State Building Under Occupation. Pavlo Skoropadsky’s Hetmanate in 1918

Abstract

Pavlo Skoropadsky was the leader of the ‘hetmanate’–a short-lived puppet state dependent on Germany that was also the first independent Ukrainian state in the twentieth century. His dictatorship serves as a case study to highlight the distinctive features of Ukrainian state building under occupation in 1918. The article examines three aspects of Skoropadsky’s reign in order to highlight the obstacles and circumstances of post-imperial state building under occupation. Focusing on the circumstances of Skoropadsky’s rise to power, his propaganda strategy, and his agrarian reform project, it will show how the Central Powers not only enabled Skoropadsky’s rise as a dictator but also how this attempt at state building defies the traditional framework of national and socialist state building after 1917.