Authors

Discussion

Understanding the reasons forthe unprovoked Russian war against Ukraine is not enough to analyze the relations between the countries after the collapse of the USSR. We could not realize the notion of specific relations between Ukraine and Russia during its stay in the Soviet Union. Russia's aggressiveness towards 'everything Ukrainian' was especially evident in the 19th century. It is demonstrated by the study of the economic policy implemented on Ukrainian lands after the incorporation of Ukraine into the Russian Empire. This policy had a pronounced colonial character, which manifested itself first in the destruction of the Ukrainian grain trade and later in the neglect of Ukraine's interests during the rapid industrialization process of the Russian Empire.

Economic relations between Ukraine and Russia were based on the 'center-periphery' model, which meant the extraction of resources from Ukrainian territories and the development of the Russian center. Russia has never been interested in the economic development of Ukraine. Industrial production in Ukraine developed much more slowly than in other parts of the Russian Empire. For instance, even the principal aim of the rapid construction of railways in Ukraine was to increase trade and export grain to Russia, i.e. to satisfy the interests of the Russian economy.

From the middle of the XVII century, the Russian Empire hoped to fully incorporate Ukraine's economy into the Russian economic system as an appendage of raw materials and a market for product sales. However, specific features of the national economy in Ukraine gradually emerged. The interests of 'businessmen' in Ukraine began to differ significantly from the interests of those in the Russian economy after the Industrial Revolution in the Russian Empire. These differences were accompanied by conflicts between the Ukrainian and Russian sugar industries, directions, and volumes of grain exports, along with unfair competition from the Russian heavy industry. The latter received large state subsidies, while the industrial development of Donbas was hampered by Russian industrialists. Notably, the growth of Ukrainian heavy industry was primarily due to foreign investments – French, Belgian, and German capital.

Ukraine as part of the Russian Empire could be seen as an internal colony, and its economic development as colonial. Russian political domination caused the imbalance and underdevelopment of the economy of Ukrainian lands. Discriminatory investments and tariff grids, high taxes and a low level of government spending, the overdevelopment of agriculture and the mining industry, and, on the other hand, the underdevelopment of other branches of production led to the fact that in 1917, the majority of Ukrainians were, as before, engaged in agriculture.

Ukraine was a colony in the economic and political sense but with varying degrees of colonial dependence.