Women Organisations in Ukraine: Genesis and typology by Anna Syomina, Mama 86, Ukraine Among the newly independent states of the former USSR, Ukraine is the third in terms of territory, the second in terms of population and the first of terms of environmental problems relatively to population. Ukrainian industry and transport facilities emit annually up to 300 tons of toxic substances per capita. Moreover, taking into account the Chernobyl disaster, citizens of Ukraine live under the permanent synergistic pressure of industrial pollution and low radiation dozes, Kiev oblast (Kiev is the capital of Ukraine, located about 80 km from the Chernobyl NPP site with about 3 million population), e.g. gets annually 234 thousand tons of toxic chemicals plus low dozes of radiation. Beginning from 1992, Ukraine depopulates, now number of deaths is 47 more, than number of newborn for 10000 people. The share of pensioners in the population is now 23% (compare with 13.5% in 1960). There are only some selected figures, that demonstrate the sad results of 70 year long Soviet period in Ukraine. The transition of Ukraine from post-totalitarian past to democracy has all its pertinent crises: economical, political, environmental and mental ones. When male population of post-totalitarian countries of former USSR, for so long separated from the outside World, die from facing reality (heart attacks, strokes, alcohol substitutes' poisoning, military and paramilitary conflicts, etc.), women bravely bear all the scrutiny of transitional period. The burden of their responsibilities leaves them no time to think about death, sickness and even fatigue, so they are to live in average for 10 - 15 years longer than men. The load, however, do not go without consequences for them. According to Ukrainian R&D Institute of Gynecology and Obstetrics, 70% of children in Ukraine are now born with some development defects, i.e., if we look at that from the point of view of the nation health - only 30% of children are born healthy, and only 20% from these 30% are healthy when graduating from school. 40% of Ukrainian women are not able to carry out normal pregnancy. Every 6-th woman is infertile. Number of abortions is substantially higher than number of deliveries. Ukrainian unemployment has woman face. About 40% from all working population are women, they earn in average 30% less wages than men (women form 54% of Ukrainian population). During the last year women crime rate has grown 52% higher, women involvement in first-rate crimes has grown twice (murders, armed robberies, etc.). This crime rise clearly characterizes the general trends within the society. Besides that disastrous situation, governmental spending on social affairs steadily declines, nearing the zero level. They attribute it to the need to enhance the economy first, but the reality might prove, that the rising sun of Ukrainian economic miracle will be observed solely by the surprised population of the nearby countries. Nevertheless, this very situation pushes ahead women civil and political awareness. The Chernobyl disaster, that has promoted the fall of Soviet empire, both have substantially influenced the specific patterns of civil organizations and movements' development in Ukraine. In 1988 - 93 practically all the civil initiatives (that are still perceived by the majority of people here as political ones) emerged and were fueled by the Chernobyl disaster consequences issues. The development of women movement in Ukraine is no exception. The idea of environment deterioration was so popular, that only the great national idea was able to compete with it, however, both of them were obscured by the smashing inflow of humanitarian aid, that was the durability test for all the Ukrainian public organizations, including the women ones. Traditionally, women organizations deal with charity. Charity in the post-Soviet Ukraine has begun with reception and distribution of humanitarian aid, but as time flow, fortunately, it was transformed and includes now education projects, assistance to disabled, low-income families, single parent families, practical help to children, etc., as well as the programmes to change social policy of the government and search for tools to implement it, that, naturally, caused increased political activity of women. Due to the fact, that Ukraine was the motherland for the worst artificial nuclear disaster, the women organizations in Ukraine include elements of environmental issues into their programmes or even have separate environmental projects. In the very recent years there were also emerged few businesswomen organizations, public employment centers, women training facilities, etc. It is worth to note, that women organizations in Ukraine have not yet identified themselves on base of gender as the purely women ones, therefore, it is hardly possible to say about feminism in the Ukrainian women movement, with some omissions to its few bright representatives. The development of third sector in Ukraine gone under the slogan: "You want to survive - let's survive together!". Organizational structures of public associations in Ukraine demonstrate a wide variety, only few from them are classical NGOs in the Western meaning. The same is true, in particular, to women organizations. The contemporary women movement in Ukraine shows two polarized organizational patterns. The first ones are rooted either in the Soviet past, or in the unmaterialized yet national idea. They are one way or another connected with the Ukrainian establishment and organized as top-down structures. These organizations claim that they are speaking "on behalf of all women of Ukraine", adopting a very strong maternalist focus. Many of them claim to have thousands of members. The second type of Ukrainian women organizations (the grass roots ones) were created by the generation of freedom-thirsty women of 30. The period of self-determination for them fortunately coincided with the fall of totalitarian system. Svetlana Kupryashkina of Ukrainian Center of Women Studies calls the first type of these organizations as "subsiduary" ones, and the second one as "separatists". This is a very clear definition of differences in the major cases of their genesis. The first group would include all semi-governmental groups, which operate on membership fees and limited state funds, as well as private donations. The second operates exclusively on foreign assistance