Yevhen BYSTRYTSKY: “To enter Europe Ukraine needs changes at home”

Financier and philanthropist George Soros is often referred to as the last twentieth century utopian. Also quite often the chain of charitable foundations set up by him in Eastern Europe is regarded as the web of an open society. In response to arguments in favor of such openness some caustically retort, “Where can this openness be seen now? Even some of it?” In Ukraine, the open society idea been supported, since 1991, by the International Renaissance Foundation with its contests, projects, and grants. Of late, following administrative transformation (always and everywhere received quite painfully), the foundation has adopted new operating principles. The Day was told about them by Yevhen Bystrytsky, foundation director. Those familiar with his methods describe him as simultaneously a devout pragmatist and practical philosopher. He has always maintained that openness is not just a good motto but also daily practice, routine, and that really positive changes in the life of society can be felt only when such practice turns into standard procedure.

The Day: Mr. Bystrytsky, has the Renaissance Foundation become a standard of an open society over almost a decade of its existence in Ukraine?

Y. B.: Suppose we start with the openness of information. Michel Foucault would’ve called it the microphysics of power or microphysics of totalitarianism. At the legislative level, we have the Constitution and other laws containing reasonable clauses. But when it comes to implementing them we confront relationships among people that are extremely hard to change. Something is being done to that end but only because you, me, and somebody else have some strings to pull; in my case, it’s because I have some friends among the ranking officeholders. Now this is where an excellent nutrient medium is found for what is generally known as conflict of interest, which is very hard to trace. As a result, we have the practice that “everybody is to blame,” so that each and everyone has something with which to be intimidated. This tradition is the inertia of life and must be overcome, difficult as this is to accomplish.

The most difficult aspect of foundations like mine is objectivity in the allocation of money. We work with the general public, the humanitarian sphere where the project evaluation criteria are rather biased. Considering that the foundation’s principal objective is an open society, we developed a database which can be accessed by every citizen of Ukraine at http://www.irf.kiev.ua to see who has received what money and why. We have the least amount of money that can be allocated out of the public eye. As a rule, this is money due Ukrainian citizens being invited by a third party, foreign organizations, to visit outside Ukraine. We also published an annual report forming a certain public opinion on how well our funds are allocated.

The foundation monitors so- called conflicts of interest; when allocating funds and authority one must keep transparent the possible interest in such funds of certain people making the decisions. Having a conflict of interest does not necessarily mean winding up on the wrong side of the law. Someone may head a district administration and announce at a budget hearing (we support such public hearings) that his son-in-law’s father, brother, or good friend is taking part in the allocation of funds. So what? He really is. You can look up the books and records. The man considers this all right. Yet there are conflicts of interest growing like malignant tumors that have to be removed.

The Day: Ukrainian society is now dominated by an alarming opinion and distrust of foreign partners, rather than fear. Are you aware of this at the foundation? If so, how do you respond?

Y. B.: How is one to overcome our age-old bias toward things unknown? Hard to say. There is a certain inertia of wariness and the constant question, Why should anyone in the West want to help Ukraine’s development? There is evidence that our people often distrust others, suspect them of bad intentions, and look for enemies. We wish we could overcome the attempts of all those officials behind closed doors to take advantage of this prejudice, the allegation that a certain foreign foundation is preventing Ukraine from following its age-old road. The Renaissance Foundation does not close its doors. It works for those wishing to do something in Ukraine. It is to for initiative provided it is well thought out and sufficiently justified.

The Day: George Soros’s severely critical article diagnosing the critical state of today’s democracy in Ukraine caused quite some reverberations in the Ukrainian press, with different publications presenting different views. How do you think this press portrays George Soros and the Renaissance Foundation?

Y. B.: I think that George Soros is portrayed in the way the Ukrainian press is now capable of. Such publications are largely geared to digging up sensations. Perhaps the authors lack the time and independent thinking, also what I’d describe as a self-contained mode, so one can pause and analyze what the founder is really after when giving money for charitable projects in Ukraine, and he has no other financial interests in Ukraine whatsoever.

The Day: Don’t you think that in the aftermath of his sharply critical article a situation could develop whereby the regime will do everything possible to stop the Renaissance Foundation’s operations in Ukraine? Have you had any response from above?

Y. B.: No, nothing at all. In fact, neither the foundation, nor its leadership, its board and oversight council, have any such misgivings, because we are both a domestic and international foundation, even though we are basically financed by Mr. Soros. I don’t think that the Washington Post’s publication will stir the government or upper administrative structures to such action. This would bring too much discredit upon Ukraine’s current political regime.

