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Reconsidering the Ukrainian Revolution

1917–1921: The Dialectics of National

Liberation and Social EmancipationChris Ford

Available online: 10 Dec 2007

To cite this article: Chris Ford (2007): Reconsidering the Ukrainian Revolution 1917–1921: The

Dialectics of National Liberation and Social Emancipation, Debatte: Journal of Contemporary

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DEBATTE, VOLUME 15, NUMBER 3 (DECEMBER 2007)

Reconsidering the UkrainianRevolution 1917–1921:The Dialectics of NationalLiberation and SocialEmancipation

Chris Ford

On its ninetieth anniversary the Ukrainian Revolution remains a matter of both

historical and contemporary political controversy. This article challenges the

predominant national and Soviet historical paradigms, including those of the

left which have restricted its views of the revolution through the prism of

Petrograd. The article analyses the Ukrainian Revolution as a distinctive process

and re-asserts the vernacular socialist movement as posing a viable alternative

which was universal in its objectives of social emancipation and national

liberation. The experience of the “rebirth of Ukraine” during those tumultuous

years brings into question previously accepted explanations of the fate not only

of the Russian Revolution but the entire European Revolution.

The Problem of the Historiography of the Revolution

Volodymyr Vynnychenko, one of the most well-known Ukrainian leaders in the

twentieth century, coined the phrase vsebichne vyzvolennia—“universal liber-

ation”.1 By this he meant the “universal (social, national, political, moral,cultural, etc.) liberation” of the worker and peasant masses. This striving for

“such a total and radical liberation” represented the “Ukrainian Revolution” in

the broad historical sense. However the expression the “Ukrainian Revolution”

may also be used in a narrower sense as indicating the great upheavals aimed at

this object, the most noteworthy of which marked the years 1917–1920.

1 Vynnychenko Rozlad i pohodzhennia (cited in Rudnytsky 419).

ISSN 0965-156X print/1469-3712 online/07/030279-28 2007 Taylor & FrancisDOI: 10.1080/09651560701711562



According to Vynnychenko, the “universal current” which strove to realize this

historical tendency comprised the most radical of the socialist parties, the

Ukrainian Social Democratic Workers’ party (Independents), or Nezalezhnyky , the

Ukrainian Party of Socialist Revolutionaries—Borotbisty and the oppositional

federalist currents amongst the Bolsheviks in Ukraine.2

In revisiting the Ukrainian Revolution on its ninetieth anniversary it is

necessary to recognize that such methods of universal history and this “universal

current” have fallen victim to the prevalent paradigms that have dominated

historiography for six decades, both intimately linked to their twin interpretation

of the Russian Revolution (Himka; Acton).

On the one hand stands the official Soviet history which crystallized in the late

1920s with the ascendancy of Stalinism. Moulded by “Marxism-Leninism”, history

was encaged within the parameters of partiinost and served as a source of

legitimacy for the system. This considered that the revolution in Ukraine had noindependent aspect but was “part and parcel of the Socialist Revolution in all

Russia”. It presented the Russian Bolsheviks in the leading role of the entire

revolutionary process of 1917–1920. The vernacular elements such as the

Ukrainian Party of Socialist Revolutionaries (UPSR) and the Ukrainian Social

Democratic Workers Party (USDRP) were characterized as “petty-bourgeois

parties” similar to the Russian Mensheviks, who attempted to retard the

developing socialist revolution. The importance of the national question was

minimized and written of pejoratively.

The omega of the Soviet orthodoxy can be found in the literature of the

national paradigm developed mainly, though not exclusively, by Ukrainian

emigres. Whilst considering a distinctive revolutionary process in Ukraine, it

gives the national dimension primary place to the detriment and subordination of

social questions. Though free from the restrictions imposed upon Soviet

historians, this school, whilst producing scholarly and valuable works, has its

own self-imposed restrictions: as an approach stilted towards “history from

above”. Being overly focused on institutions and leaders, the object of the

revolution is narrowed to that of the achievement of a national state. In this

paradigm the Bolsheviks and the most radical Ukrainian socialists had little

support. The real principles of the revolution were those of nationalliberation, denied by an invading Russian army who imposed a “puppet”

Soviet government. The radical socialists are guilty of fragmenting the UNR

(Ukrainian People’s Republic) and allying with Bolshevism, by deliberate betrayal

or political naivete.

What is often overlooked is the similarity of the two paradigms: Traits

considered negative in one are portrayed positively in the other. This is notable in

the treatment of the socialist element of the Ukrainian Revolution. Whilst it is

recognized that the majority of deputies of the Central Rada were drawn from

2 Micro histories of the Ukrainian socialist parties are included in: Rudzienski; Mace; Reshetar; Borys.There is no specific history of the USDRP, though in addition to the above two important unpublishedstudies which address this party are: Boshyk; Bojcun “Working Class”.

280 CHRIS FORD



the socialist parties, both orthodoxies put emphasis on their more moderate

tendency as if it were their overall character.3 Both also share a conception of

continuity in Soviet history running from Lenin and Stalin to the collapse of the

USSR and the emergence of an independent Ukraine in 1991.

These problems of historiography cannot be seen separately from the contextof the climate of the Cold War in which they existed. Symmetrical ideological

systems existed in the East and West, mutually antagonistic, elitist and

conservative in their conceptions of society. Both ruled out the possibility of

an alternative to the established facts of “actually existing socialism” or western

capitalism, and their assumptions were pervasive in intellectual life. Between

them these paradigms squeezed out the actuality that a viable alternative

historical course of development existed: that of an emancipatory Ukrainian

socialism. To accept this actuality was to consider history as one of discontinuity

between what came to exist and what was attempted in the revolutionary periodbefore Stalinism. This was the view of a minority of Ukrainian historians including

some survivors of the vanquished left, who considered that Stalin’s ascendancy

represented not the victory of “socialism” but a break with the revolution: the

“Bolshevik Thermidor”.

The new approaches to the study of the revolution, instead of receiving a

boost as a result of the collapse of the USSR, were instead seriously

challenged.4 Historiography became embroiled in the politics of the transition.

Historians in their rejection of the old order turned to the old orthodoxy in

the West.5

This situation has been to the detriment of an authentic social and labourhistory.6 The ninetieth anniversary invites a new engagement with the Ukrainian

Revolution, challenging labour historians in particular to move outside of the

prism of Petrograd and recognize it is a key element to our understanding of the

revolution and its fate.

The Historical Causes and Social Forces of the Revolution

On the eve of the 1917 revolution the majority of Ukraine had been held in a

colonial position by Tsarist Russia for over two and a half centuries, but contrary

to the prognosis of some, such as Georgi Plekhanov, the development of

3 An example of this is Reshetar who writes that the USDRP saw Marxism as a merely a “means bywhich national independence could be achieved” (51).4 It is important to note that influence of the social historians was not as extensive as may be thought.One study of research on Russian history in the US revealed 20–25% of PhD work within this approach(Rowney).5 Richard Pipes, the most notable of the anti-revisionists, in his works The Russian Revolution and

Russia under the Bolshevik Regime, epitomizes the resurrection of the Western orthodoxy. He assertsthat the revolution “was the result not of insufferable conditions but of irreconcilable attitudes [ . . .]

attitudes rather than institutions or ‘objective’ economic and social realities determine the course ofpolitics.” (Cited in Acton et al. 13.)6 For example, of eighty-six articles in Ukrainskyi istorychnyi zhurnal in the eight years fromindependence, only seven on the revolution touched on peasants or workers.

UKRAINIAN REVOLUTION 281



capitalism did not render permanent its status as a so-called “non-historic”

nation.7 Though this was not for the want of trying; in the mind of Moscow there

was no Ukraine; only the southern province known as Malorossia—“Little Russia”.

To maintain it in this position Ukraine was subjected to systematic institutional

discrimination through policies of Russification.Whereas national movements of the Austro-Hungarian Empire developed

apace the Ukrainian movement in Dnieper Ukraine grew in a protracted struggle

with Tsarist absolutism, which responded with a hostility qualitatively different

from its attitude towards other nationalities. This can be explained by the role

Ukraine played in the foundation of the Tsarist Empire, its ingestion by the

Muscovite state being the step that transformed it into a Russian Empire: a factor

of no small importance in the mind of Russian nationalism.

