Dmytro Dontsov | |
|---|---|
 Dontsov before 1925 | |
| Native name | Дмитро Донцов |
| Born | (1883-08-30)30 August 1883 |
| Died | 30 March 1973(1973-03-30) (aged 89) |
| Pen name | O.V. |
| Occupation | Ukrainian nationalist writer, publisher, journalist, political thinker, activist, literary critic |
| Language | Ukrainian |
| Alma mater | Saint Petersburg University |
| Literary movement | Integral nationalism |
| Spouse | |
| Signature | |
 | |
Dmytro Ivanovych Dontsov (Ukrainian:Дмитро Іванович Донцов; 29 August [O.S. 17 August] 1883 – 30 March 1973) was aUkrainian nationalist writer, publisher, journalist and ideologist. Dontsov fundamentally influenced the emergence of a radical wing of theUkrainian nationalist movement[a] in the 1920s and developed his own brand of radical Ukrainian nationalism.[4][5] His ideas and writings strongly influenced theOrganisation of Ukrainian Nationalists, particularly theBanderite generation.
Dontsov preached a separation of Ukraine from Russia and a reorientation towardsthe West. He termed his ideological programme "active nationalism" and extolled an "initiative minority" modelled on the examples ofItalian fascism andBolshevism. In the 1930s, Dontsov became heavily influenced byfascism andNazism and republished works by fascist politicians and ideologues.
Dontsov'sethnic nationalism was rejected by the Ukrainian intelligentsia in the postwar years, though he remains highly regarded among theUkrainian far-right.
Dontsov was born inMelitopol, in theTaurida Governorate of theRussian Empire — territory referred to by the authorities as part ofNovorossiya and now withinZaporizhzhia Oblast, Ukraine.[6][4] His mother, Efrosinia Iosifovna Dontsova, was Ukrainian and his father, Ivan Dmitrievich Dontsov, was a Russian entrepreneur who was elected to the cityduma in 1873 and appointed mayor in 1894.[7][4] His father died of an apparent heart attack on the eve of his inauguration when Dontsov was eleven.[8]
His mother, who had Italian and German ancestry, died the following year from an illness.[9] As a result, Dontsov was largely raised by his German step-grandfather. Dmytro and his two younger sisters adopted a Ukrainian identity, while his two brothers, Vladimir and Sergei, chose Russian identities.[10][b]
In 1900, Dontsov moved toSaint Petersburg where he completedgymnasium and enrolled atSaint Petersburg University to study law.[13] In 1905, he joined theUkrainian Social-Democratic Labor Party (USDRP) where he metSymon Petliura, editor of the magazineSlovo which published Dontsov's first articles.[14][15][4]
He was arrested for participating in a pro-Ukrainian demonstration during theRussian Revolution of 1905 and briefly imprisoned inKyiv.[16] After his release, he settled in the city and continued to contribute news and editorials for bothSlovo and the Russian-language liberalUkrainskaia zhizn (Ukrainian Life; also edited by Petliura).[17] Following theStolypin Coup in 1907, which intensifiedRussification and repression of dissent, Dontsov was arrested again and imprisoned in Kyiv. After eight months' imprisonment he escaped abroad toLviv in April 1908, then part of theAustro-Hungarian Empire.[18][19][4]
Recovering from a chronic illness contracted during his imprisonment, Dontsov moved to a resort town in theTatra Mountains where he became acquainted withVyacheslav Lypynsky, a leading theorist of Ukrainianconservativism and a pro-independencemonarchist.[20][21] At this time, Dontsov opposed the notion of Ukrainian independence and supported afederalist vision of Ukraine as an autonomous part of asocial-democratic Russia, believing in the possibility of coordination between the USDRP andits Russian counterpart.[22] He advocated a platform closer to the Russian Bolshevik faction on everything but thenational question in relation to Ukraine.[14][21]
Dontsov moved to Vienna in 1908 where he studied law, economics, and history at theUniversity of Vienna until 1911 before settling in Lviv in 1912.[23] In May of that year, he married Mariia Bachynska (later Bachynska-Dontsova), a fellow student he had met in Vienna in 1909.[24] Bachynska was a pro-Ukrainian activist,feminist, and public intellectual from a wealthy family. Fluent in German, she provided translation services for Dontsov and the later Hetmanate.[c][25][19][26] Writing about the movement to establish a Ukrainian university in Lviv, Dontsov observed in 1911: "Moreover, the history of the struggle for a Ukrainian university proves for the hundredth time that in politics it is the argument of force, not the force of argument, that matters."[27]
