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Russians in Ukraine (Template:Lang-ru, Template:Lang-uk) form the largest minority in that country, and the community forms the largest single Russian diaspora in the world. In the 2001 Ukrainian census, 8,334,100 identified themselves as ethnic Russians (17.3% of the total population), thereby making up the largest diaspora of the ethnic Russian population.

Geography

Most Russians live in the East and South of Ukraine, as well as in many cities in the center of the country. Crimea, Donbass and Taurida are considered to be home of the largest Russian diaspora.

Historic Background

Growth of Ukrainian identity

Russians and Ukrainians, both Eastern Slavic peoples, shared a common ancestry until the demise of the Kievan Rus in the 13th century. Physically separated by different powers after the Mongol invasion, different identities began to develop as a result. Although the term Ruthenian continued to be used to refer to all three branches of Eastern Slavic peoples by the end of the 19th century, with the rise of the Zaporozhian Cossacks and the Liberation wars of 1648, a separate identity was formed. After their alliance with Tsardom of Russia after the Treaty of Pereyaslav and eventual incorporation of Left-Bank Ukraine into the Russian Empire, attempts were made to incorporate Ukrainians into the Russian nation. Muscovite Russia used the term Little Russia to refer to the Cossack Hetmanate of Left-bank Ukraine, when it fell under Russian protection. While there were successes in the assimilation drive, by and large the Ukrainian separate identity survived, transforming from Ruthenian into Ukrainian.

Other Ruthenian provinces that remained outside the Russian Empire, included Austrian Galicia, Transcarpathia and Bukovyna had a surge of Russophilia which lasted from late 18th century until the end of the 19th century. However, in the late 19th and 20th centuries the Ukrainian national sentiment grew in all territories populated by Ukrainians. With the creation of first Ukrainian People's Republic and then the Ukrainian SSR, Ukrainians achieved their statehood, albeit limited, and became the dominant ethnic group in their country.

New Russia

At the end of the 18th century, the Russian Empire captured large territories from the former Crimean Khanate. In order to keep them, a systematic colonization of land that became known as New Russia (mainly Crimea, Taurida and around Odessa) began. Migrants from many ethnic groups came to this area, a large portion came from Russia proper. At the same time the discovery of coal in the Donets Basin also began a large industrialization and an influx of workers from other parts of the Russian Empire.

Both Russians and Ukrainians made the bulk of the migrants — 31.8% and 42.0 % respectfully. The population eventually became intermixed, and in the policy of Russification, the Russian identity dominated over mixed families and communities. Ukrainian separatism was suppressed as the Russian Empire officially regarded Ukrainians, Russians and Belarusians as Little, Great and White Russians, which belonged to a single Russian nation. This was further promoted because they were considered members of the same ethnic group and there were no restrictions placed on them, unlike on other ethnicities or nationalities, such as Jews and Poles

October Revolution and Ukrainian SSR

Ukraine was a battleground during the Russian Civil War (1918-1922). Although macroscopically Ukraine was fought over by several powers (Austro-Hungary, Germany, Poland); Ukrainian People's Republic, the Anarchist Black Army as well as the Red Army and the White Army. The population of New Russia by large, allied themselves only with the latter two. A large portion of men that made up the armies of Denikin and Wrangel came from New Russian volunteers (see Volunteer Army). The October Revolution also found its echo amongst the extensive working class and two Soviet Republics were formed by Bolsheviks of Ukraine: Odessa, which survived only two months and the Donetsk-Krivoy Rog, which lasted four months. Both short-lived republics barely exercised any sovereignty over the claimed area and were never recognized by fellow Bolsheviks in Russia .

Initially the Bolshevik government treated the Ukrainian People's Republic separately from the Southern and Eastern regions of the country and formed the Ukrainian Soviet People's Republic (USPR) shortly after the Revolution, claiming areas that excluded the Southern and Eastern regions . However because gaining Ukraine was crucial for the Soviet government, and to do so required support of the Ukrainian people. The issues of borders of the future Ukraine was a major one that the Bolsheviks contested with the new national states in the battle for the support of ordinary Ukrainians.

The first census of the Russian Empire, conducted in 1897 showed the large usage (and in some cases dominance) of the progenitor to modern Ukrainian language Little Russian in the nine south-western Governorates and the Kuban Oblast. Thus when the Central Rada officials were determining the future borders of the new state they based the results of the census in regards to the language and religion as determining factor in their future alignment. The ethnographic borders of Ukrainian speakers turned out to be almost twice as large as the original Cossack Hetmanate incorporated into Russia in the 17th century. .

The new borders completely included New Russia, Donbass and other neighbouring provinces. Many states after the Central Rada too claimed the new borders. Although de facto few of them were able to penetrate and rule on those areas, to appease the Ukrainians, the central Bolshevik authorities never recognized the two short-lived republics in south as permanent . and in march 1919 after their successful re-conquest created the Ukrainian SSR by combining the territories of the USPR, Donetsk Krivoy Rog and the Odessa republics. This led to many regions with Russian population being incorporated into Ukraine.

