Maidan

The History of “Maidan”. Year 2001.

Read Part I here: “In the beginning was the word. And the word was …” (Part 1)

COLLECTIVE MIND – COLLECTIVE LEADER.

”Ukraine without Kuchma” continued at the stage of active protest up until the spring of 2001. The tent city of protesters endured the freezing conditions all through the winter on Maidan Nezalezhnosti [Independence Square]. The majority of the Ukrainian mass media was silent about the protest, while foreign correspondents soon lost interest in it. The information blockade was only breached by large-scale demonstrations.

Several such demonstrations (a student march through half of the city to the center and a march into Kyiv of columns of protesters from the regions) were planned for 25 February 2001 and were scheduled to culminate in a mass demonstration on Khreshchatyk (the main street in Kyiv). However “Ukraine without Kuchma” (UWK) hit the headlines in the morning of that day when the police detained the head of the press centre for the protest action, Mykhailo Svystovych, who had just put a large number of empty bottles in his bag and headed off with them in the direction of the tent city. He was detained, but had time to ring the other leader of the action, Volodymyr Chemerys. In the police station, he read the policemen the Constitution of Ukraine and continued his anti-Kuchma campaigning among them. He was released three hours later. The absurdity of detaining a person who was simply carrying a bag with empty bottles caught the attention of the western mass media, and the news about the detention spread swiftly.

Despite the information blockade and the use of technological forms of manipulation in order to discredit both the protesters and the demands made by UWK, opposition to the regime and support for the protest actions were on the rise among the population. The protests were extended to the regions, while the authorities resorted to traditional methods from Soviet times, namely ways of instigating mass confrontations.

On 9 March 2001 the authorities stirred up a mass confrontation on Bankova St. (near the Presidential Administration) and arrested several hundred young people on suspicion of involvement in the disturbances. Those detained were severely beaten by the police.

After this it was clear to many that the regime would not give up without a fight and that they faced a long struggle. Therefore, although people did “disperse”, they did so not in order to relax, but to prepare themselves for what was coming. What made the inevitability of future battle especially clear was the beating up of students who had not taken part in the scuffles with the police, but had come to Kyiv to take part in the Founding Congress of the Civic Resistance Committee “Za pravdu!” [“For the Truth!”]. It was specifically this awareness that was later to bring people out onto the “Orange” Maidan [square]. However before becoming truly mass-scale, it grew and evolved in groups of socially-aware citizens, for example, amongst the “Maidan” group.

After 9 February, UWK basically lost its momentum, without having gained its objective which was to oust Kuchma, but it contributed to the formation of political opposition from independent movements, including the socialists, the Bloc around Yulia Tymoshenko [BYuT] and Viktor Yushchenko’s bloc “Nasha Ukraina” [“Our Ukraine”] (NU), as well as leaving behind political prisoners and new activists who were now afraid of nothing.

Through the efforts of Deputies, human rights and civic activists, it was possible to get the majority of those young people detained on 9 March released, however some remained in custody. They were soon to face serious charges quite out of keeping with the actual events . All of those charged were members of the right-wing radical organization UNA-UNSO (Ukrainian National Assembly – Ukrainian National Self-Defense). “Maidan” activists, including those who had serious ideological differences from the “UNSOvtsy”, decided to help those they had worked with in “Ukraine without Kuchma” now that they were facing repression, and began a protest action in support of the political prisoners which was to last years.

You buy a bottle of beer and abuse the “regime” and they end up inside! – leaflets with these words were distributed at charity concerts, and such slogans were printed in countless opposition newspapers. Over almost three years before the last of the political prisoners was released, “Maidan” made sure that the subject was not forgotten by providing news and through its forum, by coordinating the collection of donations, informing people about the condition of the prisoners and of their families.

In the long protest action in support of the political prisoners and their families people with very different, sometimes diametrically opposed, political views took part, and it was specifically this action which was to forge a sense of unity, that "under the present regime only solidarity and mutual support are capable of providing real help”. These were the words of one of the political prisoners, Ruslan Zaichenko, during an Internet-conference held just after he was released in 2003.

Some other words from R. Zaichenko were to become a leitmotiv and one of the most important directions “Maidan” was to move in.

"This whole system (the police, the courts, the prosecutor’s officer, lawyers and the penal institutions) has long since turned into a fairly profitable business in Ukraine. According to unofficial statistics, in 2001 64% of those in Lukyanivka (Prison) were innocent. On the suffering of such victims and their families, these creatures are raking it in. Only when punishment for their actions becomes unavoidable, will it become possible to radically change the system and put an end to this wild lawlessness”.

Thanks to the trial of the “UNSOvtsy”, the “Maidan” team gained two new members: these were Tetyana Montyan, lawyer for the leader of YNA-UNSO, Andriy Skhil who in 2001 was being held in custody in the Pre-Trial Detention Center [SIZO] of the Security Service of Ukraine (and in 2002 became a Deputy, and is now one of the leaders of the Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko), and Judge of the Kyiv City Court Yury Vasylenko who was the first and only judge who, on 22 December 2000, spoke out in condemnation of the ruling regime in Ukraine.