Disillusioned withMarxism's utopian promises, Dontsov developed aRussophobic worldview rooted inRealpolitik.[28] He advocated Ukraine's alignment withMitteleuropa as an Austro-Hungarian protectorate in what he saw the inevitable clash between what he cast as the“progressive” West and “reactionary” East.[29] He first expressed these views in a pamphlet titledModerne moskvofilstvo (Modern Muscophilism) that earned him fame and notoriety among politically active Ukrainians and Russians in Lviv and elicited accusations ofmazepynstvo ('Mazepism').[30] Dontsov presented this political programme, centred on complete separation from Russia and in which he condemned the 'Little Russian' orientation of the Ukrainian intelligentsia, at the Second All-Ukrainian Students' Congress in July 1913.[31][32] His speech was subsequently transcribed in the pamphletSuchasne politychne polozhennia natsiï i nashi zavdannia (The Present Political Situation of the Nation and Our Tasks).[31] The work brought him notoriety for its radical stance and led to his ostracism from the USDRP, which he castigated for placing faith inRussian liberalism's supposed commitment toself-determination, a commitment which he characterised as subterfuge.[33][19]Vladimir Lenin denounced Dontsov's speech as "nationalistphilistinism", though he attacked Russian liberals for their displays of contempt for Ukrainian national aspirations.[d][34]
At the outset of theFirst World War in 1914, Dontsov became a founding member of the pro-AustrianUnion for the Liberation of Ukraine before leaving in September[e] to head the Ukrainian Parliamentary Club and its press bureau in Vienna that distributed pro-Ukrainian, pro-Central Powers, and anti-Russian propaganda.[35][36] HisGerman language brochures initially circulated widely in diplomatic circles concerned with the 'Ukrainian question' though this would practically amount to little due to Austrian reluctance to offend its Polish subjects.[37] Dontsov relocated with the League of Russian Foreign Peoples (LFR)[de] toLausanne,Switzerland in mid-1916 where he was one of the signatories of an appeal toPresidentWoodrow Wilson on the grounds of self-determination. He was subsequently recruited by theGerman Foreign Office to head the LFR's press operations inBern, publishing pro-Ukrainian independence propaganda in German, French, and English.[38] Amid tensions with members of the LFR surrounding his editorship, Dontsov moved back to Lviv in 1917 where he completed his doctorate in law.[39][19][40]
Opposed to the initially pacifist, federalist, andUkrainophileCentral Rada that would found theUkrainian People's Republic (UPR) in March 1917 following theFebruary Revolution, and thus starting theUkrainian War of Independence, Dontsov joined the Ukrainian Democratic Agrarian Party (UDKhP) founded by Lypynsky and quickly rose through its ranks.[41][42] Dontsov returned to Kyiv in March 1918 by which time theBread Peace had seen theCentral Powers recognise the UPR and theGerman Empire militarily occupy Ukraine in return for deliveries of grain to the Austro-Hungarian Empire.[43][44] However, theCentral Rada'ssocialist agrarian reforms interfered with these deliveries and lowered productivity, leading the German military authorities to conspire with the UDKhP to effect acoup d'état in April that installed theUkrainian State underHetmanPavlo Skoropadskyi.[45][42]
In May, Dontsov joined Skoropadskyi's government as director of the Ukrainian Telegraph Agency (UTA) and press bureau, overseeing the production and dissemination of news and pro-Hetmanate propaganda.[46][42] From the summer of 1918 onwards, Dontsov led the Hetmanate'sUkrainisation efforts aimed at drumming up support for the government. Skoropadskyi regularly consulted Dontsov on matters of Russification and the regime's relationship with the Germans, Bolsheviks, Russians, and peasants, directing him to set upSelianske slovo (Village Word) in an effort to appeal to the latter group.[46] Dontsov advocated forCrimea as an "integral part of Ukraine".[47] Outraged at the federal union proclaimed in November between the Hetmanate andWhite Russia, Dontsov resigned from the UTA and went into hiding following the appearance of an order for his arrest as theAnti-Hetman Uprising broke out.[48][42]
