Mass Media as an Instrument of Social Mobilization of Western Ukrainian Society in the First Postwar Decade

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to reveal the peculiarities of the use of periodicals by the communist authorities as instruments of total mobilization of Western Ukrainian society in the first postwar decade, to investigate the specifics of their activities in the context of the region's Sovietization. Research methodology. The methodological approach of the study is based on the theory of a totalitarian state devoid of democratic principles. General scientific methods of analysis and synthesis, comparison and generalization are also used. Historical methods of external and internal criticism of archival sources are applied. The scientific novelty is that for the first time the peculiarities of the functioning of printed periodicals in the regional context are considered, and the ways in which they were used by the authorities as an instrument of social mobilization of Western Ukrainian society in the period of late Stalinism are shown. Conclusions. It is concluded that the press of the western regions of Ukraine was one of the most important instruments of Sovietization of the region during the first postwar decade. All regional newspapers, without exception, were the publications of the district/city/regional committees of the CP(b)U. Editorial policy a priori could not be independent, since under the conditions of the party monopoly on the information space, the entire press was under the total control of the Bolshevik Party. The printed periodicals of the period under study served as agitators and propagandists of Stalin's ideas and the policies of the ruling Communist Party. On the one hand, they helped mobilize the population to rebuild the region's economy, and on the other hand, they supported the party's policy aimed at fighting the Ukrainian insurgency. The widespread practice of engaging local residents as newspaper correspondents, the «robsilker», was aimed at creating the illusion of popular support for the Party-Soviet government and the possibility for every "ordinary citizen" to freely join the process of state building.