The social and economic geography of Ukraine was changed drastically under

Russian rule, transformed into what Mykhaylo Volobuyev characterized as acolony of a “European type”, the development of capitalism producing in Ukraine

a combination of backwardness and modernity.8 Volobuyev observed a dual

process in the economy which did not diminish but compounded Ukraine’s

position:

Hence, the question of whether there was a single Russian pre-revolutionaryeconomy should be answered as follows: it was a single economy on an

antagonistic, imperialist basis, but from the viewpoint of centrifugal forces of

the colonies oppressed by her, it was a complex of national economies. [. . .] The

Ukrainian economy was not an ordinary province of Tsarist Russia, but a landwhich was placed in a colonial position. (Volobuyev 167)

The development of capitalism in Ukraine was not organic, but shaped within

the colonial framework which impacted on the state, capital, labour relations

7 It is necessary to recognize the deep-rooted antagonism of the Russian social democracy towardsUkrainian socialism. This can be traced to the very inception of both movements in the nineteenth

century. Indeed it brought Engels into conflict with the “father of Russian Marxism”, Plekhanov, whenhe failed to support Ukrainian national rights. This revealing conflict arose in 1890 over Engels’s essay,“The Foreign Policy of Russian Tsardom”. Plekhanov replied criticizing Engels for his consideration of

Ukrainians as a nation. Engels had come to believe that one positive outcome of the overthrow ofTsarism would be that “Little Russia [Ukraine] will be able to choose its political connections freely”.

The advice of Engels made little impact for the following year Plekhanov published The Blind Alley of

Ukrainian Socialism in Russia. It depicted the Russian conquest of Ukrainian territories as an

economic necessity, the Ukrainian movement was damned as utopian with no historical basis: “Theabolition of serfdom, universal conscription, the development of commerce and industry, [. . .] theinfluence of urban life and civilization—these are the factors that have definitively merged the ruralpopulation of Ukraine, even linguistically, [. . .] into a sphere of influences shared with Russia” (citedin Rosdolsky 189). On the question of the “non-historic peoples” and Ukraine, see also LevynskyL’internatonale.8 Volobuyev was an economist and government official heading a branch of the commissariat ofeducation. His articles “On the Problem of the Ukrainian Economy” were published in Bilshovyk

Ukrainy 30 January and 16 February 1928. Though an ethnic Russian he was a spokesman for theUkrainian communists and defender of Ukraine’s right to control its economy. Volobuyev showed howcentral control and continued Russian chauvinism perpetuated the exploitation of Ukraine within theUSSR. He was attacked by the Stalinist authorities and killed in the 1930s (Volobuyev).

282 CHRIS FORD



and composition of the social classes. In 1917, the number of wageworkers stood

at approximately 3.6 million, with almost half in the mining and steel enclave of

the Donbas. Assessments of the size of the Ukrainian element of the working class

vary: According to Mykola Porsh the proportion of Ukrainians was 32.4 per cent in

large factories, 33.8 per cent in mining and 41.5 per cent in railways (cited inBojcun Working Class 113). Isaak Mazepa claimed they made up 73 per cent of all

wage earners and 88 per cent of the agricultural workers (Mazepa 13).

The proletariat bore the stigmata of colonialism, having emerged as capitalism

moved into the phase of imperialism. This saw an international division of labour

based on the relative strength and influence of the core metropolitan states, a

period marked by the further concentration and centralization of capital. This

led to transformation not only in capital but within the working class itself, with

the growth of a privileged strata. In Ukraine the working class was at first

comprised of mainly Russian migrant labour inclusive of an upper layer in thehigher-paid skilled posts (Friedgut 208). Ukrainian new entrants found Russian not

only the language of the state and administration but of the labour regime, the

factory owner and foreman, their immediate class adversary.9

These developments posited the national question at the point of production

through a division of labour which relegated Ukrainians to the low paid, flexible

strata, under-represented in heavy industry and over-represented in service and

agricultural sectors. Correspondingly the capitalist class on the territory of

Ukraine was overwhelmingly non-Ukrainian in composition, prompting Ukrainian

socialists to consider their nation as bezburzhaunist

, bourgeoisless.

The process of urbanization also saw Russians and other non-Ukrainian

minorities hegemonic, with Ukrainians constituting about a third of the urban

population; nine out of ten Ukrainians lived in the rural districts, mostly

classed as peasants with whom Ukrainian was synonymous (Verstiuk; Weinstein).

It was here that the social and national questions became enmeshed in an

explosive cocktail.

In 1917, there were 4,011,000 peasant households in Russian-ruled Ukraine.

15.8 per cent had no land under cultivation, 20 per cent owned between 0.1 and

3.0 desyatinas per farm and 55.6 per cent owned 3.1 to 10.0 desyatinas per farm.

These sections lived in relative poverty, whilst the remaining 8.6 per cent ownedmore than 10.0 desyatinas each and were wealthy peasants—kurkuls (kulaks).

Half of the poorer farms rented out their land and made a living as sharecroppers

or hired labour. The rate of impoverishment grew apace, Ukrainian peasants’

health was markedly worse than that of European Russians.10

The intimate relationship between the agrarian and national questions flowed

also from the ethnic-class composition of the landowners. Alongside the Russian

state, church and monasteries, a third of arable land was held by a class of which

three-quarters were Russians or Poles (Weinstein 31).The alienation of the

9 On this aspect of the division of labour see: Richtysky; Bojcun “Approaches”; Friedgut 208–144.10 This was reflected in the higher level of rejection of peasant conscripts to the Russian ArmyWeinstein (26–28).




peasants was captured by the Ukrainian Bolshevik Vasyl Shakhray who, looking

through peasant eyes, wrote:

The city rules the village and the city is “alien”. The city draws to itself all the

wealth and gives the village nothing in return. The city extracts taxes, whichnever return to the village in the Ukraine. In the city one must pay bribes to befreed from scorn and red tape. In the city are warm fires, schools, theatres, andmusic plays. The city is expensively dressed as for a holiday, it eats and drinkswell, many people promenade. In the village there is, besides hard work,impenetrable darkness and misery, almost nothing. The city is aristocratic it isalien. It is not ours, not Ukrainian. It is Great-Russian, Jewish, Polish, but notours, not Ukrainian. (Skorovstanskii 7–8)

This position as a colony of Russia and semi-colony of European capital was

evident in the prevailing economic inequality. In 1882 to 1906, less than half of

the revenue raised in Ukraine remained for reinvestment; a trend that continued

year after year (Porsh 76). Karl Kautsky summed up Ukraine’s predicament:

Capitalism develops in only one dimension for the Ukrainian people—itproletarianises them, while the other dimension—the flowering of the productiveforces, the accumulation of surplus and wealth—is mainly for the benefit of othercountries. Because of this, capitalism reveals to Ukrainians only its negative,revolutionizing dimension [. . .] it does not lead to an increase in their wealth.(Bojcun Working Class 71)

From this overview we may delineate the problems that faced the rebirth ofUkraine. Which of the social classes could attain hegemony and transcend the

social cleavages, establishing a cohesive and viable system? To adopt a Gramscian

approach, only a fundamental class which occupies one of the poles in society

could become hegemonic, securing the national-popular elements, and appear as

the representative of the general interest. Whilst the emergence of national

states had previously coincided with the ascendancy of the bourgeoisie, the

nature of the capitalist system in Ukraine negated such a role for the bourgeoisie

as the unifying ethico-political element. It logically followed that the hegemonic

role should correspond to the nation’s character, making the emancipation of

labour integral to the quest for national liberation (Vynnychenko, Vidrodzhennia

Natsii II 102). Concurrently the leading theorist of the Ukrainian Social

Democrats, Mykola Porsh, concluded in 1907 that the:

Ukrainian national movement will not be a bourgeois movement of triumphantcapitalism as in the case of the Czechs. It will be more like the Irish case,a proletarian and semi-proletarianized peasant movement. (193)

The Social and National Revolution in Ukraine

These contours of the Ukrainian movement were already apparent in 1905,

with it having produced its own organic intellectuals and organized in

284 CHRIS FORD



political parties, unions, co-operatives, cultural and Prosvita

educational associations. The movement which emerged at the start of

the twentieth century contained an energetic current which was strongly

influenced by socialist thought and the struggles of the worker-peasant

masses.With the fall of the autocracy in 1917 the Ukrainian Revolution soon

differentiated itself from the wider Russian Revolution, setting as its task the

achievement of national liberation through the creation of a self-governing

Ukrainian state. The period between February and October 1917 was one of

unprecedented “national enthusiasm among the masses of Ukrainian peasants,

soldiers and worker masses” in the conflict with the Russian Provisional

Government (Richtysky).