Early Soviet times

After the Red Army victory in 1923, Stalin identified two threats to the still weak Soviet state: Great Power Chauvinism (Russian chauvinism) and separatist nationalism. .

In Ukraine's case, both threats came, respectfully, from the south and the east, and the traditional Ukrainian centre and west. This initiated a policy of Ukrainization, to simultaneously break the remains of the Russian nationalist sentiment and to gain favour of the Ukrainian population, thus recognizing their rights and their dominance of the republic.

Many communities of the Russian Orthodox Church were closed and transferred to the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church . Ukrainian language was mandatory for most jobs, and its teaching became compulsory in every school. By 1930 there were only three Russian language newspapers being printed in Ukraine and in places like Odessa where ethnic Ukrainian pupils made up only a third of school children, all schools taught in Ukrainian.

In 1933, a man-made famine resulted from Stalin's policy of collectivization. In Ukraine, this event is known as the Holodomor. From this ,several million people died in Ukrainian SSR. At this time, the Soviet state reversed many of its Ukrainization policies, forced the Ukrainian SSR to cede some territories to the RSFSR (notably the Shakhty and Taganrog borderland), destroyed the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church and emphasized the learning of Russian as the official language as top priority in schools.

Latter Soviet Times

Both the famine, the rapid industrialization, and the rebuilding of the World War II destruction prompted a new wave of migrants from the rest of the Soviet Union to settle in the Southern and Eastern Ukraine, thus increasing the proportion of the Russian speaking population. Near the end of WWII, the entire indigenous population of Crimean Tatars was expelled from their homeland of Crimea, as some of Tatars were accused of collaboration with the Germans. Almost quarter of a million people were exiled to the Central Asia areas. After the ethnic cleansing, another influx of mostly Russian settlers replaced the removed Tatars and thus increased the proportion of ethnic Russian population in the Crimea from 47.7% in 1937 to 61.6% in 1993.

In 1954, Nikita Khrushchev, in a controversial and contradictory move with respect to the acting Soviet law, transferred the almost exclusively Russian populated Crimea from the Russian SFSR to Ukraine, increasing the ethnic Russian population of Ukraine by almost a million people. Controversies and legality of the transfer still remain a sore point in relations between Ukraine and Russia, and in particular between the internal politics in Crimea

Modern Ukraine

During the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukraine became a separate state. As an independent country, Ukraine kept the borders of the UkSSR, with some regions featuring a large Russian population.

Politics

In several of Ukraine's elections, political parties that call for closer ties with Russia received higher percentage of votes in the areas, where ethic Russians and Russian-speaking population predominate. However, according to the census, of all the regions, only in Crimea do Russians make up more than 50% of the total population. Such parties like the Party of Regions, Communist Party of Ukraine and the Progressive Socialist Party are particularly popular in Crimea, Southern and Southeastern regions of Ukraine.

Culture

See article: Russian language in Ukraine

Demographics

Population dynamics

Trends

In general the population of ethnic Russians in Ukraine has shown a systematic decrease in all regions, both quantitively and proportionaly. Several factors have affected this, most Russians lived in Soviet time urban centres, where the economic hardships of the 1990s have particularly affected and many chose to emigrate from Ukraine to (mostly) Russian proper or the west.

The economic decline also had its effects on the birth and death rate of the population. Other factors included the rise of local level nationalism in Central, and in particular western Ukraine.

Footnotes and citations

1. "Results / General results of the census / National composition of population". 2001 Ukrainian Census. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |accessmonthday= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
2. Новороссия земля руссоукраинцев Игорь Гуров
3. Odesskaya Olbast, World History Project Retrieved on May 19 2007.
4. Dzerkalo Tyzhnya - Donetsk-Krivoy Rog Republic — illusions and practic of national nihilism, by Valeriy Soldatenko, 10 Dec. 2004. Retrieved on 19 March 2007.
5. Ukrainian (Soviet) People's Republic World History Project Retrieved on 19 May 2007
6. Little Russian dialect on ru-wikipedia ru:Малорусское наречие
7. 1897 Census on Demoscope.ru Retrieved on 20th May 2007.
8. Den - Imperia i my, by Stanislav Kulchitsky, Vol. 9, 26 Jan. 2006. Retrieved on 19 March 2007.
9. Dzerkalo Tyzhnya - Donetsk-Krivoy Rog Republic — illusions and practicals of nationalism, by Valeriy Soldatenko, 10 Dec. 2004. Retrieved on 19 March 2007.
10. "National Factors in Party and State Affairs -- Theses for the Twelfth Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks), Approved by the Central Committee of the Party," URL
11. For more information, see Ukrainization in the UkSSR (1923-1931)
12. Pravoslavie.ru History of the Lubensky schism by Vladislav Petrushko, 19 June 2002. Retrieved on 20 May 2007
13. The Stalinist Penal System: A Statistical History of Soviet Repression and Terror
14. Ethnic Cleansing in the USSR, 1937-1949
15. Demographic Balance and Migration Processes in Crimea

See also

• Russian language in Ukraine

• Ethnic groups in Ukraine
• Russian diaspora