Zelenskyy and Havel – by Andrea Chandler
On March 15, 2022, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke to Canada’s Parliament by video link. Canadians had the unique opportunity to be addressed directly by the leader of a country at war, who faced an unwarranted attack on his own soil. While those immersed in European and Russian studies have long been aware of the challenges facing the postcommunist countries, the invasion of Ukraine has brought Eastern Europe to the centre of world attention. Zelenskyy’s gravely concerned, yet composed demeanour raised directly the threats to human security that have been imposed by an authoritarian Russian leadership. The Ukrainian catastrophe calls upon the world community once again to ponder the contentious relationship between state sovereignty and democracy, as Zelenskyy appeals to member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for assistance. NATO was explicitly formed in 1949 to protect the democracies of its members through a strong military alliance, but a perfect balance between democracy and military strength has never been achieved.
In 1999, another respected world leader raised these questions in an address to Canada’s legislature. Czech President, the late Vaclav Havel, addressed Parliament in April of that year, not long after his country joined NATO. At the time, NATO was taking action against Yugoslav President Slobodan Milošević following alleged human rights abuses, including the attempt to deport ethnic Albanians from Serbia, as the long-simmering conflict in Kosovo peaked. (1) Havel’s speech provides a good reminder that the expansion of NATO to include East European members took place within the context of a bloody war in the centre of Europe, in the former Yugoslavia. There is much to question and debate about the expansion of NATO. Nevertheless, at the moment that Havel spoke, the alliance was widely seen as the principal actor capable of defending the security of smaller European states during a decade in which the collapse of communism had had unanticipated ripple effects.
Havel’s speech to Parliament presents to the reader of 2022 as highly optimistic in some ways. He showed a faith in the ability of globalization processes to empower citizens to effect positive change, by deepening their relationships with people in other states. The twenty-first century created an opportunity for people to empower themselves, their local governments, and their civil society organizations. At the same time, said Havel, the state should assume its proper place in the background, relinquishing unnecessary coercion and letting go of its fixation with territory. Instead, the state should be devoted to advancing the well-being of citizens and maintaining fair laws passed in a democratic manner. (2)
Havel’s speech reflected his ambivalence over the position of Europe at the end of the 20th century. On the one hand, there was a clear relief at the ability of his country to join with other continental European nations, and his hope at the prospect of building a deeper multilateral community. A respected writer and activist who had been imprisoned under the Czechoslovak communist regime, Havel had written eloquently about the human being’s basic need for freedom and dignity (3). On the other hand, Havel directly addressed the conflict underway in Kosovo: as he wrote, “[NATO] is fighting because decent people cannot sit back and watch systematic, state-directed massacres of other people. Decent people simply cannot tolerate this, and cannot fail to come to the rescue if a rescue action is within their power.” (4)
Whether Zelenskyy was aware of Havel’s speech or not, the Ukrainian President’s words to Canada’s Parliament seemed to appeal directly to these ‘decent people’ who are horrified by the needless suffering of civilians as a result of aggression from another state. Zelenskyy spoke in simple, direct language, calling upon Members of Parliament to imagine experiencing in their own country the sights and sounds of bombing, destruction, deaths of innocent people. Think of what it feels like, and consider what you would do, was his message. While expressing gratitude for what Canada and other countries had already done, he called for more direct assistance to Ukraine’s military effort. In his speech he blamed neither the people of Russia nor Vladimir Putin: he located the aggression in the “Russian Federation” – the state, and by extension, its leadership. And in a phrase worthy of Vaclav Havel, he called for support from “all friends of the truth.” (5)
Havel, in his speech almost twenty-three years earlier, had raised his concerns about the Russian state. He observed that Russia saw NATO expansion as a threat, but this assertion was unreasonable: Russia simply needed to accept NATO as a counterpart with which to engage in dialogue. The problem with Russia, Havel noted, was a problem of boundaries: not so much lines of territory, but of identity – the Russian government had “an uncertainty about where the beginning is, and where the end is, of that which might be called the world of Russia….Russia has had some difficulty with that its entire history.” (6) This interpretation helps to explain the present-day situation in Ukraine. If the landscape of Luhansk oblast, Ukraine, doesn’t look that different from neighbouring Rostov oblast, Russia, then what does it mean to be Russian? In my opinion, for Vladimir Putin, Russia’s western boundary is a fuzzy, blurry space in a flat plain. It is a liminal space, a borderland, an area on a map. And therefore, an area that needs to be controlled, lest the border mysteriously creep eastward towards Moscow itself. It is as if Putin sees Ukraine without seeing Ukrainians, as if they are utterly invisible to him. From the gaze of one obsessed with Soviet notions of security, Ukraine is a territory in which barbed wire and concrete barriers grow organically; trees, wheat and sunflowers do not.
Endnotes
- North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), “Kosovo Air Campaign.” 7 April 2016. https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_49602.htm
- Address of His Excellency Václav Havel President of the Czech Republic to both Houses of Parliament in the House of Commons Chamber, Ottawa. 29 April 1999. Debates of the Senate (Hansard) 1st Session, 36th Parliament, Volume 137, Issue 134. https://sencanada.ca/en/content/sen/chamber/361/debates/134db_1999-04-29-e#0.2.X57BJ2.NBLOSJ.A6YZAF.V2
- See for example Vaclav Havel and Paul Wilson. “The Power of the Powerless.” East European Politics and Societies and Cultures, 32, no. 2, May 2018, pp. 353–408.
- Address of His Excellency Václav Havel President of the Czech Republic to both Houses of Parliament in the House of Commons Chamber, Ottawa. 29 April 1999. Debates of the Senate (Hansard) 1st Session, 36th Parliament, Volume 137, Issue 134. https://sencanada.ca/en/content/sen/chamber/361/debates/134db_1999-04-29-e#0.2.X57BJ2.NBLOSJ.A6YZAF.V2
- Address to Parliament by his Excellency, Volodymyr Zelenskyy President of Ukraine. March 15, 2022 https://parlvu.parl.gc.ca/Harmony/en/PowerBrowser/PowerBrowserV2/20220315/-1/36641
- Address of His Excellency Václav Havel President of the Czech Republic to both Houses of Parliament in the House of Commons Chamber, Ottawa. 29 April 1999. Debates of the Senate (Hansard) 1st Session, 36th Parliament, Volume 137, Issue 134.
https://sencanada.ca/en/content/sen/chamber/361/debates/134db_1999-04-29-e#0.2.X57BJ2.NBLOSJ.A6YZAF.V2
~ Andrea Chandler
Professor, Department of Political Science, Carleton University (andrea.chandler@carleton.ca)