Half of Ukrainians see positive developments in fight against corruption

Over half of Ukrainians believe that there are attempts to overcome corruption in Ukraine and positive developments are being seen, for example, in the latest news about detentions and arrests. However, one-third is convinced that this, on the contrary, speaks of hopeless corruption and the lack of any changes.

Source: results of a survey conducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS) on 29 September – 9 October 

Quote: "The majority of Ukrainians, 59%, believe that there are indeed attempts to fight corruption and positive developments in Ukraine. At the same time, a significant share of respondents chose the answer option that the latest cases are evidence of "the hopeless corruption of Ukraine and there are no positive changes" (34%)."

Details: Sociologists said they have not asked the same question before, so it is difficult to speak clearly about the dynamics of sentiment.

The KIIS reported that they conducted a survey on the state of corruption in the winter of 2022-2023 and "How effectively do you think the authorities of Ukraine are fighting corruption?" was among the questions.

"If in 2018, 25% answered "rather effectively", then in the winter of 2022-2023, this share was 50%. Therefore, we can cautiously assume that the Ukrainians are now more optimistic about the fight against corruption than they were before the large-scale invasion (and compared to what it was before the Revolution of Dignity)," the KIIS noted.

The KIIS reported that there are gradually fewer people from the western to the eastern oblasts who believe that attempts have indeed been taken to fight corruption in Ukraine. However, in other parts, except for Ukraine's east, the number of people who assess the situation positively prevails over those who assess it negatively.

In particular, 65% of people in Ukraine's west believe that there are attempts to fight corruption, and 32%, on the contrary, believe that Ukraine is "hopelessly corrupt". In the country's centre, the ratio is 60% against 34%, and 53% against 40% in Ukraine's south.  In the east, there are slightly more people assessing the situation negatively (49%) compared to 45% who believe there is a fight against corruption.

In addition, the KIIS noticed that readiness for territorial concessions depends on how the fight against corruption in Ukraine is assessed. In particular, 25% of those who negatively assessed the situation with corruption are ready for territorial concessions. Only 4% among those who see positive developments are ready for territorial concessions.

At the same time, even among those who are critical of the corruption situation, the vast majority (66%) oppose territorial concessions (while among those who assess the situation positively, 88% stand against concessions).

Reference: The survey was conducted from 29 September – 9 October. A total of 1,010 individuals residing in all oblasts of Ukraine (except Russian-occupied Crimea) were interviewed by telephone based on a random sample of mobile phone numbers. The survey was conducted among adult citizens of Ukraine (aged 18 and older) who, at the time of the study, resided in Ukraine (within the territory controlled by the Ukrainian authorities until 24 February 2022).

Formally, the statistical sampling error of such a sample (with a probability of 0.95 and considering the design effect of 1.1) under normal circumstances did not exceed 3.4% for indicators close to 50%, 3% for indicators close to 25%, 2.1% for indicators close to 10%, and 1.5% for indicators close to 5%.

It is noted that in times of war, a certain systematic deviation occurs in addition to this formal error. However, sociologists believe that the results obtained still retain high representativeness and allow for a fairly reliable public sentiment analysis.

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