Determinants of citizens’ attitude to the activities of the President of Ukraine (1994–2020)

Abstract

The article analyzes the determinants of citizens’ assessment of the activity of the Presidents of Ukraine during 1994–2020. The institution of the Presidency in the mass consciousness of Ukrainians is a reflection of social stratification. Social groups, formed mainly by different identities, evaluate the President's activities through the prism of their own economic situation, ideological identification, ethno-cultural affiliations, ethno-political aspirations and geopolitical orientations. The attitudes of Ukrainians to the head of state are related to electoral cycles, when the most positive assessments of activity are observed in the first year after the election. Using the method of multiple linear regression, it was found that the socio-economic determinant of the financial situation of the family was less tied to the electoral cycles: regardless of the term of office of the President , wealthy citizens evaluate his activities more positively while the poor ones evaluate it more negatively. In the mid-1990s, the attitudes towards the President of Ukraine were also differentiated by a region of residence and a language of communication in the family. However, after 2004 the factor of language communication in the family has reduced its influence on the assessment of the President's actions in favor of the question of the expediency of the Russian language official status. The factor of regional polarization restored its influence during 2003–2013. At the same time, since the end of the 1990s, the factor of geopolitical orientations of citizens has been gaining influence and has become one of the key ones in the following years. The assessment of the activities of Viktor Yushchenko, Viktor Yanukovych and Petro Poroshenko is characterized by clear geopolitical orientations. Instead, the attitudes to the activities of President Volodymyr Zelenskyi in the second year of his term are characterized by a negative attitude of respondents with both left and right ideological views.