On October 29, 2023, regular elections to the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine were to be held. However, in the conditions of a full-scale war, which Russia launched against our country on February 24, 2022, and in accordance with the norms of the Constitution of Ukraine, parliamentary elections were not held. Nevertheless, this fact caused powerful discussions both among politicians, journalists and citizens of Ukraine, as well as outside Ukraine.
The very fact that the elections did not take place not only did not remove the problem, but also added a significant number of additional problems and questions.
Including:
- won’t the next presidential election also be held in the last week of March 2024?
- can a country be considered democratic if it does not hold elections in conditions of war?
- does the government of Ukraine, which did not pass the scheduled re-elections even in the conditions of war, remain legitimate and it legitimacy does not decrease?
- when should elections be held that were not held as a result of the war?
- what changes need to be planned according to the realities after the war?
Of course, there are many more questions, all of them are non-rhetorical, most of them are capable of provoking significant political consequences for Ukrainian citizens and Ukraine itself. This is precisely what determines the expediency of holding a round table and discussing the outlined and related issues in a professional environment and taking into account the experience of democratic countries in Europe and the world.
The round table was organized within the framework of the “Erasmus+ Program” under the direction “Jean Monet for Higher Education” at the Department of Political Science (module “Political Institutions and Systems in Europe: Comparison and Experience for Ukraine” No. 101126702) with the support of the European Union.
