Abstract
Most political scientists expect regionalism to be a greater problem for Russia than Ukraine, particularly given the former's size and complexity of its federal system. However, regionalism declined quickly after Vladimir Putin came to power in Russia while it has been a constant factor in Ukrainian politics since the early 1990s. Using the method known as process tracing to examine the trajectory of regionalism in both countries, I argue that the shape of regionalism in Russia-specifically, its correspondence to individual federal units-facilitated the Kremlin's intervention to restore central authority. By contrast, regionalism in Ukraine formed around macro-regions which are defined by shared ethnic, linguistic, and historical ties rather than separate regional institutions. These differences help to explain why regionalism in Ukraine periodically escalates to form nationalist challenges to the central state while regionalism in Russia remains focused on the fates of individual regions.
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