RSVP for Madison Committee on Foreign Relations

All attendees are free!

October 26, 2020m 10:00am, Virtual Meeting (Zoom) - you must register in order to receive the Zoom instructions. RSVP by October 24, 2020.

Register on our website: mcfr.info

press release: The Madison Committee on Foreign Relations presents “Ukraine’s Civil Society and its Continuing Struggle for Democracy”!

Speaker:   Christopher D. Russell, Strategic Policy Analyst

Ukraine’s Revolution of Dignity is widely known for producing a major political shakeup in 2014 that disrupted corrupt political networks, triggered Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, and sparked a conflict with Russian-backed separatists in the Donbas. Less discussed is the key role that Ukraine’s civil society played and continues to play in advancing the public interest. Heavily dependent on both the financial and diplomatic assistance of its Western partners, civil society actors face an array of obstacles in their efforts to fight corruption, hold the government accountable, and advance democratic values. How does assistance to Ukraine’s civil society serve the mutual interests of the US?

Christopher D. Russell (JD-MIPA, ‘16) was recently a Strategic Policy Analyst at the Enhance Non-governmental Actors and Grassroots Engagement (USAID/ENGAGE) activity in Kyiv, Ukraine. He is a former Title VIII Research Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Kennan Institute and a Fulbright Public Policy Fellow in Ukraine.