Recent years have shown that trends in globalization, digitization, demographic change, migration, and others have exacerbated the problem of employment imbalances, which have a serious impact on global and national labour markets. It is noted that this problem will be exacerbated in the nearest future by the shock effect of the COVID-19 pandemic announced by WHO in March 2020. It has been stated that for national governments, this necessitates a focus on addressing the problem of imbalances in the internal labour markets through public policy instruments. For Ukraine, this is also important in the context of achieving the objectives of the Association Agreement with the EU, since imbalances in employment are one of the causes of the socio-economic divergence between them, which has been observed since 2014. The main types of imbalances in the labour markets of Ukraine and the European Union are shown. The dynamics of convergence and divergence processes at the EU-Ukraine level in the employment sector are evaluated, and the potential consequences of these processes are identified. The EU's current approaches and programmatic tools to tackle imbalances and divergence in employment are comprehensively described. Based on a critical approach, a general description of the current state of the labour market of Ukraine and its state policy in the sphere of labour and protection of social and labour rights of people is given. The most urgent problems in terms of employment, quantity and quality of jobs, dynamics of labour migration, etc., which have resulted from fragmentation and neglect of such policy are identified. A number of recommendations have been developed on the first steps of Ukraine's public policy aimed at balancing national and regional labour markets and overcoming divergence with the European Union in the field of employment. It is stated that the relevant state policy should be implemented in two stages. Firstly, in the near future, due to the spread of the pandemic coronavirus infection, it is necessary to adopt and urgently implement the Crisis Measures Program, developed based on the OECD Recommendations on urgent employment and social policy actions needed to support the population and business in supporting the population and business with the COVID-19 pandemic. During the second stage -in the period after the cessation of the pandemic of the coronavirus and the abolition of the quarantine regime, the first steps should be the adoption of new labour legislation of Ukraine, comprehensive programs for preserving existing and creating new jobs, strengthening the institutional role of the State Employment Service, improving the domestic remuneration system and other activities.

The paper presents the expediency of the formation and implementation of post-war Ukraine state policy under the basics of the social quality scientific concept, used to improve the social parameters of the European Union development. The authors discuss the general theoretical basis of the social quality concept, the essential milestones of its development, key foundations and concepts, and the approaches proposed by the UN Economic and Social Council, the UN Economic Commission for Europe, the International Labour Organization, the International Association on Social Quality to ensure modern societies’ social quality of life, its quantitative and qualitative assessment. Attention is focused on the expediency of the post-war introduction of the social quality approach into the system of state administration of Ukraine, which can help politicians and citizens to rethink the strategy of Ukrainian society development in the European direction based on socio-economic security, social cohesion, social inclusion, guaranteed social opportunities, and to root social values of equality, solidarity, social justice, and human dignity. The authors determined the relevance of the need to adapt the international approaches of social quality to the implementation in the functioning and development of Ukraine’s public administration system in the reconstruction of post-war Ukraine, focusing primarily on overcoming the consequences of the war. The paper shows the critical importance of the efforts that Ukraine has made since the beginning of the war to support the institutional and financial sustainability of the national social protection system and the implementation of state policy measures to promote employment and prevent the destruction of the national labour market. It is argued that the introduction into the system of public administration of post-war Ukraine of the concept of social quality adapted to domestic conditions should contribute to the “social contract” to gradually find a reasonable balance between two priorities: simultaneous increase of efforts to systematically eliminate threats of external aggression and accelerated restoration of the national socio-economic space on the principles of sustainable, inclusive development.

The peculiarities of state’s key social priorities formation amid a combination of multiple cascading economic and political crises are shown. The impact of global crisis factors on the prospects of national social development in the context of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 is revealed. Taking into account the experience of such global crises as the financial and economic crisis of 2008-2009, the COVID-19 pandemic-driven "coronacrisis", and the crisis associated with the Russia-Ukraine war, the key role of labor and employment sphere in post-crisis recovery is substantiated. On the example of Ukraine, the key social priorities in the situation of military shocks caused by the Russian Federation’s full-scale armed invasion are defined. It is shown that the formation of national social priorities and relevant directions of state policy for post-war Ukraine should be based on the following modern international approaches: 1) of the National Academy of Social Insurance (USA) – regarding the provision of social pillars of state's economic security and their financial stability; 2) of the European Union – regarding the implementation of the social quality policy and the actualization of welfare state model. Recommendations on the formation of the state policy of Ukraine in the (post)war period are developed and offered in order to provide the social pillars of economic security and ensure their financial stability in the following areas of state regulation: 1) labor and employment policy; 2) social payments, guarantees and benefits policy; 3) the policy of securing individual incomes; 4) social equality policy. For the conditions of the post-war recovery of Ukraine, it is proposed to expand the theoretical construction of social pillars with additional – demographic and labor – pillar of state's economic security.