It is also true, however, that his article is not so much an outburst of criticism as his last hope in his efforts to support the development of an open society, his belief that something can still change for the better in Ukraine. If you read The Economist’s latest articles, there is one by far more critical about Ukraine and that magazine is also quite popular in the world business circles.

In his article Mr. Soros makes it perfectly clear that the West wishes to see Ukraine as an open democracy capable of correcting all the shortcomings that have appeared over the past several years or have lasted since Soviet times. The structure of power here is oligarchic (I would even describe it as neonomenklatura) and this society is greatly stratified, with certain structures persistently refusing to assume responsibility for what is going on. George Soros says that Ukraine’s being divided into beggars and nouveaux riches is probably no one’s fault and that it is a situation in which one must consciously assume responsibility and set about correcting. Western experts consider that Ukraine’s extraordinary scope of corruption is evidence of which reforms are to be made and how fast. In any case, it is a sober, terse, but objective view of the situation. Who has ever been heard in Ukraine when voicing similar ideas?

One other thing. A lot is being said about joining Europe and European integration. However, this integration is not just slogans and diplomatic moves by the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry. It means real changes within the country aimed at socioeconomic transformations that would bring Ukraine up to the level of the European countries.

The Day: Suppose the optimistic scenario does not work in Ukraine. Will the Renaissance Foundation programs currently underway or planned be readjusted or folded up?

Y. B.: Should this happen, we would all have to rely on our own resources. Meaning that we would have to start with the ABCs of democracy, politics, everyday life, education, and so on. We might then once again forget all about Europe’s hard-earned and sage experience and turn to our domestic experts on some “third” way of life. Obviously, we would then have to wait until we came to our senses and could return to the only possible optimistic scenario for real change.

I would like to stress that the foundation, being an organization that issues grants, supporting the most interesting public and citizens’ initiatives, is in a way dependent on Ukraine’s economic and social policy. George Soros has always stressed that he wants to give grants to foundations in countries whose governments support citizens’ initiative, in other words, foundation programs. Otherwise it makes no sense. If the government gets involved with an initiative leading to the development of a democratic, open society and cooperates with the Foundation, it means, in short, that the money being channeled into Ukraine’s programs, projects, and for the benefit of private citizens will register a sharp increase. This is not drawing Ukraine into the Western spider’s web to suck it dry of its wealth (if only we knew where that wealth is!). It is a desire to support Ukraine, not to take away the best it has.

The Day: Is cooperating with bureaucrats realistic?

Y. B.: After administrative transformation the foundation has the experience and personnel to work approaching world standards in terms of management, information support of financial transactions, and electronic data transfer. Here it is impossible to conceal anything. When we contact or cooperate with government structures it is difficult sometimes to find people on the other side capable of coping with the dynamics of our management. There is still Soviet bureaucratic inertia, with traditional Soviet office management and paperwork; people often do not have a single computer and do not know how to use modern equipment. Therefore, we are planning to carry out an intern program at the foundation, meant for people from the Ministries of Education and Culture as well as perhaps from certain other structures. We want them to use the time at the foundation to get used to the international standards we are practicing and bring this knowledge to their workplaces. I am fond of repeating (sorry if it sounds like an overstatement) that our organization could now take over the management of certain ministries provided there were the need and desire.

The Day: We know that most projects of the foundation have involved the nongovernmental sector, just as it has always been emphasized that openness means being independent of the state and having access to free information.

Y. B.: Indeed, supporting nongovernmental organizations remains a priority. Incidentally, we regard higher and grade schools, libraries, and publishing houses also as independent organizations and are willing to support them; one of our tasks is to encourage state and administrative structure to assist them. Many NGOs are already using the Internet in Ukraine thanks to the R enaissance Foundation. We have supported the creation of web sites for several years running, literally in every project, so that now you can see the line “Computer, modem, network costs.” We believe that this approach makes the situation in Ukraine more mobile, developing it in the direction of an open information society. We have moved even further. The KSNet Research Center Provider was set up a long time ago. If things go according to a more or less optimistic scenario, we want to use it as the basis for the development of Ukraine’s first remote training center.

Take another example. Our new program, Public Protection of Civil Rights, is based on this initiative: a person comes to the consulting center and gets qualified legal assistance concerning his or her private problems. This center is staffed by independent lawyers and senior law school students. They help people not only understand what to do about their problems, but also become more independent citizens confident of their rights. As important is the fact that those practicing at the center (we call it a law clinic) see the end results of their help. I would even say that they become democratic activists.

And so we work proceeding from the understanding that openness must be established and supported at the same time. Sometimes we hear from those aware of their importance to this country something like “But you must support us. That’s what the donor foundations exist for.” Yes, we exist. Now it comes turn for those who come to us with proposals, projects, and other problems.