The Formation of Ukrainian Statehood: Lecture for the National Resistance Center (25 October 2025)
Vitaliy Dribnytsia’s lecture at a meeting organized by the National Resistance Center at the Donetsk Regional Youth Center. He explains how the concept of the state changed, offers a periodization of the Ukrainian state tradition, and distinguishes academic qualifications from a simplified school narrative.
Key moments
- 01:31 The meeting's subject: the formation of Ukrainian statehood
- 02:46 Why modern criteria for statehood cannot be applied mechanically to the past
- 03:34 'Our Kings' and the Commonwealth's place in Ukrainian history
- 04:45 A periodization of the Ukrainian state tradition
- 05:09 The Hetmanate and the Zaporozhian Host of the Lower Dnipro were not the same entity
- 07:26 The Ruthenian nobility and political agency in the Commonwealth
- 11:45 Why the account conventionally begins with Rus'
- 24:43 The names Kyivan Rus' and Ukraine-Rus'
- 31:53 The context of the 1654 Pereiaslav Council
- 35:47 The Cossack Revolution and the struggle for estate rights