• The “referendum” in Crimea held on 16 March 2014 fulfilled the criteria of neither legality nor legitimacy.• The “referendum” was conducted in breach of Ukraine’s domestic, bilateral (Ukraine-Russia) and international legal frameworks.• The procedure for the preparation and conduct of the “referendum” on the day, including its international observation, was entirely inadequate. • The “referendum” cannot be considered as a legitimate expression of popular will due to the violation of the criteria of free and fair voting and due to the actual number of voters and their choices being unknown. • The “referendum” creates a precedent of illegal irredentism in interstate politics and a violation of international law.This note provides an analysis of the legality and legitimacy of the so-called referendum on the status of Crimea held on 16 March 2014. It is argued that the “referendum” fulfilled neither criteria and hence cannot be considered either as legally valid or legitimately representative of public opinion. In conclusion the following points are made: first, a standpoint in both the Russian and Western mass-media of interpreting the “referendum” as a proxy for an opinion poll is misguided. Second, the “referendum” undermines political stability in Ukraine and beyond as it sets a precedent for illegal irredentism portrayed as democratic process.
The history of Polish-Russian relations had been dominated by the serious problems ranging from war and occupation to regional rivalry. The relations are no better shape in the past two decades. Probably, the recent period has witnessed an escalation of a number of crises emanating from historical memory and clashing geopolitical concerns. There has been an expanding third party factor in the relations following Poland's joining NATO in 1999 and entrance to the European Union in 2004. Russian relations with the U.S. and the EU are coming under increasing stress because of the problematic Russian-Polish relations. Poland has a strategically important position in Eastern Europe. It is one of the transit countries for Russian natural gas to the EU, which makes Poland important to both Russia and the EU. The U.S.-Poland talks to place a part of a proposed U.S. missile defense system in Poland illustrates the significance of this strategic position on the Western frontier of Eurasia and the newly conceptualized Greater Middle East. The strains on Russian-Polish relations are not restricted to foreign policy and security issues. There is also a strong domestic dimension with a highly sensitive perception of historical legacy of the relations and rising societal tension toward each other. For that reason, minor problems may turn into serious debates and diplomatic scandals between the two states. In this sense, Russian-Polish relations preserve a unique mechanism of problem creation utilizing domestic and foreign policy issues. There is a tendency to explain the Russian-Polish relations through the impact of a number of recent and short term developments. However, the roots of the problematic situation should be found in more than a thousand years of historical relations. Poland has history has left traces of pain and suffering in the collective consciousness of Polish people. There is a common sense that Russia had been behind all these negative developments. We hold the idea that the relations have structural patterns and only a comprehensive analysis which goes beyond the myopic focus on current problems may help to discover the root causes and the determinants of the relations between these two states. In this article, we will discuss the Polish-Russian relations putting emphasis on the long-lasting influences of the burden of historical relations and clashing geopolitical concerns. In this sense, first part of this article outlines the historical development of these relations. We will next analyze the role and influence of the burden of history in the problematic relations. It will be followed by a further analysis of the clashing geopolitical concerns between Russia and Poland. Finally, we will discuss what lies ahead and how future relations will be shaped. Historical Background Poles belong to the Western Slavic part of the Slavic peoples and their first state was established by the Piast Dynasty in 966. After the emergence of a common Russian threat, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland created a joint entity in 1386 and began to be known as the Commonwealth of Both States (Poland and Lithuania) (Rzeczpospolita Obojga Narodow) or known in short as Rzeczpospolita. Under the Jagiellon dynasty's rule, which lasted until 1572, this Commonwealth became one of the most powerful states in Eastern Europe ruling in territories from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea. In today's terms, the Commonwealth consisted of Lithuania, Belarusia, Poland, Ukraine, Latvia, Estonia, and Kaliningrad, parts of Russia, Hungary, Czech Republic and Slovakia. The major challenge to the Commonwealth was endless Russian threats and subsequent attacks. Russia waged violent and severe wars against Sweden and Poland in the first half of 17th century. Poland's armies invaded first Smolensk and later Moscow in 1611. A Russian patriot, Kuzman Minin, organized a people's army in Nijniy Novgorod and freed Moscow from Polish invasion on 4 November 1612. …
Stojan Protic (1857-1923) was main leader of Serbia's Radical Party from its 1881 creation almost until his 1923 death and an outstanding journalist. In earlier studies, have described his role in the party and press until 1913. Here will cover the final turbulent decade of his fine career. In 1913 major controversy erupted between Interior Minister Protic, representing the Radical Party, and Serbian ministers and military officers support by May Conspirators, who in 1903 removed the Obrenovic dynasty and murdered its rulers bringing emigre Petar Karadjordjevic to Serbia's throne as King Petar I. He became an excellent moderate ruler, popular with the Serbian people. The May Conspirators' organization, Black Hand formed in 1912, was led by capable Colonel Dragutin Dimitrijevic-Apis, key player in the 1903 May Coup. The drama of 1913-1914 centered in parts of Macedonia obtained by Serbia in the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913, and threatened to become civil-military confrontation endangering King Petar and his regime. In April 