Sovereignty and the Russo-Ukrainian War

The Russo-Ukrainian War is fought primarily over Ukraine&s;s sovereignty. To grasp the objectives on both sides, the chapter proceeds, first, to dissect the concept of sovereignty. Contrary to the classic realist, legal, and statist definition, scholars now agree (1) that sovereignty is divisible, as different authority dimensions may be delegated to or pooled with an external entity, and (2) that relations between sovereign states are hierarchical rather than equal. If "bits" of sovereignty may be subordinated to an external body, the analysis of the Russo-Ukrainian War since 2014 underscores the importance of distinguishing internally legitimate voluntary pooling from externally coerced hierarchical relations. The second half of the chapter exposes Russia&s;s imperialist aspirations to vassalize Ukraine by fully subordinating its political, economic, and security authority areas and establishing highly hierarchical relations, and then traces how Russia has failed to achieve its objectives in both the limited and the full-scale phases of the war. Ukraine has managed to maintain its independence and fights to avoid forcefully subordinating its internal sovereignty domains to Russia. At the same time, Kyiv wishes to delegate and to pool some sovereignty dimensions with the EU and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in a manner that enjoys internal legitimacy.