POSTAVENIE RUSÍNSKEJ A UKRAJINSKEJ MENŠINY NA SLOVENSKU V PODMIENKACH ČESKOSLOVENSKA (1918–1992)

The authors of the study present the development of legal and social status of the ethnic minority of Ruthenians and Ukrainians in Slovakia during the existence of the Czechoslovak state. Based on recent scholarship, in the first part of the study the authors characterize basic features of the minority and explain factors and circumstances which contributed to the annexation of the territories populated by this minority by the Czechoslovak state. The fact that Ruthenians and Ukrainians lived continuously on the annexed territory, as well as the factor of establishing of the formally autonomous region of Subcar- pathian Ruthenia, meant that members of this minority were characterized by several specifics which are dealt with in detail in the study. The democratic regime of the Czechoslovak Republic (1918–1938) enabled development of self-governed minority bodies in the benefit of the members of the community. After the restoration of Czechoslovakia and the definitive separation from the majority of ethnicities, the new political conditions leads to artificial inter- ventions in the ethnic minority ethnogenesis. This has led to a decline in its number and weakening of national attributes. After the collapse of the communist regime, the development of the minority is limited, especially, by its partition and some temporary consequences of social transformation in Slovakia.