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« 2023. # 5 (173)

The Ethnology Notebooks. 2023. № 5 (173), 1202—1215

UDK [930.2:327.8](470+571:477)

DOI https://doi.org/10.15407/nz2023.05.1202

HISTORICAL SOURCES OF THE «RUSSIAN WORLD» DOCTRINE IN THE UKRAINIAN QUESTION: EURASIANISM

POLESHCHUK Tamara

  • ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3136-9340
  • Candidate of History, Docent,
  • The Ivan Franko National University of Lviv,
  • Department of History of Central and Eastern Europe,
  • 1, Universytetska str., 79000, Lviv, Ukraine,
  • Contacts: е-mail: tpol@ukr.net

Abstract. Introduction. The concept of the «Russian world» has no unambiguous interpretation or legal definition. Over the past decade, the concept of the «Russian world» has been an integral part of Putin’s Russia’s state policy.

Statement of the problem. Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine, unleashed on 24 February 2022, and the war crimes committed by the Russian occupiers on Ukrainian lands, force us to take a deeper look at the nature of the «Russian world», rethink its ideological roots, and the role of the Ukrainian question in this concept. One of the sources of the «Russian world» was the ideas of Russian Eurasians of the 1920s and 1930s and their contemporary followers. 

The purpose of the article is to show the role and importance of the Ukrainian question in the ideology of Eurasianism and neo-Eurasianism, and the impact of these views on the concept of the «Russian world».

The methodological basis is the principles of historicism, determinism and systematicity, which, when applied to historical and typological and comparative historical methods, allow us to analyse the influence of the Eurasian ideology, in particular, their vision of the Ukrainian question, on the doctrine of the «Russian world».

Results. In search of a way out of the crisis of national and cultural identity caused by the collapse of the USSR, intellectuals close to the authorities formed the doctrine of the «Russian world». One of its nourishing sources was the legacy of the Eurasians of the 1920s and 1930s. Back then, in response to the collapse of the Russian Empire and the Bolsheviks’ rise to power, a group of young scholars, emigrants from Russia, created the doctrine of Russia-Eurasia as an original civilisation, whose creator and driver of development was to be a «triune nation» of Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians. Eurasian leaders  M. Trubetskoy, P. Savitsky sought to convince Ukrainians that their intentions to develop their own national culture and fight for an independent state were fatal. Leading representatives of the Ukrainian emigration D. Doroshenko and O. Mytsiuk, in a public debate argued against the approaches and assessments of M. Trubetskoy and his associates regarding the emergence and prospects of the Ukrainian language and culture, and the ability of the Ukrainian people to create their own statehood.

Conclusions. The concept of the «Russian world» has incorporated an eclectic mix of historical myths, various intellectual and political constructs. The legacy of the Russian Eurasians and their contemporary followers as part of the «Russian World» doctrine has become the core of Putin’s policy and neo-imperial practice, and the justification for a full-scale war against Ukraine.

Keywords: Eurasianism, neo-Eurasianism, Russian-Ukrainian war, Russia, «Russian world», Ukraine, Ukrainian question.

Received 15.09.2023

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