The movement was a bloc of the middle class, peasantry and the

Ukrainian section of the working class, cantered in the Ukrainian CentralRada. At its head was Mykhaylo Hrushevsky, Ukraine’s greatest historian,

elected chairman on behalf of the Ukrainian Party of Socialist Revolutionaries

(UPSR), and the Marxist Volodymyr Vynnychenko, popular writer and leader of

the Ukrainian Social Democratic Workers Party (USDRP), elected vice-

president and then first president of the General Secretariat, the autonomous

government of Ukraine. The Central Rada was a mass assembly consisting of

councils of peasants’, soldiers’ and workers’ deputies elected at their

respective congresses; it later expanded its constituency, drawing in the

national minorities (Vynnychenko Vidrodzhennia Natsii I 102). This included

the pioneering organization of Jewish national autonomy in Ukraine(Goldelman; Silberfarb).

The Ukrainian word “rada” and Russian “sovet”, meaning council, are direct

transliterations, and such a political translation was made on many occasions

with Ukrainians declaring support for soviet power and the Central Rada because

it was a soviet. Arising from these national peculiarities the revolution contrasted

with the “dual power” situation in Russia between the soviets and the Provisional

Government. There was a rich diversity of popular organs of self-government,

such as the Ukrainian Peasant Union, councils of workers’ deputies, soldiers’

councils, factory committees and the Ukrainian Central Rada whichdrew delegates from many of these and other bodies that appeared in the

localities of Ukraine.

The Central Rada did not exist in a vacuum; it faced the burning questions

of the world war, agrarian revolution, spiralling economic crisis and demands

for workers’ control. If the project of national liberation was to succeed, it

needed to provide solutions. In this regard all parties were tested by the

movement from below, which gave little room for prevarication for those at

the helm. But whilst all the leading parties in the Central Rada identified

themselves as socialists, there were fundamental differences in their

conceptions of the revolution and the requisite political strategy. On theburning questions they prevaricated and at key moments lagged behind the

pace of the popular movement, even on the national question with which




they were preoccupied.11 As a result, relations became strained within the

Central Rada, between its ruling circles drawn largely from the intelligentsia

and the middle class, and the rank and file of the Ukrainian movement. The

emergence of this milieu, which increasingly diverged from the radicalism of

the rank and file, pointed to the danger of bureaucracy even within a bodyas democratic as the Central Rada.12

This divergence was, as Vynnychenko explained, not about personalities but

politics. The prevailing opinion was that the creation of a sovereign state was the

“precondition of the success of its struggle for political and social liberation”.13

This perspective corresponded with the dualist view held by most social

democrats, of a socialist revolution in the west, whilst in the “backward”

Russian Empire it could only be bourgeois democratic in its nature. There were

differences over who comprised the camp of the “revolutionary democracy”, and

whether it should be an alliance of the working class with the liberal bourgeoisieor an independent bloc of the workers and peasantry, excluding the latter. Either

way, few believed that the requisite material and social conditions were

available for a socialist revolution. In Ukraine the national question brought an

additional dimension to this debate. As the urban working class was largely

Russian, critics considered that the “dictatorship of the proletariat” and “soviet

power” would exclude the Ukrainian peasantry, negating national liberation.

These traditional opinions were challenged, on the one hand by the popular

movement from below and on the other hand from above by the antagonism

towards the Ukrainian national democratic movement by the liberal and

conservative wings of Russia. The opinion steadily grew in the socialist parties

that they were in a transitional phase; the task being to “carry the bourgeois

democratic revolution to its conclusion” and “carry out a social revolution”

(Richtysky 54). The historical orthodoxies have largely neglected this tendency

within the Ukrainian Revolution, considering its location of origin as Bolshevik

influence in the soviets, or even in Russia itself. This view holds but partial truth,

for to grasp fully this conjuncture it is necessary to recognize that this tendency

also grew organically within the Ukrainian Revolution itself; as revealed by the

increased levels of class consciousness of workers and peasants, illustrated by

11 Porsh complained that: “At first the Central Rada was a bloc of parties united around the slogan of

autonomy and federation. When our party entered the Rada, it replaced its class orientation with anational one. Some of our comrades said quite plainly that until we achieve the goal of unity there

can be no class struggle in the Central Rada. [. . .] As far as I am concerned, Ukrainian social democratshad no right compromising on class interests in deference to general, national ones” (Robitnycha

Hazeta 4 Oct. 1917). According to Vynnychenko this was not simply due to their sociology, oropportunism but that they acted as “democrats, republicans and national revolutionists rather thansocialists” (Vidrodzhennia Natsii II 89–90).12 Raya Dunayevskaya identified a similar problem in the anti-colonial revolutions after 1945: “Thegreatest obstacle to the further development of these national liberation movements comes from theintellectual bureaucracy which has emerged to ‘lead’ them. In the same manner the greatest obstacle

in the way of the working class overcoming capitalism comes from the Labor bureaucracy thatleads it” (15).13 This was the view expressed by the “Provisional Organizing Committee” in 1918, which consisted ofmost of the leaders of 1917 of the centre and right tendencies of the UPSR.

286 CHRIS FORD



the radical evolution experienced by the Ukrainian socialist parties. In Russia this

radical turn saw the different strands of the popular movement brought into

unity by the Bolshevik-Left Socialist Revolutionaries leadership in the soviets,

which caught up with the changed popular mood. The key feature of the

revolution in Ukraine was not of such harmony but of divergence between thesubjective forces.

The Russian or Russified population in the cities was cut off from Ukrainian

towns and villages; psychologically they saw themselves as part of a wider

Russian Revolution. The result was that the leading role of large sections of urban

labour was assumed by leaders who stood apart from the Ukrainian Revolution.

Whilst the Mensheviks participated in the Central Rada, except for a brief period,

the Bolsheviks in the majority remained aloof from the national revolution,

shaking the ground around them, and considered it “chauvinist”.

What rapidly emerged as the salient feature of the revolution in Ukraine was adivision between the Ukrainian and non-Ukrainian section of the working class,

the estrangement of the peasantry from the urban workers and the separation of

the social and national dimensions.14

The question which could make or break the revolution was the agrarian

question. The engines of the agrarian revolution were both spontaneous and

organized through the All-Ukrainian Peasants Union, and its founder the

Ukrainian Party of Socialist Revolutionaries; between them they represented

millions of peasants. The agrarian revolution grew apace outstripping the Central

Rada.15 Peasants and returning soldiers proceeded to expropriate estates and

redistribute the land; yet whilst the Central Rada made radical declarations it

delayed taking decisive action until the convening of a Constituent Assembly.16

In its popular base there was increasing feeling that the inactivity of the

Central Rada in the social sphere could not be justified by the obstacle of the

Russian Provisional Government. The October Revolution brought these contra-

dictions to a head, serving as a stimulus in the national sphere and sharply

focusing the question of the nature of the revolution. When the Central Rada

seized power in November and declared the Ukrainian People’s Republic (UNR),

it offered the possibility for a new beginning. The national question was the

strategic key to unifying the popular elements of the revolution; a priori this

14 These problems of the revolution were highlighted in the writings of the Ukrainian Bolsheviks SerhiiMazlakh and Vasyl Shakhray (Do khvyli; English translation, The Current Situation). This became a key

text of the pro-autonomy/independence currents of Ukrainian communism during the revolutionaryyears.15 The USDRP policy was concurrent with the prevailing views of the Second International on theagrarian question. Favouring highly developed large farms, they considered it necessary to keep themfrom division, destruction and partition. This, however, gave an appearance, sometimes realized, of

pushing against the tide of the agrarian revolution.16 The Central Rada’s indecision on the land question undoubtedly reflected the division within theUkrainian peasantry itself. As early as the spring of 1917 the richer strata were making common cause

with the landlords, fearing that the revolution of the poor and middle peasantry would not leave theirholdings untouched. The Rada tried to appeal to both camps, relying increasingly on the FreeCossacks, the militia of the wealthier peasantry, while making declarations for the benefit of the poorand middle peasantry.




required that if the UNR was to be viable, it had to be the unifying means by

which social and national objectives were realized.

