Ontology of National Interests of Ukraine: System Priorities

Abstract

The study is devoted to the analysis of the content of national interests of Ukraine as a system of ensuring vital needs of citizens, society, and the state. Ontological dimensions allow to outline the coexistence of a certain set of realities, including metaphysical ones, which significantly affect the possibility of successful implementation of the strategy of Ukrainian civilizational progress. National interests are determined by the needs of the triune integrity: "citizen – society – state". It is important to achieve proportionality and unity of interests of each component, including the coincidence of state and national interests of Ukraine. Priorities include human rights, the rule of law and democratic values. The direct aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, as well as the artifacts of the totalitarian system within the country, erode meanings, values, and strategic vectors of the realization of Ukraine's national interests, produce a destructive effect. Incompatibility and alternative national interests of Russia and Ukraine are substantiated, which is confirmed by factors of historical, cultural, spiritual, and economic development. In times of crisis, the activity of civil society becomes extremely important, which takes on both the definition of content and the protection of national interests. It is emphasized that the real sovereignty, security of the state, social harmony and high standard of civil life have their ontological basis for internal determinants, including national self-determination and self-establishment of the Ukrainian people. In this case, final overcoming of the spiritual-practical and political-legal consequences of Ukraine's forced stay in the system of totalitarian reality becomes of fundamental importance. It is the attempt to return Ukraine to the rule of Moscow, to level its identity in the state, ethnic and cultural dimensions, which determines the direction of Russia's aggressive policy against our state. Protecting and defending one’s own national interests becomes the key to preserving Ukraine’s own identity and establishing it as a full-fledged subject of international relations.