Abstract

This paper seeks to contribute to our understanding of hybrid regimes endurance and survival by focusing on informal institutions as they operate in Ukraine’s context. Ukraine is a spectacular example of hybrid regime, where informalrules substitute constitutionalism. Specifically, I am interested in answering the key question – Why has the path of Ukraine’s political regime transformation is not similar to any of the post-soviet states? This theoretical and descriptive question may be reformulated into an empirical one, namely: How did informal rules shape the elite’s behavior?