Intent to Destroy: Russia’s two-hundred-year quest to dominate Ukraine
Date and time:
Monday 13 January, 2025
18:00 - 20:00
Location:
Masaryk Room, UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies
16 Taviton Street
London
WC1H 0BW
Intent to Destroy uncovers the roots of the Russo-Ukrainian War. Ukraine is a key borderland between Russia and the West, and, following the rise of Russian nationalism in the nineteenth century, dominating Ukraine became the cornerstone of Russian policy. The Russian Empire, USSR and Putin’s Russia had long used violence to successfully crush Ukrainian efforts to chart a separate path. Today’s violence is just a more extreme version of Russia’s past efforts. But unlike in the past, the people of Ukraine have overcome their deep internal divisions, and this rise of civic Ukrainian nationalism explains successful resistance to the invasion.
Speaker
Eugene Finkel
Eugene Finkel is the Kenneth H. Keller Professor of International Affairs, Johns Hopkins University. Finkel’s most recent book is Intent to Destroy: Russia’s Two-Hundred-Year Quest to Dominate Ukraine (Basic Books, 2024). He is also the author of Ordinary Jews: Choice and Survival during the Holocaust (Princeton University Press, 2017), and co-author of Reform and Rebellion in Weak States (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and Bread and Autocracy: Food, Politics and Security in Putin’s Russia (Oxford University Press, 2023). His articles have appeared in the American Political Science Review, Journal of Politics, Comparative Political Studies, Comparative Politics, and other journals. Finkel also published articles and op-eds in The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Foreign Affairs, The Spectator and other outlets.
Moderator
Olesya Khromeychuk
Olesya Khromeychuk is the Director of the Ukrainian Institute London. She is a historian and writer. She has taught the history of East-Central Europe at several British universities, and has written for The New York Times, The New York Review of Books, Der Spiegel, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and Prospect. Khromeychuk is the author of The Death of a Soldier Told by His Sister (2022) and “Undetermined” Ukrainians. Post-War Narratives of the Waffen SS “Galicia” Division (2013).
