A Note on Trotskys Articles on Ukraine A major problem with Trotskys articles on Ukraine is that they do not take into account something which, if it did not exist 75 years back, certainly does now: a sizeable mixed Russian and Ukrainian population in Eastern and Central Ukraine, that is, in a fairly large chunk of the country. One article actually refers to the creation of a powerful and purely Ukrainian proletariat having been formed by Soviet industrialisation, although there were fair numbers of Russians in factories and mines in Ukraine prior to the October Revolution, let alone prior to the First Five-Year Plan. For decades in Eastern and Central Ukraine, Russians and Ukrainians have lived together with many mixed marriages and friendships, theres a vernacular language, Surzhik, a mixture of Russian and Ukrainian. The nationalist discourse on either side ignores all this: it does not fit in with their preconceptions. Socialists should, I hope, welcome such a development. What concerns me is that the parallel Russian and Ukrainian nationalist agitation will, if it gets worse, force Russians and Ukrainians in the mixed areas of Ukraine to have to choose their allegiance and identity -- towards Moscow or towards Kiev. In a way, this was posed in the abstract when the Soviet Union broke up, but is now threatening to become a practical reality with the official nationalist agendas being run from Kiev and Moscow. We saw what this led to in Yugoslavia. If the governments in Kiev and Moscow keep raising the heat, then the consequences will be appalling. Trotskys articles here, 75 years old and not able to deal with a vitally important social development in large chunks of Ukraine, are of little use, as is the dogma of national self-determination when that dogma, when exercised by nationalist zealots, merely serves to divide people from one another. Trotskys articles on Ukraine are available here < marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1939/04/ukraine.html > and here < marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1939/07/ukraine.htm >.
Posted on: Mon, 17 Mar 2014 17:24:32 +0000