1 Introduction

Demographic trends in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine have diverged in several notorious ways from other European countries, even from those in postcommunist East Central Europe (Vanhuysse & Perek-Bialas, this volume).Footnote 1 These include fertility differentials across regions and ethnic groups , a substantial gender gap in the mortality rate , widely varying life expectancy , and increasing emigration fuelled by economic recessions, regional conflicts and repressive laws. In this chapter, we combine two disciplinary perspectives—demography and political science—to establish bi-directional causal links between population changes and politics in Belarus , Russia and Ukraine . Analysing the three demographic trends of fertility , ageing and mortality, and migration, the chapter aims to show that the population dynamics of each country have considerable political implications on both domestic and regional levels.

To that end, this chapter refers to both directions of their causal links. Applying the basic reasoning, however, that a politics cannot exist without a population, the chapter places considerable focus on the first direction (demography to politics), which is also an understudied causal link that this chapter aims help remedy. In the following, we introduce some of these trends and their political implications, to show the increased political entanglement between the countries since 1990. With this background, the rest of this chapter discusses the impacts of population change on the demands placed on governments and on the distribution of political power within states. Following this, in the conclusion, we discuss the disciplinary concepts—namely demography and politics—that link demographic variables to the political structure of a society. Given this discussion, we conclude that, due to the failed economic development and an absence of deliberative policymaking leading to poor governance, the current demographic trends can destabilize these countries.

2 Demographic Trends and Political Entanglement

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, structural changes in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine destabilized their demographic processes. The post-Soviet transformation reflected and magnified the demographic trends, as each economy transitioned from oversized, state-driven industry and agriculture to a privatized, market-driven economy. For instance, this region—Belarus, Russia and Ukraine—entered historically low fertility rates (Frejka & Zakharov, 2012; Perelli-Harris, 2008) while mortality remained high throughout the 1990s. At the same time, the lift of a fully regularized migration policy as an after-effect of the Soviet demise led to unprecedented levels of internal and external population movement.

On a country level, the demographic trends can be linked to specific political factors. For instance, in Belarus, families with higher-order births in rural and economically deprived areas long formed a homogeneous group supporting Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, which has dissipated over time alongside a declining population, potentially undermining the regime’s authoritarian rule. Fertility differentials across regions and ethnic groups also determine Russia’s particular fertility decline and so later labour shortages that policymakers must address, and Ukraine experiences similar challenges that are further exacerbated by a period of political instability between 2004 and 2014 following the Orange Revolution and EuroMaidan. Meanwhile, between 1998 and the mid-2000s, life expectancy in these countries either decreased (Russia) or stagnated (Belarus, Ukraine), followed by a rebound between the mid-2000s and 2018. Thus, we can tie fertility to ageing and mortality up to the present through stages. In a first stage, Belarus, Russia and Ukraine experienced an initial decline in infant and childhood mortality followed by declines in fertility rates. The second stage remains mostly in the future, but—as in Europe—we may see a rapid decline in mortality at older ages (Gavrilova & Gavrilov, 2009), with dire economic and so political implications.

In contrast to the above declines, emigration in all three countries increased sharply, remaining high during the last two decades. In Ukraine, this culminated in a crisis that caused a massive population reshuffling in Eastern Europe. With 1.8 million internally displaced persons (IDPs), the war in Ukraine’s east and high emigration rates delay the current democratization process, putting Ukraine’s chances for economic prosperity into question. These examples and background show that country-level demographic trends are linked to their particular political landscapes, which are in turn linked to regional-level demographic trends resulting in political entanglement in the region. The rest of this chapter analyses these links in detail, which will end in a discussion of the underlying concepts that show these links to be bi-directional—all of which is the basis for our conclusion as a first step towards more research.