A favourable conjuncture for a rapprochement between these divergent

elements arose from two trends offering the possibility of a secure foundation

for the UNR. The first was the growth in support in the USDRP and the UPSRfor the regeneration of the Central Rada on a thoroughly socialist basis,

illustrated in the decisions of the Fourth Congress of the USDRP and the Third

Congress of the UPSR.17 The second was the surge of support in the soviets

recognizing the Ukrainian People’s Republic and seeking its re-election to

widen its constituency to include the soviets.18 In seven out of the ten of

Ukraine’s largest cities the councils of workers’ and soldiers’ deputies

supported the Central Rada as the legitimate governing organ. Evidence

suggests the majority of the approximate 320 urban councils were ready to

build an independent Ukraine, evidencing a clear evolution in working classopinions on the national question (Bojcun Working Class 312). This develop-

ment found support from a significant section of the Russian and Jewish

socialists splitting the Bolsheviks in Ukraine.19

The contradiction which had arisen between the universality of the historical

object of the revolution and its actuality, revealed in the cleavages on the social

and national questions, found its resolution encapsulated in the idea of an

independent Ukraine based upon the organs of workers’ and peasants’ self-

government. This became the material basis for the ideas of the “universal

current” described by Vynnychenko.

That this rapprochement was a viable possibility can be seen from the exampleof short-lived initiatives in two of Ukraine’s major cities. In Kyiv the Bolsheviks

and Central Rada co-operated to defeat the forces of the Provisional

Government. This took organizational form in a “National Committee for the

defence of the revolution” created by the Central Rada, composed of

representatives of all revolutionary organizations in Kyiv and socialist parties in

Ukraine, including representatives of the Councils of Workers’ and Soldiers’

Deputies of Kyiv, Kharkiv, Katerynoslav and Odessa.20 It sought to extend its

17 The Third Congress of the UPSR stated that: “the national side of the revolution begins to threaten

the further successful development of the socio-economic class struggle”, warning the Central Radacould lose the support of the peasants and workers in Ukraine which will also threaten the national

gains of the revolution (Khystyuk). The Fourth Congress of the USDRP declared that the: “The presentRussian revolution, bringing in its wake a transformation in socio-economic relations unheard of in the

history of all previous revolutions, finding a broad echo in the great worker masses of Western Europe,awakening in them an impulse to quit the path of capitalism, to make a social revolution and, at thesame time, to stop the imperialist war, which may bring about an uprising of the proletariat inWestern Europe—this revolution is a prologue to and beginning of the universal socialist revolution”(Robitnycha Hazeta 7 Oct.1917).18 This support for re-election was particularly strong in towns in the northern gubernyas and in Kyiv,Kremenchuk, Kharkiv, Luhansk, Kherson, Katerynsoslav, Odessa and Mykolaiv soviets.19 The Kyiv Bolshevik Yevgenia Bosh records that the Third Universal was welcomed by “a significant

number of soviets in Ukraine” (Bojcun Working Class 306). Similarly Shakhray, a Poltava Bolshevik,records the “Proclamation of the Ukrainian Republic was met with huge demonstrations all overUkraine. A significant part of the Soviets also welcomed it” (Skorovstanskii 74).20 Robitnycha Hazeta 27 Oct. 1917.

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authority throughout Ukraine, and appealed to all revolutionary organizations to

join local committees. It expressed what the majority of the popular movement

sought: a socialist coalition based upon the popular revolutionary organiza-

tions.21 Similarly in Kharkiv the workers’, peasants’ and soldiers’ councils

established a “Kharkiv Province Military Revolutionary Committee” combiningthe soviets and the Free Ukrainian Rada, trade unions, factory committees and

socialist parties. It had a “left orientation and a strong Ukrainian component”

(Wade 261–62).

The crisis in industry, land seizures and chaos in the military all pointed in

one direction—a socialist transformation. But the forces that could bring this

about did not combine and moved unevenly, the rapprochement necessary for

its realization was retarded. Neither the fractious Bolsheviks in Ukraine, nor

their leadership in Petrograd were unified around such a perspective from

within the Ukrainian People’s Republic.22

Their approach was tactless, takingno account of the Ukrainian peculiarities and attempting to superimpose the

model of the Russian Revolution.23 The result compounded the divisions,

hindering those wishing to give the emerging transformation a Ukrainian

character and form.

The All-Ukrainian Congress of Workers’, Soldiers’, and Peasants’ Deputies on

16 December 1917 proved to be a strategic catastrophe. The event was ignited by

the surprise ultimatum of the Russian Council of People’s Commissars threatening

war against the UNR.24 The leaders of the UNR in turn denied proportional

representation to the urban soviets and some Ukrainian Social Democrat leaders

ignored their mandate to seek agreement with the Bolsheviks.25 In an atmosphere

of recriminations the Congress endorsed the Central Rada, but it was a pyrrhic

21 In effect, this new body formed what the majority of workers, peasants and soldiers had beenstriving for, a socialist coalition based upon the popular revolutionary organizations. It was the refusalof the Menshevik and Russian SR. leadership to meet this demand, which had persuaded the majority

of Bolsheviks in organizing the overthrow of the discredited bourgeois-socialist coalition ProvisionalGovernment. The Mensheviks and right-SRs, along with the Bund, sabotaged the Committee for the

Defence of the Revolution in Kyiv. They pushed a motion through the Mala Rada, condemning theBolshevik/Left SR. seizure of power in Petrograd. Ukrainian socialist parties had gone along with this,not out of support for the ousted Provisional Government, but because the Menshevik and Bund

delegates on the Central Rada, happened to be Russian and Jewish minority representatives, whomthe Ukrainians were anxious to keep on board. In practice, the Central Rada was prepared to

acknowledge the Soviet government in Russia, but not its designs upon Ukraine.22 In their campaign for the re-election of the Rada through a congress of soviets, the Bolsheviks did

not seek unity with like-minded Ukrainian socialists, nor secure support from the soviets which hadalready backed such a congress. Instead it was called by the RSDRP Kyiv Committee (see Prymak).23 An exception to this was the Poltava Committee of the RSDRP (Bolsheviks) who were engaged innegotiations with the USDRP and sought a revolutionary socialist regroupment in Ukraine.24 An appeal to the Ukrainians on 8 December 1917 by the leading organs of soviet power in Russia,

including the Central Executive Committee, demanded the “immediate re-election of the Rada” withthe proviso: “Let the Ukrainians predominate in these soviets.” However when the Council of PeoplesCommissars declared a war on the Central Rada behind the back of the CEC it did not receive

unanimous or uncritical endorsement for its action (Keep).25 The USDRP pre-meeting before the Congress had decided in favour of seeking agreement with theBolsheviks. Porsh, the UNR Secretary of Labour, was actively engaged in negotiations with theBolsheviks.




victory, and an opportunity lost.26 The internal fragmentation produced two rival

bodies claiming to be the government of the Ukrainian Peoples Republic. One was

in Kharkiv appointed by the “Central Executive Committee of the All-Ukrainian

Soviet of Workers’, Soldiers’, and Peasants’ Deputies”, elected by a subsequent

smaller Congress of soviets. The other was formed by the Central Rada in Kyiv,which also claimed to be elected by “Ukrainian congresses of peasants, workers

and soldiers”.27 It was testament to the strength of the Ukrainian Revolution that

the issue of contention had become not whether there should be a Ukrainian

Peoples Republic but the class composition and political nature of its

government.

This failure of the left was mirrored by the failure of the right Ukrainian

Socialist Revolutionaries which took over the government of the UNR in Kyiv.

In the ensuing conflict the Central Rada was the victim of its own policies

which had sown disillusionment amongst its popular base, illustrated in the“fratricidal war” with Soviet Russia.28 Many Bolshevik workers had been

inclined to an accommodation with the Ukrainian movement and did not see

the war as being of their making. The Soviet forces that were mustered were

incredibly small, approximately 6500 strong (Bilinsky). The Central Rada also

ran into trouble. Despite the country being awash with arms there was no

will to fight and many took a neutral position or defected.29 For all the

efforts of the Russian Bolsheviks to make the war one of classes it took the

form of a national conflict, which paralyzed much of the Ukrainian left.