Despite his support for the uprising and his friendship with Petliura, Dontsov loathed the new socialist regime and, returning to the UTA, advised theDirectorate to grant Petliura emergency dictatorial powers.[49] On receiving news that theWhite Volunteers had placed a bounty on his head, Dontsov departed toParis in early January 1919 as part of the UPR's diplomatic mission to theVersailles peace talks.[50] He remained with the delegation for ten days before departing to meet Lypynsky andYevhen Konovalets in Vienna in order to develop a military and political strategy going forward, with Konovalets attempting to construct a unit out of Ukrainian POW's.[51] Dontsov and Lypynsky coordinated their propaganda efforts from the latter's Ukrainian Bureau but they disagreed on the way forward ideologically and geopolitically with Dontsov opposed to what he saw as the Hetmanite movement's pro-Russian tendencies and Lypynsky opposed to an alignment with a resurgentPoland.[52] In mid-February, and following thefall of Kyiv, Dontsov left for Bern to once again head the UPR's now-exiled press bureau,[f] with efforts later focused on attempting to secure the UPR's place at theTreaty of Riga negotiations that concluded in 1921 with the partition of Ukrainian lands primarily between Poland and the Bolsheviks.[53][42]
Having advocated that Ukraine become a part ofJózef Piłsudski'sIntermarium project, portraying it as acordon sanitaire against the Bolsheviks who he regarded as an insidious reincarnation ofRussian imperialism, Dontsov was granted permanent settlement in Lviv, personally approved by Piłsudski.[54] In 1921, Dontsov published his first book,Pidstavy nashoї polityky (The Foundations of Our Politics), in which he presented a political ideology he termed 'active nationalism' and which largely resembledintegral nationalism in a Ukrainian context, arguing for the subordination of individual, class, and humanitarian interests to the biological survival of the nation.[g][55] Criticising the Hetman movement, Dontsov advocated for the Ukrainian peasantry as the necessary basis for anynation-building, insisting that if guided by a philosophy matching its temperament and traditions, the peasantry was capable of building a society strong enough to "save Europe from Muscovite barbarism".[56] He blamed Ukrainophilism and Ukrainian conservatism for the failure of the revolution and envisaged asocial Darwinian,agrarian, andauthoritarian democracy grounded in self-discipline and self-action.[57]
Dontsov became closely connected to theUkrainian Military Organisation (UVO) though avoidedPolonophobic rhetoric and even motioned for an alliance with Poland at the UVO's founding congress in August 1920 which was blocked by Konovalets andYevhen Petrushevych.[58][59] At Konovalets's insistence, Dontsov became chief editor of theLiteraturno-naukovyi vistnyk (Literary-Scientific Herald, hereon LNV) in 1922, reshaping it from an impartial non-partisan forum into a vehicle for his integral nationalistic political agenda and a Ukrainiannationalist cultural renaissance to which end he published poets in service of constructing a nationalist mythology capable of inspiring fanatical devotion, among themOlena Teliha,Oleh Olzhych, andUlas Samchuk.[60][59]
The LNV became successful among the new generation of Ukrainian nationalists with Konovalets describing Dontsov as the "spiritual dictator of Galician youth"—Stepan Bandera andRoman Shukhevych, as members of a Ukrainian nationalist youth organisation several years later, organised public readings of the LNV in Lviv.[61] In a 1923 article, Dontsov extolled Bolshevism andItalian Fascism as models of a ruthless 'initiative minority' on which to base the Ukrainian nationalist movement and assumed anti-democratic positions.[62][63] The Tyutyunnyk affair that year saw Dontsov for several months publish anti-Petliura and anti-Polish materials inZahrava,[h] another publication he edited, purportedly written byYuriy Tyutyunnyk but who was actually under the coercion of the Ukrainian branch of theGPU.[64] Dontsov himself had written several criticisms of the Polish establishment and maintained close connections with the nationalist underground for which the embarrassing affair was used as a pretext to threaten him with deportation to theUkrainian SSR, leading him to agree to adhere to a pro-Polish agenda.[65]