3 Declining Fertility Rate and Government Responses

The total fertility rate (TFR) in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine followed a downward path from the late 1980s until the turn of the century (Frejka & Zakharov, 2012; Philipov, 2003). While achieving temporary growth in the 2000s, the TFR has remained below the pre-transition periods. More importantly, it is also below the stable replacement rate level approximately defined as 2.1 live births per woman. In 2017, the total fertility rate in Russia was 1.62 births per woman (Federal State Statistics Services, 2017). In Belarus and Ukraine, this rate was even lower—1.54 in BelarusFootnote 2 and 1.37 in UkraineFootnote 3 (Timonina, 2017). Belarus, Russia and Ukraine mainly pursue a pro-natalist public policy model in which the primary objective is to raise fertility and the principal instruments to achieve this goal are financial. These include large birth allowances, in combination with other increased benefits and well-compensated parental leaves. The following elaborates on population policies in the recent years in each of the three countries.

3.1 Belarus

Low fertility occupies a major political and public discourse in Belarus. The ‘National Programme of People’s Health and Demographic Security of the Republic of Belarus 2016 – 2020’ is the most recent legislative attempt to stabilize population and increase the total fertility rate from 1.73 to 2.1.Footnote 4 Policy measures aimed at boosting fertility include a lump sum payment for each birth. As of 2018, the payment is equivalent to $1,006 for the first and $1,412 for higher-order births, or 10 and 14 times the subsistence level budget, respectively. Under the universal childcare benefits, families receive 35% of the average wage for the first child and 40% for subsequent children.Footnote 5

The key task of the family policy in Belarus is to promote the image of a larger family. In fact, higher-order births were traditionally more widespread in this country compared to Russia and Ukraine, receiving larger financial incentives from the government (Frejka et al., 2016; Zakharov, 2008). In 2015, the government introduced a family capital programme, offering a one-time allowance of $10,000 to families that decided to have a third child. Other benefits for higher-order births include tax incentives and low interest mortgage plans, while the state lifts the mortgage burden if the family has four or more underage children. However, economic insecurity combined with a poor housing situation reduced the number of Belarusians considering having more than two children (Amialchuk et al., 2011), with social rejection and stereotyping of large families being further reasons for that decline (Denisov et al., 2012). Moreover, a major discrepancy in family sizes exists between cities and villages, with a significant number of large families living in rural areas, contributing to the staggering gap in TFR that reaches 3.1 in rural and 1.3 in urban areas in 2017.Footnote 6 Nevertheless, both fertility rates and overall population are also declining in rural areas.

The ‘strategic family’ policy envisages the fertility decline in considerably narrow terms, using it instrumentally to mobilize the social support for the regime by consolidating public opinion. The incentives for higher-order births are deployed to maintain higher fertility rates in economically deprived rural regions that represent the bulwark of the regime since the mid-1990s (Beichelt, 2004; Manaev, 2006), rather than among the potentially less loyal urban population. On the other hand, a declining TFR in rural areas could be seen as a factor contributing to the erosion of the social support of Lukashenko (Ioffe, 2014).

3.2 Russia

The Russian Government has prioritized the demographic crisis as one of the most pressing problems since 2006. However, the challenge has been largely perceived within the context of national security and the conservative geopolitical rationale. The ‘Demographic Policy of the Russian Federation for the Period until 2025’, formulated by the President’s directive in 2007, set the goal of increasing the cumulative fertility rate by 1.5 times until 2025, i.e. to around 2.1.Footnote 7 The government announced a revamp of the demographic policy at the end of 2017 to further stimulate the growth of the fertility rate through four policy channels.Footnote 8 First, it introduced monthly payments to families with first-child or second-child births or adoption if their income does not exceed 1.5 times the subsistence level of employed population in the respective region. This measure indicates a transformation of pro-natal policies with the focus shifting from multiple births per family to low-income families, who are often young. The current measures thus stimulate more families to have children at a younger age, at the same time risking an increase in child poverty .

