Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2020 December 8

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December 8

Early 1990s Ukrainian polling on the Soviet Union's collapse and break-up?

Does anyone here know of any early 1990s (specifically 1991-1994) Ukrainian polling in regards to Ukrainians' views on the Soviet Union's collapse and break-up? Specifically, I want to know if the number of Ukrainians who regretted the Soviet Union's collapse and break-up in 1991-1994 was significantly higher than the 10% of Ukrainians who voted against Ukrainian independence in the December 1991 Ukrainian independence referendum. Futurist110 (talk) 00:02, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

Professor Stephen F. Cohen has argued in one of his works that when Ukrainians voted for independence in December 1991, a lot of them didn't actually know that they were going to vote for full independence; rather, Cohen claims that a lot of Ukrainians thought that a new union (along the lines of the Soviet Union, but much freer and fairer) was going to soon follow even after a successful Ukrainian independence vote: https://www.google.com/books/edition/Soviet_Fates_and_Lost_Alternatives/uoJFyqxx9KUC?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=%22really%20vote%20to%20leave%20the%22 Basically, I want to test the veracity of Professor Cohen's hypothesis in regards to this issue. Specifically, I want to try figuring out whether Professor Cohen's hypothesis in regards to this is likely to be true or likely to be false. Futurist110 (talk) 00:06, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

But there is a union that Ukraine joined after they voted for independence. It still exists, but Ukraine (mostly, but not entirely) quit in 2018 following the whole Crimea/Donbass mess. See Commonwealth of Independent States. --Jayron32 12:53, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

That union is mostly symbolic, though--no? Comparable to the British Commonwealth. (Yes, Russia did try to turn it into something bigger than that, but Ukraine and perhaps some other countries have always blocked and vetoed these Russian proposals.) Futurist110 (talk) 23:03, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

You're showing your age, it hasn't been the British Commonwealth since 1949, but the name lingered on in the Commonwealth Games until 1974. Alansplodge (talk) 09:23, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

FWIW, I'm only 28 years old! Futurist110 (talk) 23:09, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

LOL :-) Alansplodge (talk) 10:13, 10 December 2020 (UTC)

UN peacekeeping in the 90s and now

I'm under impression that the UN peacekeeping forces now are less prominent globally than, for example, in the 1990s when I heard frequent news reports about blue helmets. It seems now Russian peacekeepers are more visible in hot areas than blue helmets. Is it indeed so? 212.180.235.46 (talk) 13:48, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

Russian forces are present in Crimea, eastern Ukraine, Syria, and now increasingly in Libya, but I don't know that what they do can be described as "peacekeeping" -- see Wagner Group. United Nations peacekeepers have somewhat tarnished their reputation by spreading cholera in Haiti (something which the UN leadership kept shamelessly and brazenly lying about for many months) and several sex scandals (not forgetting Srebrenica, of course). Israel has insisted on keeping such UN forces to the absolute minimum role that Israel can obtain, ever since the May 1967 U Thant fiasco, when the United Nations basically gave up on any serious attempt to prevent the then-future Six-day War of June 1967... AnonMoos (talk) 15:24, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

opinionated comments Viennese Waltz 17:25, 8 December 2020 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Erm that's a pretty biased view. You could equally easily say Israel probably doesn't want to be held accountable for their breaking of countless UN resolutions.... Fgf10 (talk) 16:24, 8 December 2020 (UTC) That's nice. Whatever gets passed in the United Nations' ritualistic Two-Minutes Hate Against Israel sessions ever since the Soviet-Third World alliance of dictators against democracies was consolidated at the United Nations in the 1970s has no relevance to the events of May 1967, when then-Secretary General U Thant failed to make use of peackeepers in any way which would keep the peace, and in fact ended up pretty much paving the path to war. It was one of the actions which solidified Israeli contempt for the UN (even before the infamous Resolution 3379). Whether he wanted to or not, U Thant taught the Israeli government and people in the "school of hard knocks" that the United Nations will never act to defend Israel in any way, but it will often act to try to prevent Israel from defending itself, and the Israelis have kept that in mind ever since... AnonMoos (talk) 16:45, 8 December 2020 (UTC) +1. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 18:43, 11 December 2020 (UTC)

EH? Is AnonMoos suggesting that the Russian forces in Crimea are even remotely in ANYONE's perception'peacekeepers'????????? (I'm not even touching Russian forces in eastern Ukraine because Russia won't admit to them - hardly the way one normally seeks PR for peacekeeping.) Hayttom (talk) 20:50, 14 December 2020 (UTC)

I was trying to gently squelch the idea without using emphatic language. AnonMoos (talk) 01:26, 15 December 2020 (UTC)

Additional examples of ethnic federations

Which additional examples of ethnic federations--either real-life examples or proposed examples that were never actually implemented--are there? So far, I can think of:

• The Soviet Union
• Communist Czechoslovakia
• Communist Yugoslavia
• Ethiopia
• Bosnia and Herzegovina (sort-of)
• Nepal (maybe?)
• Pakistan
• India
• South Sudan
• Belgium
• Russia (sort-of; a lot of its federal units are ethnic Russian-majority, though it does have some that are specifically meant for minorities)
• The pre-World War I United States of Greater Austria plan, but it was never actually implemented
• Joe Biden's 2006-2007 proposal to partition Iraq into separate Sunni Arab, Shi'a, and Kurdish federal units, but it was likewise never actually implemented--yet, at least!

The European Union could be thought of as an ethnic confederation due to the widespread prevalence of nation-states within it, I suppose.

Anyway, though, which additional examples of ethnic federations (aka ethnic federalism)--either real or proposed/hypothetical--have there been? Futurist110 (talk) 23:42, 8 December 2020 (UTC)

Bosnia and Herzegovina is definitely an ethnic federation, as various ethnic groups control their own sub-national institutions. Not sure why you put Ethiopia and Nepal on this list, however. India is just a basic federation; it just happens to have various ethnic groups among its huge population. Xuxl (talk) 14:28, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

In regards to Bosnia and Herzegovina, do the Croats there have their own self-governing institutions? As for Ethiopia and Nepal, the ethnic federalization article on Wikipedia mentions them as being ethnic federations. As for India, aren't a lot of its states roughly based on ethnic lines? Telangana for the Telugu people, for instance. Futurist110 (talk) 18:51, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Should probably say "ethnolinguistic", since the Indian state boundaries were largely redrawn along linguistic lines after independence.. AnonMoos (talk) 02:16, 11 December 2020 (UTC)

China and Burma come to mind. DOR (HK) (talk) 20:31, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

China isn't actually a federation, though. Neither is Burma, apparently. Futurist110 (talk) 23:08, 9 December 2020 (UTC)

Both have carve outs for ethnic minorities (and honor them in the same pathetic way). DOR (HK) (talk) 02:00, 11 December 2020 (UTC) ADD: "Union" of Myanmar...