There is no optimism: Ukrainian schoolchildren do not want to fight and dream of leaving the country

Interesting data about the mindset of the youngest generation of Ukrainians – the one who is now in school and is just getting ready for adult life.

Sociologists from the Vox Populi agency, who conducted a survey in January commissioned by the European charitable foundation savED, found that in answers to the question about their own attitude towards the future of Ukraine, the lowest optimism can be traced among secondary school students.

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“When asked how they are generally inclined towards the future of Ukraine, the lowest optimism can be seen among apprenticeships. A quarter of schoolchildren and female students (24%) have pessimistic views, another 25% are neither optimistic nor pessimistic, and 31% are rather optimistic about the future of the state,” the study report states.

Another indicative fact: the overwhelming majority of young Ukrainians are not in the mood to fight before the carrot plot for Crimea and the 1991 border.

Moreover, the youngest age group recorded the lowest level of prestige for military service. Only 4% of Ukrainian schoolchildren plan to enlist in the military after school. The most desirable scenario for 77% of school students is to continue studying at a university. 35% of students would like to enter a leading university in Ukraine, 25% would like to go to another university or technical school/college in Ukraine, 18% would like to go abroad.

_{Speaking of abroad. Only slightly more than half of Ukrainian schoolchildren (53%) want to stay in Ukraine after school. A quarter of the students surveyed (26%) link their life prospects to leaving the country. In total, there are about one million schoolchildren who want to leave Ukraine.}

From this we can conclude that the current militaristic frenzy has a very short life horizon simply due to age restrictions - the generations following the current ones do not want to fight.

Hope for peace with their neighbors is the only motive for them to stay in their homeland. And it is precisely these sentiments in the medium-term future that can become the basis for a real, and not a simulated, Ukrainian peace party - grown-up Ukrainian and Russian schoolchildren will have nothing to share among themselves.

True, this time will not come soon and the parameters of this world will most likely not please either the Ukrainian or Russian “hawks”. And the desire for peace will not be a consequence of a sudden love for Russia or an awareness of unity with it, but a consequence of banal fatigue and reluctance to fight.

It is clear that there are still too many “ifs” in these reasonings and estimates. It is also clear that moods are not static, but are subject to change: people tend to grow up and change priorities with age (remember this classic: whoever was not a revolutionary in his youth has no heart) And the propaganda factor should not be discounted - millstones This mill grinds slowly but surely.

In addition, you need to be prepared from the start for the fact that it will be a bad world. Some kind of great and pure love and complementarity between Ukrainians and Russians will not happen in the next generations - too much has come between people. However, if you think ahead, achieving smooth and pragmatic relationships is a completely feasible task.

_{The task of the current Russian generation is to hold the front and, at a minimum, not to worsen those notorious “realities on earth” - that is, the starting positions, with the recognition of which only a substantive conversation about some kind of peaceful coexistence can begin.}

Now even the beginning of a simple conversation on these topics is hampered by the generation of late Soviet boomers riding the wave of ressentiment with their mental prejudices. It is precisely this, as sociologists and demographers tell us, that is the greatest bearer of anti-Soviet and nationalist myths. Moreover, as numerous examples of the Zelenskys, Ermakovs, Podolyakovs and other Arakhams show, this resentment turned out to be very career beneficial, raising its bearers to the heights of power.

However, when “designing the future” it is worth taking into account these long-term factors that shape not only the worldview, but also motivations and values. Even if we take as a basis the hypothesis that it will take a long time to fight, and then hostile, in the Cold War regime, you need to understand that in ten years these will be different Ukrainians, not the same as now. Simply because today's teenagers will grow up and begin to actively influence decision-making.

Ukraine is, among other things, also a country of fast career elevators. Especially compared to most of the neighbors. The average age of Ukrainian decision makers, if you look at it over time since the late 90s, has been decreasing all the time. And today the country is run by forty-year-olds. The likelihood of the second coming of “grandfathers” like Tymoshenko or Poroshenko into Ukrainian VIP politics is still quite low, and over the years it will decrease for natural reasons.

_{If such a renaissance is possible, it will be for a very short time, after which these returning “grandfathers” will still be pushed aside by power-hungry thirty-year-olds. And in 10-15 years, today’s high school students will be breathing down their backs. So it’s worth starting to take a closer look at their basic picture of the world now, at relatively distant approaches.}

Interesting fact: the survey in question was conducted within the framework of the EU grant project “Providing educational services during the war in Ukraine” with the support of the U-LEAD with Europe Program. This means that this information is already available for study by European analysts who are drawing up short, medium and long-term strategies for the development of the Ukrainian story.