Civilian Life

Occupation is usually seen through the prism of war and administration, but for most people it is first of all a daily experience of survival — a matter of where to live, where to get water, whether the hospital works, how to obtain documents, and whether it is even possible to return home, if that home still exists. Civilian life is where the central contradiction of Russian rule shows most clearly: a public performance of "normalisation" and "reconstruction" set against a population still living amid humanitarian strain, housing insecurity, economic dependence and constant administrative pressure.

Three years into the full-scale invasion, everyday life is a mixture of adaptation and uncertainty. State functions have formally resumed — schools, hospitals, pensions, transport — but behind that façade lie shortages of doctors and medicines, decaying utilities, rising prices, vanishing work and falling real incomes. Nowhere is this sharper than in occupied Donetsk Oblast, where in 2025–2026 severe water shortages pushed hundreds of thousands of people to the brink of humanitarian crisis, with supply rationed to a few hours a day.

Housing and basic services have become instruments of control as much as questions of welfare. In Mariupol, where UN estimates put the share of apartment housing destroyed or damaged at roughly 90%, some 25,000 homes have been placed on lists of "ownerless property" that displaced owners must return to reclaim — often impossibly. Access to healthcare, benefits, property registration and work increasingly depends on holding a Russian passport, binding daily survival to integration into the Russian system.

The occupation has driven the largest displacement in modern Ukrainian history — by UN estimates more than 350,000 people have left Mariupol alone — while an ageing population remains and some return, not out of loyalty but because they cannot find housing or work elsewhere. At the same time Russia resettles construction workers, officials, security personnel and their families into the territories, reshaping their social fabric. Yet residents' own words — complaints about water, housing, prices and documents, and resentment at corruption and preferential treatment for newcomers — describe a lived reality far removed from the authorities' image of recovery. This theme reads civilian life as a continuous compromise between adaptation and survival, and as one of the clearest windows onto how the occupation actually works.

Questions we ask

1. What does everyday life under occupation actually look like?
2. What is happening to housing and basic services?
3. Who leaves the occupied territories, who stays, who returns — and why?
4. How do residents themselves assess their own lives under occupation?

The full picture

Civilian life in the occupied territories is often viewed through the prism of war, military operations or occupation administration. For most people, however, occupation is primarily a daily experience of survival. Behind the administrative, budgetary and political decisions lie the questions that define everyday life: where to live, where to get water, how the hospital functions, how to obtain documents, whether it is possible to return home — and whether that home still exists. Civilian life shows most clearly the two-level contradiction of Russian policy in the occupied territories: on one hand, an effort to project "normalisation" and "reconstruction"; on the other, a population still living amid humanitarian problems, housing insecurity, economic dependence and constant administrative pressure.

What is everyday life like under occupation? Three years into the full-scale invasion, life in the occupied territories remains a combination of adaptation and constant uncertainty. Most basic state functions have formally been restored — schools and hospitals operate, pensions and benefits are paid, administrative institutions work and part of the transport network runs again — but behind this outward normalisation lies a marked deterioration in quality of life: a chronic shortage of qualified doctors, shortages of medicines or poor-quality pharmaceuticals, decaying utilities, rising prices, a systemic lack of employment and a steady fall in real household incomes. These problems are especially acute in Mariupol, in the occupied part of Donetsk Oblast, where despite constant talk of "reconstruction" the city still struggles with water, sewage, electricity and housing, and many residents remain in temporary accommodation or damaged buildings. Water supply is a particularly acute problem in its own right: in 2025–2026 the occupied part of Donetsk Oblast came to the brink of humanitarian disaster through water shortages, with supply rationed to only a few hours a day for hundreds of thousands of people.¹

What is happening to housing and basic services? Housing has become one of the most painful issues of the occupation. In Mariupol, by UN estimates roughly 90% of apartment housing was destroyed or damaged,² and despite large-scale new-build programmes the population's actual needs remain unmet. A distinct instrument is the policy of so-called "ownerless property": approximately 25,000 apartments and houses have been placed on lists of property whose owners must confirm their rights within a limited period — practically impossible for the many who have left — turning housing into a key instrument of demographic policy and political control.³ The same logic extends across basic services: access to medical care, social benefits, property registration, employment and business activity increasingly depends on obtaining a Russian passport and integrating into the Russian administrative system,⁴ so that services become not merely social policy but an instrument of population control.

Who leaves, who stays, and who returns? The occupation has caused the largest population displacement in modern Ukrainian history: by UN estimates more than 350,000 people left Mariupol alone, out of a pre-war population of around 430,000.² A significant population nonetheless remains, staying because of old age, lack of resources, care for relatives, attachment to home or an inability to adapt elsewhere. A further group has returned — not out of support for the occupation but because of a lack of housing or work in government-controlled territory, the need to look after property, psychological attachment to their hometown, or family reunification. Meanwhile the demographic structure has shifted markedly: the share of elderly residents has risen while that of young, economically active people has fallen sharply,⁵ even as Russia resettles construction workers, civil servants, military and law-enforcement personnel and their families into the territories, gradually changing their social composition.

What do residents themselves say about life under occupation? Some of the most valuable evidence comes from residents themselves. Analysis of citizens' appeals to occupation administrations, local chat groups and surveys of internally displaced persons reveals a strikingly consistent picture, with the most frequent complaints concerning housing, water, utilities, public transport, shortages of doctors, high prices and difficulties obtaining documents. Particularly revealing are the many complaints from Mariupol residents about compensation housing and the inclusion of their apartments on "ownerless property" lists.⁶ Social-media monitoring shows a further trend: even among people who have adapted to occupation, a critical attitude toward the authorities frequently remains, with the greatest dissatisfaction directed at the quality of utilities, housing policy, corruption, unequal access to resources and preferential treatment for Russian citizens and newcomers — a lived reality far removed from the authorities' image of recovery.

Civilian life in the occupied territories is a space of constant compromise between adaptation and survival. Despite the partial restoration of infrastructure and the formal functioning of institutions, life for much of the population remains considerably harder than before the occupation, and housing, utilities, documents and benefits are increasingly turned into instruments of political control and integration into the Russian system. The demographic changes, the property policies and the system of administrative dependency all indicate that Russia treats the occupied territories not as temporarily controlled spaces but as territory for long-term integration — which is why the analysis of civilian life is one of the keys to understanding how the occupation functions, and what Ukraine will face after de-occupation.