26 Those delegates disaffected with the events in Kyiv walked out and made their way to the rivalCongress of Soviets of the Donbas, Kryvyi Rih area being held in Kharkiv on 9 December 1917.Subsequent Soviet historiography would recognize this event as the First All-Ukraine Congress of

Soviets. Though mainly consisting of RSDRP(b) and Russian Left-SRs; it also included UPSR and USDRPdelegates. A split took place in the USDRP, a tendency known as the USDRP(Left), headed by

Medvedev and Neronovych (see Butsenko 121–22).27 It would be an error to view the Kharkiv government as solely founded in order to give the Russianwar against the UNR the appearance of an internal conflict. According to Shakhray: “Not one

responsible member of the party ventured to protest against the promulgation and creation of theUkrainian Peoples Republic. On the contrary, in complete agreement with the programmatic demand

of the right of nations to self-determination, they openly or at least tacitly stood on its ground. Thewill of the Ukrainian nation emerged, the Ukrainian people separated into a Republic, the federative

union with other parts of Russia. Well and good! We in this Republic will wage a war not against theUkrainian Peoples Republic, not in order to strangle it. No! This will be a struggle for power within theUkrainian Peoples Republic—this will be a class struggle” (Skorovstanskii 110–11).28 Holubnychy writes: “This reminds one of Lypynsky’s comments that the Ukrainian socialist parties‘gave away’ the land ‘in order to be politically popular’. Unfortunately, they did not give away enough

and therefore were not sufficiently popular. And this is why they failed, while Lenin succeeded”(Holubnychy 46–47).29 Vynnychenko wrote later: “We exerted valiant efforts in order to stop that ‘invasion’, as we used to

call it, to win over our soldier masses, which were inert towards us, to our side. But they displayed nowish to fight against the Bolsheviks even in Kyiv, fraternizing with them and taking their part. TheUkrainian Government could not rely on any of the units quartered in Kyiv; it had no reliable unit evenfor its own protection” (Vidrodzhennia Natsii II 216–17).

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The Kharkiv government was not so much a puppet but stillborn and largely

ignored by Soviet Russia’s troops.30

The involvement of Soviet Russia and the Central Powers deepened the

malaise; through the substitution of internal elements by external forces, the

revolution consumed itself. Lured by the appeal of the Germans the Central Radadelegates at Brest, Litovsk entered a union with the Central Powers. The

Germans then deposed both Ukrainian Peoples Republics; first the soviet, then

like the proverbial Trojan horse, they turned on their hosts and dispersed the

Central Rada as unreliable “left opportunists”.31

In light of the current fashion amongst some contemporary Ukrainian

politicians for the “Ukrainian State” of Hetman Skoropadsky brought into being

by the German coup, it worth recalling assessments at the time were far from

favourable (see “Ukrainian History”). It was considered a retrogressive regime of

comprador capitalists and landlords “aimed at the destruction of the revolu-tionary gains” in the social, then national spheres (Maistrenko Borotbism 72).

This provoked militant resistance by the labour movement, but the most intense

and violent opposition was peasant resistance to food requisitioning and

restoration of land to the landowners.

The Hetmanate proved to be a defining moment, sharpening the process of

differentiation in the Ukrainian Revolution. This was expressed in the growth of

the Borotbisty , the left-wing majority of the UPSR, the USDRP Independents

(Nezalezhnyky ) and the trend amongst the Ukrainian Bolsheviks represented by

such figures as Mykola Skrypnyk and Vasyl Shakhray and Yury Lapchynysky. Each of

these elements of the universal current saw the Ukrainian Revolution as an

integral part of a revived international struggle for socialism, its success or

failure dependent on events in the European arena.

The strength of this current revealed itself during the rebellion against the

Hetmanate; initially headed by a bloc of parties under the leadership of the

Directory of the Ukrainian Peoples Republic, it also coincided with the revival of

the councils of workers’ and peasants’ deputies and the soviet idea. The

revolution in Germany and Austro-Hungary and the example of Soviet Russia

acted to strengthen the drive towards a radical turn; on the other hand the

middle class and moderate elements proclaimed the revolution above all a

30 There was a retreat from the Kharkviv Congress of Soviets’ decisions with an array of splinter Sovietrepublics. Real power was revealed not to be the soviet government but the military forces of SovietRussia. Shakhray, a minister, complained: “What kind of Ukrainian government is this when itsmembers do not know and do not want to know the Ukrainian language? They have no influence inUkrainian society. No-one has even heard their names before. What kind of ‘Ukrainian Minister of the

Army’ am I when all of the Ukrainised divisions in Kharkiv will not obey me and defend Soviet powerand I am compelled to disarm them? The only military support we have in our struggle against theCentral Rada is the army Antonov brought into Ukraine from Russia, an army moreover that looks at

everything Ukrainian as hostile and counterrevolutionary” (cited in Bojcun Working Class 327).31 On 9 March 1918 Colonel von Stolzenberg told his High Command: “It is very doubtful whether thisgovernment, composed as it is exclusively of left opportunists, will be able to establish a firmauthority” (Fedyshyn 96).




national democratic one. Rapidly the broad movement from below outgrew these

constraints into one directed towards a soviet republic.

The Conflict of the Internal and External Forces

One criticism of the most radical Ukrainian parties is that whilst the contest

remained an internal affair they were defeated by their moderate socialist rivals;

evidence of this is seen in the revival of the UNR in late 1918, not the soviet

republic they envisaged. The balance was shifted towards them by the Russian

Red Army.32 This critique wrests on the presumption that democratic channels

existed under the Directory for such choices to be freely made. But

the participatory democracy was not revived within the UNR; instead the

conservative elements of the Hetmanate, in particular the military circles—theotamanschyna, were its inherent partner. It was Petlyura’s militarists, who were

engaged in pogroms and indiscriminate repression of the labour and peasant

movement, who emerged as the face of the revived UNR.33

The All-Ukrainian Labour Congress called in January 1919 was to have based

the UNR on “labour councils” based on proportional representation and bridging

the divide between workers and peasants. Regardless of the fact that the

Directory declared itself a transitory body until the congress, the military circles

mounted a campaign of harassment of the very forces on which the republic was

to be based.34 As a consequence the popular movement took a passive attitude

toward the Congress whilst the radical left was prevented from carrying on

agitation, and the elections were stifled.35

The above assessment is further flawed in its presumption that the fall of the

Directory was due to external factors. In fact the Bolsheviks could not have

attained power without a shift internally. A measure of the decline in the

popularity of the Directory was the collapse of its armed forces from over

100,000 in December 1918 to a mere 21,000 in just over a month. Having broadly

supported the Directory during the “November Ukrainian Revolution”, the

peasants, who were dissatisfied with its policies, rapidly went into opposition.

Extensive evidence reveals considerable support for the Borotbisty in the

32 Amongst others this is the assessment of George Luckyj in his foreword to Borotbism in the 1954,New York edition.33 Vynnychenko writes the Directory “did not even give the population a chance to catch its breathand see at least some difference between itself and the Hetmanshchyna” (Vidrodzhennnia Natsii III

145).34 A soviet bloc was formed within the UNR between Ukrainian and non-Ukrainian socialists consistingof the USDRP (Independentists), UPSR left, the Socialist Revolutionary Internationalists, the Bund, the

United Jewish Socialist Party and the RSDRP(Menshevik) Internationalists. The bloc resolved to defendthe worker-peasant revolution, to mollify the national struggle and to correct the political errors ofthe Bolsheviks in Ukraine.35

At the time of elections to the Labour Congress, part of the Left Bank had already been taken bySoviet troops, and in part of it the peasants and workers were at war with the Directory’s army. Thuselections could not be held there. On the Right bank there was a wave of pogroms. In the south theFrench army and the Russian Volunteer Army had captured Odessa and were advancing.

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countryside in their fight with Petlyura’s evaporating forces. A string of

additional partisan brigades actively supported the soviet platform the

Borotbisty and Nezalezhnyky .36 The Red Army which advanced on Kyiv did so in

circumstances in stark contrast to the earlier war with the Central Rada. Its ranks

were swollen by Ukrainian troops who went over en masse, seeing in the revoltthe means by which to realize their social aspirations which were so neglected by

the Directory (Adams 93).

The situation in spring 1919 could not have been more favourable for internal

reconciliation and a convergence between the Ukrainian and the Russian

Revolutions. The creation of a Ukrainian republic based on councils with a

plurality of pro-soviet parties was a viable possibility. Why was this conception of

Ukraine not realized?

An explanation can be found in the unresolved contradiction between the

internal and the external of elements of the revolution. The tendency of theinternal forces was apparent in the struggle of the Central Rada for self-

government, in the proclamation of the independent Ukrainian People’s Republic;

and in the striving to create an independent Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic.

In contrast, the tendency of the external forces was to subordinate Ukraine to

Russia and retard the internal forces (Richtysky 58–59). It is was a striking example

of a clash between what Hal Draper later described as the “two souls of

socialism”, the democratic conception of “socialism from below” versus the

elitist conception of “socialism from above” (1–33). The agency of external

“socialism from above” in this case was the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks)

and its subsidiary Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine.