Second, the ‘maternity capital’ programme introduced in 2006 was prolonged for 3 more years, i.e. until the end of 2021. Under the programme, individuals giving birth or adopting second or higher-order children are entitled to receiving a certificate for the sum of $6,804.Footnote 9 The certificate can be redeemed for the following purposes: improving housing conditions, children’s education , the mother’s pension funds, the purchase of goods and services needed for the integration of disabled children into the society. Under certain conditions, the certificate can also be used for receiving monthly payments.Footnote 10 The third policy direction expands the number of regions receiving co-financing for payments to families with the third and higher-order births from the federal budget from 50 in 2017 to 60 in 2018, covering all regions with a cumulative fertility rate below 2.0.Footnote 11 Finally, mortgage subsidies were introduced for families with second or third children born between January 2018 and the end of 2022, whereby the state subsidizes interest rates of above 6% per year.Footnote 12

These monetary measures, temporary in nature, are taken in addition to the general (non-temporary) child and maternity allowance policy, which includes maternity allowance and childcare allowance during maternity leave and monthly child benefits. The President’s 2017 guidelines also included two qualitative goals: first, reducing the waiting time to kindergartens for children between 2 months and 3 years old and, second, improving the access to and quality of medical services for children.Footnote 13 While the monetary incentives of the four above mentioned points already found realization in legislation and specific measures, the latter two were only delegated to the government to be included into the 2024 strategy planning.Footnote 14

The sustainability and the lasting effect of monetary measures are questionable. Monetary incentives were in place since the introduction of the maternity capital in 2007, but the fertility rate remained below the goals (Frejka & Zakharov, 2012). The existing fertility policies confirm the government’s short-term focus on mobilizing electoral support during the political-business cycles, rather than achieving intergenerational improvement of fertility rates. The episodic growth in TFR was widely used during the presidential campaign in 2012Footnote 15 as a ‘success story’, a success that was actually due to a slowdown in the postponement of childbearing (Frejka & Zakharov, 2013).

An interesting development in fertility in Russia concerns discrepancies in different population groups. Despite the overall decline, the TFR of several ethnic groups living in Russia is still above the replacement rate (Zakharov, 2018: 50). Ethnic Russians have the second lowest fertility rate of all major ethnic groups living in the country. These differences contribute to the changing ethnic composition of Russia alongside migration. Ethnic groups with higher fertility rates are also becoming more indigenized. For instance, among federal subdivisions, Chechnya has one of the highest birth rates in Russia (Sievert et al., 2011), and the federal unit is the most mono-ethnic area (Rosstat, 2013). Formerly, this region was a flashpoint of internal conflict in the country (Lieven, 1999). In this regard, the fertility differential and indigenization of the region may lay ground for potential ethnic-nationalist mobilization as hypothesized by the effect of young men bulges on political violence (Sommer 2018; Urdal, 2004). However, the recent demographic trends show the convergence of birth rates between minorities, including Muslims and the Russian majority.

3.3 Ukraine

The fall in fertility rate, coupled with increased emigration and high mortality, presents a major demographic challenge, contributing to the prospect of a rapid population decline in Ukraine by 2050 (Lutz et al., 2017). Ukraine’s total fertility rate of 1.374 births per woman in 2017 was the lowest since 2008, while total live births declined dramatically from 520,700 in 2012 to 465,900 in 2014 to 364,000 in 2017Footnote 16 (Timonina, 2017: 51). Economic and political turmoil in preceding years, along with the unresolved conflict in the east of the country, aggravated the fertility crisis in that families consciously delay childbearing or decide to have fewer children. Additionally, the average salaries in Ukraine are among the lowest in Europe, and GDP per capita is around two times smaller than in Belarus and four times smaller than in Russia (World Bank, 2014), further discouraging family planning . Moreover, the fertility rate is higher in villages, where socio-economic conditions are worse than in cities. In 2017, the rural fertility rate was 1.522 compared to 1.283 in urban areas (Timonina, 2017: 51). Relatedly, the UN medium variant population projection estimates that Ukraine will undergo a more dramatic population decline than Belarus or Russia , with a population decrease of 7.8 million or nearly 18% population decrease by 2050 (UN, 2017).

