INTERVIEW: Bohdan Hawrylyshyn, a major player in the Ukrainian renaissance (12/24/95)

INTERVIEW: Bohdan Hawrylyshyn, a major player in the Ukrainian renaissance

by Roman Woronowycz

This is the second of a two-part series on noted scholar Dr. Bohdan Hawrylyshyn, one of the true movers and shakers in contemporary Ukraine. Dr. Hawrylyshyn chairs various organization in Ukraine and in Switzerland, among them the International Renaissance Foundation of Ukraine, which is part of the Soros Foundations; the International Management Institute and the Council of Advisors to the Presidium of the Parliament of Ukraine. In addition he sits on the American-Ukrainian Advisory Committee, a distinguished body of statesmen, politicians, businessmen and international experts established in 1993 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a public policy institute in Washington. Zbigniew Brzezinski chairs the advisory committee.

Last week Mr. Hawrylyshyn discussed the work of the advisory committee and his thoughts on the current state of market reform in Ukraine. This week he talks about the work of the International Management Institute and the International Renaissance Foundation.

CONCLUSION

Q: Dr. Hawrylyshyn, you mentioned earlier that on November 29 the International Management Institute met to review its work of the last five years. What were some of the themes? Was this a general meeting, or a comprehensive review?

A: We were reviewing what are the accomplishments, what we should continue, what we should change. The main accomplishment so far has been the education of good people in post- experience, post-university MBA programs, full-time. We have graduated some 250 people in that time and will graduate another 65 on December 16.

We needed to review, however, whether we are having enough impact in Ukraine. One of the interesting elements has been that these MBA students do consulting projects for Western European firms, who are interested in investing or doing business with Ukraine. They travel to corporate headquarters, get their mandate, do feasibility studies, prepare recommendations and sometimes even get hired by these companies. This is a unique element of that MBA program.

We reviewed and decided that we also have to reach out to board members [of Ukrainian corporations]. As companies get transformed in Ukraine, they have to create boards of directors, whether a two-tier structure as in Germany or unitary as in the Anglo-Saxon world. We have to educate people on how to make the boards function. We have to re-educate the heads of enterprises as to how to create corporate strategies.

So we will continue the MBA program; in fact ,we will expand it, but also launch programs for top executives.

Q: Why was Dubai chosen as the site of the meeting?

A: One of the board members of the International Management Institute in Kyiv, a former Swedish student of mine from IMI-Geneva, has a petroleum company in Dubai. He invited all the board members, half of whom are from outside of Ukraine, half from within Ukraine, to the meeting there. Traditionally we have one meeting per year in Ukraine and one outside. One of the foreign board members acts as the host and pays the expenses. That's why this time the choice of an exotic place - Dubai. The name of the person is Adolph Lundin. it just so happens that his mother, though of Austrian origin, was born in Odessa.

Q: How many students, specifically, do you see moving through the IMI program after expansion?

A: We will be graduating 150-160 MBAs from the full-time day program and the evening two-year program. We should have 800 or so executives and some government officials going through the school per year. The duration of the executive programs will vary - one week, two weeks, four weeks.The number of people that will go through the school in five years, will clearly be over 1,000 people per year.

Q: When you talk of increasing output, are you also talking of increasing associated financing?

A: Naturally, because we also need expanded facilities. We have already started to create a new teaching facility. It will be in the park of the Kyiv Technical University, a historic building, which we are rebuilding to keep its historic character. It will have two classes for 60 students each for the MBAs, and facilities for our executive programs.

Q: Will the finances flow from the Soros Foundations, which funds the International Management Institute through the International Renaissance Foundation?

A: Some. When we started, a number of multinational corporations made financial contributions. We will go back to some of them, now that we have a very good record of accomplishments, to keep up with the expansion phase. There are some members of the board who have already donated money to IMI. But we have also received almost $3 million in the past from the European Union for developing this institution.

And I should mention that I did not appeal for financial help from the diaspora because the amounts involved are quite significant, and it would take a great deal of searching. Without saying exactly how, after we knew that we could have an old building for remodeling, it was possible within 24 hours for me to get commitments for $400,000. To help on this scale would be very difficult for our diaspora.

Q: Where did the money come from, specifically?

A: Actually it came from three people, two of them, Mr. Soros and Mr. (George) Chopivsky, and the third one gave it out of his pocket. It was the same man who invited us to Dubai. I telephoned him late one afternoon, and before noon the next day $100,000 was in our account.

Just recently we received $1 million from USAID to work together with Carnegie Mellon's School of Industrial Administration to introduce portfolio management programs in Ukraine.

Q: Will the Carnegie Mellon Institute be organizing and instituting that program?

A: Carnegie Mellon has developed parts of this program. We will be adapting it to the conditions in Ukraine, and the IMI will be teaching it. We now have an application with USAID to help with the expansion of the building and also with associated costs. In the long run we would intend to have operational costs covered just by tuition fees because they are fairly high anyway.

Q: In your estimation, what is it that the International Renaissance Foundation, the "umbrella" group for Soros-supported programs does that makes it so essential to establishing civil society in Ukraine?

A: Rebuilding civil society means encouraging initiatives by individuals and groups to do things rather than expecting the government to tell them what to do and giving them the means to do it. That can mean a variety of things: helping a group of veterans to create a special association; some actors to create an artistic group; some artists to make an artistic exhibition; an individual who wants to create a special educational program for women; or a group of women who want to create an association.

