Soviet Legacy and Colonial Mentality: Continuity and Change in Ukraine’s Higher Education
Journal: East/West Journal of Ukrainian Studies
Year: 2025

This article considers the forces that impeded university reform in Ukraine prior to the Russian invasion in 2014 and the onset of the full-scale war in 2022. Ukraine’s post-Soviet educational system, which was originally designed to reproduce the subservience, compliance, and rigidity of the Russian and Soviet empires, preserved administrative mechanisms and entitlements that curbed institutional transformation. Russia’s invasion, however, spurred universities in Ukraine to make a radical move