right to a job than women, nearly a majority report agreeing with the statement that “what most women really want is a home and children”, and a majority (54%) thinks that a pre-school child suffers if his/her mother work.

In terms of attitudes toward DV legislation, it is also worth noting that the Latvian Parliament has recently strengthened its legal system to protect victims of domestic violence by approving, in February 2022, a law granting the police the right to separate the victim of domestic violence from the perpetrator, even without the victim’s request. The FROGEE survey reveals that public knowledge around this provision at the time of discussion within the government was relatively limited (30% of survey respondents reported being aware of such discussion, see Berlin-Perrotta et al., 2024), signalling that decisions around DV legislation did not feature prominently in the public debate, at least at the time of the interview.

In sum, the data suggest that gender-based violence and IPV are pressing issues in the Latvian context. The public does not seem to be especially polarized on the extent to which major expressions of IPV should be legislated. Beliefs about more subtle forms of violence, or violence that is more clearly an expression of a patriarchal culture that assigns specific roles to women and men, appear to be more polarized; the same can be said more generally about beliefs on gender roles.

Conclusion

In the face of the recent Latvian Parliament vote to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention and the growing public protests against it, we provided some background to understand the political and societal movements that underlie these events. Our analysis starts from the observation that, overall, the Parliamentary vote is not so much about the main purpose of the Istanbul Convention, which is to fight gender-based and domestic violence, but rather about the Convention’s definition of gender as a social construct. We document that at the societal level, there is general support for legislation aimed at combating a major expression of gender-based violence, such as IPV. However, the Latvian public appears to be more polarized on perceptions about women’s and men’s roles in society, with more traditional views being popular among large shares of the population.

The Parliamentary opposition to the Convention, therefore, can be at best understood as an expression of society’s unease with less traditional gender-based roles, coupled with political parties’ positioning with respect to an increasingly weakening governmental majority. However, framings of the Convention’s definition of gender as an attempt to override the binary definition of sex, despite this being neither a direct nor an indirect tenet of the Convention, might also have contributed to inflaming the related debate. These framings have charged stances on the Convention with significance in terms of Latvia’s geopolitical positioning between the EU, of which the country has long been a member, and Russia, a powerful reference especially for the ethnic Russian population. These factors combine to make stances on the Convention profoundly divided at a time when the country is exposed to increased external threat by Russia’s heightened aggressiveness in the Baltic region.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

Estimating Tax Evasion in Europe: Direct vs. Indirect Survey Methods

Posted on November 10, 2025 | Policy Brief

Stack of €50 euro banknotes in partial shadow, symbolizing hidden cash and tax evasion survey methods.

How can societies accurately gauge the share of the workforce engaged in the shadow economy when direct questions inspire selective silence or evasion? This policy brief presents findings from a new cross-country survey experiment combining direct questions and an indirect “list experiment” method, conducted in Latvia, Italy, and Denmark. Results show that, contrary to expectations, indirect methods did not yield higher estimates of undeclared work compared to direct questions. The research reveals that in environments with high tax morale and a substantial shadow economy, both direct and indirect measurements can be biased. Sharing information about prevailing tax norms with respondents can improve survey consistency, informing future tax evasion measurement and anti-evasion policymaking.

Social Desirability Bias in Tax Evasion Surveys

Surveys on tax evasion often provide respondents with multiple response categories beyond simple “yes” or “no.” For example, the survey for Latvia (Kantar, 2024) found that 3% openly acknowledged undeclared income, but refusal (2%) and “hard to say” responses (4%) illustrate additional uncertainty and possible underreporting due to social desirability bias when respondents consciously avoid disclosing disapproved or illegal acts to maintain a positive self-image or avoid perceived censure. This bias is potentially serious in tax compliance research, where both tax morale and fear of consequences can shape reporting behavior.

Indirect questioning techniques, such as list experiments, aim to reduce social desirability bias by allowing individuals to conceal answers within a broader set of innocuous items (Blair et al., 2020). In a typical list experiment, respondents are randomly assigned to receive either a list of non-sensitive items or the same list with an additional sensitive item; by comparing the mean number of items endorsed across groups, researchers estimate the prevalence of the sensitive behavior without requiring explicit disclosure (Blair & Imai, 2012; Glynn, 2013).

Recent empirical work employing list experimental designs has significantly advanced the understanding of tax evasion dynamics across diverse fiscal and cultural contexts. Fergusson, Molina, and Riaño (2019) analyzed VAT evasion among Colombian consumers and found minimal social desirability bias, with list experiments and direct self-reports yielding similar evasion rates (~20%). They attributed this to the normalization of evasion in high-informality regions, where descriptive norms (perceived prevalence of evasion) outweighed injunctive norms, reducing stigma.

This contrasts with Genest-Grégoire et al. (2022), who detected significant bias in Canadian income tax self-reports: list experiments revealed 13.5% income tax evasion (compared to 5.6% in direct questions) and 28.5% consumption tax evasion (compared to 26.2% in direct questions). The study identified stronger stigma around income tax evasion, particularly due to institutional withholding mechanisms that make income tax evasion more difficult compared to consumption taxes. Authors posit that divergent motivational mechanisms underlie these evasion types: income tax noncompliance triggers stronger moral condemnation due to its association with deliberate fraud, while consumption tax evasion is often rationalized as a “victimless” violation of complex regulations.

Hence, high tax morale, while generally associated with greater compliance, also leads individuals to conceal or misrepresent socially undesirable actions more rigorously, which amplifies social desirability bias in survey responses. This effect is particularly pronounced in environments where tax evasion is strongly stigmatized, as respondents may feel increased pressure to align their self-reports with prevailing moral standards, even if those reports do not reflect their true behavior. Conversely, in contexts where evasion is normalized or perceived as widespread, the stigma associated with noncompliance decreases, potentially making individuals less reluctant to report such behavior.  Nevertheless, both direct and indirect measurement techniques may still fail to accurately capture the true prevalence. This is because reduced stigma alone does not eliminate other sources of bias, including cognitive complexity, survey design imperfections, and strategic respondent behavior, such as misinterpreting instructions or using responses to send political or social signals beyond truthful self-disclosure.

Recognizing these persistent methodological challenges, this policy brief presents evidence from a study employing both direct and indirect questions on tax evasion across three European countries with varying levels of tax morale and shadow economy prevalence. By analyzing how social contexts influence reporting behaviors, the brief provides insights into the effectiveness and limitations of these survey approaches in different normative environments.

