Lev Dobriansky

Dobriansky was born on November 9, 1918, in New York City, the son of Ruthenian emigrants from Western Ukraine (then Austria-Hungary). His father, Ivan (John), was born in Kalush and his mother, Eugenia (née Greszczuk), emigrated in 1910. He had a brother, Bohdan. He received an undergraduate degree in 1941 and a master's degree in 1943 from New York University, where he was an instructor of economics throughout the 1940s. He received his doctorate from NYU in 1951.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/05/AR2008020503179.html?tid=informbox|newspaper=Washington Post|title=Lev E. Dobriansky, 89; Professor and Foe of Communism|date=February 6, 2008|first=Joe|last=Holley}} His dissertation was a critique of the economist Thorstein Veblen.Knight, Frank H. [http://ann.sagepub.com/cgi/content/citation/321/1/196 Review of Veblenism: A New Critique by Lev E. Dobriansky]. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 321, No. 1, pp. 196-197 (January 1959). [http://www.doi.org/10.1177/000271625932100175 doi:10.1177/000271625932100175]. {{S2CID|145473487}}. He would later publish his

Dobriansky taught economics at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., from 1948 until his retirement in 1987. During his tenure there, he became a professor emeritus and taught such classes as "Soviet Economics."{{cite web|url=http://www.georgetown.edu/undergrad/bulletin/emeriti.html|publisher=Georgetown University|title=Professors Emeriti|url-status=dead|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20080214110024/http://www12.georgetown.edu/undergrad/bulletin/emeriti.html|archivedate=2008-02-14}}{{cite web|url=http://www.acuf.org/issues/issue101/commentslev.asp |title=A Georgetown student remembers Prof. Dobriansky |publisher=American Conservative Union |url-status=usurped |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20090106055250/http://acuf.org/issues/issue101/commentslev.asp |archivedate=January 6, 2009 }} Among his students was Kateryna Yushchenko (née Chumachenko), the future First Lady of Ukraine.{{cite web|url=http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/9123.html|title=Mrs. Kateryna Yushchenko's speech during сommemoration servise {{sic|hide=y}} in memory of Lev Dobryanskiy|date=2008-02-19|first=Kateryna|last=Yushchenko|authorlink=Kateryna Yushchenko|publisher=Press office of President Victor Yushchenko|url-status=dead|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110519055321/http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/9123.html|archivedate=2011-05-19}} In 1970, he founded and directed the Institute on Comparative Political and Economic Systems at Georgetown.{{cite news|url=http://www.thehoya.com/node/15297 |title=Obituary |work=The Hoya |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20080516222011/http://www.thehoya.com/node/15297 |archivedate=May 16, 2008 }}

Dobriansky was also a faculty member at the National War College from 1957 to 1958, and served as a consultant for the United States Department of State, the International Communication Agency, and the United States House of Representatives.

Dobriansky briefly worked in an official capacity in Chile (1975–1976).{{Citation needed|date=April 2008}}

On October 25, 1982, Dobriansky was nominated by President Ronald Reagan as Ambassador to the Bahamas, succeed the previous ambassador, William B. Schwartz.{{cite web|url=http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=41909|title=Nomination of Lev E. Dobriansky To Be United States Ambassador to the Bahamas|date=October 25, 1982|first=Ronald|last=Reagan|authorlink=Ronald Reagan|publisher=The American Presidency Project}} Dobriansky remained on this post until August 30, 1986.{{cite web|url=https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/po/com/10379.htm|title=List of American ambassadors to the Bahamas|publisher=Office of the Historian}}

Dobriansky was the chairman of National Captive Nations Committee (NCNC). of which the local committees were often allied with the Banderite wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists.{{Cite web|title=Register of the Lev E. Dobriansky papers|url=https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt9w10382r/entire_text/|access-date=2021-02-23|website=oac.cdlib.org}}{{Cite web |title= Seven Decades of Nazi Collaboration: America's Dirty Little Ukraine Secret|url=https://fpif.org/seven-decades-nazi-collaboration-americas-dirty-little-ukraine-secret |access-date=20 August 2022|website=Foreign Policy in Focus|date=18 March 2014 }} Dobriansky wrote the Captive Nations Week Resolution, which was adopted by the United States Congress and signed into law by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in July 1959. As a result of his activism, this resolution has been proclaimed every year by each successive president.{{cite news|url=http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080209/EDITORIAL/396090091|title=Lev Dobriansky|date=February 9, 2008|work=Washington Times}}{{dead link|date=December 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} He also founded and chaired for many years the related National Captive Nations Committee, which advocated for the nations memorialized in the resolution.