This overarching conflict was exacerbated by the existence of a dual centre

inside Ukraine which fomented instability in the social revolution. This duality

revealed an inherent weakness of the largest of the Ukrainian left parties, the

Borotbisty . Maistrenko wrote that although “strong in the countryside, they failed

in their bid to control the revolutionary movement in the cities, where they were

powerless to compete with the Bolshevik influence” (Borotbism 102). But it would

be a mistake to believe there was a uniform hostility of urban workers towards the

Ukrainian movement. Indeed in May 1918 the All-Ukrainian Workers’ Congress

representing half a million workers, whose delegates were overwhelmingly non-Ukrainian, favoured “an independent Ukrainian People’s Republic” (Krawchenko).

Symptomatic of the Russian Bolsheviks’ approach to the Ukrainian question

during this conjuncture was the composition of the “Provisional Worker-Peasant

Government of Ukraine”. Initially at its head was Georgii Pyatakov who provided

its theoretical scaffolding. Pyatakov belonged to the “radical left” current of

Marxism represented by such figures as Rosa Luxemburg which opposed national

self-determination as a slogan in contradiction to internationalism.37

36 Mazepa Ukraina 28; Adams 120–23. Even the Sich Rifleman, considered the staunchest of the

Ukrainian regiments, declared their support for the soviet platform in March.37 Pyatakov’s most well-known work on the national question is The Proletariat and the “Right of

Nations of Self-determination” in the Era of Finance Capital, written under the name of “P. Kyivsky”and published in 1916.




Flushed with revolutionary romanticism this left-communism was a strong

current within Bolshevism.38 By decision of Moscow, Pyatakov was later replaced

as Head of the government by Christian Rakovsky.39 Recently arrived from the

Balkans this self-styled specialist on Ukraine denied the very existence of

Ukrainians as a national entity. He announced that the Ukrainian peasantry hadno national consciousness, and that what did exist was now submerged in class

consciousness. The national movement was simply the invention of the

intelligentsia as a means to obtain power (Rakovsky “Beznadezhnoe”). These

views, combined with the existing “left communist” and Russophile currents,

were a recipe for disaster.40 When in March 1919 the “independent” Ukrainian

Soviet Socialist Republic was founded, this was welcomed by the Ukrainian pro-

soviet parties. Far-reaching socialist policies were outlined in the resolutions of

the Third All-Ukrainian Congress of Workers’ Peasants’ and Red Army Deputies,

and by the new Constitution of the Ukrainian SSR. The problem was that theConstitution was not implemented; Ukraine remained, and was considered by the

government, a regional unit of Russia.41

The rift that grew within the left stemmed not only from dissatisfaction with

policy on the national question but also despite the promise of the “rebirth of

soviet power locally”, there was an overall absence of self-government. The

republic was ruled through appointed revolutionary committees, revkomy , and in

the countryside, committees of poor peasants, kombedy . Workers councils

existed only in the large towns and then only in an advisory capacity; soviet

power as such did not exist. The Ukrainian trade union movement was purged,

subordinated to the state and absorbed into All-Russian structures. Despite their

adherence to the soviet platform, the Ukrainian socialist parties were sidelined

by the Pyatakov-Rakovsky regime. Even though the UPSR had adopted a

communist programme and sought unity with the Bolsheviks, they were still

looked upon suspiciously and excluded from positions of authority. The paper of

the Nezalezhnyky bemoaned:

It is now two months since the soviet authorities occupied Kyiv, but we have yetto see real soviet power or the dictatorship of the proletariat. All we have is thedictatorship of the communist party. (Chervony Prapor 3 Apr. 1919)

These Ukrainian Marxists branded it the “commissar state” whose adminis-

tration gave greater prominence to the Russian middle class imbued with

38 In 1915 a tendency formed within the RSDRP opposed to Lenin on the national question, consistingof Pyatakov and Yevgenia Bosh, both leading Bolsheviks from Ukraine, along with Nikolai Bukharin,which developed into a left communist current during the revolution (Lenin’s Struggle 365).39 Key texts are: Rakovsky Selected Writings; Broue. Neither of them actually engage critically with

the policy of Rakovsky in Ukraine in 1919.40 Much has been written of this trend in Germany citing it as a libertarian alternative to Leninism, yetthe record of this trend in Ukraine is noticeably neglected.41

According to Balabanoff, first Secretary of the Communist International and a friend of Rakovsky’ssent to assist him in Kyiv, “the Bolsheviks had set up an independent republic in the Ukraine. Inactuality that section of it in which Soviet rule was established was completely dominated by theMoscow regime” (Balabanoff 234).

294 CHRIS FORD



chauvinist prejudices.42 This dangerous alienation was compounded by the

retarding of the agrarian revolution through excesses of grain requisitioning and

the transplanting from Russia of an elitist land policy of the “commune”, formed

not by the self-activity of the peasants but imposed from above (Chervony Prapor

28 Feb. 1919). As opposed to positively transcending the social and nationalcleavages, the Bolshevik regime exacerbated them. This produced powerful

centrifugal forces; engulfed by peasant unrest, the Ukrainian SSR split and

disintegrated into internecine conflict. This crisis saw two distinct tendencies

which have complicated historical analysis ever since: on the one hand

the attempted revolutionary mobilization of society and on the other its

antithesis—fragmentation and class decomposition. Indicative of the latter were

pogroms, brigandage and otaman adventurers. No sides in the conflict escaped

being tainted by the effects of this vortex.

This was an unprecedented situation, a result of the legacy of imperialism andthe antagonism between the internal and external forces. These risings, which

split the Red Army, were of far greater scale and consequence than the more

widely known Kronstadt Revolt in 1921. The most popular demand was that of

democratically elected soviets. An All-Ukrainian Revolutionary Committee led by

the Nezalezhnyky attempted to gain the leadership of the insurgency; described

as a fight between the Russian and Ukrainian Bolsheviks it was a struggle not

against but within the Ukrainian SSR. The Nezalezhnyky sought to overthrow the

“government as an occupation power”, forestall Petlyura and force the Russian

communists to agree to a truly Ukrainian soviet republic.43 With some exceptions

the Borotbisty fought alongside the Bolsheviks and sought to curtail theinternecine conflict.

The Ukrainian Question Decides the Fate of European Revolutions

Ivan Maistrenko considers that the Bolsheviks had “more chances than the

Jacobins to continue the national revolution, in other words to organize the

creative impetus of the masses which was directed towards the construction of a

new society” (Babenko [Maistrenko] 6). One such opportunity was in the calls in1919 for the reconstitution of Soviet Ukraine as a genuinely independent and self-

governing republic. Amidst meltdown this demand received international support

in the shape of the new Hungarian Soviet Republic founded in March 1919. This

was soon followed by the proclamation in April of the Bavarian Soviet Republic

42 The Bolshevik leader Skrypnyk later recorded 200 decrees “forbidding the use of the Ukrainianlanguage” under Rakovsky’s rule by various bureaucrats (Skrypnyk 14).43 Under the protectorate of the “First Soviet Kyiv Division” commanded by Danylo Zeleny, the All-Ukrainian Revolutionary Committee established its headquarters in the town of Skvyra in Kyivgubernya. The revkom issued a call to arms “against the occupation government of Rakovsky”, and

the “traitorous Directory, which is negotiating with the French and other imperialists”. They gave anassurance that an All-Ukrainian Congress of Workers and Peasants Councils, the sovereign body of thenew Ukrainian Soviet Republic, would be convened. A good outline of the events can be found in aletter from Yu Mazurneko to Rakovsky (Mazurneko).






Political Centre. Barely distinguishable in their nationalism from the conserva-

tives and militarists, their main objective was the preservation of the “one,

indivisible Russia” and the restoration of Russia as a “great power”.46

What is striking about this key juncture is that despite despair with the

Bolsheviks there was not a collapse or decline in support for the soviet idea.Indeed the opposite occurred. In the case of the Borotbisty , having re-launched

as the “Ukrainian Communist Party” (Borotbisty ) they witnessed a surge in

support. Hrushevsky notes that “under the slogan of a Ukrainian Republic that

would be independent yet Soviet and friendly toward the Bolsheviks and Soviet

Russia, the masses flocked to their banner” (Mace 59). The Bolsheviks received a

similar surge of support enabling the Red Army to repulse Denikin’s offensive into

central Russia.47

One explanation for this mobilization is that it was based on a choice between

restoration and resistance; this however does not fully explain Ukraine. Thisposes again the contention discussed above that whilst the contest remained an

internal affair the pro-soviet groups lost to their more moderate rivals. Yet

despite circumstances which would appear most favourable to the parties of the

remnant UNR, they did not gain hegemony of the popular resistance in the winter

of 1920.

