Piotra Murzionak: From the Belarusian ethnos to the Belarusian Democratic Republic

(webzine “Kultura. Nation”, N 33, April 2024, 5-21, www.sakavik.net)       

Abstract. The ideological struggle against Russian narratives that Ukraine as a state does not exist and has no right to exist is relevant and not only in relation to Ukraine, because the same Russian approaches are already used or may be used directly in relation to our Belarus. Arguments are made that Belarus and Russia have different historical paths of development, that the Belarusian and Ukrainian peoples do not represent a “triad” people together with the Russian people, and that Belarusians, at the beginning of the 20th century, matured as a people and were ready for the declaration of an independent state, the Belarusian People’s Republic. Isolation from Russia excludes Belarus from belonging to the “Russian world” on the basis of many objective factors: a) permanent, compact residence of Belarusians in the same territory for centuries; b) presence of clear ethnic boundaries; c) ethnic nature different from the Great Russians and Ukrainians; d) the association of Ruthenians as a part of the GDL; e) civilizational belonging to Western civilization (Magdeburg Law, Reformation and Counter-Reformation processes of the church, unionism, Diets, geographical belonging to Europe); g) linguistic identification; f) presence of the national elite; h) the aggressive nature of Russian policy, which is justified by the leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church.

Categories: Асьвета, Гісторыя, Нацыя Беларусы