Occupied with economic and political reforms, the Ukrainian Government has not paid much attention to fertility policies, which remain largely limited to monetary incentives. The National programme provides family incentives via payment of $1,473 for one birth. The payment is made in two parts: a lump sum payment of $368 in the two to three months after birth and the rest in monthly payments of $31 for 3 years.Footnote 17,Footnote 18 Additionally, there is monthly monetary support to families with an income below subsistence level for each family member, including single parent families and single parents who do not receive alimony. The amount of the payment is limited to 75% of the subsistence minimum and based on its difference to the current income. Footnote 19

4 Political Determinants of Pension Reforms

Although the three countries share similar features of population ageing (low fertility but high adult mortality rate), the frequency and high amplitude of demographic waves are more pronounced in case of Russia. Moreover, Russia’s ageing is characterized by an unusually high excess mortality for men, with the latest data showing the gap standing at 11.1 years (Zakharov, 2018). As the population pyramid in Fig. 1 illustrates, the higher proportion of women spreads from the age of 40 onwards and will not disappear by the middle of the century. The gender gap in mortality is 11 years for Belarus and 9 years for Ukraine, which are likewise among the highest in the world (WHO, 2014) (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1
figure 1

(Note Males are to the left [black], females to the right [grey]. Source Computations by Richard Cincotta)

Population Pyramids of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine 1990–2020–2050

Full size image

The life expectancy differentials appear across the regions of Russia and between rural and urban areas in Belarus and Ukraine. The Caucasus holds the highest rankings within Russia, with a life expectancy of 80.8 years in Ingushetia, followed by Dagestan (77.2) as of 2016. The lowest life expectancy is observed in Tuva, at 64.2 years (Timonin et al., 2017). Given the ethnic differentials in life expectancy, Russia’s latest census from 2010 shows that the adult mortality rate is higher among Russians than other ethnic groups. As urbanization progresses in Belarus, the age composition of rural areas is changing. The number of older citizens living in rural areas is growing, being exclusively dependent on intra-family transfers which alter the traditional patterns of rural life of the elders (Dobrinsky et al., 2016). The patterns are similar in Ukraine, yet magnified by a higher death rate (Grigoriev et al., 2010; Richardson et al., 2018). Though adult mortality rates dropped significantly in these countries when compared to the early 1990s, life expectancy at birth is still lower than in Western Europe (Rechel et al., 2013) (Fig. 2). However, with an increasing number of elderly people, the key challenge for the governments is the need for the pension reforms.

Fig. 2
figure 2

(Source [1] UN Population Division [2017]. [2] University of California, Berkeley, and Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research. The Human Mortality Database. [3] Census reports and other statistical publications from national statistical offices: National Statistical Committee of the Republic of Belarus [BELSTAT]; Russian Federation, Federal States Statistics Service [ROSSTAT]; State Statistics Service of Ukraine [UKRSTAT])

Key Demographic Indicators

Full size image

The following paragraphs discuss the pension reforms in connection to the political consequences of population ageing. Despite the abundance of coverage on the economic consequences, the effects of an ageing population on the political structure have received far less attention in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine (Vanhuysse & Goerres, 2012; this volume).

4.1 Belarus

The pension system of the post-Soviet Belarus is characterized by a PAYG (pay-as-you-go) system that uses conventionally defined benefit formulas for the calculation of pensions (Grishchenko, 2016). Rapid ageing places the Belarusian economy under pressure, with a shrinking working population ratio. The government responded to the situation by rising the pension age to 58 for women and 63 for men in 2017.Footnote 20 A more radical pension reform would be politically unacceptable for the ruling regime for two reasons. First, Lukashenko’s supporters among the Belarusian population have distinct demographic characteristics (Manaev, 2006). The largest group consists of retired or economically inactive elderly citizens in rural areas, many of whom are less educated and have minimal contact with people outside of their immediate social circle (Ioffe, 2014; Nikolyuk, 2011). Convinced supporters of President Lukashenko are against privatization of the public sector and state property and see no problematic issues with democracy, electoral freedom or the state of human rights in Belarus (Wilson, 2011: 83). Most importantly, pension benefits are their primary income support, making them susceptible to pension reforms .

