d e v e l o p m e n t a n d t h e p o l it i cs o f d i f fe re n t i a t i o n • s a r a h d . p h i l l i p s WOMEN’S SOCIAL ACTIVISM IN THE NEW UKRAINE WOMEN’S SOCIAL ACTIVISM IN THE NEW UKRAINE p h i l l i p s IND IANA University Press Bloomington & Indianapolis http://iupress.indiana.edu 1-800-842-6796 INDIANA When the socialist regimes of Eastern Europe fell in the early 1990s, it was assumed that robust civil societies would be the key to establishing democracy in the region. Western governments allocated millions of dollars to civil society building efforts, especially nongovernmental organizations. In postsocialist Ukraine, with privatization and the scaling back of the social safety net, it is primarily women who have been left as leaders of service-oriented NGOs and mutual-aid associations, caring for the marginalized and destitute with little or no support from the Ukrainian state. In this compelling study, Sarah D. Phillips follows eleven activists over the course of several years to document the unexpected effects that social activism has produced for Ukraine’s women as they take up the “housework of politics.” While NGO activism is generally assumed to be empowering in such situations, Phillips reveals the NGO sector to be a site for postsocialist “differentiation” of citizens, as criteria for productive citizenship are reworked, and the rights and needs of various categories of citizens redened. By viewing the women’s experiences in the broader context of social change, Ukrainian social welfare reform, and international development programs, Phillips examines intertwining processes of differentiation as certain types of claims, organizations, and NGO leaders are privileged over others, sharpening social inequalities. s a r a h d . p h i l l i p s is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Indiana University, Bloomington. New Anthropologies of Europe Daphne Berdahl, Matti Bunzl, and Michael Herzfeld, founding editors Cover illustration: Women at an AIDS awareness march in Kyiv. Cover photo courtesy of UNIAN. RUSSIA & EASTERN EUROPE WOMEN’S STUDIES ANTHROPOLOGY Cover illustration: Women at an AIDS awareness march in Kyiv. Cover photo courtesy of UNIAN. FPO even though le is 300 dpi Women’s Social Activism in the New Ukraine New Anthropologies of Europe Daphne Berdahl, Matti Bunzl, and Michael Herzfeld, founding editors SARAH D. PHILLIPS Women’s Social Activism in the New Ukraine Development and the Politics of Differentiation indiana university press Bloomington and Indianapolis This book is a publication of Indiana University Press 601 North Morton Street Bloomington, IN 47404-3797 USA http://iupress.indiana.edu Telephone orders 800-842-6796 Fax orders 812-855-7931 Orders by e- mail iuporder@indiana.edu ©2008 by Sarah D. Phillips All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses’ Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences— Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. Manufactured in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data Phillips, Sarah D. Women's social activism in the new Ukraine : development and the politics of differentiation / Sarah D. Phillips. p. cm. — (New anthropologies of Europe) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-253-35164-7 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-253-21992-3 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Women social reformers— Ukraine. 2. Non- governmental organizations— Ukraine. 3. Ukraine— Social conditions—1991– I. Title. HQ1236.5.U38P45 2008 303.48′409477—dc22 2007047359 1 2 3 4 5 13 12 11 10 09 08 In loving memory of my mother, June H. Phillips, my grandmother, Erah Howell, and my friend, Faina Neiman. “She hath done what she could.” Contents Preface ix Acknowledgments xv Note on Transliteration and Translation xvii Note on the Purchasing Power of the Ukrainian Hryvnia (UAH) xix Introduction: Women, NGOs, and the Politics of Differentiation 1 1. All Aboard the “Titanic Ukraina” 30 2. Ukrainian NGO- graphy 63 3. Claims and Class 107 4. Movin’ On Up: Social Activism and Upward Mobility 138 Conclusion: Dyferentsiatsiia, Democracy, and Development 154 Notes 167 Bibliography 181 Index 197 Preface Kyiv, Ukraine. January 1999. Svetlana and Vira, the director and assistant di- rector of the charitable fund “Our House,” which provides assistance to large families (those with three or more children), are working late. They have been in the cramped, one- room offi ce all day, handing out food baskets to the sev- enty member families. It is freezing outside and not much warmer in the offi ce, where the walls, zigzagged with ominous cracks, barely seem to support the sagging, leaky roof. We all have our coats on; Svetlana wears a denim jacket with an American fl ag stitched on the back, humanitarian aid from the United States. The offi ce smells of instant coffee, cigarette smoke, and mothballs, the latter emanating from cardboard boxes of donated clothing from France and Germany that crowd the offi ce, stacked up to the ceiling. Svetlana and Vira keep checking their watches— they both have three children to get home to. It is mostly mothers who have stopped by to pick up the “rations”—cooking oil, cereals, spaghetti, and condensed milk donated by a local businessman. They sign their names in a notebook, and Vira hands each of them two plastic bags full of food. Most pause to chat with Svetlana, Vira, and other mothers before venturing back out into the cold. One woman asks Svetlana about subsidies for housing payment— to what discounts are large families entitled? Which fami- lies qualify, those with fi ve children, or do families with three children “count,” too? Another relates how glad she is that she bought her son’s school uniform a size too big last fall— he has almost grown out of it already. Finally, all the bags are claimed and it is time to close up. Svetlana, exhausted, sinks into a rickety wooden chair, lights an unfi ltered cigarette, and offers me more coffee. She lets out a deep sigh and rubs her temples. Having composed herself she looks at me with tired eyes and asks, “Do decent, hard- working people live like this in your country, too?” Though I did not know it at the time, thus began my fi rst interview for this project, an ethnographic investigation into the lives of women leaders of non- governmental organizations (NGOs). By January 1999 I had already spent a year in Kyiv, the capital city of Ukraine, carrying out research on Ukrainians’ utilization of alternative medicine after Chernobyl. As I elicited narratives from people about Chernobyl, illness, and the body, it became clear that the suffer- ing caused by Chernobyl had been compounded by other sources of suffering during the twelve years since the nuclear accident in 1986. Although narratives on Chernobyl, its causes, and consequences abounded in my informants’ un- solicited speech, they also spun out narratives of unemployment, marginaliza- tion, and abandonment by the state, usually with little or no prompting from me. Through these litanies, people linked health issues with social issues and . PHILLIPS Women’s Social Activism in the New Ukraine Development and the Politics of Differentiation indiana university press Bloomington and Indianapolis This book is a publication of Indiana University. America Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data Phillips, Sarah D. Women's social activism in the new Ukraine : development and the politics of differentiation / Sarah D. Phillips. . struggles and learning about the lives of women in different parts of the world. Their commitment to social change and their insights into the effects of socialist collapse on the lives of everyday