Our work can be in the educational, cultural, artistic, political and economic field - support for the publication of some journal, whether it is political science, economics or philosophy - so that they would not have to reflect official points of view but would be entirely independent.

We have helped create an independent media center out of which grew a number of initiatives, including a news agency and independent television programs. We have covered the whole spectrum of activities of what could be considered normal for a civil society where we feel that either an institution could be born or a group of people will carry on interesting and useful work.

Some examples: the foundation supported the creation of a publishing company called Osnovy, which now publishes a large number of world classics in economics, in political science, in philosophy, etc., which were not available in Ukrainian. Some are available in Russian and some not at all.

Osnovy has published some newly authored books. Ultimately Osnovy's work should be self-sustaining financially, but given the costs of paper, this is not possible for now. The government does not support such publications. It is somewhat beyond the traditional activities of publishing houses. The editors have to decide which classics are worthy of translation. Some Western know-how is needed.

We have some special large-scale programs, such as the transformation of humanities programs. This is done in cooperation with the Ministry of Education. The purpose is to get texts written in the humanities: in sociology, psychology, anthropology, philosophy, but also history, economics, political science - all the areas of education that were warped under the Soviet regime.

We give potential authors small amounts of money to submit worthy proposals. Further support is given to write manuscripts.When they submit the manuscript it goes to an expert committee, then we decide whether to publish the books in small editions. When reactions from professors, students, pupils are good, we publish the texts in large editions and they become official texts.

This is why we cooperate with the Ministry of Education. The Ministry of Education, again, is not in a financially strong enough position to initiate such an undertaking, and the International Renaissance Foundation cannot on its own introduce new textbooks.

Q: In what language are these texts published?

A: In Ukrainian. There will be a few texts in Russian specifically designed for the Crimea because it is more useful to have some texts that are sound in content, let's say the history of Ukraine, even if they are in Russian, rather than have as text the Soviet history of Ukraine. The bulk of the texts, probably over 95 percent, will be in Ukrainian because that's where the desperate need is.

Retraining of the military is another important area of our work. Because the armed forces are shrinking. We have retrained some 20,000 officers for civilian occupations. Quite a few have opted for entrepreneurial activities. They were given loans or a little starting capital and quite a few have started their own businesses.

Establishing civil society is the key goal, but helping with the transformation of economic and political processes is also very important.

Q: How much of the organizational structure involves people from Ukraine, and how much of it is composed of people brought to help out in Ukraine?

A: From the very beginning I thought that the best combination would be one or two outsiders within each organization. Obviously, they had to be people who speak Ukrainian and professionally competent, so that they would have the respect of their Ukrainian colleagues. Also, they had to be prepared to stay for a while, first to learn how to function in Ukraine and then to have a lasting impact.

Most of the people are from Ukraine. They know the situation better, their education level is very high. If one combines some of the skills that exist in the West with the intellectual potential of the people in Ukraine, then one gets very good results.

I believe very strongly in that combination. The ultimate purpose is that all the work should be done by the people of Ukraine. That is, at any rate, the ultimate purpose of any activity that I am involved in. If one has skills and knowledge from the outside world, one should gradually pass it on and then step back. If people in Ukraine want some further advice or help they will ask for it.

Q: How did you get involved with the International Renaissance Foundation; how did you get involved with George Soros?

A: Mr. Soros was invited to the annual meeting of the Club of Rome, of which I am a member. We met in Hanover, Germany, in 1989. We had a good, open discussion, even a tough discussion, about political philosophy, Eastern Europe, Ukraine, about nationalism and anti-Semitism, etc.. We developed a relationship of confidence. He said, "Maybe I should do something in Ukraine." At that time he wanted to create a branch of his Russian foundation in Ukraine. I said that it certainly would not do, while Ukraine was not yet independent it was moving toward it, hence a separate foundation should be created.

Ivan Dzyuba had also paid Mr. Soros a visit in New York with Volodymyr Savaliev. He thus met another two people from Ukraine. In April 1990, he came to Kyiv and we launched the foundation.

Q: There are very few who say that the work of the Soros Foundation is not needed in Ukraine, but some do say that it is a will that is being put upon the people of Ukraine without them having the choice as to how to implement change.

A: Yes, the reactions against George Soros have been very strong, curiously enough, in the country of his origin, in Hungary. It is also very strong in Russia, where many say that it is just another Zionist plot. He had a lot of difficulties with that foundation, had to fire a lot of people there; much money was stolen. Such things have not happened in Ukraine.

I think that there are several reasons. First, our elite, in spite of different political inclinations, adopted in 1989-1990 a very liberal policy towards other nationalities in Ukraine - Jews, Russians, whoever. Secondly, from the beginning, for the first two years, the foundation was called the Ukrainian-American Renaissance Founda-tion, not the Soros Foundation. The foundation was run totally by Ukrainians, with a couple of people from the diaspora, but not foreigners, as was the case in some other countries.

The board of directors consisted of personalities who had the trust of the people. All of the above contributed to the legitimacy of the IRF and made it less suspect. There have been a few articles in the Communist papers because they are against whatever comes from the Western world. Ours is one of the success stories, as Mr. Soros stated publicly.

Not everybody is thrilled with the what we do and how we do it, but there is no suspicion about the motives. The foundation is there to help Ukraine transform itself into a politically free, economically viable open society and an independent country.

PART I

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