HARVARD UKRAINIAN STUDIES - See also - Harvard University

488 I. S. KOROPECKYJfits. Had the Ukraine been able to retain its funds, the growth rate ofits economy would undoubtedly have been faster and the populationwelfare higher.Were the Ukraine just another region in an ethnically homogeneouscountry, the most one could say would be that its continuous loss ofnational income has been highly inequitable for the region's population.But the Ukraine is inhabited mainly by Ukrainians, a peopledifferent from ethnic Russians, the dominant nationality in Russia/USSR. Furthermore, a convincing argument can be made that Ukrainiansdid not join either tsarist Russia or the USSR voluntarily. There isan obvious need, then, to define the economic status of the Ukraine, asthe country of a distinct ethnic community.A rather general definition states that whenever there is "anyrelationship of effective domination or control, political or economic,direct or indirect, of one country over another" (Cohen, 1973,pp. 15-16), a case of imperialism exists. Of course, according to thisdefinition the Ukraine has been Moscow's colony for more than threehundred years. Another, narrower definition helps to focus on theeconomic aspect of the Ukraine's situation. According to it, economicimperialism between countries exists when a transfer of nationalincome takes place from the weaker to the stronger country under thethreat of force (Boulding, 1972, pp. x-xi). Such an unequal relationshipcan also exist between two regions inhabited by two ethnicallydifferent nationalities within a country. National income transfersfrom the weaker to the stronger region — which are legal though notlegitimate — precisely characterize the economic relations betweenthe Ukraine as a colony and Moscow as a metropolis.Since the Ukraine has been experiencing economic loss to otherregions of Russia/USSR, the question is who, specifically, has gainedfrom this situation. Until the 1950s the poorer regions of Russia/USSRmay have advanced somewhat at the expense of the richer Ukraine.For the two most recent decades this has no longer been true becauseof the rising inequality among the republics. In terms of outputmaximization, the entire USSR, too, has not gained at the expense ofthe Ukraine, for productivity in the Ukraine generally rose faster thanin the entire USSR. Finally, there is no conclusive evidence that theeconomic welfare of ethnic Russians improved at the expense of theUkraine either before or after the Revolution. As for other aspects ofsocial life, no single factor can explain the outflow of national incomefrom the Ukraine. Undoubtedly, all these factors have had a certain