In September, 1960, Dobriansky testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee on the role of Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev in crimes against the Ukrainian people perpetrated by his predecessor, Joseph Stalin, such as the Holodomor.{{cite news|title=Crimes of Khrushchev Against the Ukrainian People|url=http://www.ukrweekly.com/old/archive/1960/1796003.shtml|accessdate=1 July 2015|work=The Ukrainian Weekly|date=17 September 1960}}

In 1993, Congress authorized the NCNC to begin raising funds to build a Victims of Communism Memorial.{{cite web|url=http://bulk.resource.org/gpo.gov/bills/103/hj237ih.txt|title=Joint resolution to authorize the construction of an international monument in the District of Columbia to honor the victims of Communism|last=Rohrabacher|first=Dana|authorlink=Dana Rohrabacher|date=July 23, 1993|publisher=House of Representatives|access-date=April 16, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100508162107/http://bulk.resource.org/gpo.gov/bills/103/hj237ih.txt|archive-date=May 8, 2010|url-status=dead|df=mdy-all}} To this end, Dobriansky helped create the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, along with such notables as Lee Edwards, Grover Norquist, and Zbigniew Brzezinski.{{cite news| url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F03E5DD1539F930A15751C1A963958260 | work=The New York Times | first=Dinitia | last=Smith | title=For the Victims of Communism | date=December 23, 1995}} He served as the foundation's first chairman. After many years of fundraising and advocacy, the Memorial was finally completed on June 12, 2007, less than a year before Dobriansky's death.{{cite news|url=http://www.america.gov/st/washfile-english/2007/June/20070612153648idybeekcm0.967312.html|title=President Bush Dedicates Memorial to Victims of Communism|date=12 June 2007|first=David|last=McKeeby|work=America.gov|url-status=dead|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20080411174409/http://www.america.gov/st/washfile-english/2007/June/20070612153648idybeekcm0.967312.html|archivedate=11 April 2008}}

Dobriansky also played a role in the construction of another Washington, D.C., monument - a statue of Taras Shevchenko, the Ukrainian nationalist and artist.{{cite web|url=http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=25023 |title=Remembering 'Mr. Captive Nations' Lev Dobriansky |publisher=Human Events |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20080318120055/http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=25023 |archivedate=March 18, 2008 }}

Dobriansky was involved in the Ukrainian National Information Service, the American Council for World Freedom, the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America, and the United States Council for World freedom.{{Citation needed|date=April 2008}}

File:Pdobriansky.jpg

Notices after his death on January 30, 2008, include a press office release from the former president of Ukraine, Viktor Yushchenko.{{cite web|url=http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/8842.html|title=V. Yushchenko moarns L. Dobriansky's death|date=2008-02-01|publisher=Press office of President Victor Yushchenko|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20120207180135/http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/8842.html|archivedate=2012-02-07 }}

The foreign policy expert and former diplomat Paula Dobriansky, his daughter, is a trustee of the foundation he helped establish, the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation.{{cite web |title=Amb. Paula J. Dobriansky, Ph.D. |url=https://victimsofcommunism.org/leader/hon-paula-dobriansky-phd/ |website=Victims of Communism |language=en}}

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Books

• Veblenism: A New Critique. Public Affairs Press, 1957. Introduction by James Burnham.
• [https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/22930/file.pdf The Vulnerable Russians]. Pageant Press, 1967.
• U.S.A. and the Soviet Myth. Devin-Adair Company, 1971.

Published addresses

• [https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/22166/file.pdf The Non-Russian Nations in the U.S.S.R.: Focal Point in America's Policy of National Liberation.]

::"... a very able address ... at the conference on psychological strategy in the cold war, held in Washington on Friday, February 22, 1952."McMahon, Brien. [https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/22166/file.pdf "Extension of Remarks of Hon. Brien McMahon of Connecticut."] In: Dobriansky, Lev. [https://diasporiana.org.ua/wp-content/uploads/books/22166/file.pdf The Non-Russian Nations in the U.S.S.R.: Focal Point in America's Policy of National Liberation]. Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1952, p. 1.

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{{succession box|title=United States Ambassador to Bahamas|before=William Bernstein Schwartz Jr.|after=Carol Boyd Hallett|years=1982 – 1986}}

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Category:Economists from New York (state)

Category:1918 births

Category:2008 deaths

Category:Diplomats from New York City

Category:New York University alumni

Category:Georgetown University faculty

Category:American people of Ukrainian descent

Category:Ambassadors of the United States to the Bahamas

Category:20th-century American economists

Category:New York (state) Republicans

Category:American anti-communists