Why holding elections now may not be the best safeguard for Ukrainian democracy

By Derek Stanford Hutcheson, Professor of Political Science, Malmö University

A recent call by Ukraine’s former defence minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, for new national elections in Ukraine – which would be the first to take place in the country since 2019 – has sparked a renewed debate about whether it is possible to hold a legitimate vote in wartime.

Under normal circumstances, Ukraine’s parliamentary elections would have been held in October 2023. Presidential elections would have followed in March 2024. But the circumstances are, of course, far from normal.

Almost a fifth…

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