Second, the sine qua non of the pension reform is reforming PAYG-based public pensions including various defined benefit (DB) schemes, point schemes, and notional defined contribution (NDC) schemes (Grishchenko, 2016). An extensive systematic pension reform, therefore, needs modernization of the economy and the establishment of stronger links between tax-based contributions and pension benefits (Myles & Pierson, 2001; Wang et al., 2016). However, these reforms would contradict the authoritarian political conditionality, a mechanism that allocates and uses financial resources to sanction or reward recipients to aggrandize authoritarian leadership (Brooker, 2013).

4.2 Russia

The Russian pension system is based on social insurance notional and individual accounts (Grishchenko, 2016). Financing is based on contributions, but these are primarily covered by the employers, the state or the self-employed. With the intensifying population ageing, financing pension benefits become increasingly difficult for the government. Also, a cyclical increase in pension benefits is not due to the structural changes in the economy but mostly due to the oil-led welfare policy (Cerami, 2009).

During the third presidential term of Vladimir Putin (2012–2018), pension reforms were formulated to develop individual accumulative accounts, diversify the financing of the system and increase the age of pension eligibility (Aasland et al., 2017). However, public opinion was strongly against the increase of age in pension eligibility (Avtsinova et al., 2018). Indeed, Putin won re-election for his fourth overall term in office in 2018 through the campaign promise not to increase the pension age. This promise did not last long, as Duma introduced pension reforms in June 2018, increasing the pension ages from 55 to 63 for women and from 60 to 65 for men (Kluge, 2018). The incumbent politicians justify the reform in a narrative similar to Western European countries, but the realities of Russia in terms of lower healthy life expectancy, poverty among the elderly population, an ineffective health system and a gender gap in mortality are noticeably different.

The pension reforms are a necessary predicament to elevate the fiscal burden from the national budget given the increasing ratio of pensioners in Russia to the employed. However, similar to Belarus, the pension reforms contradict the conceptual premise of the competitive authoritarianism (Levitsky & Way, 2010; Way, 2005). Pensioners are a critical electoral demographic for Russia’s current political regime, mostly comprising women who dramatically outnumber men and live considerably longer. Infamously defined as ‘The regime of Babushkas’, Russia is thus facing a dilemma in its attempt to cope with the demographic crisis, specifically population ageing and guarding its core electorate (Robertson, 2009).

4.3 Ukraine

The solidarity pension insurance system of Ukraine is financed on a PAYG-basis and administered by the Pension Fund of Ukraine (Slobodyanyuk et al., 2017). Ukraine’s pension reform was introduced in October 2017, aiming to tackle poverty among elderly citizens, albeit without much success. Recalculations of pension benefits only marginally increased the pensions.

Ukraine’s population is not only shrinking, but also increasingly ageing. By 2050, one-third of Ukraine’s population is projected to be above 60 years old, the highest rate among the three countries studied (UN, 2017). Ukraine hosts 12 million pension beneficiaries in various categories who depend on 14 million contributors.Footnote 21 Furthermore, the cohorts entering retirement will be considerably larger than the young cohorts entering the labour market, which further increases the age dependency ratio .

The most common explanation of population change in countries in Eastern Europe and the Middle East is that it is underpinned by the distribution of ‘youth bulges’ in the society causing political instability and conflict, inimical to the democracy (Cincotta, 2005; Urdal, 2004). In a positive way, demographic progress could support movement from autocracy to democracy (Sommer, 2018). In the case of Ukraine, rapid population ageing, unprecedented outward migration and low fertility rates do not allow the country to recuperate from the political disturbances of the past two decades.

