Yes, a strong consensus among many historians, the Ukrainian government, and several other nations holds that the Holodomor was intentionally targeted against Ukrainians as a national and ethnic group, and constitutes an act of genocide.
The famine, which occurred in 1932-1933 and killed millions, was caused by the policies of Joseph Stalin's Soviet regime. While a broader famine affected other parts of the Soviet Union, a series of specific, lethal decrees were aimed primarily at Ukraine and the largely Ukrainian-populated Kuban region of Russia.
Evidence for the Targeting of Ukrainians
Suppression of Ukrainian National Identity: Stalin and other Soviet leaders felt threatened by Ukraine's strengthening cultural autonomy and sought to destroy the Ukrainian independence movement. Repressive policies included the decimation of Ukrainian intellectual, cultural, and church elites, and the forced promotion of a "new Soviet identity" and the Russian language.
Disproportionate Policies: Policies such as excessively high grain procurement quotas, blacklisting of entire villages (which meant confiscating all food and supplies), and a law that made stealing even a few stalks of grain punishable by execution were implemented with particular severity in Ukraine.
Blocking Movement: In January 1933, the Soviet government issued a secret decree that prevented Ukrainian peasants from leaving their villages or the Ukrainian SSR in search of food, effectively sealing the borders and trapping them in the famine-stricken areas.
Statistical Bias: Recent research using disaggregated data found that regions with a higher share of ethnic Ukrainians were collectivized more intensely, subjected to higher grain procurement rates, and experienced significantly higher famine mortality, even when controlling for other factors like weather or agricultural productivity.
Historical Consensus
The debate among scholars largely centers on whether the famine was an intentional plan to cause mass death, or if it was an "instrumentalization" of an already-developing famine to punish resistance and suppress Ukrainian nationalism. However, most agree that the Soviet regime intentionally worsened the famine for political and national reasons and is responsible for the mass deaths.
Ukraine, the U.S. Congress, the European Parliament, and 33 other countries have officially recognized the Holodomor as a genocide.
