The war waged by Ukraine is not only a military confrontation, but a civilizational conflict between freedom and tyranny, dignity and slavery, culture and barbarism. In this conflict, culture is not an adjunct to military efforts, but an independent front of struggle where the fate of the Ukrainian nation is being decided.
This was announced by the chairman of the Ukrainian Security Club, Yuriy Goncharenko (NGO “Foundation for Promotion of Democracy”) , on May 27 at the expert roundtable “Ways to Strengthen Ukraine’s Social Resilience: Values-Based Expertise”. As part of this event, which took place in Kyiv, leading Ukrainian experts identified the most pressing problems of Ukraine’s defense capability.
The event was organized by the Conservative Platform (a joint project of the NGO “Foundation for Promotion of Democracy” and the Hanns Seidel Foundation in Ukraine) and the Ukrainian Security Club.
During the discussion, Yuriy Goncharenko (NGO “Foundation for the Promotion of Democracy”) voiced a Christian democratic vision of cultural policy and expressed an expert strategy: how to implement a value network of responsible politicians in Ukraine who will not pursue policies based on populism.
The Christian democratic approach involves the integration of the cultural dimension into all areas of the state strategy,” emphasized Yuriy Honcharenko.
Goncharenko also emphasized the importance of culture as the basis of national existence in times of war. “The library and church, theater and museum, school and choir become not just institutions, but strongholds of national resistance,” the expert said.
Yuriy Goncharenko called culture a space of meaning-making and the basis of national resilience and warned against cultural relativism, which leads to the loss of moral guidelines. The expert emphasized countering ideological threats, in particular neo-Marxism and woke ideology, which destroy traditional values and national identity.
“The future of Ukraine depends not only on military victories, but also on cultural ones. Because a real victory is not only the liberation of territory, but also the establishment of the Ukrainian way of life, Ukrainian culture, and the Ukrainian dream of a just, free, and dignified society,” said Yuriy Goncharenko.
The head of the Ukrainian Security Club emphasized that “Ukraine should move from a defensive cultural strategy to an offensive one, from preservation to creation, from the periphery to the center of the European cultural space,” said Yuriy Goncharenko.
Yuriy Goncharenko also emphasized the need to develop defensive democracy in Ukraine, a concept of achieving long-term peace in the face of persistent threats. The key thesis of defense democracy is the axiom that a lasting peace is possible only through constant readiness for defense.
The roundtable discussion “Ways to Strengthen Ukraine’s Social Resilience: Values-Based Expertise” demonstrated how the combined efforts of civil society and military leaders help consolidate Ukrainian society during the war and lay the social foundations for defense capability.
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