Nationalism, national identity, and ethnicity are complex social phenomena worldwide and especially so in post-Soviet Ukraine. This monograph explores the causes and conditions of post-communist nationalist revivals focusing on the re-emergence of Cossack movements in Russia and Ukraine since the late 1980s. The study explores how different theories of nationalist movements underpinned different national policies and, ultimately, different socially constructed realities that led to the armed conflict between Russia and Ukraine.
"The Cossacks are back, both on the pages of academic monographs and the battlefields of the new East European wars. They wear traditional garbs but carry modern weapons and advance new ideologies. As is persuasively argued by Olexander Hryb, nationalism explains their return on the political and cultural stage more than anything else. It is impossible to understand the rise of modern Russian and Ukrainian national identity without examining the unexpected revival of the Cossacks. This book offers invaluable insight into both."-Serhii Plokhy, Harvard University