The article focuses on the complex political, legal, sociocultural and geopolitical problems initiated by the political crisis in Ukraine. The authors analyze the historical and socio-political prerequisites and the global context of the Ukrainian crisis. In the light of this crisis, prospects of the geopolitical and geoeconomic reconfiguration of the former Soviet Union are considered. Special attention is paid to the problems of state consolidation, to the dysfunctions of the democratic process, to the efficiency of democratic political institutions. The transformations of the constitutional and legal system and of political regime are analyzed in the context of the current crisis. Risks of state insolvency and possible disintegration of Ukraine, prospects of reestablishment of the state as an option of crisis recovery, destructive practices of the post-revolutionary period, and the role of informal institutes in Ukrainian policy are evaluated. These factors contribute to a rapid growth of cleavages in the Ukrainian society – in many respects because of the ethnic centered nation building policy and of xenophobic mobilization. Comparative analysis of the Ukrainian and Russian experiences post-Soviet transformation of political systems reveals two different variants of interaction and mutual control of oligarchy, bureaucracy and political personalistic regimes. As a result of this interactions two different solutions to the problem of civic nation building in a post-Soviet transformation context emerge. Which of these options may be more successful remains an open question.