Approach

The research used a nationally representative sample of 6,915 respondents from Latvia, Italy, and Denmark, utilizing Norstat online panels in the respective countries. It was administered as an online Computer Assisted Web Interview (CAWI) in May 2024. Respondents in the study were randomly assigned to one of two list experiment conditions: half received a 5-item list including the sensitive tax evasion item, while the other half received a 4-item list without the sensitive item (see Figure 1). Importantly, all respondents—regardless of their list group assignment—were asked a direct question about undeclared income at the end of the survey. This design allows comparison between indirect and direct measures within the same individuals, clarifying reporting patterns and social desirability effects.

Figure 1. Indirect question for the control group of the list experimental study

Notes: The 5-item list for the treatment group included additional activity “Received all or part of the income without paying taxes (received money “off the books”)” and asked to indicate max 5 items. The activities were listed in random order for each respondent.

All participants also completed a placebo list experiment, in which both lists – i.e., containing 4 or 5 items – consisted entirely of non-sensitive behaviors (see Figure 2). Correspondingly, everyone was also asked a direct question about the non-sensitive behavior (“Bought a house or apartment (including on credit)”), thereby mimicking the structure of the tax evasion list experiment. This design allowed controlling for possible cognitive errors in filling out a complicated survey task, such as a list survey question, that are unrelated to social desirability bias.

In addition, half of all respondents were primed to information with actual data on how many citizens in their country consider tax evasion unacceptable, sourced from a recent representative survey that was carried out in January 2024. In this pre-survey, just 39% (i.e., minority) found tax evasion wholly unacceptable in Latvia; 59% in Italy, and 53% in Denmark (i.e., majority). The goal of this priming was to test whether informing respondents about local norms affected reporting patterns.

Figure 2. Placebo list of the study

Notes: The 5-item list for the treatment group included additional activity “Bought a house or apartment (including on credit)” and asked to indicate max 5 items. The activities were listed in random order for each respondent.

Key Findings

Results show that indirect list experiment estimates of undeclared work (4.1% overall) did not significantly differ from direct question estimates (7.2%). Hence, respondents did not find the topic sensitive enough to avoid honest answers in either format.

Priming respondents with information about the unacceptability of tax evasion in their country had no statistically significant effect on the direct measure of admitted undeclared income, nor on aggregate estimates from the indirect list experiment, indicating that willingness to disclose undeclared work remained unchanged regardless of norm priming.

Figure 3. Estimates of tax evasion from the list experiment and direct question

Source: Author’s estimate from the survey results.

However, country-level analysis revealed an anomaly in Italy: the list experiment produced an implausible negative estimate, driven by some respondents who marked zero items in the treatment list but later admitted to undeclared work in direct questioning. While this inconsistent response pattern was most prominent in Italy, the country with the highest tax morale (as based on pre-survey), and the largest shadow economy across the three countries (Medina and Schneider, 2018), it has also been recorded in the other two countries. Specifically, the pattern was observed among 11% of respondents who admitted to tax evasion in the direct question in Italy, compared to 5–7% in Latvia and Denmark.

Considering the complexity and unusual formulation of the question for the list experiment, one might attribute this pattern to a respondent’s confusion or cognitive error. However, this explanation is unlikely because of the responses to the placebo list experiment, where all list items and a direct question are non-sensitive. There, the specific response pattern – respondents reporting zero items on the list question while simultaneously admitting to the direct question – is observed substantially less frequently, indicating a low baseline error rate for misunderstanding or inconsistent reporting on non-sensitive items.

The comparison between the sensitive and placebo list experiment results indicates that the anomalous pattern observed in the tax evasion list experiment is unlikely to be due to confusion with the survey format, but rather represents a deliberate, context-specific form of strategic misreporting. One possible reason for this pattern might be that some Italians who admit to tax evasion in the direct question may believe that inflating shadow economy estimates will spur stronger policy reactions or public debate. In this way, their answers to the survey may represent strategic “signal sending.”

Priming respondents with accurate information about societal norms regarding the unacceptability of tax evasion – an approach referred to as vignette priming – consistently reduced the occurrence of this contradictory response pattern. Fewer respondents reported zero items in the list experiment while admitting to evasion in direct questioning, a change observed universally across the three countries.

Two main interpretations of the effects of such vignette priming can be suggested. The first interpretation, related to the strategic motive discussed above, suggests that vignette priming helps align respondents’ understanding of prevailing social norms on tax evasion. This improved awareness discourages deliberate misreporting, thus improving the overall validity and reliability of the survey’s methodology, even if it does not increase overall admissions of tax evasion itself. An alternative explanation is that vignette priming helps respondents better recognize and correctly count items in the list experiment, thereby improving response accuracy and alignment across question formats.

In other words, norm priming fosters more consistent survey responses, whether by reducing the temptation to manipulate results or by increasing recognition and attention among respondents.

Conclusion

Efforts to estimate tax evasion through surveys must strike a balance between the limitations of direct self-reports and the incomplete protection against bias afforded by indirect methods. This study finds that, in the surveyed countries, list experiments do not yield higher or more accurate prevalence estimates than direct questioning. However, particularly in high-morale environments with substantial shadow economies, some respondents may strategically manipulate survey results in hopes of prompting political action.

Norm priming through vignettes enhances experimental integrity and reduces strategic errors, underscoring the importance of accounting for social context in survey designs. For tax policy makers, measurement should always be validated with error diagnostics and social context cues, and survey formats should be adapted for cross-country comparability and public trust.

Acknowledgements

The study is financed by the European Commission’s Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship Action (Grant agreement ID: 101109679).

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

Improving Women’s Political Representation Beyond Gender Quotas

Posted on October 20, 2025 | Policy Brief

Women waving Turkish flags during a political rally, symbolizing support for Political Representation Gender Quotas in Turkey.

While gender gaps in politics have narrowed considerably in recent decades, large disparities remain in several countries, especially those where binding gender quota laws have not been adopted. What are alternative pathways for increasing women’s political representation in these countries? We investigate one such pathway in the context of Turkey. A conservative dominant party, Erdogan’s AKP, is often challenged in local elections by a Kurdish party that promotes gender equality in electoral lists and in society more generally. Exploiting variation in Kurdish party wins in municipal elections during 2009-2019, we find that the Kurdish party winning leads AKP to increase its share of female candidates by 25 to 30% in the next election. Our data suggests that AKP’s response is primarily motivated by strategic considerations aimed at appealing to voters who may value gender-balanced representation. The implications of these findings extend beyond Turkey, suggesting that one party empowering women can help reduce gender gaps in lists across the board.