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In 1926, Dontsov published the bookNatsionalizm (Nationalism), his most famous work designed to incite a fanatical devotion to the Ukrainian integral nationalist programme that cemented his position as an idol of the Ukrainian nationalist youth inGalicia and across Europe.[66] Dontsov exemplified a new Ukrainian that is youthful and brutal, "with stone heart and burning faith", and prescribes a value system of active nationalism comprisingromanticism,dogmatism, illusionism,fanaticism,amorality,creative violence, and the initiative minority.[67] In a critique ofNatsionalizm, Lypynsky accused Dontsov of bastardising and plagiarising his ideas whereafter the two leading nationalist theorists would enter into apolemic.[68]
Dontsov's refusal to cooperate with the UVO and later theOrganisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (founded in 1929 and hereon the OUN) in spite of the degree to which his works inspired its members fostered mutual suspicion whereby the exiled executive leadership sought to regain control over the outbreak of unsanctioned political violence in Galicia.[69][70] OUN ideologues criticised Dontsov's ideology throughout the 1930s, most significantly leading to a heated polemic between Dontsov and Volodomyr Martynets, editor of the OUN's ideological journalRozbudova natsiï (Building the Nation), during the summer of 1930.[71] In response to theUkrainian Greek Catholic Church's outspoken criticism of his politics and the effect it was having on Galician youth in the early 1930s, Dontsov adoptedanti-clerical positions.[72]
A dwindling readership and a crisis in contributing authors who clashed with Dontsov's authoritarian editorship led to the demise of the LNV in 1932, later restarted under the nameVistnyk (Herald) in 1933 with the financial support of the UVO and Bachynska-Dontsova.[73] WithAdolf Hitler'srise to power that year, Dontsov enthusiastically supported the newChancellor and advocated for an alignment withNazi Germany.[74] The rise ofNazism reflected a triumph of Dontsov's ideas whereafter it exerted a significant influence on his writings, deepening his obsession with 'International Jewry' that had largely been inflamed by the 1927Schwartzbard trial to the point whereantisemitic themes began to appear in almost all his articles.[75][76] By the spring of 1939, Dontsov's antisemitic writings were closely aligned tothose of Hitler.[77] In the final issue ofVistnyk for September, Dontsov reacted with puzzlement to theMolotov-Ribbentrop Pact and published the articleZhydivske pytannia i natsional-sotsializm (The Jewish Question and National Socialism) that had the stated aim of popularising Hitler's teachings inMein Kampf.[78]
Due to his pro-Nazi views and connections to the Ukrainian nationalist underground, Dontsov was arrested and briefly imprisoned inBereza Kartuska Prison at the outset of theGerman invasion of Poland in September 1939, dissolvingVistnyk, before the prison was abandoned and its inmates released upon the news of theSoviet invasion from the east.[79][80] After this, Bachynska-Dontsova initiated a divorce for reasons still debated by historians.[81] Dontsov fled viaKraków toBerlin, then toDanzig, and finallyBucharest where he lived with and was financially supported (for the remainder of his life) by Ukrainian biologist Yurii Rusov and his wife, Nataliia Gerken-Rusova, an artist and playwright who had been a key contributor toVistnyk.[82][19] Dontsov worked with the couple to publishBatava which ran until November 1941 and where Dontsov, influenced by Rusov, deepened his interest inscientific racism, dividing the Ukrainian population into stratified racialcastes:Nordic,Mediterranean,Dinaric, and Oriental.[83] Due to Rusov's position as editor, Dontsov also contributed to the Hetmanite publicationUkraïnskyi robitnyk (Ukrainian Worker).[84]
Following theGerman invasion of the Soviet Union, Dontsov moved toNazi-occupiedPrague in late 1941 where he contributed to theSS-operated Reinhard Heydrich Institute[de], founded in July 1942 afterHeydrich'sassassination two months earlier.[85] Dontsov continued espousing pro-Nazi views despite the violent crackdown on OUN members in Ukraine, some of whom he had had close relationships with as contributors to the LNV andVistnyk.[86] He opposed theOUN-B's presentation of aliberal democratic platform in 1943 in private correspondence with the organisation's leadership, writing that "the OUN should stand against imperialist powers, including Jewry, but not againstimperialism". He complained that the new programme was bereft of what he saw as Ukrainian historical traditions with regard toCossackdom,xenophobia, andantisemitism.[87]
