ADMINISTRATIVE AND LEGAL SUPPORT FOR THE REINTEGRATION OF VETERANS IN UKRAINE

Abstract

This article is devoted to a comprehensive analysis of the administrative and legal framework for the reintegration of veterans in Ukraine and the formulation of proposals for its improvement. The methodological basis of the study comprises: the formal-legal (dogmatic) method, the method of analysing law enforcement practice, the statistical method, and others. Their application has made it possible to comprehensively analyse legislative regulation and law enforcement practice in the field of veterans’ reintegration, and to identify current issues in this area of public administration. The theoretical basis of the study consists of publications by Ukrainian scholars devoted to the legal, socio-economic, educational and other aspects of the reintegration of veterans in Ukraine. The legal framework of the study consists of Ukrainian legislative acts concerning the competences and powers of public administration bodies responsible for implementing veterans’ policy in Ukraine. The empirical basis of the study consists of data on the number of persons registered in the Unified State Register of War Veterans, as well as case law regarding the acquisition of the legal status of a combatant and the status of a person with a war-related disability. The study conducted has demonstrated the merits of digitising the procedure for granting the legal status of a combatant, as well as the legal status of a person with a war-related disability. Ensuring that the information required to obtain these legal statuses is fully recorded in databases and state registers will enable those eligible to acquire them, as well as their legal representatives, to obtain these legal statuses in the most efficient manner. The need for a thorough review of public administration in the implementation of Ukraine’s veterans’ policy has been demonstrated. Veterans and their family members, as well as civil society organisations representing the public interests of veterans, must be mandatory participants in this review. The aim of such a review is to identify the actual needs of veterans and their family members in the areas of healthcare, social security, education, advisory services, etc. It is precisely on the basis of the results of such a review that the Veterans’ Policy Strategy for the period up to 2030, as well as the action plans for its implementation, should be revised. A link has been established between the institutional framework for public administration in the field of veterans’ integration and the review of Ukraine’s veterans’ policy. The creation of new institutional bodies within existing public administration entities, or the establishment of new public administration entities that do not yet exist within the executive branch, is only possible after clarifying the issue of the objective impossibility of assigning tasks in the field of veterans’ reintegration to existing divisions and departments of public administration entities, and the impossibility of retraining staff working in such structural units of public administration bodies.