Sooner or later, Ukraine will hold elections, and post-war society is extremely vulnerable to the influence of populism. The nation, which has lost thousands of its best sons and daughters, is very sensitive to such phenomena as corruption, election advertising, and even the very resumption of the usual political process, which is always accompanied by a struggle for power.
Everyone will be full of high expectations, but the experience of post-war countries shows that one should never expect overly idealistic political and economic processes in a war-torn country. Populists, even after a devastating war, will remain themselves and fight for power.
Populism is always based on three pillars:
- Belief in the antagonism between the “common people” and the “eternally corrupt elite.”
- Appeals to the wisdom of the “deep people,” who for some reason always need charismatic leaders to personally defend the people.
- Ability to solve complex political and economic problems with simple, quick and decisive solutions.
Populists promise “mountains of gold” with simple solutions, but most of their proposals, which fit on a single Facebook picture, are refuted by a simple explanation of their implausibility and often harmfulness. Studies of countering populism show that even simple informing citizens and explaining the unrealistic nature of populist promises can already bring down the level of support for a populist idea by at least 30%.
One of the most popular promises of populists on social media is the idea of making the minimum wage in Ukraine $1,000. Populists promise to oblige and force “hucksters” to pay people a decent salary, and those who do not want to will learn the “power of the law.” But naïve citizens who like such posts on social media do not think that if such a law is passed, entrepreneurs will circumvent it and not work at a loss. For example, an entrepreneur owns several stores, where he employs several saleswomen, whom he pays UAH 20,000 per month. If the state requires him to pay 40 thousand to one employee, he will pay 40 thousand to one, as required by law, and fire the rest of the employees due to unprofitability. It is possible that several stores will be closed, as their maintenance will be more expensive for the owner.
Or the entrepreneur will hire workers illegally for even lower wages than they were paid before the law was passed, which “cares” about the people. As a result, employees will receive lower wages, most of their salaries will go into the shadows, and the state will not receive taxes from illegal workers.
We should not ignore the laws of economics and human psychology: when something becomes unprofitable, people look for ways to get around it. At the same time, the state will not benefit from this, except for corrupt law enforcement officers. Thus, populist “concern for the people”, unjustified by the real performance of the country’s economy, may result in the growth of the shadow sector, a decrease in real wages, corruption, and a decrease in tax revenues for the state.
Once upon a time, Stalin wanted to force peasants to hand over their grain for nothing so that the cities could have cheap bread. The peasants began to refuse to work at a loss, and the authorities decided to take the grain by force, organizing the Holodomor and driving people into collective farm slavery. As a result, millions of people were killed and labor efficiency dropped tremendously, because slave labor has never been efficient. And the USSR, until the last year of its existence, had a lower grain yield than before the Bolshevik coup of 1917. A peasant with a horse in 1917 harvested more than a Soviet collective farmer with all the tractors and combines in 1991.
Most of the populist slogans on social media about reducing MPs’ salaries (which currently amount to about UAH 30-35 thousand), selling only Ukrainian gas to the population, and other “caring” ideas will actually lead to an increase in corruption and a decrease in the development of the domestic economy. A corrupt official will not become honest just because a new law on punishment for corruption has been passed, but corruption will be reduced by building a transparent system where no decision can be made alone on the sidelines without explaining its rationale to the public. Only a transparent decision-making system based on public scrutiny can make corruption impossible.
At a critical time for the state, it is important for Ukrainians to realize that we have no right to make another mistake, to allow profane and incompetent liars to decide the fate of our country in its struggle for independence.
Author: Valeriy Maydanyuk
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