Miejsce Stepana Bandery w ukraińskiej polityce pamięci w latach 2014-2019

Abstract

The following paper covers the topic of Stepan Bandera’s place in the Ukrainian politics of memory in 2014-2019. Inspired by the narrowest of the definitions of the politics of memory proposed by Lech Nijakowski, I conducted a analysis of Ukrainian central and local authorities’ actions relating to the figure of Stepan Bandera. Among the sources that were used there are documents of various Ukrainian authorities, including the Verkhovna Rada, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance (UINR) and local governments. I also analysed the public statements of Ukrainian politicians who held the positions of President, Prime Minister, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada or ministers regarding how they referred to the figure of Bandera. I have analogously analysed the statements made by Volodymyr Viatrovych, President of the UINR. The materials from the Ukrainian local media helped to trace the actions taken towards the figure of Bandera at the local government level. The qualitative analysis showed that Bandera played a noticeable but not at all key role in the Ukrainian politics of memory in the period under study. The leader of nationalism was described in the category of ethnocentrism, but at the same time the number of actions relating to his figure taken by the authorities was relatively small. The main qualitative change is the fact that the Bandera’s politics of memory went beyond Galicia and Volhynia. In the period under study, several dozen Bandera streets appeared in Central Ukraine, Bukovina and Transcarpathia, and 2019 was proclaimed the “Year of Bandera” in the Zhytomyr Region.