In Ukraine, few people realize that the scope of the volunteer movement in the country is, to a certain extent, a global phenomenon.
It is truly difficult to find another country in the world where tens of thousands of volunteers work systematically, to whom millions of people constantly give money (donate) for necessary causes. This is a unique situation, notes writer Andrei Lyubka.
It is clear that this uniqueness is dictated by circumstances - the war and the weakness of our state, that is, the need for citizens to take responsibility here and now.
But still, for many Western observers, experts and decision makers, the strength of the Ukrainian volunteer movement is one of the main reasons to believe that Ukraine will not fall.
Despite the vertical and centralized system of state organization, which is very strong today (and it is in this centralized force that its fragility lies), we have an extensive system of horizontal connections in society, permeating all spheres of life, all regions and layers of society. This is, in fact, the internal framework of Ukraine on which everything rests.
And the volunteer movement is not only about well-known large foundations, organizations or systemic volunteers who have been working for three or many years in a row. Yes, these are strong structures, but there are many such funds in different countries, and this is just a typical story.
What is unique?
What makes Ukraine unique are volunteers who do not call themselves volunteers and do not consider themselves volunteers. These are people who, at a certain moment, simply open a collection and carry it out among their (mostly small) circle of acquaintances. For helmets and walkie-talkies, for wheels for cars, for cars and drones themselves, electronic warfare systems and Starlinks, for getting people or animals out of shelling.
Such a person lives his normal life, has a main job, but at a certain moment someone turns to him with a request or request and this person takes on this burden and responsibility. Organizes a collection, buys what is needed or transfers money to the military, reports to people and returns to normal life. Such a person can announce the next training camp in six months or not at all.
These are the volunteers whom I call “poets and poetesses.” Because they do this at the call of their souls, when they have inspiration or when the mood strikes.
But system volunteers have turned into ants who manage these matters 24/7 and have long-term, virtually continuous and endless planning.
The greatest strength of Ukraine lies precisely in such “poets and poetesses” from volunteerism. More precisely, in that invisible substance that gives them the courage to start collecting and take on such responsibility.
This magical substance is called trust. Because a person who suddenly announces a collection hopes that others will support him. They will support us because we are talking about a common cause that is important to everyone. Not personal, but general, for the benefit of society (in the sense of community, society). And such a person has grounds for hope, because he observes around hundreds and thousands of other meetings that may move slowly, but still move and close.
In fact, we are all witnesses, participants and even co-creators of a miracle. Because it is a miracle that some person - out of the blue, out of a blue - can donate his own money to another person whom he does not even know, in order to help yet another person whom he has also never seen with his own eyes. saw.
This can happen once a year, but when it happens every day for three years in a row, it’s a real miracle.
Miracles happen every day in Ukraine
More and more often, in my speeches abroad, I talk specifically about volunteering. After all, I see how this topic finds a sincere response, surprises and inspires foreign audiences, and causes genuine delight.
Ukrainians live inside this process and therefore do not notice it, but abroad this spiral of horizontal connections in Ukrainian society is stunning and fascinating. After all, this is an ideal!
Every conscious person working in this area - social affairs, politics, charity - dreams of a society that supports each other, trusts each other. And now you can see this with your own eyes in Ukraine. And this gives us colossal moral capital, thanks to which they continue to sincerely support us.
Because no matter what anyone says, the world is ruled by good people and good intentions. And when a German burgher or a French farmer hears about a retired Uzhgorod teacher who, on the day of payment of her meager pension, immediately transfers part of the money to support the army, this disarms them. Because I want to support such a person – and therefore such a society and such a state.
Many Ukrainians laughed that the Speaker of the US House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, knelt and prayed before making a decision to support Ukraine. But - regardless of religion - war really poses a moral imperative for people and societies.
Everyone makes, first of all, a personal decision to support Ukraine, which is then transformed into government resolutions and presidential decrees. And this personal decision is dictated not by geopolitics, but by the understanding that it is necessary to support the people, in which even a pensioner allocates her modest few hryvnias for a good cause.
Believe me, from the point of view of geopolitics, we would have been exchanged and abandoned long ago, but the support continues, because there is something very real, human in this war that affects everyone.
The moral imperative of a good deed and bright people who support each other in an apocalyptic situation, trust each other. This is our magic and our strength!