Pathways to Gender Equality in Political Participation

Across the world, women have historically been underrepresented in political institutions, but considerable progress has been made in recent decades. Legislated gender quotas are credited for having contributed significantly to such progress, especially in developing countries (Berevoescu and Ballington, 2021). Across different contexts, well-designed quotas have been shown to successfully increase the share of women in electoral lists and, although to a lesser extent, in legislative and leadership positions (see Campa and Hauser, 2020 for a review of this literature).

Research also suggests that the electoral system could influence women’s political participation, with more women being elected under proportional rather than majoritarian systems (Profeta and Woodhouse, 2022) and, within proportional systems, through closed rather than open lists (Gonzalez-Eiras and Sanz, 2021). Moreover, recent findings suggest introducing term-limits as a tool to boost women’s electoral prospects (Kansikas and Bagues, 2025).

However, despite the positive trends worldwide, large gender disparities in political representation persist in many countries. Some of the most entrenched inequalities are found in states governed by authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regimes promoting conservative values, where legal reforms to enhance gender equality are unlikely. For instance, the map in Figure 1, which assigns lighter shades of blue to countries where gender gaps in political empowerment are larger, shows that across Europe and Central Asia, four of the five lowest scoring countries are authoritarian or semi-authoritarian, namely Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Hungary and Turkey, which Freedom House ranks as “partly free” or “not free”.

Figure 1. Gender gaps in political empowerment

Source: World Economic Forum. Gender Gap Report 2025. Note: The figure shows country scores on the World Economic Forum’s Political Empowerment Index. Lighter shades of blue indicate a larger gender gap in political empowerment.

What are alternative pathways that may increase women’s political participation in such contexts, where gender quotas and other representation-enhancing electoral reforms are unlikely to be introduced?

In recent work – Campa et al. (2025) – we study one such pathway in the case of Turkey, namely the emergence of a competitive, albeit not dominant, party that commits to gender equality in lists and beyond.

Women’s Political Participation in Turkey

Despite early enfranchisement — municipal voting rights in 1930 and full suffrage in 1934 — women’s political representation in Turkey remains low. Women are severely under-represented in Parliament at around 20% after the 2023 elections. Turkey is also one of the 24 countries worldwide where women’s representation in local governance is below 15% (World Economic Forum). The share of female mayors was less than 0.5 percent between 1930 and 2004 (Koyuncu and Sumbas, 2016), with a minor increase observed since 2005. During this period, the share of female candidates in electoral lists for the municipal council also increased by 6 p.p., and the share of female councillors increased by 5 p.p., but as of 2019, these shares were still severely low, at, respectively, 14 and 12%.

AKP Versus the Kurdish Party

The under-representation of women in local governance masks stark differences between parties, especially between the ruling party, Erdogan’ Justice and Development Party (AKP henceforth), and one of the main opposition parties in local elections, the Kurdish party, which ran in 37% of the elections held between 2009 and 2019 and won 19% of them.

AKP is ideologically conservative and with a religious base. During the 20 years in power, it passed no law to increase women’s representation in politics, despite the vast gender gaps at all levels of government.

The Kurdish party instead stands out in the Turkish political landscape for its commitment to gender equality in many areas of society, including politics. For instance, currently the party pledges to enact a gender-mixed co-leadership system at the party level as well as a “zipper quota” in its electoral lists, and more generally advocates for a gender equal society “starting with the local governments” (see the party’s official website). Both the mixed-leadership system and a version of the candidate quota have been in place for two decades.

As a result, the share of female candidates for the municipal council is much higher in electoral lists associated with the Kurdish party, at 21% on average over the period 2009-2019, as compared to AKP’s 11%. The Kurdish party’s share of female candidates is also remarkably high in comparison to the other major opposition party, the Republican People’s Party (CHP henceforth), which averages 13% female representation in its local electoral lists. The higher feminisation of the Kurdish party’s lists is reflected in the share of women elected: on average, only 6% of the councillors elected with AKP are women; this number goes up to 12% for CHP and jumps to 28% for the Kurdish party (see Figures 2 and 3).

Figure 2. Female share in candidate lists in municipal elections in Turkey.

Source: Author’s calculation based on own digitisation of data released by Turkey’s Higher Election Council (YSK). Note: The figure shows the share of women in candidates’ lists for the election of municipal councillors by party, focusing on the major party that governs at the central level (AKP) and its two main competitors at the local level (CHP and the Kurdish party).

Figure 3. Share of women elected as municipal councillors in Turkey, by party.

Source: Author’s calculation based on own digitisation of data released by Turkey’s Higher Election Council (YSK). Note: The figure shows the share of women elected as municipal councillors by party, focusing on the major party that governs at the central level (AKP) and its two main competitors at the local level (CHP and the Kurdish party).

We also note that the Kurdish party tends to elect a much larger share of female mayors than its competitors. According to the High Election Council (YSK) Election Statistics, in the 2009, 2014, and 2019 elections, the share of female mayors elected by the Kurdish party was respectively 21, 30, and 45%, whereas AKP elected less than 1% of female mayors in 2009, and this percentage remained stable at 1% in the 2014 and 2019 elections.

The Effect of a Kurdish Party’s Win on AKP’s Behaviour

Against this background and given the recent improvement in the share of female candidates across all parties (see Figure 2), we ask whether a Kurdish party victory prompts AKP to improve the gender equality in its lists in subsequent elections. By studying this question, we hope to contribute to shedding light on the forces that might help close gender gaps in political representation in relatively traditional societies governed by authoritarian or semi-authoritarian governments, where the under-representation of women in political institutions is particularly severe and gender quotas are unlikely to be adopted.

