МОДЕРНА ПОЛІТИЧНА МЕНТАЛЬНІСТЬ УКРАЇНСЬКОГО НАРОДУ

Problem setting. Consideration of the basic contemporary mental characteristics of the Ukrainian people will make it possible to better understand the global perspective of the newest state building in Ukraine.Recent research and publications analysis. Mentality is thoroughly investigated by many scholars as a sociocultural phenomenon in all its diversity and complexity (S. Acreman, R. Dodonov, J. Dyubi, D. Eber, G. Gachev, M. Gubanov, V. Gulay, L. Herasina, L. Levy-Bruhl et al.). Particular attention deserves works that explore the phenomenon of Ukrainian mentality in all its diversity.Paper objective. The purpose of this article is to identify the modern political and mental characteristics of the Ukrainian people based on an analysis of its long-standing and recent historical experience.Paper main body. The article reveals the historical context and specific features of the modern political mentality of the Ukrainian people. The most important mental characteristics of Ukrainians are established using methods of historical description and sociological survey. Today, community-centeredness is a necessary mental lever for the process of decentralization, which thanks to the efforts of the central Ukrainian authorities led by the President of Ukraine P. O. Poroshenko is gaining momentum in modern Ukraine and has full support from the overwhelming majority of the population. This is the case when Ukrainians are typical Europeans for whom the efficient system of local self-government acts as the basis of the regime of the political polyarchy. The dominant factor in the specifics of the mental basis of Ukrainianity is long-term statelessness. This factor led to the emergence and existence of statist (state) anomie as an integral part of the political mentality of the Ukrainian people.Non-government led to the apparent disunity of Ukrainian ethnic territories in time. The affiliation of the Ukrainian lands to the Austro-Hungarian, Russian empires, Czecho-slovakia, Poland, Romania influenced the traditions, life and culture of various groups of the Ukrainian people. For example, anarchism, collectivism and paternalism are considered to be decisive for the mentality of the Dnieper people, compared with the Galician national consciousness and identification in them is much weaker.On the other hand, the mentality of Galician Ukrainians was constantly in the field of Western European culture (Polish, German, and Austrian). An important role in the mental setting of