With the advance of theRed Army, Dontsov left Prague for theAmerican occupation zone in early 1945 from where he travelled toParis and then toLondon in 1946, before moving toNew York in 1947.[88] Later that year, he crossed the border intoCanada on a tourist visa and, despite a public investigation into his wartime activities, was permitted to settle inMontreal where he taught Ukrainian literature at theFrench-languageUniversité de Montréal from 1949 to 1952.[89][19]
Dontsov attempted to promote his Russophobicanti-communist views in speaking tours but found himself a pariah in much of the Ukrainian diaspora in large part because of the pro-Nazi and fascist views he espoused before and during the war but he was also perceived as a faithless, hypocritical coward by many nationalists due to his alignment with the Nazis despite the deaths of Teliha, Olzhych, and other nationalists by their hand who had followed his teachings.[90]
Dontsov's activities in postwar exile consisted of him writing extensively for the Ukrainianémigré press, mainly in publications associated with the OUN-B.[19]Stepan Bandera remained in contact with Dontsov throughout the 1950s, offering him the role of editor in his organisation's newspaper which Dontsov declined.[91] In his later years Dontsov became a devotee oftheosophy, repackaging his worldview pertaining to theSoviet Union for aChristian fundamentalist audience during theCold War and excised pro-Nazi and antisemitic elements from his republished works.[92][93][19] Dontsov argued that the Cold War should become aholy war against theSatanic Soviet Union and that, since aThird World War was inevitable,the West shouldstrike preemptively.[94] Following Bandera's assassination, Dontsov published anobituary in a November 1959 issue of OUN-B periodicalHomin Ukraїny in which he praised Bandera as the embodiment of a principledanti-democratic, anti-communist fighter.[95]
Dontsov died on 30 March 1973 in Montreal, aged 89, and is buried in the Ukrainian Orthodox Cemetery inBound Brook, New Jersey.[96][97]Yaroslav Stetsko presided over his wake which was attended, among others, by former members of theUPA and representatives from Ukrainian diaspora organisations, including theWorld Congress of Free Ukrainians, theOrganisation for the Defense of Four Freedoms for Ukraine, and theUkrainian Canadian Congress.[98]
Across his life, Dontsov went through different contradictory phases and periods of political orientation and never presented his ideas in the form of a logically consistentdoctrine.[99][100] Historian Taras Kurylo considers Dontsov to have instead created a "mosaic of what he considered the most important".[101] In formulating active nationalism, Dontsov borrowed much from the likes ofFriedrich Nietzsche,Johann Gottlieb Fichte,Vilfredo Pareto, andGeorges Sorel.[102][103] According to historian Oleksandr Zaitsev, Dontsov was also influenced by the writings and ideas ofArthur Schopenhauer,Oswald Spengler,Henri Bergson,Maurice Barrès,Charles Maurras,Gustave Le Bon, andGaetano Mosca, with Nietzsche remaining the greatest influence on his works.[103] In the 1920s, Dontsov admired nations and leaders who inhabited his principles of will power, resolution,hierarchy,voluntarism, ruthlessness, mercilessness, belligerency,zeal, andamorality.[104] In his writing this encompassedFascist Italy, theBritish Empire,Imperial Japan, and theUnited States, of which he especially admiredthe effective colonisation of theWild West.[105] He argued that to defeat theBolsheviks, Ukrainian nationalists would need to adopt its methods.[106]
In a style more typical of theRussian intelligentsia of the time, Dontsov mixed literature and politics and, according toIvan L. Rudnytsky, exhibited adoctrinaire turn of mind that resorted to simplereductionist formulas accompanied by radical solutions.[92][107] Critics of Dontsov at the time and since have asserted that he did more to import Russianculture andthought intoUkrainian culture than anyone else during the interwar period, with his contemporaries often citing his Russian background to the extent that it plagued his career inWestern Ukraine.[108][106]
Trevor Erlacher characterises Dontsov's personality and his body of work as 'iconoclasticauthoritarianism', asserting that he "readily sacrificed logic and consistency for the sake of emotive impact or political expedience, vulgarized the ideas of the writers whom he invoked to fit the rhetorical needs of the moment, and moved chameleonlike between political, cultural, and philosophical trends".[109] Erlacher describes Dontsov's seminal 1926 workNatsionalizm as being "a collection of impressions and expressions designed to have an emotional effect and undermine the reader's trust in reason", going on to write that "[p]atent falsehoods, such as Dontsov's misrepresentation of the Ukrainian anarchistDrahomanov as a "convinced Russian statist," either evade detection and are acceptedprima facie, or anger the reader and turn them immediately against the book".[110]