Using a novel dataset covering municipal council elections in Turkey in 2009, 2014, and 2019 —including candidates’ gender —we exploit within-municipality variation in Kurdish party victories to identify their impact on AKP’s female candidates’ share. We find that a Kurdish party win leads to a 2.8 to 3.4 p.p. increase in AKP female share of candidates in the next election, representing a 25–30% increase from a baseline of 11 p.p.; the estimate is robust across different econometric specifications, and we document that AKP lists were not on a differential trend in terms of share of female candidates in places where the Kurdish party wins – in other words, the increase in female candidates is only subsequent to the Kurdish party victory, strongly suggesting that it is indeed the result of AKP’s response to the growing popularity of the Kurdish party, and not the product of a secular trend of growing women’s representation. We also find that a win from another major opposition party, CHP, prompts smaller and only marginally statistically significant increases in female representation, suggesting that it is not just electoral competition that would force AKP to improve the selection of its candidates, but the Kurdish party’s gender focus that matters.

Why does AKP respond to a Kurdish victory by increasing its share of female candidates? Its behaviour could be strategic — appealing to voters who appear to care about some form of gender balance in lists — or stem from learning through exposure to capable female councillors. To gauge the relative importance of these different explanations, we exploit a special feature of the Turkish electoral system, namely parties submitting, together with the “main” list of candidates to be selected by voters, a “special quota” list containing the candidates directly assigned to the municipal council by the party if it wins the plurality vote. Such a list is not very salient to voters, and often not visible to them. We find no increase in women on AKP’s special lists after the Kurdish party wins, indicating the motive is likely an electoral strategy rather than internal reform.

Conclusion

Across the world, women have historically been underrepresented in political institutions. While gender gaps in political participation have narrowed considerably in recent decades, particularly due to the adoption of gender quotas, large disparities remain in many countries. Some of the most entrenched inequalities are found in states governed by authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regimes, where legal reforms to promote gender equality in politics are unlikely. Understanding alternative pathways for increasing women’s political representation in these contexts is a pressing challenge. We investigate one such pathway in the case of Turkey.

Although the ruling party, AKP, has remained resistant to gender-based reforms, it has increasingly faced local-level competition from a Kurdish party that consistently champions gender equality. Leveraging a new dataset covering municipal council elections in 2009, 2014, and 2019, we find that when the Kurdish party wins a municipality, AKP increases the share of female candidates in its master list by approximately 25 to 30% in the subsequent election.

The implications of these findings extend beyond the Turkish case. In political systems where institutional reform is unlikely, competitive pressure from parties that prioritise gender equality can still drive changes in political behaviour. Even without quotas, such parties can shift norms and electoral expectations, thereby inducing rival parties to adopt more inclusive practices.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

How the Combination of Income and the Quality of Local Conditions Affects Well-being in Old Age

Posted on October 13, 2025 | Policy Brief

Elderly couple sitting on a park bench, enjoying a peaceful moment together, symbolizing financial stability and income well-being in Poland.

Contemporaneous income and the quality of local living conditions have both received recognition in the literature as important determinants of subjective well-being. However, little is known about their joint impact and the possible moderating influence each may have on the relationship with the well-being of the other. In a recent study (Myck et al. 2025), we investigated the role of income and quality of local area on different dimensions of well-being of older adults in Poland. Our findings show that a higher quality of local conditions amplifies the association between income and well-being, which implies that high-income older individuals tend to benefit more from improved local conditions. Our findings suggest that low incomes may constrain older people from taking advantage of local public services, and thus draw attention to policies aimed at improving access to these services, especially in low-income, peripheral areas. While the results also point towards broad benefits of targeted income transfers, it is notable that their effective translation into higher well-being strongly varies with the quality of municipal local conditions.

Introduction

As most developed countries face rapid population ageing, governments continue to seek effective policies to support older adults. Identifying effective policy solutions remains vital in supporting different population groups, including the growing group of older citizens. In this brief, we present a summary of results from a recent study (Myck et al. 2025), in which we examine the role of the combination of incomes and local conditions for the well-being of older individuals. The analysis is conducted on data from Poland, a country characterised by rapid population ageing and a recent prioritisation of monetary transfers in the policy mix, with much less attention given to the financing of local and centrally funded public services. The analysis aims at understanding the role of the quality of local conditions for the well-being of older individuals, and at identifying how the level of income modifies this role. In other words, we examine if higher income affects individual well-being differently in high- compared to low-quality regions.

Subjective well-being has for a long time been examined in relation to individual socio-economic characteristics, like education, health, material conditions and social relations (Layard 2006, Dolan et al. 2008). Many authors have also stressed the importance of the local environment and the quality of public services (Aslam and Corrado 2012), although the influence of local conditions on well-being has been documented mostly at high levels of aggregation (countries or large sub-national regions; Perovic and Golem 2010; Colombo et al. 2018). Principally, though, the combined implications of local conditions and the material situation at the individual level on well-being remain largely underexplored. In our study we explore granular local conditions at the level of municipalities, allowing us to examine the relationship accounting for significant within-country differences in a shared institutional framework. Such disaggregation seems especially important in analysing the quality of life of the older population due to the likely relevance of local health and care services, high-quality transport options, local safety, green spaces and other public services.

Individual and Local Factors

To examine the direct and moderating roles of local conditions on well-being and their relation with income, we rely on a combination of individual- and local-level data (for methodological details, see Myck et al., 2025).

The individual-level data comes from the Polish part of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). This dataset provides detailed information on health, labour market activity, material situation and social relations of individuals aged 50 years and above for almost all European countries. In addition to the usual socio-demographic information (age, gender, education, marital status, and income), SHARE collects several self-reported measures of physical and mental health, as well as a number of broad dimensions of quality of life. One such measure is CASP, which aims to capture the quality of life among older individuals in four important dimensions:  Control, Autonomy, Self-realisation and Pleasure. With twelve questions (three for each dimension), each participant evaluates how often they feel in a certain way or experience certain situations. The final outcome is a summed score in the range of 12 to 48, with higher values indicating a higher quality of life.

For the purpose of our analysis, the individual dataset has been augmented with regional-level information. To capture as much variation in the quality of local conditions as possible, we rely on 14 indicators collected either at the municipal or county level (respectively, the bottom and middle tiers of the administrative division of Poland). They represent the quality of localities in terms of economic factors, housing infrastructure, green spaces and health services. Given the high correlation between these regional variables, they have been combined into a single local quality index using principal component analysis (PCA). The index is calculated on the municipality level, with higher values representing better quality of local conditions. Figure 1 below shows the spatial distribution of the index across all Polish municipalities, highlighting significant regional differences in the local quality of life in Poland, particularly between the Western and Eastern parts of the country.

