In the current difficult times in Ukraine, preservation of the family as foundation of human life is assuming ever greater importance. It is gratifying that, in spite of all hardships, there are some positive processes going on in Ukraine: people begin to hold the family and the related values in higher esteem. An all-time low divorce rate is ample proof of this. According to the Ministry of Justice, this year Ukraine has seen – for the first time in the past decade – an as much as 20-precent drop in the number of the officially dissolved marriages.
While about 166,000 married couples divorced in 2008, this number has shrunk by 30,000 this year. This means we are gradually returning to basic Ukrainian values, including a strong family. Also positive is the continuing tendency of the number of registered marriages exceeding that of divorces. This year the number of marriages into is 56 percent higher than that of dissolved marriages. The Ministry of Justice says that the most durable marriages traditionally occur in Transcarpathian oblast. For example, since the beginning of this year, this region has had only one divorce against every four marriages. A similar ratio (three to one) exists in Volhynia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Lviv, Rivne, Ternopil, and Chernivtsi oblasts, as well as in Kyiv. In other regions, there have been every two marriages against one divorce since the beginning of this year.
COMMENTARY
Yurii SAIENKO, senior research associate, Institute of Sociology, National Academy of Sciences, Ukraine:
“When a society is rife with all kinds of troubles, disasters or cataclysms, people regard the family as the main refuge, a system of survival and protection, and an institution of social security. This was also proved by the Chornobyl disaster, when the victims pinned all their hopes on the family. It is only in the family that one can rehabilitate themselves under unstable conditions.
“The family is now assuming greater importance. The latest survey that our institute has conducted shows that people mostly place their trust in the family. Asked about whose future you are most of all worried about, 88 percent said “the future of my family.” In other words, Ukrainians put such things as trust and the hope that their happy future is impossible without the integrative influence of the family above everything else. The second, third and fourth things that Ukrainians are concerned about are one’s personal future (60 percent), the future of Ukraine (60 percent), and the future of one’s close relatives, respectively. Our citizens are extremely conscientious, for they link the family, Ukraine, and themselves. Should a trouble come over, these factors will assume the greatest importance. Whether this trend will further prevail depends on how soon Ukraine improves its living standards. But there is also a tendency that impairs the family: the development of a democratic society boosts the importance of political organizations which people themselves create as an instrument of social security. In other words, they will address certain problems with the help of not only their family but also a civic organization. A burgeoning civil society is bound to reduce the prestige of the family, which may result in a growth of divorces. So we must work with the populace, starting from the kindergarten and school because it is in childhood that the basic values of life begin to form.”
