The normative and legal component of the national-state selfdetermination of the Ukrainian people

Abstract

It is relevant for the further progress and development of Ukraine to study the ascending legal foundations that laid the foundations of the constituent power of the people as the source, bearer and sovereign subject of power. The first stage of the Ukrainian people’s sovereignty process was completed during the National Liberation War of 1648–1657 with the formation and legalization of the institutions of the Ukrainian Cossack state, which was recognized as a subject of international relations. The next stage of the sovereignty of the Ukrainian people, as asocial subject of Ukrainian state-building, began in Western Ukrainian lands with the “Spring of Nations” in 1848 and ended with the formation of its own sovereign state-the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic. In Trans-Dnieper Ukraine, this stage began at the end of the 19th century. and ended in the period of the Ukrainian national liberation struggle of 1917–1921 with the restoration of national statehood. The state sovereignty of the Ukrainian People’s Republic was realized through a dialectical combination of the right of nations to self-determination and the principle of territorial integrity of the state. After the announcement by the Russian Soviet party leadership of the date of formation of the USSR on December 30, 1922, the Ukrainian SSR actually lost the opportunity to exercise the sovereign rights of the Ukrainian people and the state. During the dismantling of the Union of the SSR, the Ukrainian people used the right to self-determination, which is enshrined in the provisions of the Declaration on State Sovereignty of Ukraine dated July 16, 1990. A detailed analysis of legal acts that regulated the issues of external and internal sovereignty and legal personality of the Ukrainian people (nation) and the state in different historical periods will make it possible to objectively assess the formality and reality of Ukraine’s sovereignty in different historical periods. Key words: Ukraine, people’s sovereignty, nation-state self-determination, people’s right to self-determination, sovereignty, Cossack-Hetman era, UNR, Directory, ZUNR,Ukrainian SSR, juridification of Ukraine’s sovereignty, normative and legal component,historical significance