The Role of Income and Local Conditions for Individual Well-being

We examine the relationship between well-being, contemporaneous household income, and local conditions in a panel random effects regression, controlling for an extensive vector of covariates. Our results confirm a strong positive association between income and well-being, with a 100 per cent increase in disposable income corresponding to increases of up to 0.66 points on the CASP scale. While this may seem small, given the scale of the CASP measure, the effect is similar to that of being employed relative to being retired (0.56 CASP points), married relative to being widowed (0.78), and very close to the average difference in CASP between men and women, conditional on other controls (0.57).

Figure 1. Distribution of the index capturing the quality of local conditions at the municipality level in Poland

Note: Municipality borders are in white, regional borders in yellow. Source: Myck et al. (2025).

We also find that the regional index is positively correlated with well-being. Importantly, though, since income and the quality of regional conditions are strongly correlated, we examine the importance of their interaction in the well-being regression. This facilitates the investigation of the differential reaction of well-being to income for different values of the index (and vice versa). In Figures 2a and 2b we present average marginal effects of each one of the variables as calculated at different percentile levels of the other.

The results indicate noticeable variation in the strength of the association between income and well-being, depending on the quality of local conditions (Fig. 2a). Income seems to matter little at the lower end of the distribution of the regional index and much more in localities of better quality.

Figure 2. Average marginal effects (AME) of income and the regional index on well-being

a) AME of log(Income) across distribution of the regional index

b) AME of the regional index across the distribution of log(Income)

Note: Figures show point estimates of AMEs and the corresponding 90% confidence intervals. Well-being is measured with a CASP score of 12-48. Source: Myck et al. (2025).

While the growing role of income as local conditions improve might seem surprising, it well aligns with the fact that consumption of some publicly provided goods and services is dependent on or related to income: apart from the obvious examples such as culture, more important dimension of access to public services might relate to the areas where rich and poor people live, the quality of public transport and easy access to highly localized public services.

Strong positive effects of regional quality on well-being are also observed among respondents with the highest incomes (Fig. 2b). The association for low-income individuals cannot be statistically differentiated from zero.

Conclusion

The results of our study suggest that for high-income older individuals in Poland, better local conditions are reflected more strongly in their well-being compared to that of low-income residents. For the poorest older individuals, improvements in local conditions have little or no bearing on their well-being. At the same time, increases in income are associated more strongly with well-being in areas with the highest levels of quality of local conditions.

The policy implications of our results thus highlight the detrimental consequences of the combination of low income and poor quality local conditions for individual well-being and the challenges to improving the latter. Our results suggest that effective policies aimed at increasing the well-being of older adults require a careful combination of direct and indirect measures, or otherwise a combination of support focused on income transfers with provision of, and better access to, the relevant range of public goods and services.

Our results also point towards targeted rather than simple universal income transfers: greater income increases are needed in low-quality areas compared to top-quality ones to secure the same change in well-being. Moreover, the fact that local quality translates differently into well-being for the rich and the poor suggests that there are significant disparities in access to local services by income level. This, in turn, calls for developments in access and mobility opportunities and investments in local public services to ensure better access to these services among low-income residents. Local policies in high-quality areas should become more sensitive to the needs of poorer older inhabitants, while improvement of local conditions in low-quality regions needs to accompany direct transfer policies for these to effectively translate into a higher quality of life of older individuals.

Acknowledgement

The authors acknowledge the support from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, Sida.

The original study (Myck et al. 2025) was financed through a joint grant of the Polish National Science Centre (NCN, project no: 2018/31/G/HS4/01511) and the German Research Foundation (DFG, project no: BR 38.6816-1) in the international Beethoven Classic 3 funding scheme (project AGE-WELL).

References

  • Alesina, A., Di Tella, R. and MacCulloch, R., 2004. Inequality and happiness: are Europeans and Americans different? Journal of Public Economics, 88 (9–10), 2009–2042.
  • Aslam, A. and Corrado, L., 2012. The geography of well-being. Journal of Economic Geography, 12 (3), 627–649.
  • Colombo, E., Rotondi, V. and Stanca, L., 2018. Macroeconomic conditions and well-being: do social interactions matter? Applied Economics, 50 (28), 3029–3038.
  • Myck, M., Oczkowska, M. and Kulati, E., 2025. Income and well-being in old age: The role of local contextual factors. The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, 30, 100551.
  • Perovic, L. M. and Golem, S., 2010. Investigating Macroeconomic Determinants of Happiness in Transition Countries: How Important Is Government Expenditure? Eastern European Economics, 48 (4), 59–75.
  • Rossouw, S. and Pacheco, G., 2012. Measuring Non-Economic Quality of Life on a Sub-National Level: A Case Study of New Zealand. Journal of Happiness Studies, 13 (3), 439–454.

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

Mapping Ukrainian CSOs in the Nordic-Baltic Region: Areas of Advocacy and Common Challenges

Posted on September 29, 2025 | Policy Brief

Modern cityscape at dusk with illuminated glass tower in central Stockholm, symbolizing innovation and cooperation, related to mapping Ukrainian CSOs.

This policy brief maps Ukrainian civil society organizations (CSOs) active in the Nordic-Baltic region (NB8), based on a 2025 survey and discussions at the Nordic Ukraine Advocacy Summit. It highlights the diverse landscape of advocacy groups, ranging from long-established diaspora organizations to initiatives formed after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The analysis highlights key challenges, such as the lack of coordination mechanisms, uneven access to political platforms, and limited technical capacity. Closer cooperation with policymakers and donors would benefit both sides, utilizing CSOs’ expertise in facilitating better integration of displaced Ukrainians and improving inclusive policymaking. It is important to recognize the role of Ukrainian civil society not only as a facilitator in the immediate support efforts but also as a strategic partner in shaping Europe’s long-term peace architecture.

Introduction

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 caused a massive migration of Ukrainians settling across the EU, including the Nordic-Baltic region. This movement gave rise to a wide range of new initiatives, including advocacy, cultural diplomacy, support for integration, and humanitarian efforts. Alongside long-standing diaspora organisations, these newly formed groups quickly became vital actors mobilizing resources, amplifying Ukraine’s voice internationally, and contributing to host societies. In light of these dynamics, it is worthwhile to understand how these organizations operate and what challenges they face.

