For close to 150 years, from the late 18th to the early 20th centuries, Ukrainians lived in two empires: about 80% of them were subjects of the Russian emperors, and the remainder inhabited the Habsburg empire.*
Thus, at the dawn of the modern era, Ukrainians found themselves in political systems that were radically different from those to which they had been accustomed. Like all empires, those of the Russian Romanovs and the Austrian Habsburgs were vast territorial conglomerates containing huge populations of ethnically and culturally diverse peoples.
Political power was highly centralized and vested in the person of the emperor, who saw no need to take into account the views or desires of his subjects. Emperors and their officials demanded absolute obedience and loyalty from their subjects, viewing these obligations not only as political duties, but also as moral and religious ones. In return for subservience, empires promised their subjects security, stability, and order. It was an arrangement that many of the empire’s subjects found reasonable and even attractive.In governing their numerous and widely scattered subjects, emperors depended primarily on the army and the bureaucracy. The army defended and, if the opportunity arose, expanded imperial borders. It could also serve to preserve internal order. The bureaucracy extracted taxes (most of which went to support itself and the army) and attempted to arrange society in a manner that best served the interests of the empire. In contrast to the nobles – both Ukrainian starshyna and Polish szlachta – who dominated Ukrainian society in the 18th century and acted on the principle of the less government, the better, the imperial bureaucrats who governed in the 19th century believed that the more rules and regulations they imposed on society, the better off society would be. Although local elites continued to be important, it was increasingly imperial ministers, based in far-off capitals, who made the crucial decisions that affected the lives of Ukrainians.