Rukh

The **People's Movement of Ukraine** (Ukrainian: ***Народний Рух України***, romanized: ***Narodnyi Rukh Ukrajiny***) is a Ukrainian political and first opposition party in Soviet Ukraine founded in 1989. Often times it is simply referred to as the ***Movement*** (Ukrainian: ***Рух***, romanized: ***Rukh***).

## History

### Establishment and formation

Initially organized as the **People's Movement of Ukraine for Perestroika**, Rukh was founded on 16 February 1989, as a civil-political movement as there were no other political parties allowed in the Soviet Union but the Communist Party. The founding of Rukh was made possible due to Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev's Glasnost policies. The program and statutes of the movement were proposed by the Writers Association of Ukraine and were published in the journal *Literary Ukraine* (*Literaturna Ukraina*) on 16 February 1989. The organization has its roots in Ukrainian dissidents — the most notable of them being Viacheslav Chornovil who was elected as the first leader of the movement. Among members there were also liberal and reform-minded communists as well as Ukrainian nationalists. From March to September 1989 numerous constituent party conferences took place across Ukraine. The first Constituent Congress of the "People's Movement of Ukraine for Perestroika" took place on 8–10 September 1989 in Kyiv. The movement was registered by the Council of Ministers of the Ukrainian SSR on December 9, 1989. After the creation of the Ukrainian Republican Party (URP) and the Democratic Party of Ukraine (DPU), the People's Movement of Ukraine unofficially existed as a coalition of those two along with numerous other smaller factions. In October 1990 Rukh's second Party Congress took place. During the session it was decided to exclude the word "Perestroika" in order to not be associated with the communist movement. Oleksandr Lavrynovych was elected as leader.

At first the movement aimed at supporting Gorbachev's reforms, later the People's Movement of Ukraine was instrumental in declaring independence of Ukraine as well as conducting a popular referendum on this issue. This was partially due to the Russification policies of the Soviet Union which were strengthened during when Vladimir Shcherbitsky was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Ukraine (1972-1986). During Rukh's existence within the Soviet Union, many of its members were threatened and intimidated.

## Organizational and ideological work

In 1990, Rukh achieved total success in the election campaign, which resulted in the formation of a new non-communist government within the Supreme Soviet of Ukraine. Majorities in a number of local Central and Western Ukrainian councils were also secured. This, however, drew a bigger division between the East and West of Ukraine.

In the first year of its existence, Rukh organized a number of large-scale mass events aimed at the struggle for Ukraine's independence and the revival of the Ukrainian nation. The movement's biggest public, political, cultural, and social actions were:

* Human chain (1990) – a chain of volunteers that stretched around 550 kilometres all the way from the city of Lviv to the city of Kyiv. According to the Department of Internal Affairs of the Ukrainian SSR there were only 450,000 participants, while the organizers claimed that there were between four and five million.
* Mass excursions (1990) – festivities near Nikopol and Zaporizhzhia to celebrate the 500th Anniversary of the Zaporizhzhian Cossacks.
* Various activities near Berestechko, Baturyn, Lubny, and Khotyn.

## Opposition of Rukh to the 1991 Soviet coup d'etat

During the military coup in Moscow in August 1991, hard-line Ukrainian communists agreed to express support to the State Committee on the State of Emergency and Rukh became a serious political force to offer organized resistance to it. Rukh's activists became one of the main organizers of the opposition to the actions of the putschists. Mass reallies both in Kyiv and mostly in the western regions of Ukraine were organized.