5 Understanding Migration Politics

As a key demographic driver, immigration presents policy leverage and counteracts the ageing effects of persistent low fertility levels (Grant et al., 2004). In contrast, emigration interrupts human capital formation and calls into question the future of the economic development (Beine et al., 2008). Moreover, migration has a political impact upon population composition in terms of its ethnicities, religions, races, languages and national origins (Teitelbaum, 2014). Belarus, Russia and Ukraine actively pursued similar population policies; however, their migration policies and situations are notably distinctive. Additionally, the Ukrainian crisis accelerated population shifts in the region.

The principal Soviet tools for regulating internal migration were the internal passport and propiska (residence permit) designed to realize certain economic goals (i.e., distribution and rationing), coercive ones (the repression of dissent, surveillance) and regime adherence (Light, 2012: 405). The central Soviet Government administered population relocation across the Union to propel the industrialization and urbanization to create a shared identity. Policymakers in the three studied countries began supporting immigration in the early 1990s by adopting market regulations. However, the countries were not able to respond effectively to the wave of newcomers.

5.1 Belarus

Belarus presents a unique situation when it comes to migration policy. The government strictly regulates the migration process, monitors Belarusian emigrants in Europe and only allows limited numbers of immigrants to live in the country. This approach can be rationalized through the political economy of migration, which suggests that immigrants living in a democratic host country are more likely to export democracy to their countries of origin through the grassroots organizations entrenched in transnational political activities (Aleinikoff & Klusmeyer, 2011; Bauböck, 2003; Walzer, 1983). However, this political stance became difficult to maintain in the aftermath of the Ukrainian crisis insofar as Belarus has become a major host country for Ukrainian migrants.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, migrants usually used Belarus while en route to the European Union (EU) (Greenhill, 2010; Jandl, 2007). However, since the conflict erupted, Belarus has become a safe place for migrants from the Donetsk region. Furthermore, migrants from Ukraine have historically been treated differently, demonstrating high degrees of adaptability and integration due to cultural and linguistic similarities (Gentile, 2017). Additionally, specific regulations were set to address Ukrainian migrants, lifting barriers in the application process and informing migrants on jobs available.Footnote 22 Nonetheless, Ukrainian migrants still do not have access to health care and other social benefits, and there is no legal obligation on the government to provide refugees with shelter and necessary allowances.

Overall, Belarus has become the host to more than 150,000 migrants from Ukraine, including refugees, economic migrants and people with family ties in Belarus in the period 2014–2017.Footnote 23 The total contribution of the Ukrainian migrants increased Belarus’ population by more than 1%. Consequently, Belarus has more Ukrainian migrants per capita than any other country. At the same time, the sheer volume of migrants has put pressure on Belarus’ economy. The Belarusian Government is particularly interested in allocating migrants in rural areas as labour force shortage is omnipresent in agriculture (Gentile, 2017).

5.2 Russia

Starting in 1991, large movements of migrants from post-Soviet countries have been a demographic reserve to the declining population in Russia, which today interplays with a resurgence of Russian nationalism. For instance, the ethnically-motivated migration reached its peak in 1994 with an official influx of 1.2 million immigrants (Sievert et al., 2011). However, while immigration eases the labour shortage in the period of population decline, it is not enough to prevent the trend (Ioffe & Zayonchkovskaya, 2010).

In 2007, the first attempt to liberalize the legislation on migration was made by the Russian Government, which was caused by the concern over labour market demand (Zayonchkovskaya, 2007). The legislation defined more favourable conditions for the employment of migrants from the Commonwealth Independent States (CIS) (Malakhov & Simon, 2014). However, the liberal attempts were soon curtailed by the restrictive measures when the state replaced the simplified work permits without a quota with a system of ‘patents’ with much higher requirements for foreigners to work in Russia (Malakhov & Simon, 2018). The new regulation of migration soon became the subject of corruption at the regional level. The authorities intentionally increased the price of patents to bargain, which forced potential migrants into illegality (Malakhov & Simon, 2016). Though the regulatory framework has evolved, the government failed to effectively integrate migrants into the labour market. Moreover, immigrants from the CIS are often low-skilled workers and face barriers to integrate into the society. Conversely, increasing numbers of highly qualified Russians are moving to Europe and the United States of America (Zayonchkovskaya, 2007).

