“We Made a Contribution to the Revolution”: Shifting Scales of Politics and Unity in Ukraine

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

Based on ethnographic and interview data from the 2013‐2014 Euromaidan mobilizations in Ukraine, I use the example of the “secondary city” of Cherkasy to show that protest participants used shifting scales to participate in the protests in Cherkasy and in the capital city of Kyiv. This participation showed national unity across Ukraine at the same time that it refocused Cherkasy residents’ attention to local political issues. These processes call into question protesters’ definitions of Europe, democracy, and national identity, all contested across Ukraine during Euromaidan. This article argues for greater attention to secondary cities in the context of mass mobilization, as local instances of protest participation redefined notions of community at multiple scales.