To this end, the Nordic Ukraine Forum, with the support of the Swedish Institute, conducted a Survey of Nordic-Baltic Ukrainian Civil Society Organisations 2025: Mapping Areas of Advocacy, Structures, and Common Challenges between March and May 2025 (Zubkovych et al., 2025). This study examined Ukrainian CSOs active in both the Nordic-Baltic region (NB8) and Ukraine, based on a structured survey of 17 organizations (from an initial pool of 42). Notably, the survey focused exclusively on organizations with advocacy for Ukraine as a main activity, excluding smaller initiatives dedicated primarily to humanitarian relief, such as collecting clothes or food. Additionally, the output of the survey has been supplemented by the discussions and outcomes from the Nordic Ukraine Advocacy Summit (NUAS), held in Oslo in June 2025, with 30 participating CSOs. Together, these sources provide a unique empirical overview of the role and activities of Ukrainian advocacy CSOs in the Nordic-Baltic region.

Survey Results

Areas of Advocacy

The survey covers Ukrainian advocacy organisations based in the Nordic-Baltic region, where Sweden-based organisations or initiatives made up over half of the total respondents. The survey represents both long-established diaspora organizations and newer initiatives formed in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. About one-fourth of CSOs were established before 2014 (the earliest in 1997), while the majority were founded after 2022, reflecting the urgent mobilization of diaspora communities during the war.

Surveyed CSOs represent a broad mix of leadership roles, gender, professions, languages, membership sizes, and funding models. Most remain volunteer-driven and rely on short-term or project-based funding. More detailed demographic and organizational profiles can be found in the report by Zubkovych et al., 2025. Survey results show that Ukrainian CSOs in the NB8 focus on a wide range of areas. The most common activities include advocacy for Ukraine’s military support, cultural diplomacy and education, as well as support for displaced Ukrainians and their integration (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Focus areas of Ukrainian CSOs in the Nordic-Baltic region

Source: Zubkovych et al., 2025.

Many organizations also prioritize working with media, countering disinformation, humanitarian aid to Ukraine, and advocacy for Ukraine’s EU integration, followed by legal aid, human rights, and gender issues.

Figure 2 presents the main types of activity through which Ukrainian CSOs pursue their objectives. As shown, Ukrainian CSOs perform their tasks by raising social media awareness (82%) and organizing events in support of Ukraine (82%). Other key activities include demonstrations, media outreach, and direct engagement with policymakers. These findings suggest the need to examine more closely which social media platforms are being used, especially given the increasing risks of disinformation and propaganda.

Figure 2. Types of activities of Ukrainian CSOs in the Nordic-Baltic region

Source: Zubkovych et al., 2025.

Main Challenges

At the same time, the survey reveals the main challenges that Ukrainian CSOs in the Nordic-Baltic region have been facing (Figure 3). In particular, the respondents mentioned the absence of structured coordination mechanisms, which leads to duplication of efforts and uneven visibility.

For instance, while several groups in Sweden and Norway focus on humanitarian aid, their activities often run parallel rather than in partnership. The lack of common platforms or umbrella networks reduces their collective influence and makes it more challenging to articulate shared priorities to governments and donors. Without stronger horizontal coordination, CSOs risk competing rather than complementing one another in their advocacy and support work.

Figure 3. Main challenges for Ukrainian CSOs

Source: Zubkovych et al., 2025.

Funding emerged as one of the most pressing issues in the survey. Most organizations reported reliance on short-term, project-based grants or donations. Many CSOs lack multi-year funding, which makes strategic planning and staff retention almost impossible. This precarious situation often leads to volunteer burnout and creates uncertainty about the future of their programs. Donor practices have unintentionally exacerbated this vulnerability by neglecting the long-term capacity-building needs of diaspora CSOs.

The survey further highlights significant disparities in institutional access. Larger CSOs, particularly those based in capital cities such as Stockholm, Oslo, and Helsinki, enjoy greater visibility and are more likely to receive invitations to political consultations. By contrast, smaller groups in regions often remain excluded from policy-making processes, despite being closer to affected communities. This imbalance risks creating unequal representation, where only a handful of well-resourced organizations shape public debate, while others remain invisible. Respondents from Baltic states also pointed out that while they are engaged in cultural diplomacy and integration activities, they struggle to gain recognition from national ministries or international donors. The result is a fragmented advocacy landscape, where not all voices are equally heard.

Many organizations reported gaps in technical capacity, particularly a lack of specific skills in fundraising, project management, digital communication, lobbying, and public outreach. Additionally, the survey highlighted the dual role that Ukrainian CSOs currently play outside Ukraine. On one hand, they act as advocates for Ukraine internationally, lobbying for sanctions, military aid, and continued political support. On the other hand, they provide practical integration services for displaced Ukrainians, including legal counselling, language courses, housing support, and employment assistance. While both roles are crucial, this dual identity can create tensions. For instance, CSOs in Sweden and Finland reported that resources devoted to advocacy sometimes limited their ability to address integration needs, while groups in Estonia and Latvia noted that local integration demands risk overshadowing their transnational advocacy. Without clearer strategies or additional resources, CSOs may struggle to balance these functions effectively.

Conclusion

The survey of Ukrainian CSOs in the Nordic-Baltic region, combined with insights from NUAS 2025, highlights both their urgent needs and strategic opportunities.

For CSOs, strengthening coordination mechanisms is critical to reduce duplication and amplify their collective influence. Creating cross-border advocacy platforms and thematic working groups would help CSOs to better coordinate their activities, learn from others’ experience, and articulate common priorities. In particular, smaller CSOs would benefit from learning how to adopt effective communication strategies, diversify outreach through multiple platforms, and enhance engagement with local communities and institutional stakeholders.

At the same time, CSOs should invest in internal capacity: skills training in project management, advocacy, and digital communication can improve efficiency and increase funding opportunities. Finally, CSOs should balance their dual roles, such as supporting displaced Ukrainians locally while advocating for Ukraine internationally, by dividing responsibilities and tailoring strategies to avoid role conflict.

In turn, policymakers and donors may benefit from closer cooperation with Ukrainian CSOs. As documented by Anisimova et al.  (2025), Ukrainian CSOs and civil society actors have already stepped in to fill gaps left by the public sector in the Nordic-Baltic countries. They have been facilitating labor market integration by offering mentorship, language support, and professional networks; improving access to information and bridging communication barriers between displaced people, employers, and municipalities. By recognizing and making use of Ukrainian CSOs’ experience, NB8 governments can develop more efficient mechanisms for integrating displaced populations. Furthermore, wider interaction with CSOs – including small local ones, currently underrepresented in the policy dialogue – may help coordinate with local communities and ensure inclusive policy-making processes.