According toAlexander J. Motyl, supporters of Dontsov have generally focused on his contributions to the formation of aUkrainian national identity while his detractors and critics focus on histotalitarian tendencies.[5]Volodymyr Yaniv, writing for theEncyclopedia of Ukraine, asserts that Dontsov "made a decisive contribution to the undermining ofRussophilism and the influence ofCommunist ideas in Western Ukraine in the 1920s".[19] Yaniv characterises Dontsovism as voluntarist andpantheisticmonism.[19]
According to historians Oleksandr Zaitsev, Taras Kurylo, andJohn-Paul Himka, Dontsov andVistnyk in the 1930s became the main popularisers ofNational Socialism andItalian Fascism among Ukrainians inPoland and thediaspora.[111][76] Dontsov translated and published extracts ofMein Kampf andLa dottrina del fascismo as well as reprinting works by Nazi ideologuesJoseph Goebbels,Alfred Rosenberg, andHans Günther.[112] According to Zaitsev, Dontsov's articles inVistnyk were replete with quotations fromMussolini andHitler, with him publishing biographies of the twodictators as well asLéon Degrelle andFrançois de La Rocque.[113]
Kurylo and Himka consider Dontsov by the late 1930s to have formulated a "Ukrainian version offascism".[76] Zaitsev considers Dontsov's ideas to be closer to those of theConservative Revolution,[i] though he notes that thepalingenetic myth played a significant role in his ideology with his 1944 workDukh nashoï davnyny (The Spirit of Our Antiquity) being the best example of this.[100] He characterises the output ofVistnyk as constituting literary fascism rather than its political counterpart due to its indirect impact on events, describing it as a form ofproto-fascism "in which nationalimperialism was bizarrely combined withanti-colonial discourse and the pathos ofnational liberation".[115][100]
Dontsov's active nationalism has commonly been ascribed as a Ukrainian form ofintegral nationalism in the historiography. Some historians, such asPer Anders Rudling andGrzegorz Rossoliński-Liebe, object to this classification of Ukrainian radical nationalism, noting that integral nationalism is itself a proto-fascist ideology or arguing that it is indistinguishable from fascism.[116][117][118] Zaitsev considers this position to be not without foundation though asserts the view that such a designation is of limitedheuristic value.[119]
Though they had their differences Dontsov andVyacheslav Lypynsky initially worked closely together, remaining on good terms until the early 1920s by which point their views had diverged considerably.[120] Where Lypynsky saw the need fornation-building to be driven by anaristocracy and denounced the peasantry as an impoverished mass more interested inanarchy than building strong political institutions and a stable civil society, Dontsov argued for a peasantry imbued with anirrationalwill to power and led by a nationalist politicalelite.[121] Dontsov subscribed to thepopulist myth of a homogenous peasantry and argued for anethnically homogenous nation cleansed of foreign influences while Lypynsky viewed greatersocial differentiation as a source of stability, championingterritorial nationalism.[121]
Dontsov attempted to provoke Lypynsky several times in 1925, attacking the centrality oflegalism to his thinking and denying his commitment to Ukrainian independence.[122] Lypynsky responded in a letter to theNew Jersey newspaperSvoboda:
"I know you Ukrainian intelligentsia snakes too well to be surprised by these lies, to have any desire to answer them, or to engage in polemics with you. Keep lying. The more your lies besmirch the Ukrainian name, which you yourselves represent, the more your baseness will drive away all honest Ukrainians, and the sooner the branch on which you sit will fall, and you boors will die, blinded by your own spite."[123]
Thepolemic that ensued after the publishing ofNatsionalizm in 1926 became highly acrimonious and personal and served as one of the main themes of discussion among Ukrainian nationalists going forward.[124] Lypynsky wrote of Dontsov's works in the early 1920s:
