Two Central Meanings of Subjectivity and Their Application in the Political Context of Modern Ukraine

This paper examines the fundamental meanings of the concepts of “subject” and “subjectivity” in Western political philosophy, aiming to place them within the context of modern Ukraine. The discourses on Ukraine-as-a-subject are examined in relation to the two contradictory senses of subjectivity: (a) autonomous, selfpossessing, and (b) dependent, belonging subject. As the idea of an autonomous subject in Western political thought is closely related to colonial ideology and practice, this concept should be replaced with the notion of the historical, dependent subject, which is shaped by the political regime it belongs to. Consequently, the paper argues that the sense of a belonging subject (b) better reflects the actual practices of subjection, because it captures the factor of belonging to the community and presupposes the ethical, normative impact of the political collective on its subjects. Aristotle’s first systematic use of the word subject (to hupokeimenon) is based on the verb “to belong” (hupokeimai), from which the Latin civis (citizen) is also derived. Accordingly, the true ‘autonomy’ of the subject lies in the ability to choose one’s ‘belonging’ and to participate in a political community that reinterprets and changes one’s own intellectual tradition. In this case, the historicity of the subject does not mean a fateful and singular History, but rather a multiplicity of stories that give meaning and value to their subjects. The only way to partake in the act of subjectivation is through self-regulated education, which molds the social subject within the community. In the case of Ukraine, this primarily means that political power should be locally generated through civil institutions and groups that play a normative role in society. Only when education and political organization become a res publica can subjectivation be a liberating practice, as envisioned by the theorists of the Enlightenment.