Ultimately, it is important to recognize the role of Ukrainian civil society not only as a facilitator in the immediate support efforts but also as a strategic partner in shaping Europe’s long-term peace architecture.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.

Liberal Values in Ukraine Days Before the 2022 Invasion

Posted on September 22, 2025 | Policy Brief

Monument in Kyiv at sunrise symbolizing Ukraine liberal values of freedom, democracy, and resilience.

Just weeks before Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, the European Social Survey completed the 10th round of data collection on public attitudes and beliefs in Ukraine. This policy brief examines regional variation in liberal values such as attitudes toward democracy and the EU, based on that data. While respondents in Eastern Ukraine were more skeptical of democracy and EU integration, they did not consistently reject liberal social values to a greater extent than respondents in other parts of the country. The most striking divide however, lies in institutional trust, which was significantly lower in Eastern Ukraine. This suggests that trust in institutions, which may have been further negatively impacted by prolonged exposure to violence since 2014, underlie the observed regional differences in attitudes towards democracy and the EU. Understanding these differences is vital for policymakers navigating Ukraine’s reform and EU accession process.

Introduction

It has been well documented that values in post-communist countries in Eastern Europe on average, tend to be more authoritarian, more nationalistic, more in favor of state intervention in the economy, and more skeptical towards sexual and ethnic minorities and foreigners than in Western Europe (e.g., Roland 2012). Behind the averages, however, there is substantial variation in values across subgroups of populations. Even before the onset of the full-scale Russian invasion, a discussion on regional Ukrainian differences in relation to democratic values, the wish for EU integration, and similar liberal attitudes existed, both in and outside of the country.

The path towards a closer relationship with Europe and the EU started already in 2014, but since February 2022, Ukraine has politically positioned itself even closer to the EU, and an EU accession process is now underway. However, for a successful reform process in Ukraine, how public opinion is shaped and whether attitudes and values converge towards those of the EU will be important (Olofsgård et al. 2024).

With this in mind, this policy brief provides a descriptive account of public liberal values in Ukraine by analyzing data from the 10th round of the European Social Survey (ESS) conducted just weeks before the full-scale invasion on the 22nd of February 2022. Some of the differences we observe are likely long-standing and related to differences in language preferences and cultural and informational exposure from Russia and the EU, respectively. Yet, given the exposure to instability and conflict in the eastern part of Ukraine since 2014, we also discuss the role that exposure to conflict may have played in explaining several attitudinal dimensions, including satisfaction with democracy, support for liberal social values, attitudes toward Europe and EU integration, as well as levels of trust.

Data

The ESS round 10 data was collected through face-to-face interviews in Ukraine between January 18th, 2022, and February 8th, 2022. The nationally representative survey focuses on public attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors and includes questions on opinions on democracy, the EU, and similar topics commonly considered to capture liberal views.

ESS Sample Characteristics

The sample consisted of more women than men (about 59 percent and 41 percent, respectively). While the Ukrainian population is well-educated, most still find it difficult (41 percent) or very difficult (32 percent) to live comfortably on their income. 11.5 percent of the sample was unemployed, while 31 percent were retired. Broken down by location, most average outcomes are similar, albeit with the East displaying somewhat lower levels of education and greater income difficulties (see Figure 1 for an illustration of what oblasts (regions) are included in each geographical unit). Unemployment was, however, substantially higher in the West (about 15 percent), while the share of retirees was lower (26 percent).

Some heterogeneity exists when it comes to belonging to a religious denomination. In the Central and South, around 63 percent state they belong to a church/mosque/synagogue, etc. The East is roughly at par with the national average (70 and 69.5 percent, respectively), while this figure is 82 percent in the Western part of the country. Similarly, there are major differences in the language one most often speaks at home. In the country as a whole, 13.4 percent stated they speak both Ukrainian and Russian at home. In the East, this figure was as high as 27.1 percent, displaying the duality in mother tongue in this part of Ukraine. The corresponding figure for the West was 3.3 percent. On the contrary, 92.4 percent marked that they most often speak only Ukrainian at home in the West, whereas this figure was only 5.2 percent in the East.

Figure 1. Geographical Classification of Ukraine’s Oblasts

Note: The map depicts the ESS coverage at the time of data collection, excluding Crimea and Sevastopol – illegally annexed by Russia since 2014.

Key Variables of Interest

To understand the views on liberal values, ESS responses to questions in the following areas have been considered:

  • I. Merits of democracy: satisfaction with the way democracy works; importance of living in a democratic country.
  • II. Liberal democratic values: agreement with statements such as “gay men and lesbians should be free to live their own lives as they wish”; attitudes towards the merits of obedience, respect for authority, and loyalty towards leaders; attitudes towards immigrants.
  • III. Opinions about Europe and the EU: support for further EU integration; emotional attachment to Europe; vote intention in a hypothetical EU referendum.

Regional Differences

There are some clear regional divides in attitudes toward democracy, liberal values, and EU integration across Ukraine in the weeks leading up to the full-scale Russian invasion. These differences are particularly pronounced between Eastern Ukraine and the Center, South, and West – though not uniformly in the same direction.

Figure 2. Attitudes toward democracy, liberal values, and EU integration across Ukraine

Source: Authors’ creation from ESS.

On democratic commitment, only 37 percent of respondents in the East considered it “extremely important” to live in a democratically governed country. This was about 16 percentage points lower than the national average. When categories were grouped into low, medium, and high importance, the East still trailed the national average by about 10 percentage points (about 67.5 and 75 percent, respectively). Similarly, satisfaction with democracy is the lowest among respondents from the East (about 6 percent compared to a national average, including the East, of 11 percent). Geographical differences are also evident in the responses to the question on whether it is acceptable for a country to have a strong leader above the law. A smaller share rejected this in the East (about 30 percent compared to the national average of 37 percent).

However, the East stood out in the other direction on some core liberal values, as depicted in Figure 2. It had the lowest share disagreeing with LGBT rights (31 percent vs. 40 percent nationally), the weakest support for teaching children obedience (17 percent), and the highest rejection of it (41 percent). Further, only 12 percent in the East agreed that “the country needs most loyalty towards its leaders,” compared to 26 percent nationally. This question could reflect one’s view on the current leadership, warranting some caution in the interpretation. On immigration, however, the East was less liberal: only 19 percent saw immigrants as having a positive impact, versus about 30 percent nationally.

