45. Cultural meaning of the Enlightenment

The Age of Enlightenment (or simply the Enlightenment) is the era in Western philosophy, intellectual, scientific and cultural life, centered upon the 18th century, in which reason was advocated as the primary source for legitimacy and authority.

Developing simultaneously in France, Great Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Portugal and the American colonies, the movement was buoyed by Atlantic Revolutions, especially the success of the American Revolution, when breaking free of the British Empire. Most of Europe was caught up, including the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Russia, and Scandinavia, along with Latin America in instigating the Haitian Revolution. The authors of the American Declaration of Independence, the United States Bill of Rights, the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, and the Polish-Lithuanian Constitution of May 3, 1791, were motivated by Enlightenment principles.

The "Enlightenment" was not a single movement or school of thought, for these philosophies were often mutually contradictory or divergent. The Enlightenment was less a set of ideas than it was a set of values. At its core was a critical questioning of traditional institutions, customs, and morals, and a strong belief in rationality and science. Thus, there was still a considerable degree of similarity between competing philosophies. Some historians also include the late 17th century, which is typically known as the Age of Reason or Age of Rationalism, as part of the Enlightenment; however, most historians consider the Age of Reason to be a prelude to the ideas of the Enlightenment. Modernity, by contrast, is used to refer to the period after The Enlightenment; albeit generally emphasizing social conditions rather than specific philosophies.

46. The process of Russification in Ukrainian lands of Russian Empire: main waves

Russian rule on Ukrainian lands was, for most Ukrainians, repressive. Whatever limited democratic institutions Ukrainians might have enjoyed under Cossack or Polish-Lithuanian rule were destroyed, replaced by an autocratic government in which there was no constitution, no political rights, no elected assembly, and no separation of powers. The Russian tsar was the supreme authority, dominating both secular governmental institutions and exercising control over the Russian Orthodox Church. Local courts were controlled by the landlords, and the police—both regular forces and, after 1826, a secret police—were harsh. Military conscription, introduced in Ukraine in 1797, entailed a commitment of 25 years, which, given Russia’s frequent military campaigns and the harsh conditions within the Russian military, often meant a death sentence. Most Ukrainians (this term would gain currency only later, as the Russian authorities preferred to call them “Little Russians”) were enserfed peasants, tied to the land and to the labor demands imposed on them by landlords. Whereas many landlords grew rich on the grain trade, most peasants lived in squalid conditions. Illiteracy rates were high; health provisions were minimal.

Russian rule, however, also had an important cultural component. Because the “Little Russians” were linguistically and culturally similar to the “Great Russians,” the government viewed Ukraine as essentially Russian land, although Russia did not take advantage of temporary occupation of parts of eastern Galicia during the Napoleonic Wars to try to unify all the “Little Russians” into the Empire. A medal struck in 1793 in honor of Catherine II read, “I have recovered what was torn away,” an indication that Ukrainian lands— from the Right Bank to Crimea—were deemed as historically “Russian,” even though they had never been ruled by Moscow. Rather, such an attitude was a clear indication that Russia was appropriating the patrimony of Kievan Rus; and, to the extent that the population on these now Russian lands spoke a language different from proper Russian, were not Orthodox, or, heaven forbid, conceived of themselves as something other than Russian, they would have to be “Russified.”

Russification took on various forms. The most obvious indicator that some of the “Little Russians” were not properly Russian was that they attended non-Orthodox churches. This was especially true in Right Bank Ukraine, which had been under Polish-Lithuanian rule, where many Ukrainians had converted to Catholicism (many of these had become fully Polonized) and, more commonly, were adherents to the Greek Catholic (Uniate) faith. Initially, the Russians displayed some tolerance toward the Greek Catholic Church, but, after a Polish revolt in 1830–31 that had some support by the Greek Catholic hierarchy, the Russian authorities took a dimmer view on its activities. In 1839, at the Synod of Polotsk (in today’s Belarus), the Greek Catholic Church was banned on Russian territory, and its parishes were transferred to the Russian Orthodox Church.

Russian authorities, however, did not force all inhabitants to profess Christian Orthodoxy. Large numbers of

Education provided another means for Russian authorities to “Russify” the population. The first university in modern Ukraine was established in Kharkiv (Kharkov in Russian) in 1805 and a university was established in Kiev in 1834. Both were Russian-language institutions. Primary education was also in Russian, which meant that Polish-language schools on Right Bank Ukraine were closed. This hurt Ukrainians because they could not afford to educate their children at home instead. As a consequence, literacy rates under Russian rule actually fell. Nevertheless, there was no comprehensive program to remake the Ukrainian peasant masses into Russians. Rather, because they were “Little Russians,” the assumption seemed to be that they would naturally, through a sort of osmosis, eventually embrace “Great Russian” culture. There was, at least until an explicit crackdown on works in the Ukrainian language in the 1860s and 1870s, no coherent “Ukrainian” policy, let alone a conscious policy to define a modern Russian identity. Thus “rather than trying to assimilate the peasant masses, the authorities concerned themselves with preventing nationalists and radicals [who emerged in the later half of the 19th century] from reaching out to the villages.”