POPULISM IDEAS IN THE 2019 ELECTION CAMPAIGN OF THE PRESIDENT OF UKRAINE

Abstract

The article analyzes key slogans that were actively used in the 2019 presidential election campaign. Programs that reflected real political demands and populist slogans were taken into account.

The study of populism is updated by the existence of a social order from interested political actors who use populism to implement their programs and fight for power. In our opinion, there are several factors behind the considerable and lasting impact of populism in independent Ukraine. One of the aforementioned, we consider the quality of political culture, above all its component, as the lack of ability of many citizens to critically comprehend complex socio-economic and political realities, the tendency to make immediate and too simple conclusions about difficult and contradictory things.

At the same time, the populist category of «people» – the bearer of all virtues, the highest purpose and the measure of good and evil – is relevant today in Ukraine, leading from the Ukrainian national-democratic movement of the 19th century, with its distinctly populist features. The new Ukrainian national movement has, to a certain extent, taken it as part of its intellectual heritage from its historical predecessors, especially since, as noted above, it was necessary during the decisive attack on the communist regime.

In the last few years, populism in Ukraine of letters that are incapable of delivering on their unrealistic promises can easily turn into a similarly striking collapse. However, Ukrainian populism is a very flexible, multidimensional phenomenon, and it should be thought that in the coming years it will remain, though in different forms and with other leaders, an influential factor in Ukraine's political struggle.

The elections in Ukraine are losing the value of a mechanism for establishing standards of responsible public policy. This is also a testament to the weakness of political parties, because it is they who should be interested in strengthening such an institution of democracy as elections, since it is elections that allow political parties to exercise themselves. The electoral system continues to be a factor in socio-political tensions, provoking political forces to use regional differences as an instrument of political struggle.