Book Presentation: Russia against Ukraine (Anton Shekhovtsov)

Name: Book Presentation: Russia against Ukraine (Anton Shekhovtsov)
Start: 2026-01-29T13:00:00+01:00
Location: Spitalgasse 2, 1090 Wien, Austria

Schedule

Thu, 29 Jan, 2026 at 01:00 pm

UTC+01:00

Location

Spitalgasse 2, 1090 Wien, Austria | Wien, WI

Please note that for organizational reasons the event date and timing has changed (Dec 1, 25 -> Jan 29, 26). We are sorry for the inconvenience.
Lecture format: on site
Room: 2R-EG-07 (lecture hall of the Institute for Eastern European History).
Street address: Spitalgasse 2, Campus of the University of Vienna, Hof 3.
This Transformative Seminar will entail a presentation and discussion of the Centre for Democratic Integrity's new volume Russia against Ukraine, edited by Dr. Anton Shekhovtsov.
Russia’s political leadership – echoed by some external voices – often claims its invasion of Ukraine was driven by national security concerns over NATO expansion. However, this narrative does not withstand critical examination. When Russia occupied Crimea and parts of the Donbas in early 2014, Ukraine was a neutral state. Since gaining independence in 1991, Ukraine had maintained a non-aligned status, reaffirmed by a 2010 law. Despite this neutrality, Russia violated numerous international agreements, including the UN Charter, the Helsinki Final Act, the Budapest Memorandum, and the 1997 Treaty on Friendship with Ukraine, which explicitly recognised Ukraine’s territorial integrity. Exploiting Ukraine’s non-membership in NATO, Moscow launched a war unseen in Europe since the Second World War. Russia’s focus on NATO is not just misleading – it serves as a strategic distraction from its revisionist aims: challenging the post-Cold War order and dismantling Ukraine as a sovereign nation. Central to the latter is Ukrainophobia, a deeply rooted ideological hostility towards Ukraine, embedded in Russian geopolitical chauvinism.
Commissioned by the Centre for Democratic Integrity, the volume Russia against Ukraine explores the socio-cultural foundations and political manifestations of contemporary anti-Ukrainian sentiment within the Russian state and society.
You can download the PDF of the publication here (https://democratic-integrity.eu/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/Anton_Shekhovtsov_ed-Russia_against_Ukraine.pdf).
Anton Shekhovtsov is a director at The Centre for Democratic Integrity, a Vienna-based non-profit association monitoring attempts of authoritarian regimes to influence politics, societies and public governance in Europe, and Associated Researcher at the Research Center for the History of Transformations at the University of Vienna (Austria).
More information on this event: https://www.recet.at/event-news/events/detail/book-presentation-russia-against-ukraine