The fear of immigration is widespread, commenced with the perception that ‘newcomers would tilt the demographics in their favor’ and that a so-called Islamization of Russia could follow (Center, 2017). Opinion polls show germinating xenophobia against immigrants (Sievert et al., 2011), almost exclusively against immigrants from non-Slavic or non-European origins (Gorodzeisky, 2019: 205). In the course Russia’s political system consolidating towards authoritarian rule (Riabov & Riabova, 2014), however, the Kremlin has increasingly manipulated the inclusiveness of national identity. Due to the increasing ethnic prejudice in the country, as well as the perceived threat to national identity, the Kremlin ruling elite now faces an immigration dilemma, as its manipulative narrative directly contradicts Russian migration policy and its labour needs.

Indeed, as an example, the main policy narrative during the Russian annexation of Crimea was that it safeguarded the national identity of Russian-speaking people in post-Maidan Ukraine. While this line of argumentation was mainly used to mobilize the domestic audience, the attempt at outbound legitimization of the foreign-policy decisions was related to the contested international norms concerning self-determination, secession, independence and the Kosovo-Crimea parallel constantly drawn by the Russian Government (Rotaru & Troncotă, 2017). Subsequently, Crimea’s status referendum in 2014 resulted in favour of the unification of the peninsula with Russia. Following the referendum, Russia attempted to affirmatively expand in-migration with the considerable impact of ‘russification’ of the peninsula as implicitly stated in the Regional Development Strategy.Footnote 24 Though with serious discrepancies, official statistics show that at least 140,000 people have moved to the peninsula, mainly from Russia, while simultaneously a similar number of former residents of Crimea have moved to Ukraine .

The shifts in the ethnic composition of Crimea may help to further cement Russia’s position on the peninsula. At the same time, the number of asylum seekers from Ukraine in Russia reached almost 430,000 people (UNHCR, 2018). Similarly to Ukraine, the influx of forced migrants was also considered a threat to security and social stability by host communities (Borisova, 2014). During the first wave of post-conflict immigration, people settled close to the borders. However, migrants were constantly re-allocated to other areas, up to the East, the Volga region and to the Urals via pre-assigned refugee quotas with further restrictions imposed on moving to Moscow, Saint Petersburg and some other areas (Kuznetsova, 2015; Mukomel, 2017).

5.3 Ukraine

During the period of Yanukovych’s presidency (2010–2014), Ukraine witnessed popular discontent with the political order and faced a zero-sum choice to accept either Russia’s or the West’s terms of agreement into their respective regional integration projects. The country has strictly fractionalized into two political camps: one fundamentally pro-Russian and the other fundamentally pro-European. The regime change brought about by Maidan in 2014 threatened Russia’s interests in the region, validating the possibility that oligarchic-capitalist regimes could be ousted by a sustained popular uprising. The consequent Ukrainian crisis was ultimately militarized and internationalized with social, cultural and political consequences.

According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), mass population shifts from Ukraine resulted in the fifth largest number of IDPs in the world, reaching 1.5 million, predominantly uprooted from the Donetsk and Lugansk regions and Crimea (GRID, 2016; MoSP, 2018). As previous studies have shown, the arrival of IDPs into host communities is often embroiled in complex intergroup dynamics, frequently defined by stereotyping, discrimination and power relations further accelerated by poor socioeconomic situation and political instability (Bohnet et al., 2018). Similar patterns have been recorded in the case of Ukraine categorizing IDPs as a social threat.Footnote 25 Moreover, Ukrainian Government has consistently failed to address problems of IDPs, resulting in policy and protection gaps. Only in September 2018, the Supreme Court ruled to entitle IDPs to pension benefits. At the same time, the Court ruled that the residence registration of an IDP is temporary in its nature, thus constituting no grounds for its holder’s participation in local elections , effectively restricting political representation of the IDPs. This ruling bears important electoral consequences for the upcoming elections in 2019, since 75% of the respondents among IDPs voiced their distrust of the incumbent President in the survey on the political preferences and attitudes of IDPs (IFES, 2018).