This is a matter of contemporary concern as twenty-first-century politicians

vie for the legacy. One explanation is that military inferiority was the cause of

UNR defeat by the Whites. There is no doubt some truth in this but it does not

fully explain its overall disintegration; for this we must also recognize the

progressive political degeneration of the UNR played out in their encounter with

Denikin.

In August 1919 Kyiv was handed over to the Volunteer Army with hardly a shot

fired. The reason was that the UNR leaders were contemplating an alliance with

Denikin, partly in the hope of securing the support of the Entente. The delays in

confronting Denikin further eroded support especially amongst the partisans.

Meanwhile life in UNR territory was so bad that even loyal social democrats

complained that citizens saw little difference between Petlyura and Denikin.48

Internally there was a further antagonism fracturing the UNR.

On 22 January 1919, the Directory of the UNR had officially united with theWest Ukrainian People’s Republic.49 But this sobornist did not achieve the long

sought unity of Ukraine; it was a symbolic act, with the western Ukrainians

46 On the attitude of the Volunteer Army towards the Ukrainian question, see Procyk.47 A Volunteer army spy reported on the mood in threatened Petrograd: “The worker elements, atleast a large section of them, are still Bolshevik inclined. Like some other democratic elements, theysee the regime although bad as their own. [. . .] Psychologically, they identify the present with

equality and Soviet power and the Whites with the old regime and its scorn of the masses” (Figes 675).48 The central organ of the USDRP reported: “the growth of uncertainty about the difference betweenour government, our system of rule and that of Denikin” (Robitnycha Hazeta 5 Oct. 1919).49

The West Ukrainian People’s Republic was proclaimed on 19 October 1918. Evhen Petrushevych, thechairman, a former member of the Austro-Hungarian parliament, became the Republic’s dictator.Shortly after the republic proclaimed independence Poland attacked. Most of the army, consisting ofabout 50,000 soldiers, crossed into the territory of the Ukrainian People’s Republic.




retaining their own army and government structure. The conservative

Petrushevych regime guarded its autonomy, fearful of the socialism of the

Dnieper Ukrainians (Levynsky Sotsiialistychna). The Ukrainian Peoples Republic

disintegrated when Petrushevych placed the Galician Army at the service of

Denikin, whilst Petlyura turned to Pilsudski’s Poland signing away Eastern Galiciain return for an alliance.

Considering this end game of the UNR one cannot but question the accusation

of “national treason” levelled at the Ukrainian radical socialists. On the question

of independence the actual record of the various national governments of

1917–20, supported by the moderate socialists, leaves a lot to be desired. Having

declared independence in January 1918, sovereignty was surrendered to the

Central Powers; the Directory restored independence only to agree to give

the French control over the army, railways, finance and composition of

the government.50

Exchanging territory and sovereignty with Polandcontinued the same practice in which preservation of independence was not

the primary principle.

In contrast the Borotbisty , the USDRP Nezalezhnyky and sections of the

Bolsheviks were consistent advocates of Ukrainian independence within an

international view of creating a new social order. Throughout this period they

made no compromise with regard to the existence of a Ukrainian republic.

In their international relations this stance strengthened reciprocal recognition by

the Bolshevik leadership who, despite their centralist outlook, did not retreat

from accepting the necessity of a distinct Ukrainian republic.51

It would be wrong to conclude from the above that the popularity of such

parties as the Borotbisty can be explained solely by a fierce reaction to the rule

of Denikin and Petlyura. Such a view denigrates the fact that ordinary working

people, including illiterate peasants, consciously engaged in an effort to

transform the society in which they lived. Difficult as it is for some in our era

of “post-modernism” to comprehend, revolutions are remarkable moments

which radically change people as well as their surroundings. We should not lose

sight of the fact that in 1917–20 Ukraine experienced such a moment. It is

astounding that though exhausted by World War, occupation and civil war any

Ukrainians retained the energy to be driven by such ideals. Yet such was the scaleof insurgency in the winter of 1919–20 that Denikin committed as many troops

against Ukrainian partisans as against the Russian Red Army itself. This vice broke

the Volunteer Army, bringing a decisive military and political turn in the

revolution.

50 The Entente was uncompromising with regard to Ukrainian sovereignty. In General Order No. 28.General d’Anselm commander of the Allied forces of Southern Russia declared: “France and the allieshave not forgotten the efforts made by Russia at the beginning of the war and they have now come to

Russia to give all worthy elements and patriots the possibility of restoring order in the country, anorder long since destroyed by the terrors of the civil war.”51 This stands in stark contrast to the Volunteer Army with whom Skoropadsky and Petlyura sought analliance, despite its refusal to recognize Ukraine other than as “South Russia”.

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The Nezalezhnyky considered that twice the revolution had suffered defeat

due to the weakness of the “internal forces of the Ukrainian revolution”. In order

to ensure a third victory the internal forces “must get control over the Ukrainian

socialist revolution and shape its course and character” (Chervony Prapor 21 Dec.

1919). Amongst those Bolsheviks still active in Ukraine a current emerged whichechoed the opinions being raised by the Nezalezhnyky and Borotbisty , led by Yurii

Lapchynsky (Mace 52). The federalists proved unable to found a new party in

Ukraine, but strengthened the change in the RKP(b). After three years of

revolution, in a series of resolutions and proclamations the Russian Bolsheviks

took the initiative to secure the support of the Ukrainians. Vynnychenko

considered these were an “acknowledgement of the weight of the national

question” yet cautioned that Lenin’s qualified recognition of independence

created “doubt” that it was a “question only of tactics” (Vynnychenko

Vidrozhenia Natsii III 486–91).The consequences of the Bolsheviks’ reassessment were far reaching for the

Ukrainian left-wing parties. The Ukrainian soviet parties faced difficulty in

chasing their goal of an independent Soviet Ukraine. Either they could work

through the organs of the Ukrainian SSR, established not on their terms but under

the control of the Russian Communists, or they could attempt to build a Soviet

government independent of Moscow based on local forces.

In the winter 1919, the Borotbisty made serious attempts to gain hegemony in

Ukraine but they failed to gather the necessary strength (Maistrenko Borotbism

177). What Maistrenko writes of them is equally as applicable to the

Nezalezhnyky :

The Borotbisty had little control in the cities, and, had they declared war on theBolsheviks in the winter of 1919, their large following in the villages wouldprobably have refused to support them. The masses would not have understoodwhy two parties with the same political platform—Soviet rule—should fight oneanother. (Borotbism 119)

The Nezalezhnyky had neither the stomach nor the strength to repeat an

earlier insurgency which they now considered “erroneous”. There were also deep

theoretical differences which soured relations between the Marxist Nezalezhnyky and the Borotbisty with their populist roots, which prevented a unified Ukrainian

centre emerging.

For a short period in 1920 there existed degree of plurality in Ukraine with

three communist parties, the Bolsheviks, the UKP(Borotbisty ) and the

UKP(Nezalezhnyky ).52 The conditions which allowed for this soon changed,

when with the failure to gain recognition by the Communist International the

Borotbisty at the end of March 1920 voted to amalgamate with the KP(b)U

(Maistrenko Borotbism 206). From our twenty-first-century vantage point it

would be easy to consider the faith of the Borotbisty in the Communist

International an error. This would fail to appreciate the difficult choices they

52 In addition to the Jewish communist organizations (Gurevitz).




faced and perspective to which they adhered. The Russian Communists as a

governing party were in a position to take advantage of the strength of the state

apparatus, the Red Army, and the financial and moral support they held as the

main section of the Communist International.

The Borotbisty considered that the prospects for independence would be morepromising in the framework of extending the revolution, from this standpoint,

like much of the international labour movement; they held the Comintern in high

esteem. When its Executive instructed them to amalgamate with the KP(b)U,

they were faced with the choice of remaining separate and competing with the

Bolsheviks for power, or merging.

This episode also reveals the serious contradictions of Lenin’s own thought.

He continued to adhere to the RSDRP policy of “one party, one state”, which had

already had negative consequences for the revolution. Ukrainian socialists had

long argued authentic internationalism was represented by self-organizednational parties having equal involvement in an International alongside the

Russian socialists. The Ukrainians resisted their subordination to an existing

dominant-state Party, which could so easily become the conduit for chauvinism

and stifle democratic initiative.

