TY - JOUR AU - Sytnyk, Y. PY - 2020/12/27 Y2 - 2024/03/28 TI - ARTIFICIAL OPPOSITION OF UKRAINIANS OF EAST AND WEST IN THE PERIOD OF INDEPENDENT UKRAINE ON THE EXAMPLE OF DONETSK REGION JF - Zaporizhzhia Historical Review JA - ZHR VL - 2 IS - 54 SE - History of Ukraine DO - UR - https://istznu.org/index.php/journal/article/view/929 SP - AB - The article attempts to highlight the artificial opposition of the Ukrainian East and West in the period of independent Ukraine on the example of the Donetsk region. It has been noticed that during the last decades there have been observed various kinds of attempts to artificially counterpose the population of the West and the East, primarily in the linguistic sense. It was emphasized that the idea of the split of the "two Ukrainians" was cordially picked up by a part of the Ukrainian political, moreover, it was rather ingeniously exploited by him long before she acquired a bright publicistic form. It is noted that all sorts of pro-Russian political groups were an active tool for these actions. And as a result – the events of 2014 were a difficult exam for the Ukrainian state and society, while simultaneously opening a new page in national history. Behind the scenes of political, diplomatic, military confrontation around the territorial integrity and the preservation of a single civil space of Ukraine, the struggle of ideas unfolded, which revealed deep-seated mentality of the population and local elites. Consequently, from the end of February 2014, the active phase of the deployment of separatist movements in the east and south of Ukraine was launched. At the same time, Russia and pro-Russian forces, in order to push the local population towards political mobilization in their own interests, appealed to the following historical and historical constructions: "South-East", "Novorossiya", "Donbass", "Donetsk People’s Republic" (DPR), "Lugansk People’s Republic" Republic" (LC). It is indicated that the so-called "South-East" is an artificial construction of the media and political science space known to the population through the mass media, but not rooted in its consciousness. It is noted that the policy of opposing the Ukrainian West and East was combined with the purposeful destruction of the Ukrainian identity of the Donetsk region. It was summed up that it was precisely such actions that largely led to the occupation of part of the territory of Ukraine in 2014 and the decisions of the Kremlin against Ukraine of a hybrid information war.  ER -