Furthermore, Ukraine is one of the major sending countries in international migration, with more than 10% of Ukrainians living and working abroad (Van Mol et al., 2018). While Russia had previously been a top destination for immigrants from Ukraine, the political re-orientation following the so-called EuroMaidan, coupled with the conflict between the two countries and a downturn in the Russian economy, caused a major change in this pattern (Düvell & Lapshyna, 2015). EU countries are increasingly becoming a major destination for migrants from Ukraine. The introduction of the visa-free travel regime with the EU is expected to further contribute to this trend. Young people especially are prone to move from Ukraine to European countries in search for higher salaries and better opportunities (Van Mol et al., 2018). Outflow of skilled labour and young people contributes to the overall population decline in this country. Around one-fifth of Ukraine’s working population live abroad (Strielkowski & Sanderson, 2013: 315), exacerbating the repercussions of ageing and undermining the prospects of economic growth.

6 Conclusion

The interdisciplinary study of the link between population change and political developments resides in the nexus among demographic processes, discourses and policies. Based on this interplay, we have shown that population policies in the three countries reflect the resurgence of Russian nationalism, the authoritarian attempt to consolidate the public opinion in Belarus and the emergency attempt to save the declining population in Ukraine. To conclude, we now discuss these concepts.

As concepts and disciplines, demography and politics draw bi-directional causal links between demographic variables to the political structure of society (Goerres & Vanhuysse, 2012). For instance, first going from demography to politics, population change influences political transitions (Cincotta, 2005; Organski et al., 1984), revolutions (Goldstone, 1991) and participation in regional and international conflicts (Cranmer & Siverson, 2008). In the second direction, e.g. democracy increases life expectancy (Mathers et al., 2001), depresses infant mortality (Nussbaum, 2010), and decreases fertility rates (Da Rocha & Fuster, 2006).

For reference to European demographic trends, Teitelbaum (2014) conceptualizes that demographic changes on political representation depend fundamentally upon the nature of the political systems. Thereby, the electoral institution is the central mechanism that transforms changing population preferences into the legislative norms and registers the source of political leadership in European democracies (Billingsley & Ferrarini, 2014). Therefore, e.g. family policies and pension reforms are the outcomes of democratic deliberation. It would be misleading, however, to assume a similar mechanism is applicable in the cases of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. Indeed, although the demographic shifts placed demands on the governments, as we have shown, deliberative and decision-making bodies within authoritarian parties and legislatures adopted policies to pervade authoritarian rule rather than genuinely address demographic challenges (Boix & Svolik, 2013). Thus, while the above analysis used the European examples to guide the usage of concepts, we applied those concepts as perspectives that require attention to the realities of demographic trends and political structures in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine.

All in all, given the bi-directional links, we conclude that the demographic trends, if not addressed by policymakers in these countries, could destabilize these countries or indeed the entire region. As we show, the distinct characteristics in population change Belarus, Russia and Ukraine include fertility variation across ethnic groups, a major gender gap in mortality, unstable life expectancy trends and migration tendencies aggravated by conflicts and economic downturns. As we have shown throughout, unlike in established European democracies, governments in authoritarian and transitional regimes are generally less able to mitigate the risks arising from the demographic change, as they are less flexible and less responsive to the transformational processes taking place in societies as their result. Specifically, the monetary-based, pro-natalist family policies deployed by all three countries are only oriented to the short-term and do not sufficiently address the need for qualitative change in e.g. childcare and health systems. However, the way that demographic variables influence the political structure still remains largely unexplored, especially in relation to Belarus, Russia and Ukraine, and this chapter and its conclusion are at best a first step for future research.