Західно-Українська Народна Республіка: державно-політичне та соціально- економічне реформування в умовах визвольної війни

Abstract

The article analyzes the state-building activity of the Ukrainian National Rada and State Secretariat of the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic under the conditions of the Ukrainian-Polish war of 1918– 1919. Particular attention is paid to reforming the authorities and the administration, conducting military, land, educationaland other reforms. The Ukrainian government was tolerant to the activities of national communities – the Jewish National Councils, local Jewish and Polish police. The uncensored publication of Polish newspapers was allowed, in particular “Glos prawdy” (Stanyslaviv), “Gazeta Kolomijska” (Kolomyia) and others. However, the Ukrainian and Polish authorities failed to avoid mutual internment of officials, public and political figures, their families, the destruction of monuments to the figures of Ukrainian and Polish culture. The activities of the government and the UN Rada of the WUPR showed that the leaders of the Ukrainian parties, the recent ambassadors of the Galician Sejm, have gained a good grasp of the experience of European democratic traditions and strived to build a republic that would serve as an example of Ukrainian state order, tolerant solution of long-standing interethnic contradictions. However, military aggression of Poland, Romania, Hungary and Russia on the western lands of Ukraine in 1918–1920 destroyed the national state building process. ZUNR leaders sought from the Entente to solve the East-Galician problem on the basis of the right of nations to self-determination in order to prevent the incorporation of Ukrainian lands into the Second Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Instead, with the support of the leadership of the Bolshevik republics of Russia and Ukraine in the summer of 1920, Galician Revolutionary Committee was created in Ternopil and the puppet Galician Socialist Soviet Republic was proclaimed. This state was not recognized by the international community and its two-month policy of Sovietization was also criticized by the emigre government of ZUNR. On February 23, 1921, the Paris Session of the Council of the League of Nations confirmed the temporary nature of the Polish military occupation of Eastern Galicia. In response, on April 30, 1921, Ye. Petrushevich proposed to the League of Nations the project “Fundamentals of the state system of the Galician Republic”, which provided for the revival of an independent social and legal state, where the parliamentary elections were proposed to carry out by three national curies, and the president was the leader of the republic. The project wasn’t accepted by the League of Nations. It was also not possible to consolidate the national-state plans of the WUPR and the UPR. On March 14, 1923, the Council of Representatives of the Entente States recognized Eastern Galicia as a part of Poland. After announcing the protest statement, on March 15, 1923, the exiled government of the WUPR was self-destructed in Vienna. The experience of the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic can also be useful for contemporary politicians and governments with regard to the formation of a revolutionary parliament and a coalition government, the creation of the system of local authorities functioning with the participation of potential opponents and a balanced land reform.