For the first time in historical scholarship, the dissertation provides a comprehensive analysis of the genesis of research into the history of industry in the Ukrainian SSR in the postwar period (1946–1965). It establishes that the existing historiography covers only certain aspects of the problem and therefore does not offer a holistic reconstruction of the historiographical process, nor of the trends in methodology and research agendas of different historiographical schools and approaches. The study analyzes the narratives of Soviet, Western, diaspora, and contemporary Ukrainian scholars, their theoretical and methodological foundations and conceptual apparatus, and on this basis determines the current state, completeness, and reliability of research on the history of industry in the Ukrainian SSR in the postwar twenty-year period (1946–1965). The works of Ukrainian scholars that had not previously been the subject of historiographical analysis are examined, and a range of relevant topics for future concrete-historical studies is identified. The content of works by Western scholars that had likewise not previously been subjected to historiographical analysis is also investigated.
The periodization of the historiography of industrial development in the Ukrainian SSR (1946–1965), the classification of the entire body of historiographical sources, the list of falsified and insufficiently studied areas in the history of the Ukrainian SSR’s postwar industry (1946–1965), and the key vectors for future concrete-historical research have been refined.
Further development has been achieved in the process of rethinking a number of conclusions and conceptual approaches dominant in Soviet, Western, and diaspora historiography; a number of analytical discrepancies in works on the history of the postwar industry of the Ukrainian SSR have been refuted. The theoretical, methodological, and conceptual apparatus of historiographical research has also been further specified and refined.
It has been demonstrated that Soviet historiographers did not question the methodological foundations of the works they analyzed, which in turn made it impossible to identify new directions and perspectives. Research was conducted in full accordance with the views of the party-state leadership and focused on the analysis of decisions adopted by the party and the course of their implementation. The real mechanisms of preparation and decision-making were not studied. The historiographer, like the historian, usually retold the content of particular fundamental political decisions and then, on the basis of concrete material, demonstrated the activities of the party and the government in implementing them: at the beginning of a period, prerequisites were formed and tasks were set; at the end of the period, the tasks were declared fulfilled. Soviet historiography was characterized by the concept of the linear development of socialism. Researchers viewed the past as a movement toward a supposedly non-contradictory present, from the vantage point of which the study itself was conducted. Under such conditions, only those features of the past were to be noticed that had led to the current state of affairs. This situation persisted in Soviet historical scholarship until the late 1980s. In historiographical works, a bibliographical and descriptive rather than a critical and analytical approach prevailed.
At the same time, the authors of historiographical studies raised the issue of the need for a comprehensive study of the history of industrial development, changes in research methods, and the adjustment of judgments and conclusions in accordance with the real content of processes in the industry of the Ukrainian SSR. The theoretical and practical significance of the dissertation lies in the systematization and generalization of the historiographical narrative and in its interpretation within the framework of the latest trends in the genesis of world and Ukrainian historiographical scholarship.
The theoretical significance of the dissertation consists in expanding and conceptually developing the scholarly understanding of the industrial history of the Ukrainian SSR in the postwar period (1946–1965) as an independent field of research.
The author conducts a systematic examination of the emergence and development of historiographical narratives in Soviet, Western, diaspora, and contemporary Ukrainian scholarship, demonstrating the dependence of methodological approaches and research questions on the political context, the availability of sources, and the prevailing academic paradigms and worldviews. On this basis, the dissertation refines the periodization and classification of historical works and delineates the boundaries of the scholarly validity of existing interpretations.
