On June 8, 2024, we gathered in the city of Lviv to outline the basic principles that define Ukrainian conservatism at the present stage through the Charter of Values.
Today, the term "conservatism" is widely used. However, the definitions of this term are so diverse that they blur the very essence of conservatism.
Our task, here, is to clearly define and articulate a set of core conservative principles in order to engage Ukrainian society in a cultural, social, and political discussion.
Therefore, in rediscovering a common understanding of conservatism in Ukraine, we have focused on the following principles:
- We do not understand conservatism as a denial of development, but rather as an affirmation that it is the eternal values that are the basis of a sustainable and prosperous society. Therefore, by fostering a harmonious relationship between innovation and ethical principles, we strive to build a society that not only thrives economically, but also defends its own values.
- We stand for the preservation and are ready to defend the unique cultural and historical identity of the Ukrainian people and its national sovereignty by any means appropriate. Nowadays, this is even more important than ever, when we are fighting a war with the Moscow aggressor.
- We understand that we have two battlefronts - external and internal: the totalitarian Moscow horde and the degraded leftist-neoliberal globalist structures, for whom responsible and self-aware freedom of free people is the enemy.
- We stand for a diverse and pluralistic society, where there should be many open opportunities, a free-flowing dialogue, and a free choice of balance between spiritual and material components. Justice, freedom, harmony, and concern for the common good are among the most common values for all of us.
- We affirm the urgent need to align our development with ethical considerations and recognize the role of faith and morality in shaping a just and compassionate society.
That is why we are opposing various superficial, contradictory, and fleeting trends aimed at imposing uniform left-liberal thinking and ethical relativism on society. - We are experiencing a deep demographic crisis that threatens our very existence. Therefore, we are committed to measures that support the birth rate and help families in their noble pursuit of parenthood. A stable and favorable environment for family life provides the basis for the well-being of the entire society.
- We support the traditional family as the foundation of society, recognizing its key role in raising future generations. General policies on family, marriage and sexuality should be traditional.
- We oppose attempts to deconstruct the natural differences between men and women, recognizing that such ideologies destroy the very structure of our society.
- We stand for the right to life - from the moment of conception to its end. Every human being is priceless. People are more important than things. Therefore, the measure of every institution is whether it threatens or improves human life and dignity.
- We reaffirm our commitment to the development of local communities and societies.
- We believe that education creates the image of a citizen. It is the process of social development of a person, the transfer of socially significant experience, skills, abilities, and ideas about the world around him or her, which ensures the continuity of generations as well as social and historical processes.
That is why our view of education is based on the fact that education should transmit values and traditions while opening up a wider world of ideas. We value the diversity of educational traditions and options, giving preference to educational institutions that draw on local and community experience that constitutes a national tradition. - We oppose the imposition of ideological agendas in educational institutions and will promote academic environments that encourage critical thinking.
- We see that the channels through which the cultural knowledge, traditions and wisdom of the ancients were transmitted and strengthened (schools and universities, cultural heritage institutions and mainstream media, both public and private) have not only ceased to fulfill their original role, but have become active agents of disorder and chaos. Now they aggressively spread incomprehensible and hateful ideologies among the public.
Therefore, not only at the political level, but also at the cultural level, we will confront these existential challenges for our future. - We believe that today it is extremely important for us to give a meaningful and well-grounded answer (based on our own traditions) about the importance of science, its role in Ukrainian culture, its value content, its philosophy, and its future.
Today, one of the components of victory in this war is the intensive development of the scientific process. Because ensuring the defense capability of our country involves the development of new types of weapons, and this requires both a high level of technology and constant research in the field of basic sciences. The issue of science concerns not only technical aspects, the scale of funding, ensuring the continuity of scientific elites, and the institutionalization of scientific institutions, but also determining the current state of science, revising some of its prerequisites, and the correlation of the scientific process with Ukrainian culture and its values. Science is not an end in itself. Its value depends on its place in the context of the overall value system. Only in a particular culture does science find its meaning, weight, and significance. - We believe that the ecology is about the interaction of natural and social environments.
It is people who are responsible for protecting nature while using its resources with due regard for those who will inherit them in the future.
That is why we also refer to the ecology of a human being (his or her upbringing, education) and the ecology of socio-political systems (the interaction of the elements that make them up). That is, about their purity. And it depends on ourselves, on our consciousness, on our reasonable living in the social environment and political system where we are living.
Since everything in nature and society is important - a small grain of sand, every insect, every person, every relationship... - We stand for a power guarantor, which is a private weapon. The absence of a weapon makes a citizen defenseless against an armed criminal. Without private arms, democracy turns into a farce with the usurpation of power.
- We claim that the republic is a common cause, and therefore free and conscious living in the state means active participation in all its affairs, since its condition directly depends on the extent to which we participate in its life.
This is what constitutes a civic virtue: to participate in the affairs of the state, to make the state your own, to achieve liberation from arbitrariness, and to become an equal participant in common life.
Every citizen (who lives freely and consciously in a given state) understands that the status of the state directly depends on the extent to which he or she participates in it. - We believe that social capital includes not only the reified labor of our ancestors, but also our land and its subsoil.
This also applies directly to the intangible capital we have inherited – our culture.
We are against the usurpation of national capital by a limited number of people. - We understand a citizen to be a person with legal capacity, materially independent of the state apparatus, who lives in Ukraine and:
- recognizes the natural moral order of Ukrainian society;
- acts in accordance with it;
- is personally interested in the functioning of the national state and civil society; - We define society as an organized community of people at a certain stage of historical development, united by their specific relations, which originate from Ukrainian traditions.
These functions include: economic; paternal; educational; recreational, general health care and sports; ideological and mass media; moral and ethical regulation; determination (and/or recognition) of the sovereign of the state, adoption of the Constitution; control over the activities of the state apparatus. - We understand the nation-state as a special social institution created on the initiative of society through citizens, which is endowed by its citizens with certain functions enshrined in the Constitution that do not contradict the traditions of Ukrainians.
Citizens make the supreme power of the national state legitimate.
State functions, as well as inherently social functions, are based on Ukrainian traditions and the model of civil society derived from them.
The inherently state functions include: legislation; defense and security of the state; diplomacy; justice; protection of civil rights and freedoms; environmental protection; and money issue. - We believe that it is not a natural right of anyone to immigrate to the country of their choice. The country should not become a territory of uncontrolled immigration. The country should determine the standards of integration for immigrants it wants to accept as citizens.
- The aggression of the Moscow horde in Ukraine is both a component and a manifestation of the end of neoliberal globalization and the formation of a new political, economic and technological fragmentation of the world. Ukraine should take advantage of this moment to integrate as much as possible in the promising innovative world fragment.
- Europe is first and foremost a historical and cultural concept, not just the European Union. Our common identity is based on the classical values of European civilization: Roman legal culture, Greek philosophy and Christian ethics.
- That is why, we believe that one of the tasks of the global conservative movement is to cooperate, help and support each other in the struggle for the spiritual and material heritage of our civilization and love for our home and homeland, which are under threat.
With this we have outlined a number of values that have the right to determine our future.
Only after this we can talk about the emergence of a conservative project in Ukraine and raise the question of its political implantation.
Join us in our common cause.