Determinants of economic attitudes in a post-communist society: the case of Ukraine

Abstract This article investigates the sources of economic attitudes of Ukraine’s population based on the 7th wave of the WVS. It examines the utilitarian and sociocultural explanations of variations in the five dichotomies, which reflect pro-capitalist and pro-socialist views on various aspects of economic life. The utilitarian explanation suggests that economic attitudes associated with institutional change are determined primarily by socioeconomic status as a result of adaptation to market transformations. The culturalist explanation suggests that economic attitudes that reflect ethical aspects of economic life depend largely on regional and ethnolinguistic distinctions that were historically inherent in Ukrainian society. The empirical results provide robust support for the utilitarian explanation only in the case of supporting the government/individual responsibility for the provision of citizens. Instead, the socio-cultural explanation is reliable concerning the ethical aspects of economic life (income differentiation, competition assessment, source of success) and manifested itself in the case of attitudes toward private/state property in business and industry.