grants or private donations, but avoids or cannot receive money from the state. The first group tends to be conservative in issues, is centered around providing material assistance in form of small monetary donations, food, medicine, organizing health trips for children, affected by Chernobyl, etc. They are also very active in the official policy. The second group of organizations (NGOs) center around different sets of issues, these are mostly smaller groups of women, which operate at local, rather than at national level. Many of them side with environmental groups, run consumer literacy programs, language and computer courses, do questionnaires, publish newsletters, provide consulting for women, etc. This group would also include all educational initiatiatives, such as women gymnast, lyceums, etc., which advocate the need for separate education for young women and girls in transformational societies. Growing professionalism has been a positive trend among many of these groups as is their active participation in international training programs for voluntary organizations and international conferences. Youth women NGOs in Ukraine are now in their induction period. The substantial role in the education of new generation of women-leaders for youth organizations is played by Vega Center, the one, integrated into the state structure of social services for youth. However, the Center unites 12 evening women gymnasiums in different cities of Ukraine. The most gifted graduates of the gymnasiums will be able, due to the democratic educational patterns, to become the future leaders of youth women organizations in very diverse range of activities. It is to be noted, that the development of women movement in Ukraine is going with accelerated speed due to favorable coincidence of the period of third sector establishment in Ukraine and the year of World Women Conference in Beijing. The women rights issue started to develop in Ukraine among women's organizations during last year due to the attention, which focused on it in the whole world before the UN Conference on Women. For the first time in the practice of Ukrainian Parliament, parliamentary hearings on Women Rights Convention (CEDAW) were attended by the representatives of non-governmental organizations (due to the initiative of the National Preparatory Committee for the World Women Conference). The hearings were hold in July 12. There were no constructive proposal on implementation of the concrete projects. Four pro-governmental women's organizations have represented speeches, stated various problems in the society and required the government to change the situation. One of these speakers claimed to better changes due to the relapse of communist's system. Summing up this brief communication, I have to note, that women movement in Ukraine goes along as a process of extensive development. The last year was characterized by the substantial strengthening of governmental presence within all the spheres of social life. If a citizen of a modern democratic state remembers, that a state exists once a year, while completing (without any particular pleasure) a tax declaration, a citizen of Ukraine feels hard breadth of the state every time, from awakening to sleep (notwithstanding, that she/he ignores a tax declaration). Development of the second sector (private business), declared a lot of times as part of so called economical reform resulted in merging of the second sector and the first one, and the second sector plays subordinate role in the alliance. It is well known that it is the second sector that creates medium class, forming the frame of political and economical stability and independence for non-governmental, non-profit organizations. So, any attempt to find something new in modern non-governmental movement in Ukraine is far from being successful and that might be true not only for women organizations but for other spheres, too (e.g., for environmental movement, there was not any new environmental organization in the last year, notwithstanding apparently favorable external preconditions). However, the organizations, that were created 5, 6, 3 years ago, might now, based on their experience and tested strategies, try to form at last some planned budgets (the budgets, that, as long ago, are formed from grants, occasional donations and random sources) and to perform their programs in a permanent manner. We are only to be surprised by unbelievable endurance of third sector pioneers in the country (especially women). Just take into account that traditional paternalistic model of our society assumes that a man is responsible for material security and caries out external functions (social) and a woman plays a subordinate role and carries out internal functions. The reality breaks old stereotypes and responsibility for material wealth is to be taken by both sides. The matter, unfortunately, is not connected with free self-determination of women (or this factor is often a minor one), the functions' changes are still of more forced pattern. Even shaky equality in gender relations due to women employment, might cause family conflicts, relationships' breaks, etc., etc. Here we see a loose-loose pattern: if in a family a woman earns more than a man, he feels himself subordinate and the family comes to a conflict, if she earns less, a new conflict arises, caused by overall shortage of money... Moreover, if a woman chooses the non-governmental sector as a field of activities, she goes against not only old and deep-rooted stereotypes on man - woman relations, she automatically confronts all the traditional society models, that are impregnated with the leading role of the State (it was the Party earlier, the one and the only), that excludes independent civil initiatives at all. Because the non-governmental activities in the country still are not a source of even minimal stable income (I have to note, that minimal stable income in Ukraine and in Western Europe are far from similar, due to liquidation of old social security net, without establishing of any new one) and are accompanied by huge psychological burden, while discussing the movement we are not to forget that the movement is formed by people, many of whom work in such conditions for years. But even they will thing the matter over and over again, if they were to begin all this from zero now. As I have already noted, the situation of women organizations is not an exception.