14 Interior Minister Protic issued Priority Decree giving predominance to civilian officials in Serbian Macedonia opposing the priority Serbian officers had enjoyed there. Colonel Apis became involved in bitter struggle with Protic's Radical Party and with Prince Aleksandar Karadjordjevic. Apis declared: I never believed [Nikola] Pasic, Stojan Protic and the Radical Party would oppose us, i.e., officers in Serbian Macedonia. I complain most about Pasic and Protic since we had not expected this persecution from them. (1) Initially, Serbian officers enjoyed clear priority in Macedonia, while Belgrade delayed naming proper civilian officials there. Should the military continue to rule Macedonia, or an interim civil administration? The Pasic cabinet decided on the latter. (2) Acting briefly as war minister in January 1914, Stojan Protic then strongly opposed the May conspirators. Amidst rumors that Belgrade might name civilian like Protic as regular war minister, Black Hand officers, led by Colonel Apis, met in the Danube Division's staff room January 15th to plan strategy. Rumors spread that the Radical cabinet would retire Apis and other Black Hand officers from the army. (3) Black Hand's newspaper, Pijemont, denounced civilian and police officials, named from loyal Radicals, for bribery and corruption. (4) British envoys reported Serbia's Macedonian civilian administration was incompetent since the Radicals had installed uneducated and corrupt cronies. Allegedly, Black Hand had sentenced Pasic and Protic to death. (5) For months in 1913-1914, Pijemont accused Protic and the Radicals of denying the army needed funds, involving it in party feuds, and quarrelling with top officers. Allegedly, Protic saw praetorians in his sleep, and undermined public confidence in army leaders. Protic, it asserted, a disturber of the peace, must be removed from the (6) Protic's Priority Decree almost toppled the Pasic cabinet, threatening to provoke military coup by angry officers. Granting most authority to civil police, Protic's Decree confirmed army subordination to the state. (7) In Macedonia, claimed Pijemont, Protic's police plundered the populace and humiliated army officers. His Decree allegedly opened gulf between policy and army in Macedonia. (8) Protic's Interior Ministry blocked Pijemont's dissemination in Macedonia. Each passing day revealed officers virtually united against Protic and the Radical cabinet. Several Macedonian garrisons petitioned to rescind the Decree and General Petar Bojovic telegraphed from Skoplje, Macedonia, on recision to the War Minister. (9) As Opposition leaders criticized Protic and backed the officers, Premier Pasic faced potentially united Opposition which left parliament (Skupstina). Pasic's cabinet clung to slim majority, so if seven Radical members were absent, no business could be transacted. …
In the first decades after its demise in 1918, the Austro-Hungarian Empire's collapse assumed a decided air of inevitability in the national histories of the day. Scholarship since the Second World War, reflecting greater skepticism towards the nationalist agendas that superseded the multinational state, has generally adopted a more objective tone regarding the causes of its collapse. Samuel R. Williamson Jr., for example, concluded: Habsburg monarchy had problems to be sure in 1912, but its future did not appear more uncertain than at earlier times in its history. Indeed, the Dual Monarchy appeared to have a vitality that would ensure its survival. (1) This modern view seconds that of Baron Istvan Burian von Rajecz, the Austro-Hungarian Foreign Minister for much of the war, who wrote in his memoirs: We, the official protectors of the venerable structure [of the state], were convinced of its adaptability to new developments. (2) The later President of the Austrian Republic, Karl Renner, also echoed this sentiment. Describing the Habsburg realm in 1918 in terms that foreshadowed the European Union, he wrote: Therefore, the smaller nations have every reason to abolish the inequality of their natural existence, their defenselessness and helplessness alongside the greater nations, by joining a supranational association based on law. Such an association cannot eliminate their natural inequality, yet it can guarantee them continued existence and the ability to act on the world stage. (3) In contrast, Count Ottokar Czernin, Burian's successor as Foreign Minister, concluded gloomily in his memoirs: We were bound to die. However, even he conceded that options, however limited, existed for the Dual Monarchy: We were at liberty to choose the manner of our death, and we chose the most terrible. (4) One wonders what constituted death for the conservative aristocrat, and whether the choices confronting the Habsburg government between 1914 and 1918 all would have led to the state's dissolution. Even the conclusion of Robert A. Kann, doyen of Habsburg studies for much of the twentieth century, to the effect that for Habsburg policy-makers there generally was no right course but only a choice between greater and lesser evils, might be deemed unduly pessimistic. (5) As a multinational state, the Austro-Hungarian Empire certainly faced severe challenges in the last years of its existence. Not least of these was the reality that its foreign policy was driven in large measure by internal, national considerations. As Count Leopold Berchtold, the prewar Minister of Foreign Affairs, concluded in 1914 on the eve of the Sarajevo assassination crisis: Because of the events of the last years, an intensive relationship has been formed between foreign policy and those national questions which are connected with an irredentist movement supported from abroad, so that a firm conduct of foreign affairs, without the knowledge of internal treatment of these national questions, has become impossible. (6) If the relationship of the various Habsburg nationalities to each other and to the dynasty was complicated, and the foreign policy determined by those realities no less so, the outbreak of the World War offered the opportunity for more radical departures in both areas. With room in certain cases for both national agendas and dynastic loyalty, the multinational state's dissolution was anything but a foregone conclusion in the summer of 1914. One national group within the Dual Monarchy, the Poles, not only supported the Habsburg war effort, but actively and openly advocated Polish national unification as one of Austria-Hungary's war aims. Unique among the nationalities, they did so with the general consent and support of the Austrian government. This reflected the privileged and loyal position that the Poles occupied in the Habsburg state structure. As an adjunct to the Ausgleich of 1867, the Poles were granted widespread political and cultural autonomy in Galicia. …
