Editorial Note, Mar-Apr, 2023

More than a year since the start of war in Ukraine, and with that war still ongoing, the lead article in this issue of Social Scientist by Anuradha Chenoy takes a step back to assess what triggered and sustains this avoidable and dangerous conflict. While recognising that the war is ‘illegal’, Chenoy’s basic contention is that it was provoked and not just a result of wanton Russian aggression. Rather, the war is part of the now threatened hegemonic ambitions of the United States, which in pursuit of those ambitions supported a coup in Ukraine that led to regime change and created the conditions for a prolonged civil war. Seeing that regime change as part of a NATO effort at encircling Russia, the Putin government concluded that it had no option but to wage war.