"His writings are so contradictory that he would have gone mad long ago if he had treated them even a little seriously. Fortunately for himself, he only "writes" them"[80]
Andrew Wilson describes Dontsov and Lypynsky as the two most influential Ukrainian nationalist thinkers of the twentieth century, with their feud symptomatic of a wider clash of ideas between democratic and militant nationalism that remained relevant to modern Ukrainian politics.[125]
Dontsov biographer Trevor Erlacher portrays hisRussophobia as finding its origins in intolerance andchauvinism he supposedly experienced from Russian classmates as a schoolboy and inSaint Petersburg literary circles, hardened by his encounters with the imperial authorities.[126] Erlacher casts Dontsov's opposition toRussian imperialism as the singular constant in his body of work, noting that he at the same time admired other imperial powers and celebrated the principle ofconquest through war.[127]
During his time in Kyiv from 1905 to 1907, Dontsov developed a lifelong fascination with themedievalKyivan Rus' whereby he came to view Russia as a crude imposter.[17] He thereafter viewed Russia and Europe as two antithetical civilisations, in his 1921 book promoting hatred of and struggle against Russia as a basis for the politics, literature, and spirituality of Ukraine and the widerWestern world.[128] His polemic ofRussian culture based itself in its supposedMongol origins that engenderedbarbarism whereby he presented hisWeltanschauung as a struggle betweenEuropean and Asiatic civilisation, with Ukrainians responsible for whatever wasEuropean in Muscovite culture.[129]
From 1926 to 1933 he began to argue that Bolshevism was the latest manifestation of an Asiatic, Jewish-Muscovite essence that arose out of the "racial chaos" of theMongol khanates.[130] According to Erlacher, in the latter half of his life Dontsov exhibited apathological hatred of Russians and openly fantasised aboutgenocidal vengeance at any cost.[131] InBatava (published from 1940 to 1941), Dontsov characterised 'Oriental', the lowest racial caste in his system, as aTatar-Mongol-Russian mix that corrupted the Ukrainiangene pool with slavish, disorderly traits.[132] Though he would in exile remove overtly antisemitic and pro-Nazi passages from his republished works, his sections onrace science remained.[133]
Alongside his brother Vladimir, Dontsov supported Jewish self-defense groups againstpogroms in the Russian Empire prior to moving toSaint Petersburg in 1900.[j][134] In 1910 he criticised ethnographer Olena Pchilka for spreading "antisemitic and religious fog" and "nationalistdemagoguery" though by 1918 he had come to regard Ukrainian Jews asfifth columnists, inherently pro-Russian, pro-Bolshevik, and anti-Ukrainian.[135][136] In response to a complaint by the German military authorities regarding his editorship at the UTA, Dontsov claimed that he was "between a hammer and an anvil" with the "Jewish-Russian press" on one side and the Germans on the other.[136]
In his 1921 book Dontsov criticisedJudeo-Bolshevism conspiracy theories, insisting that Bolshevism was principally a Russian phenomenon while also arguing that the Jewish working class had sided with the Russian Bolsheviks because of theirracial psychology and class interests.[137] Reacting toPetliura's murder in 1926, Dontsov asserted that "the Jew is not guilty of everything" but were "terribly guilty" of servingRussian imperialism and Bolshevism.[135][138] The following line where he states "Only when Russia falls in Ukraine will we be able to settle the Jewish question in ourcountry in a way that suits the interest of the Ukrainian people" has been interpreted by historians one of two ways. It has been interpreted as either a threat to the Ukrainian Jewish population and damning proof of his radical antisemitism as early as 1926 or as proof of his pragmatism towards Ukraine's Jews at this point, with the 'Jewish question' remaining secondary to Russia— historian Trevor Erlacher asserts that there is some truth to both interpretations.[139] Reacting to the 1927Schwartzbard trial, Dontsovdenied thatthe pogroms had taken place,blaming Jews for having been hostile toward Ukrainians and asserting that they were motivated by a desire to rule and exploit Ukraine.[140] He wrote that Petliura's mistake was that he "wanted to win the support of a cowardly and slavish race with concessions".[135] Responding to awave of antisemitic policies inNazi Germany, Dontsov wrote in April 1933:
