Ukraine’s Razumkov Center think tank published the detailed results of their latest survey about the impact of foreign policy factors on people’s perceptions of various countries apart from Russia. The full report can be read here, but the present piece will only focus on what it revealed about Ukrainian attitudes towards Poland. Before continuing, readers might be interested in reviewing the results of these surveys from January and March about Polish opinions towards Ukraine.
Returning to the Razumkov Center’s survey, Ukrainians are more concerned Polish farmers’ intermittent blockades of the border than anything else, including partisan US disputes that continue holding up aid. 58.4% of Ukrainians had a quite (18.2%) or mostly (40.2%) positive attitude towards Poland as of late last month when the survey was conducted compared to 32.1% who had a mostly (24.5%) or quite (7.6%) negative one. The difference between the two categories was 26.3% while 9.5% struggled to answer.
To put that into perspective, 93.2% of Ukrainians have a quite (57.3%) and mostly (35.9%) positive attitude of Canada compared to 2.8% who have a mostly (2.7%) and quite (0.1%) negative one, which placed it at the top of the list. The US was slightly below the bottom half of the 16 countries surveyed with 80% of Ukrainians having a quite (43.6%) or mostly (36.6%) positive attitude compared to 12.9% having a mostly (10%) or quite (2.9%) negative one.
By contrast, Poland is second from the bottom between Turkiye and Hungary. Regarding the first, 68.3% of Ukrainians have a quite (20.2%) or mostly (48.1%) positive attitude towards it compared to the 18.4% of them who have a mostly (16.3%) or quite (2.1%) negative one. As for the second, only 29% of Ukrainians have a quite (8.1%) or mostly (20.9%) positive attitude compared towards it to the 62.8% who have a mostly (35.7%) or quite (27.1%) negative one.
The difference between the Canadian, American, Turkish, Hungarian, and Polish categories is 90.4%, 67.1%, 49.9%, 33.8%, and 26.3%, with all of them except for the Hungarian one having more positive views than negative ones. Another interesting point is that the gap between these two categories significantly narrowed with respect to Poland between the periods of May-June 20223, August 2023, January 2024, and March 2024 when the Razumkov Center carried out its four surveys thus far.
In the order that they were mentioned above, the differences were 91.8%, 89.7%, 75%, and finally 26.3%. The period May-June 2023 preceded the Polish-Ukrainian grain dispute, August 2023 was one month before September’s climax, January 2024 was the first month of returning Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s liberal-globalist coalition government, while March 2024 was one-quarter of a year into it. This suggests that the first farmers’ blockades only had a minimal effect on Ukrainian perceptions at first.
It wasn’t until the latest round of blockades, which included dramatic footage of farmers dumping Ukrainian grain, that public opinion began to decisively shift to the point where the difference between positive and negative views was compressed by almost two-thirds in just two months’ time. This represents the largest recorded change by far of any of the 16 countries that Ukrainians were asked to share their opinions about at the previously mentioned intervals.
It’s important for readers to remember that the root cause of the Polish-Ukrainian dispute that’s toxifying mutual perceptions is majority-foreign ownership of Ukraine’s industrial agriculture, which Polish President Andrzej Duda drew attention to in a recent interview that was analyzed here. Moreover, many might have also missed Ukraine’s infowar campaign against Poland that was analyzed here, which attempted to smear it as a Russian-infiltrated society whose government is corrupted by the Kremlin.
From Ukrainians’ perspective, Tusk’s reluctance to use force against the farmers for reopening the border coupled with his government’s support for curbing Ukrainian agricultural imports (both of which are driven by domestic political considerations) lent (false) credence to the aforementioned perception. These developments alongside the dramatic footage of farmers dumping Ukrainian grain contributed to the noticeable shift in Ukrainian attitudes towards Poland over last few months more than anything else.
They had high hopes that the downturn in bilateral ties last year under the previous conservative-nationalist government would be reversed under Tusk’s liberal-globalist one, only to end up deeply disappointed after he caved in to domestic political pressure. He’s unlikely to reverse his position anytime soon after the conservative-nationalists commanded the largest plurality in this month’s local elections unless foreign pressure upon him to forcibly reopen the border becomes unbearable.
Even if that happens, it’s unclear whether it would positively reshape Ukrainian attitudes towards Poland. A lot of bad blood has already been spilt between the two countries’ societies over the past few months that won’t easily be forgotten. In fact, it could even provoke conservative-nationalist Poles into carrying out more public anti-Ukrainian displays that go beyond dumping that country’s grain, which could include organizing nationwide marches against Tusk on the pretext that he’s Zelensky’s puppet.
After all, the fateful decision to use force to disperse the farmers that are blockading the border would be done for the purpose of facilitating military aid to Ukraine, thus showing that he’d rather order the state to harm his fellow Poles than risk Ukraine being forced to compromise with Russia. Nevertheless, if the Polish-Ukrainian grain dispute that’s caused by the former’s foreign-majority ownership of its industrial agriculture isn’t soon resolved, then mutual perceptions might unprecedentedly worsen.
