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[OUN PROGRAM] Prohrama Orhanizatsii Ukrains'kykh Natsionalistiv (Zatverdzhena na III-mu Velykomu Zbori Ukrains'kykh natsionalistiv 30-ho serpnia 1947 roku) [i.e. Program of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (Approved at the 3rd Grand Meeting of Ukrainian Nationalists on August 30, 1947)]

Nakladom OUN, 1947. Item #1959

16 pp. 20.5 x 14.5 cm. In the publisher's paper covers. Good to very good condition. Minor creases of the covers. Conjoining leaves with pages 7-10 partially detached from the staple. Owner’s stamp “A. A. Granovsky” on the title page, later inscriptions “Donor”, “Belgium” near the stamp. Previous owner of the book, professor Alexander A. Granovsky (1887-1976) was an Ukrainian-American entomologist employed at the University of Minnesota. He led an active social life, protected Ukrainian heritage and helped 5000 Ukrainians from DP camps to settle in the US after WWII.

The Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) represented an important vector of Ukrainian search for self-identification during the 1st half of the XXth century, especially after the fall of the Russian Empire.
The Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists was officially formed in Wien in 1929. OUN settled its basic policy as forming a united, independent Ukraine within its ethnic territories: "a policy of all-Ukrainian statehood". The leader was chosen: colonel Yevhen Konovalets (1891-1938). Many smaller nationalistic groups were included into OUN and both Eastern and Western Ukraine territories were represented in the grand meetings. OUN established Territorial Executives to embody its ideas. OUN had both illegal (mainly in Eastern Ukraine) and legal (mainly in Western Ukraine) periodicals. Those promoted nationalist ideas that became extremely popular with the youth. With time,
OUN rapidly advanced towards radical methods of freeing those “ethnically Ukrainian” territories. It organised strikes, property seizures and a streak of terrorist attacks in Poland, some led by prominent OUN member Stepan Bandera (1909-1959). Fanatical youth was devoted to nationalistic ideas and OUN rapidly was gaining fame outside its circle of 20 000-something members.

As an organisation, OUN was highly structured and organised via military-like subordination. And as with any structured organisation, differences in views led to a split. The assasination of Konovalets in 1938 showed a gap in understanding between the more centrist OUN leaders who lived abroad and the younger activists in Ukrainian territories, some of them being as far-right as the Nazis were. The latter formed their own OUN branch and the two factions started to lead its activities independently. Both were hostile towards each other.

This brochure was published after the 3rd meeting of people who were following the initial OUN ideas, led by Konovalets. Since the IInd grand meeting that took place in Rome in 1939, this faction was led by Andrii Melnyk (1890-1964). And while the Bandera-led OUN faction was very active on the political field during 1940’s and even tried an unsuccessful alliance with the German army in hopes to establish the independent country, the Melnyk faction suffered loss of influence. Some members were absorbed by more active Bendera groups while Melnyk himself lived in a concentration camp.
It was only after WWII Melnyk-led faction became a noticeable power. It reviewed its program adapted at the IInd congress. Back in 1939, Melnyk was announced “Leader of the nation” and the organisation tended to look like a future personalistic regime. Now, to adapt to the post- Hitler world, Melnyk and his comrades decided to vote for a change. The program of change is expressed in the present brochure. The idea was to remove the ideology even further from what the Nazis showed to the world.
The program is divided into VI parts. Those parts are: State, Armed forces, Spiritual and cultural life, Social politics, State economics and International policy. They are preceded by a list of nine maxims, all on the importance of nationalism and the future Ukrainian National Revolution as the key factor in forming the independent state. In this document, the State organisation maintains a more democratic approach compared to the 1930’ies: equality before the law (part I, article 14), independent court system (part I, article 13) and a national leader elected by the parliament (part I, article 9), religious freedom (part III, article 2). The Social politics part demonstrates Melnyk’s ability to notice the historical changes and to decrease the supposed state participation in the regulation of daily life compared to the early versions of OUN programs: in the program of 1939, the Ukrainian state was even straightforwardly marked as “totalitarian”.

All those are major changes compared to the earlier version of the OUN programs. The program is also more specific and more detailed than the previous proclamations, but still the ideas of where and how the State should develop after the national revolution are not as vague as they were before. It was said that the Revolution will be completed in 3 stages: national liberation, consolidation of the state, further development (part II, article 2), but what is “development” was not very clear. As things turned out, this program didn’t matter as OUN failed to become an integral a fortiori a leading part of modern society. OUN regarded itself as a social movement, not a party. But after WWII political life surged in the DP camps and emigrant community, so Melnyk-led faction evolved and became a political force, part of the so-called Ukrains'ka Natsional'na Rada, a Parliament of the government-in-exile. The fights continued to be mostly political. OUN was imposing nationalist ideas but with time those rose less and less interest. So when the Ukrains'ka Natsional'na Rada transferred its full powers to the Ukrainian government in 1992, right-wing nationalism was nothing more than a ghost from the past.

WorldCat locates 11 copies of this edition: 6 copies at University of Toronto Library in Canada (possibly, same copy listed under different directories), 5 copies in the US:
at Harvard, Yale, Columbia University, University of Minnesota, Stanford.

Price: $1,200.00