The article presents the analysis of the main issues related to the formation of the national, cultural, political, confessional self- identification of the Ukrainian people and the aspirations of its representatives to propose a model of social and political structure that would provide conditions for the development of all Ukrainian citizens in the most appropriate way. As a result, different views of Poles and Ukrainians on this matter at the end of 1918 led to open Ukrainian-Polish political struggle, and later moved, which became a new stage in the cohabitation of the two neighboring peoples.
Abstract. The paper attempts to investigate the peculiarities of the national liberation movement of Western Ukrainians during the interwar period, when several social movements emerged, represented both as democratic unions and parties that carried out the legal struggle, as well as by two illegal political forces. Leading political forces tried to influence the national liberation, which did not lead to the consolidation of the community and further contradictions. Instead, the struggle of the Polish national chauvinists and Ukrainian patriotic forces did not allow Ukrainians to defend the sovereignty of their state, since this was affected by the military-political situation in the region, the position of the Entente countries, as well as the ethnic relations of the region. The development of the Ukrainian national liberation movement was perceived as antistate activity by the Polish society, and the unresolved political, economic, cultural, educational, and social problems -as an attempt to "steal" these lands. The Polish community considered the "Ukrainian question" through the prism of its own struggle for state independence and "groundless claims of Rusyns" to these territories. The consistent assimilation policy of the Polish authorities, the actual lack of unity of Ukrainian political forces pushed part of the Ukrainian youth to the use of more radical forms of struggle. In January 1929, the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) was created in Vienna. The prevalence of national interests over individual ones was proclaimed, the supreme goal of the struggle was asserted by the achievement of state independence. Methods of struggle -propaganda, propaganda, sabotage and terrorist. Not only representatives of the occupation authorities, but also Ukrainians who did not share the ideology and methods of struggle of the OUN, were subjected to terror. Despite ideological sympathies or antipathies to the Ukrainian national idea, objectivity requires that the activities of legal parties and illegal influences significantly on the historical events of the twentieth century.
The article makes an attempt to investigate the peculiarities and determine the regularities of cooperation between the Ukrainian and Polish states during the time of the Second Rzeczpospolita, to recreate the overall picture of events and their subsequent influence on the relations between the two countries. Analysis of the concepts of activities of various representatives of the Polish government is presented, which helps to prove that Poland's constant struggle for spheres of influence in the international arena led to unpleasant consequences that claimed the lives of the representatives of many nations, including Ukrainians and Poles. At the same time, the struggle of the Polish national chauvinists and the Ukrainian patriotic forces did not allow Ukrainians to defend the sovereignty of its state, since the military-political situation in the region, the position of the Entente countries, as well as the ethnic relations of the region did not contribute to this. The attempt to normalize the Ukrainian-Polish relations in the Second Commonwealth did not bring the expected results because it was not seen by the government as a positive solution to the problem. Having negatively impacted the life of Ukrainians, these actions were remembered as the last wasted attempt to improve the situation on the eve of the Second World War. Ukrainians in such a difficult situation were forced to adjust to the requirements of time, and therefore quite often changed the vector of activity toward the cultural and social direction. The intellectuals were fighting for the right to teach in Ukrainian in schools, preserving traditions and gaining minor rights and privileges. The positions of the Polish government, in this case, remained unchanged, with the exception of the insignificant tolerant statements of its individual representatives. Consequently, Polish politics did not achieve the desired results.
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