Moving to the post-Soviet space, Vlad Mykhnenko provides a vivid account of possibly the most dramatic period of contention in post-communist Europe, that of the coal miners of the Ukrainian Donbas region. He shows that the conditions initially favoured the miners, and the movement grew into ‘a symbol of the emerging civil society’ in the Soviet Union. In the first stages of its mobilisation, the miners’ movements were an important factor within the process of democratisation in Ukraine. However, as a consequence of a series of bad strategic choices (most notably in forming political alliances) and of the shift in the mood in the whole country, the movement finally faltered.