The Borotbisty and Lenin shared a common fear; they both sought to prevent a

repeat of the internecine conflicts of the summer of 1919. The threat from the

Polish regime of Jozef Pilsudski influenced both parties, who feared a renewed

war between the left which would provide an opportunity to the right.

The amalgamation of the Borotbisty sparked controversy on the Ukrainian left

but was not considered by all as a defeat; just three years later the communist

historian Ravich-Cherkasski suggested that it was under their influence that the

Bolsheviks evolved from “the Russian Communist Party in the Ukraine” to the

“Communist Party of Ukraine”.53

That fact that the UKP (Nezalezhnyky ) remained independent reminds us that

for many the concept of a party subordinate to Moscow tended to vitiate the

whole notion of national liberation. Whereas as in other countries the communist

parties were founded through a process of unity between socialist organizations,

this was not the case in Ukraine. Consecutive efforts by various elements to bring

about such a regroupment had not succeeded in sufficient strength or consensusto resist Russian centralism.

Those who organized in the UKP (Nezalezhnyky ) attempted to achieve their

goal through the soviets. It was a difficult route as the soviets were steadily being

supplanted by a one-party state. At the Fourth All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets

of 1920 the political landscape was shaped by the Russian Communists; elections

were restricted, diminishing the representation of the Ukrainian peasantry and

the working class. It was a pale shadow of the mass assemblies of 1917, the scene

53 His thesis, officially condemned since 1927, was that the Soviet regime and Communist Party inUkraine had two distinct ancestral roots, one extending from the Russian Revolutionary movementand another from the Ukrainian socialist movement (Ravich-Cherkasski 148).

300 CHRIS FORD



of a persistent, but rearguard battle for an “economic and politically

independent Ukrainian Socialist Soviet Republic”.54

Lenin and the Bolsheviks clearly reneged on their assurances to convoke a

congress of soviets able to freely decide on the status of Ukraine. The winter of

1920–21 was a critical turning point, the broad based attempts to reconstituteworkers self-government proved unsuccessful, a socialist revolution had not

succeeded in the west, Soviet Ukraine was intact but it was far from that

conceived by the Ukrainian Marxists, instead it was the scene of “arid

bureaucratism and Bonapartism” (Vynnychenko Revoliutsia). The soviets, the

subjective element by which the social and national elements of the revolution

could have been reconciled, fell into abeyance as the locus of real political

power shifted to the higher organs during the now growing “Bolshevist

Thermidor”.55

The Paradoxical Legacy of the Ukrainian Revolution

In 1920 the depleted, exhausted pro-soviet forces defeated the Volunteer Army

and the Polish invasion. The resulting Riga peace treaty re-partitioned Ukraine;

five million Ukrainians remained under Polish rule. Maistrenko concludes that the

“struggle for a sovereign Ukrainian SSR was decided in the negative not by the

internal development of Ukrainian political life but by the external pressure of

administrative organization” (Borotbism 196).But the failure to establish an independent Ukraine in 1920 is neither the end

of the history nor would it provide an adequate assessment of the Ukrainian

Revolution. The years 1917–20 presented an historic opportunity to resolve the

Ukrainian question; the divergences over the social and national questions that

arose were not irreconcilable.

An interesting early analysis of the Ukrainian Revolution as it reached its

conclusion was presented by the dissident Marxist Andrii Richytsky, in a

memorandum by the UKP (Nezalezhnyky ) to the Second Congress of the

Communist International in 1920. Richytsky outlined how the dialectics of

negativity “stirs into life the so-called ‘non-historical nations’ and ‘fosters thenational rebirth of countries’ ” (66). The workers’ revolution was but one

manifestation of the contradictions of modern capitalism which had also brought

to the fore national liberation struggles. He argued that

The task of the international proletariat is to draw towards the communistrevolution and the construction of a new society not only the advanced capitalistcountries but also the less developed peoples of the colonies,—taking advantage

of their national revolutions. To fulfil this task, it must take part in these

54

Nova Doba 14 Aug. 1920.55 In a letter to the Politburo on 2 November 1920, Trotsky reported that: “Soviet power in Ukraine hasheld its ground up to now (and it has not held it well) chiefly by the authority of Moscow, by the GreatRussian Communists and by the Russian Red Army” (cited in Borys 295).




revolutions and play the leading role in the perspective of the permanent

revolution. It is necessary to prevent the national bourgeoisie from limiting the

national revolutions at the level of national liberation. (Richtysky 54)56

From our vantage point can we consider the perspective of the UkrainianMarxists and the “universal current” historically unviable? The fact that repeated

opportunities to realize this conception were negated by the unresolved

contradiction between the internal and the external elements of the revolution

does not devalue its viability. The organized workers’ movement saw a significant

shift during the revolutionary years, steadily turning towards support for a

Ukrainian republic, either in cooperation with the Ukrainian parties, or in

opposition.

Prior to 1917 there existed only “southern Russia”. The revolution had swept

away the old social order and forged the Ukrainian SSR, a “clearly defined

national, economic and cultural organism” (Kostiuk 39). It became the frame-

work for a significant struggle between the two trends in Ukraine, the centralist

Russophile element, and the “universal current” of Ukrainian communists. The

“universal current” succeeded in committing the Communist Party of the Soviet

Union to the policy of korenizatsiia (indigenization), known in Ukraine as

“Ukrainization”, a programme of “positive action” with regard to language,

culture and promotion of non-Russians in the soviet, party, trade unions and

co-operative apparatus.

Whilst this gain was fragile, Ukrainization heralded an unprecedented national

renaissance in the 1920s. The Ukrainian communists, energetically carriedforward Ukrainization, viewed as a “weapon of cultural revolution in Ukraine”.57

In the eyes of some it was an engine of efforts to assert autonomy and liquidate

the vestiges of colonialism. To others it was a manifestation of opposition to

ascendant Stalinism. The experience of Ukrainization provides us with the

paradoxical legacy of the revolution, which brought “the Ukrainian people to the

threshold of nationhood by the end of the decade” (Krawchecnko). We must also

note that in their Memorandum to the Comintern in 1920 the Nezalezhnyky had

made a remarkably accurate prognosis of Ukraine’s historical trajectory, posing

the question of whether the Ukrainian communist opposition within the KP(b)U

could succeed in bringing about a reform. The answer was chillingly correct:

Past experience has shown that there is no guarantee that a healthy revolutionarycurrent will prevail by organic means in the KP(b)U, for the envoys of the RKP, theformal leaders of the KP(b)U, will not stop at the physical destruction of partyopposition as well as put an end to any comradely relations within the party, infact destroying the party, in effect abolishing the party statutes and stifling itsentire elective culture by means of party officials appointed from above—just soas to prevent a spontaneous opposition inside their own party being able to seizepower. (Richtysky 59)

56 The approach was unique; they were the only communist party that referred to theory ofpermanent revolution during the entire course of the Russian Revolution.57 This is how Ievhen Hirchak, a comrade of Skrypnyk, described Ukrainization (Dmytryshyn 71).

302 CHRIS FORD



This did not rule out concessionary reforms “in order to satisfy the desire of

the broad masses” for economic improvement and overcoming the colonial

legacy. This took the form of the RKP “attempting to introduce a purely bourgeois

national-cultural autonomy, thus announcing their readiness to move towards the

nationalist mood in Ukraine” (Richtysky 60). The dissident Ukrainian Marxistsconsidered it would fail as “this move is an extremely weak one given the

complete absence of the national element and of organic inability in the KP(B)U”

(Richtysky 61). They were tragically vindicated.

The dynamics of Stalinist centralism destroyed the last vestiges of equality

between the republics, The Ukrainian communists and intelligentsia were

annihilated. So deep rooted was the vernacular socialist tradition, the

“co-founders of the Ukrainian SSR” that they were amongst the last remnants

of opposition purged in 1936 and represented such a vital force in politics that

they were still being subjected to official attack until the fall of the USSR(Kostiuk 97–98). In conclusion, we may recall Lenin’s neglected speech at Zurich

in 1914:

What Ireland was for England, Ukraine has become for Russia: exploited in theextreme, and getting nothing in return. Thus the interests of the worldproletariat in general and the Russian proletariat in particular require that theUkraine regains its independence.58

How well Lenin should have remembered Marx’s statement that “the English

Republic under Cromwell met shipwreck in Ireland. This shall not happen twice!”It did, in Russia’s Ireland.59

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Documents

Chris Ford, 'Reconsidering the Ukrainian Revolution' (2007)