He also was a member of the Austrian parliament, chaired the Shevchenko Scientific Society and held the post of secretary of education and religious affairs of the West Ukrainian National Republic.

Oleksander Barvinsky was born on June 8, 1847, in Shliakhtyntsi, a village near Ternopil in western Ukraine (at the time, part of Austria-Hungary), into the family of a Ukrainian Catholic priest.

Like many Western-Ukrainian priestly families Barvinskys were of noble origin and belonged to Jastrzębiec coat of arms.

Even after most Ukrainian leaders abandoned this approach by 1894, Barvinsky along with Anatole Vakhnianyn refused to reconsider their positions and together with him formed the political party "Catholic Ruthenian-Social Union".

When Austria-Hungary fell apart following the First World War, Barvinsky became the minister of education and religious affairs of the West Ukrainian National Republic,[2] retiring from political life after the Poles captured the capital of Lviv.