Money, morality and new forms of exchange in postsocialist Ukraine

Leveraging symbolic capital: the use of blat networks across transnational spaces

“…Following the collapse of the Soviet system, some scholars argue that blat has remained a social practice involving friendly assistance (Polese 2008;Wanner 2005). Others, however, claim that blat networks have become increasingly commodified with individuals using them to accumulate economic capital in the newly formed marketbased societies (Smith and Stenning 2006), thereby assigning the term a more negative meaning.…”

“…Vitaly mentioned how 'we all aim to help each other out when someone asks for help' and made it clear that there was no expectation of reciprocity. Such comments demonstrate the continuing importance of blat as a social practice that stresses friendly assistance (Polese 2008;Wanner 2005), trust and working to bind and reinforce a social network of individuals. While blat relations emerged in the late Soviet period to navigate the intricacies of a failing Soviet economy, today people use them to develop their entrepreneurial pursuits across transnational borders that lie beyond the contours of post-Soviet spaces.…”

Acts of Negotiation: Governmentality and Medium of Instruction in an Eastern Ukrainian University

“…However, some scholars argue this policy decision was too late. Wade (2015), for example, claims that the perceived status of the Russian language and Russian speakers as being oppressed in relation to Ukrainian was part of Putin's stated justification for entering Crimea and eastern Ukraine.…”

The Global Encyclopaedia of Informality, Volume 1

“…Anthropologists in particular have seized on the concept of morality as an analytical device for problematising the dominance of the normative, global language of audit described above (Humphrey 2002;Mandel and Humphrey 2002). One strand of this literature advocates taking local definitions and terminologies of corruption into account, suggesting that people may subscribe to an alternative moral order (Werner 2002;Wanner 2005) or operate with a 'contextual morality', which legitimises socially and legally questionable actions in given situations (Polese 2008). Another growing body of work considers ostensibly 'corrupt' actions within their wider context of local practices of exchange, obligations of care, and rights 38 to welfare (e.g.…”