THE POLISH-UKRAINIAN UNION OF 1920 IN THE POLISH PUBLIC DISCOURSE DURING THE INTERWAR PERIOD

Abstract

The purpose of the research is to highlight the political thought and professional historiography interaction and its impact on the Polish-Ukrainian union interpretation in the context of events and the dynamics of the historical process. We consider an integral part of our study to describe the discussions on Eastern policy in the Polish society before the conclusion of the union. The antagonism between the so-called federal and incorporation models, which manifested itself in the period from the formation of the independent Polish Republic to the signing of the Peace of Riga, determined the attitude to the Polish-Ukrainian union in 1920 throughout the interwar period. The methodology of the research is based on the following methods as the content analysis, hermeneutic and epistemological approaches, since a significant part of the sources comprises the press and political journalism. While analyzing the work with texts, the key principles developed by K. Skinner and J. Pocock have been considered, who noted the importance of the context and intellectual atmosphere understanding at the time of the text, as well as taking into account the author’s planned recipient of the text. According to the method of the narrative analysis, developed by Jerzy Topolski, we distinguish three components in the texts analytically: logical-grammatical, persuasive and theoretical ideological layers. We share the principle of relativity of the historical source concerning the knowledge and worldview of the historian. The scientific novelty is that in Ukrainian historiography a comprehensive analysis has been made on the Polish public discourse of the interwar period concerning the attitude to the alliance with the Ukrainian People’s Republic (UNR), which was concluded on the eve of Kyiv Offensive of 1920. The Conclusions. In the article it is stated that during the interwar period the Polish-Ukrainian union of 1920 did not arouse significant interest both in the Polish public and among historians. Sometimes the union was mentioned in the politicians’ memoirs sometimes discussed by the publicists as one of the minor episodes of the Polish-Soviet War. The Polish-Ukrainian union was depicted in general works on the history of Poland or research on the formation of borders after 1918 mainly. Given the nature of these works, the Polish-Ukrainian union was described superficially, focusing mainly on the political aspects, for example, Poland’s recognition of Ukraine and border decisions. The genesis issue and various practical embodiments of the Polish-Ukrainian cooperation were ignored. The interpretation of the alliance with the UNR depended on the author’s political sympathies. J. Piłsudski’s concepts’ supporters wrote about him in approving intonations, and he was strongly criticized by sympathizers of the national democracy.

Key words: the Polish-Ukrainian Union, 1920, Piłsudski, Petliura, the Polish-Soviet War.