"We do not need to adopt Hitler's methods. But we must remember that a people cannot allowitself to be ruled (politically or spiritually) by an alien element and that this alien element darenot, as is now the case in [Soviet] Ukraine, be the master of our land."[135]
Throughout the 1930s antisemitic tropes appeared in almost all of Dontsov's articles inVistnyk, often in the form of citing Jewish names to assert the Judeo-Bolshevism conspiracy theory.[141] Dontsov also promoted theworld Jewish conspiracy theory— for instance, in a 1934 article he wrote that to prevent the future state from becoming a "Ukraine of the Schwartzbards", the Ukrainian elite "should not be members of a people (or sect) that receives directives... from international Jewry, which actively supported Bolshevism and the expropriation of our peasants for the benefit of their race".[142] Dontsov came to regard antisemitism as a Ukrainian tradition, in a 1937 article faulting the Ukrainian leaders of 1917-1921 for failing to take advantage of the Judeophobic sentiments of the Ukrainian masses.[143] In a 1938 article, he criticised the most outlandish of conspiracy theories surrounding 'International Jewry', subscribing instead to a view of Jews as a "parasitic phenomenon" secondary to the Russian Bolsheviks.[144] InThe Riddle of the Third Reich published a few months before the start of theSecond World War, Dontsov aligned himself with Hitler's view of Germany and extolled him and his entourage as a model for Ukrainian nationalists to follow, writing that, in spite of "Israel's millions of dollars", "Israel had to bow its neck" before the new German faith and power.[145]
Despite Dontsov's revision of his republished works, he maintained a keen personal interest in antisemitic conspiracy theories, as evidenced by his personal papers which contain heavily underlined conspiratorial brochures and newspaper clippings in the margins of which he frequently scribbled "Jew" where his opponents in the media were Jewish.[146]
Dontsov has been regarded as the "spiritual father" of the UVO and OUN by nationalists and his ideas remained influential in theémigré OUN-B andAnti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations during the Cold War era.[147][148] In his later years,Yaroslav Stetsko described himself as having always been and remaining a 'Dontsovist' (dontsivets).[104]
According toTimothy Snyder, Ukraine rejected Dontsov's theory that it should be exclusively for and about people who spoke Ukrainian and shared Ukrainian culture. His brand ofethnic nationalism lost out in favour of thepluralistic form championed byVyacheslav Lypynsky andIvan L. Rudnytsky.[149] Dontsovism was explicitly rejected by theSixtiers who instead focused onindividual rights, therule of law, and constructing a common front with otherSoviet dissidents.[150]
According toAndrew Wilson,Soviet propaganda was successful in convincing many Ukrainians that all Ukrainian nationalists of the 1930s and 1940s had been Dontsovites, feeding into a mythologized tradition that many Ukrainian radicals would later seek to revive in the 1990s.[151] Dontsovite nationalism reemerged in the late 1980s and early 1990s in theUkrainian far-right, especially in theUNA-UNSO led byYurii Shukhevych, theSocial-National Party of Ukraine, and the politics ofValentyn Moroz.[152]Far-right groups reprinted Dontsov's works and, in 2007, Oleh Bahan[ukr] and Petro Ivanyshyn[ukr] founded the Dmytro Dontsov Scientific-Ideological Centre to advance his ideas.[153][154]
Petro Poroshenko has quotedThe Present Political Position of the Nation and Our Tasks in his speeches.[155]
According to Trevor Erlacher, virtually all 21st century Dontsovists selectively interpret the meaning of Dontsovism to fit various agendas, aided by Dontsov's varying beliefs and allegiances across his life, though the principle of moving away fromRussia and towards Europe remains consistent.[156]
In 2013, a memorial plaque to Dontsov was unveiled at his former residence inLviv bySvoboda politicianIryna Farion, though it was later destroyed by unknown vandals. Its restoration was funded byRight Sector.[157] In January 2019, another memorial plaque in honour of Dontsov was unveiled on the side of theUkrinform headquarters inKyiv.[157]
Several streets in Ukraine are named in honour of Dontsov inDnipro,Zhytomyr,Ivano-Frankivsk,Lutsk,Lviv,Odesa,Sumy,Kherson, andKropyvnytskyi— a street inMelitopol bearing his name was renamed in 2022.[157][158]
[Taken from theInternet Encyclopedia of Ukraine, published by the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies.][19]