In the summer of 2001 they launched a new section of the website "Dirty judge’s gown". Later this section became called “Law”, but over the years it transpired that problems of law, legal proceedings and of the judiciary were key issues for the “Maidan” community, and were most often discussed on "Free forum". At present news on legal subjects make up 30 % of the overall amount of news on “Maidan”.

In addition to news on the website, a section for Articles appeared, followed soon by a section Drafts (see the first theme introduced by the “technologist” (O. Logvinova): “Does the opposition want to win?”). It was with discussion of this issue that a long-term and systematic form of cooperation began between “Maidan” and the opposition which in 2005 came to power.

"Maidan" turned into a collective mind, a loosely structured, data base dispersed both in space and in time, an open interactive and analytical center which collects information, produces ideas and ensures feedback with politicians.

This feedback takes place also via the spreading of “positive thought-viruses”, these being productive ideas which we would like to inseminate into public consciousness, and make them others’ ideas, renouncing any authorial rights to them. I would mention at present only a small number of such open “special operations”, the rest will be found by historians, for the open bases of the website are the fullest history of Ukraine, and we have no intention to stop writing it.

Throughout 2001 a process was underway on “Maidan” of analyzing and making sense of the experience gained from “Ukraine without Kuchma” which was first recorded on 18 May 2001 in our manifesto. In this document of doctrinal significance there is a key phrase: “… we have one current objective: Ukraine in which it’s a buzz to live. Our Ukraine.”

The Name of Viktor Yushchenko’s bloc “Nasha Ukraina” [“Our Ukraine”] appeared two months later, on 15 July 2001.

We declared in our Manifesto:

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We will use methods which logically follow from our principles and the roots of which grow from cyberspace. Effectively this means the creation of SOFTWARE FOR THE BRAIN, that is, BRAINWARE.

Copyleft frees our thoughts from such obstacles as the sense of personal importance, the search for present personal benefit, the permanent need TO REINVENT THE WHEEL. The experience of copyleft structures reminds us not for nothing that the best and most stable organization is self-organization.

Constructiveness and good will are OUR ONLY TEST OF BEING ONE OF US / ALIEN. Other tests are not foreseen. It is absolutely immaterial WHO SPECIFICALLY suggests an idea and who makes it a working model.
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These principles have through the years been the uniting force for the “Maidan” community. They have enabled us to develop as a non-hierarchical network.

In 2001 there were people who were part of our community and called themselves “maidanivtsy” (“Maidan” people) who had never even seen the Internet and who had heard about the website from printouts of material that they had got from friends.

In 2001 in the National University “Kyiv-Mohyla Academy”, a samvydav self-financing newspaper “Maidan-Mohyla” with the logo and principles of “Maidan” began coming out created by students on their own initiative and without agreeing this with us. The newspaper has been entirely independent from an organizational point of view from us, while it is a member of the “Maidan” community.

During the discussion of our manifesto it transpired that “it’s hardest of all to demonstrate to a slave why he needs freedom”. This has also become one of the main directions of the practical work which “Maidan” has been engaged in over many years.

Spontaneous actions of different activists began. One of the most flamboyant was the protest action on 6 September 2001 on Maidan Nezalezhnosti when two activists use razors to make cuts in their stomachs and used their own blood to paste the monument with their demands. Among other things, they demanded that court reform be carried out, that the Gongadze case be investigated and that the political prisoners be released. Thanks to “Maidan”, this action gained wide publicity.

The “Maidan” community took an active part in preparing the street action to mark the anniversary of “Ukraine without Kuchma”, and dedicated to the broadening of the boundaries of freedom. Together with other activists, the “Maidan” people came out on 10 December 2001 onto Maidan Nezalezhnosti, calling this protest action “Practical lessons on human rights”. On 11 December the demonstration was dispersed by the police and participants were detained. On 12 December they were released after a court hearing which issued them with warnings. It was to be “Maidan” which constantly and most fully covered this action. Leading world news agencies obtained their information from our website.

Three main phases were worked out in the action:
1. working out the plan and making preparations using online means
2. online back-up (including the involvement of online participants in active work, making phone calls to the police)
3. aggressive but non-violent support for those detained

It is interesting now to read the chronological account of these actions and compare them with the events of the Orange Revolution. In this action there was no leader and it effectively demonstrated the possibility and efficacy of collective leadership.

The protest action “Practical lessons on human rights” was to become an example of how one needs to defend civic rights from the unwarranted actions of the regime. The result of analyzing and coming to understand the experience of the action was the project “Ukrainian Legal Self-Defense” – the prototype for the future Alliance of Civic Activists “Maidan”. It was there also for the first time on 21 December 2001 that the future colour of protest was mentioned: “In form that actions could be orange”.

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This was how we effectively arrived at the principle of a collective leader, with the lack of formal leaders in the sense of people who know everything, can do everything and give everybody orders. The role of the leader is assumed by the collective. Any person who has the necessary experience and the will can become the coordinator of a current project.

(to be continued shortly)

Original text in Ukrainian with links to original archive posts:
http://maidan.org.ua/static/mai/1134219616.html