Investigating the Russo-Ukrainian War: Evidence and Analysis from PeaceRep’s Ukraine Programme

Authors: Luke Cooper, Sophie Gueudet, Taras Fedirko, Volodymyr Vlasiuk, Mary Kaldor, Cindy Wittke, Brian Milakovsky, Valentyn Hatsko, Andrii Darkovich, Roksolana Nesterenko, Daria Bevziuk, Karolina Czerska-Shaw, Roch Dunin-Wąsowicz and Wojciech Michnik

Since the start of the full-scale invasion, PeaceRep has investigated the development of the Russo-Ukraine War from a holistic and multidimensional set of perspectives and lines of enquiry. PeaceRep’s Ukraine programme starts from the premise that the war needs to be analysed from a sociological and political economy vantage point and not understood narrowly as a state-based geopolitical dispute. Our research has assisted Ukrainian policymakers with approaches and policy frameworks that support resilience and a politically just and sustainable peace.

The programme was established as an international partnership, working closely with Ukrainian and institutions based in or with specialist expertise on Central and Eastern Europe. We also established several ad hoc partnerships around specific initiatives such as research publications, conferences and workshops. The present policy brief aims to draw together concluding research findings from the PeaceRep programme, examples of where we have delivered impactful research-policy-practice outcomes, and an account of the role of our overall research method – what we call “civic network research” – in delivering these activities.

Research Synthesis Series

The Research Synthesis Series sets out PeaceRep’s core conceptual and empirical contributions to the field of peace and transition processes. Drawing on our data-driven evidence and comparative research into the changing nature of peace and transition processes, the series presents top-line insights and analysis from key thematic and geographic areas of research, collated from across our full consortium of organisations and in-country partnerships.