Ukrainian identity: historical and cultural retrospectives and сurrent perspectives

SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY

Abstract

The Ukrainian identity (in the sense of identifying with Ukraine as the highest position in the system of individual identification hierarchies) has been considered in the extremely broad contexts. It has been shown that ethnocultural, ethnopolitical, religious-dynastic, early-modern, classical identity models, the model of the dual identity of Ukrainians are consistently changing each other in the history of Ukrainian culture both in the Soviet Union and in the diaspora. The most notable is the connection of modern Ukrainian identity with only those models that extend from the early modern times.

It has been shown that in the years 2013/2014-2017 the transition from opposing models of current Ukrainian identity to a single, consensus model, but with different levels of re- flection, is completed. Formal political level identity covers 70% of residents of Ukraine. Actual language and cultural identity is inherent in about 50% of the citizens of Ukraine. The real ethnical identity — in no more than 25% of Ukrainian. The political class does not play a leading role in the process of national consolidation, but only plays up to them.

This identity can be called «hybrid», because it combines the elements of ethnic and political identity. It is an inverted reflection of the deep multiculturalism of Ukrainian culture. The most representative, political, level of identity in it is associated with the narrowest, postmodern, segment. That is one of the reasons for its current unsettledness, but at the same time — a new horizon of consolidation in the post-Postmodern situation.