Substantive attention to the phenomenon of non-governmental organization in the history of Ukrainian Constitutions

Abstract

The article attempts to analyze the dynamics of changes in regulatory and legal attention to the phenomenon of "public organization" in the content of the Constitutions, which were officially introduced during the twentieth century in the Ukrainian lands by different political regimes.
A brief analysis of the general initial data (time, conditions, content) of the relevant norms, as well as the author’s opinion on the functional definition of the essence of the studied phenomenon.
The opinion about the Ukrainian traditions of the names of the organizational and legal form of associations of citizens is thoroughly presented.

The dynamics of attention to the phenomenon of "public organization" in the content of the norms of all Constitutions, which were put into effect outside the Ukrainian lands, shows several important aspects. First, the existence of an institution in Ukrainian society is a good sign of collectivism. We believe that the voluntary organization of citizens in the form of a collective association to protect their interests is a national tradition of Ukrainians and has a long history. Secondly, the mentioned official names for the definition of associations of citizens (union, organization, public organization) trace the evolution of respect for collective forms of associations of citizens from traditional national (during the Ukrainian Revolution of 1917 – 1920) to unified and partially Russified ( in the Soviet period). Third, the traditional section on the rights and responsibilities of citizens in the content of such fundamental state documents as the Constitution is a sign of the state’s understanding of the importance of public grouping of Ukrainians to perform various functions aimed at ensuring the collective interests of society and interaction with the state. Fourth, the difference in the content of the relevant norms of the Constitutions indicates the different attitude of different political regimes to public organizations and their functional capabilities. In the future, it is possible to adjust the research to a comparative analysis of the evolution of the content of special laws on associations of citizens, their functional and organizational features and diversity in comparison with the constitutional sources of the respective years.