14:30
King's College London
November 17
Strand Campus Room: S-2.08Strand, London, WC2R 2LS
The Department of War Studies invites you to a discussion with Svitlana Kovalchuk, the Executive Director of Yalta European Strategy (YES), on Ukraine’s political transformation amid war.
As Ukraine continues to defend its sovereignty and democratic institutions under extraordinary strain, this discussion will explore how the country’s political landscape has evolved between the battlefield and the ballot box.
Drawing on her extensive experience leading one of Ukraine’s most influential international platforms, Svitlana Kovalchuk will reflect on the resilience of Ukraine’s democratic governance, the interplay of power and civil society in wartime, and the challenges of maintaining political unity in the face of existential threat. The conversation will also consider Ukraine’s broader trajectory toward European integration and what its wartime experience reveals about the future of democracy and statehood in the 21st century.
Dr Domitilla Sagramoso is a Senior Lecturer in Security and Development at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London, and an expert on Russian foreign and security policy, with a particular focus on the post-Soviet space. Her research spans violent conflict, Islamist-jihadist movements in the North Caucasus, and Russia’s wars in Ukraine, the South Caucasus and the Middle East.
The Conflict, Security and Development (CSD) Speaker Series is an initiative from the Conflict, Security & Development Research Group in the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. It aims to bring together interested individuals with leading experts and influential thinkers in the fields of conflict, security, and development.
Svitlana Kovalchuk is the Executive Director of Yalta European Strategy (YES) — Ukraine’s leading international platform advancing the country’s European future and fostering global dialogue on democracy, security, and development. For nearly a decade, she has been at the forefront of YES and the Victor Pinchuk Foundation’s international initiatives, strengthening Ukraine’s global visibility through flagship events such as the YES Annual Meeting in Kyiv and Ukrainian platforms at the World Economic Forum in Davos and the Munich Security Conference. Before joining YES, Svitlana worked with the German Corporation for International Cooperation (GIZ), leading projects to enhance the institutional capacity of Ukraine’s state and local authorities under special programs of the German government. A graduate of the Institute of International Relations at Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Svitlana holds a PhD in Political Science and is also an alumna of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.