The sharpest regional divide between the East and other regions concerns attitudes toward Europe and EU membership. In a hypothetical referendum, 73 percent of respondents in the East said they would vote to remain outside of the EU, compared to 47 percent in the South, 23 percent in the Central, and just 11 percent in the West. Support for further European unification was also substantially lower in the East, with only about 17 percent in favor of further unification, as compared to the almost 50 percent national average. Similarly, emotional attachment to Europe is substantially lower among respondents from the East, with nearly all respondents stating low or medium attachment only – figures that nearly invert those of respondents from the West of Ukraine.

The Role of Trust

Turning to the measures of trust, the East clearly stands out. Trust in the parliament, the police, political parties, politicians, and the legal system was substantially lower among respondents from the East (in the ranges of 5 to 15 percentage points more respondents answered they had a low level of trust in said institutions than the national average). When asked about trust in the United Nations, the East also stood out with more than 50 percent stating low trust compared to the national average of about 37. The same pattern holds also when asked about the European Parliament – 73 percent compared to the national average of about 44 percent – stated low trust. Respondents from the South also displayed lower levels of trust across all measures, but the deviations from the average are about half as big as the East.

When asked whether people can generally be trusted, or one can’t be too careful, the East did not stand out in this way, underpinning how distrust is strongly directed toward institutions, both national and international.

Conflict Exposure

Figure 3 details the conflict intensity in the last two years leading up to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. As can be seen, incidents of violence are concentrated in the Donbass area, including the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. While not marked by similar levels of active conflict, Kharkiv oblast – also part of the East classification – borders areas with high levels of conflict intensity in the Donbass, as well as Russia in the east.

Figure 3. Conflict intensity in Ukraine, by raion

2020

 

2021

Source: Authors’ creation from Armed Conflict and Location Data.

It should be noted that the map also depicts strategic deployments and political unrest, such as demonstrations, explaining the prevalence of “conflict” also in a few other places in Ukraine prior to February 2022. The occurrences of such incidents are, however, far less than those in Luhansk oblast and Donetsk oblast at the time. An important piece of information is that the intensity pattern holds for the time Armed Conflict and Location Data for Ukraine has been available (2018), i.e. individuals situated in the East have been exposed to incidences of violence over a prolonged period of time.

This raises the question whether this exposure to violence may have contributed to increased differences in trust in institutions and support for democracy and the EU beyond what was already there before 2014. The most immediate effect probably comes from selective migration, i.e., that individuals who remain in the eastern regions in early 2022 despite the violence since 2014 may be those who, on average, are more skeptical of the Ukrainian government and its tilt away from the authoritarian Russia and towards the EU. But previous literature and recent studies on Ukraine suggest that there may also be a direct effect coming from exposure to violence on an individual’s attitudes. This relationship has recently been mapped by Obrizan (2025). A key finding is that military solutions are preferred in the segment of the population that has experienced hardship and personal losses since the full-scale invasion in 2022.

More generally, any kind of trust – including the interpersonal one – can be affected by exposure to conflict. The relationship is complicated, and in some instances, violence can cause more pro-social attitudes and behavior. An important distinction, however, is that exposure to violence amplifies the distinctions in attitudes and behavior towards members of in- and out-groups (Olofsgård, 2025). This suggests that conflict may have further increased the differences between the East of Ukraine and the rest of the country, if many residents in the former perceive national and western institutions as being dominated by groups they do not feel strong attachments to.

Further, terror management theory (e.g., Landau et al. 2004) suggests that fear induces support for charismatic and strong leadership. In a context where liberal democracy is not everywhere well enough entrenched, this may tilt over into support for more authoritarian leadership in response to attacks triggering stronger emotions of fear. Furthermore, work by Feldman and Stenner (1997) shows that the impact of perceived societal threat on triggering stronger authoritarian preferences can depend on authoritarian predispositions. The latter is measured by, e.g., looking at attitudes towards child rearing and emphasis on obedience. In the context of the finding above, this would imply that the impact of violence on authoritarian preferences would be weaker in the eastern parts of Ukraine, compared to the rest of the country, a potentially interesting avenue for future research.

Conclusions

The findings in this policy brief nuance simple narratives about regional divides in Ukraine. While dissatisfaction with democracy and skepticism toward the EU are more common in the East, this does not necessarily correspond to a general rejection of liberal social values. In some cases — such as attitudes toward child-rearing, authority, and LGBT rights — respondents from the East even express more liberal views than elsewhere.

Not explicitly discussed in the brief is the topic of mother tongue. The data shows that Russian speakers are less emotionally attached to Europe and less supportive of EU integration. Yet, there is no consistent evidence that Russian speakers are less committed to liberal democratic values overall. The effect of language is difficult to disentangle from geography, particularly given the concentration of Russian speakers in Eastern Ukraine.

What does stand out more clearly is that trust and the general view on institutions are substantially lower and more negative in the East. Respondents from the East consistently report lower trust in national and international political institutions. Interestingly, this pattern does not extend to generalized social trust — the East does not differ markedly from the rest of the country. This contrast suggests a more focused skepticism directed at formal institutions, rather than widespread social distrust. One possible explanation, as discussed in Olofsgård (2025), is that when exposed to conflict and violence, interpersonal trust may reflect confidence in one’s in-group, while institutional trust hinges on feeling represented within the broader political system. If respondents from the East perceive themselves as excluded from the national or European in-group, this could explain their lower levels of trust in both domestic and international institutions, and exposure to violence may have further amplified this. While signs of such alienation appear in the data, one should refrain from drawing too strong conclusions from this alone. Another possible explanation is that prolonged exposure to violence has eroded confidence in the government’s ability to protect citizens, and in the effectiveness of EU support, which would turn support away from the EU option preferred by the current government.  Future research on the effects of war exposure should more carefully disentangle the various aspects and forms of trust and how they relate to liberal values in Ukraine. Rebuilding institutional trust remains a key challenge. In this context, instilling peace and decentralizing political power may be essential for increasing trust in the Eastern part of the country, if that helps residents in the East to identify with public institutions. As Ukraine advances on its path toward EU membership, fostering a shared sense of national belonging will be critical in overcoming the narrative of an East–West divide when rebuilding the country.

References

Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in policy briefs and other publications are those of the authors; they do not necessarily reflect those of the FREE Network and its research institutes.