This first case study of how the East European peasantry was drawn into national politics focuses on the Ukrainians of Galicia (1772–1914). On the basis of first-hand testimony by peasants and rural notables, it demonstrates that the peasants' political consciousness was forged by serfdom, reforms initiated by the state, and the penetration of a money economy.

This book breaks new ground on related issues, including the connection between class and national consciouness, the reasons for a sharp exacerbation of the peasantry's antagonism toward Jews, the new role of generational differences in the village, and the place of rural women in the national movement.

Winner of the 1989 Antonovych Foundation History Prize Co-published with the Macmillan Press and St. Martin's Press. See Bukovyna, Carpathian Mountains, Principality of Galicia-Volhynia, Dilo, and Boyars in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine.