GUEST EDITORS: • Marina Andeva (University American College Skopje, Skopje, North Macedonia) is a political scientist and sociologist interested in multiculturalism and minority rights, cross-border cooperation and migration studies. Her other working engagements include the position of Research Fellow at the Institute of International Sociology in Gorizia, Italy since 2009; • Oksana Krayevska (Ivan Franko National University in Lviv, Lviv, Ukraine) is a political scientist with expertise in political and economic aspects of European integration, common policies of the EU and the EU–Ukraine relations. Since 2018 she holds the position of the Senior Research Fellow at the IFNUL Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence “Western Ukrainian Research Centre for European Studies”; • Bartosz Czepil (University of Opole, Opole, Poland) is a political scientist and sociologist whose scientific interests focus mainly on quality of governance embedded in the local and regional contexts, corruption and border studies. He is the coordinator of the Border and Regional Studies Network established within the CEEPUS. SUBMISSION GUIDELINES: • The proposals for this special issue indicating the title, objective, methodological approach, data sources and expected results with a maximum of 500 words should be submitted by e-mail to: bczepil[at]uni.opole.pl and and in Cc: marina.andeva[at]uacs.edu.mk; oksana.krayevska[at]lnu.edu.ua  (with the mention: Special Issue on Ukraine in the XXI century), by September 30th, 2023; • The authors will be notified about the acceptance of their proposal by October 30th, 2023; • The deadline for paper submission is February 28th, 2024; however, early submissions are welcome; • The contributors are required to follow the authors’ guidelines. The paper acceptance is conditioned by strict com-pliance with the editing conditions, including references; • Evaluation period: March-June 2024; • The period of publication in online format (may undergo changes depending on the evolution of the evaluation): July- September 2024. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE TOPIC: The full scale Russian aggression against Ukraine launched on 24 February, 2022 once again attracted interest in this big European country, located between the Russian Federation and the European Union. For observers from Central Europe the current geopolitical position of Ukraine might remind of a seminal essay by Milan Kundera published in 1984 Tragedy of Central Europe, where he makes the point that although Central Europe was politically “kidnapped” by the Soviet Union, culturally it still belonged to the West. One can discern similarities with the current, somehow tragic, position of Ukraine as a country stuck in between, trying to resist imposition of the Kremlin’s demarcated political borders, and at the same time having its cultural identity already embedded in the realm of Western world and decisively declaring orientation towards the EU. The geopolitical importance of contemporary Ukraine and its specific position result in complicated, multidimensional processes and challenges, leading to variety of questions to be addressed by scholarly community. These are questions going beyond reflection on geopolitical and military aspects of the war against Ukraine, because Ukrainian history and current developments articulate wider problems faced by international community in the XXI century such as strength and weakness of liberal democracy, intensified international migrations, minorities, quality of governance, security threats and risks triggered by disinformation. Thus, Ukraine is an important case to study not only as a separate political entity, but as a political system entangled and indicative of the processes occurring on international scale in seemingly different political contexts. We invite authors with contributions, especially on the following topics: • The impact of Russian aggression on Ukraine: political, ethnic, social and economic implications; • The EU-Ukrainian relations and perspectives of Ukraine’s accession to the EU; • The NATO-Ukrainian relations and perspectives of Ukraine’s accession to the NATO; • Ukrainian refugees around the world; • The challenges of reforming governance system in Ukraine; • Political, economic and social transformations in Ukraine; • Relations between Ukraine and its neighbours; • Place and role of Ukraine in the Baltic and Black Sea Region; • The majority-minority relations and the minority rights in Ukraine: war implications and the EU adhesion perspective; • Cultural (non-territorial) autonomy for protection of minorities in times of territorial; state-driven politics. Besides the above mentioned themes, the guest editors are open to and welcome also papers that relate to other relevant topics on Ukraine from various research areas and methodological approaches.