Perhaps, no Russia-created myth about Ukraine remains as deeply ingrained in our memory and sense-making as “Ukrainians and Russians are fraternal peoples.”[1] Several generations of Ukrainians have grown up being sure they have historical similarities and a connection with Russians that has never really been there.
For decades, the socioeconomic models that tested cooperation predicted that it would only endure in groups that developed social norms of commitment, trust, and reciprocity.[1] But as Mathew Jackson noted, and what still holds, those predictions invariably have drawn from models that address small groups of agents and ignore questions of how communities build networks into historical regimes with the capacity to create bonds extending beyond kinship and lineage.