The Economics of Betrayal: Why Every Ukrainian Leader Sells Out the People Who Brought Him to Power

There is a pattern everyone in Ukraine has seen, but few have dared to call it what it is: a mechanism, not a moral failing. A leader comes to power with a team. The team is made of people who took the risk with him, financed the campaign, stood beside him back when victory was anything but certain. And then, once he has the chair, the leader starts handing out positions. He does not hand them to the team. He hands them to yesterday's opponents, to situational allies, to business interests that need appeasing, and sometimes to outright enemies. The friends, the partners in success, get the second-tier posts at best, and often nothing at all.

read more..