'Energy security' is a growing public concern. (1) With energy prices rising from a combination of growing demand relative to available supplies, major consuming countries are struggling to formulate effective long-term energy policies. Highly dependent on relatively few energy sources and producing regions, most European Union (EU) member states have only begun to appreciate the urgency of this task. Their predicament became dramatically apparent in the winter of 2006, when Russia's Gazprom monopoly halted natural gas supplies to Ukraine, with the cut-off reverberating much further west, as Ukrainian territory conveys four fifths of Russia's gas exports to Europe. Given the heavy reliance of various EU member states and candidate countries on Former Soviet Union (FSU) gas, Betina Ferraro-Waldner, the EU's external relations commissioner, called the Russo-Ukrainian gas dispute an 'eye-opener', dramatically elevating the status of energy on the Union's foreign policy agenda. (2) The EU has recently come to recognise that Turkey may be able to offer crucial strategic advantages in this area. (3) In signing a recent intergovernmental agreement to back the building of the Nabucco gas pipeline that will connect Europe with various non-Russian sources of gas from the East via Turkey, EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs stated that this project is 'essential to Europe and the EU's most important gas supply project'. (4) Going further, Emma Bonino, Italian Minister of International Trade and European Affairs, expressed that 'Turkey is an important energy corridor' to suggest that various controversial issues, such as the one over Cyprus, would not block Turkey's EU membership. (5) As discussed herein, such declarations are based on assumptions that require closer scrutiny. One is that EU economies need to increase the security of their energy sources. The second premise is that the EU has to project greater influence over its major energy suppliers--Middle East, Caspian Basin and Russia--in order to attain this diversification. The third is that Turkey, inside of the EU rather than as a nonmember, will be instrumental in giving the Union this influence. The final assumption is that Turkey can provide an alternative East-West energy transportation route at a reasonable cost. The paper analyses these major premises to assess the relative utility of Turkey in Europe's quest to ensure secure access to energy sources and how this would affect Turkey's membership prospects in the decade to come. Our conclusion is that the value of Turkey for the EU from an energy-security angle is becoming vital. Although increasing awareness of Turkey's valuable role in this regard does not automatically make EU member states more receptive to the prospects of Turkey's accession into the Union, the fact that Europe's capacity to meet projected energy demand from existing supplies remains tenuous argues for a more positive EU attitude towards Turkish membership in the Union. This does not necessarily mean that the EU cannot obtain its goal of energy security without Turkey as a full member, but the alternatives involve European access to energy at a much higher price both economically and politically. The EU Needs More 'Secure' Energy Until recently, no significant common policy had emerged regarding security of energy and energy imports in the EU area. Energy has never been included in the EU founding treaties because 'it was considered strategic' by the members. (6) The European Commission's 'Green Paper' of November 2000 highlighted the shortcomings and risks inherent in EU members' individualistic policies and initiated a serious debate on the need for 'secure' energy supplies. The March 2006 Green Paper goes further, proposing that all member states should agree on an overall strategic objective in terms of energy, which would '...combine the freedom of Member States to choose between different energy sources and the need for the EU as a whole to have an energy mix that, overall, meets its core energy objectives'. …
Introduction In addition to being former communist countries, Slovenia and Estonia share several other similarities. First, they are both small countries in terms of the size of their territory and number of inhabitants. Second, they are new countries that gained independence only after the collapse of communist regimes. (In the case of Estonia, independence was, in fact, regained since it was a sovereign country in the period between the two World Wars.) Third, they were the most economically developed regions in former multi-national settings (although Slovenia was at a considerably higher level in this regard) with the most Western contacts due to their geographical proximity to Western Europe: Slovenia borders Austria and Italy while Estonia has a maritime border with Finland. However, the nature of the communist regimes in these two countries differed considerably in some aspects. In general, the Yugoslav regime was much more open and Slovenia enjoyed more regional as well as national (cultural) autonomy, while in Estonia the oppressiveness of the Soviet regime remained strong until the beginning of perestroika and Estonians were exposed to a severe process of Russification (which resulted in a one third Russian-speaking population--this demographic fact still has quite important political and social consequences). Despite the above-mentioned similarities and some differences, these two new EU members experienced different dynamics in their systemic transformation. They established varying types of socioeconomic regulation and different institutional settings. Our analysis intends to show how these variations were determined partly by the logic of historic legacy or path-dependence, i.e., the conditions at the start of the transition process, as well as by the character of the main actors, namely the elites, particularly the political ones, and their strategic choices. In order to understand better the role and significance of these two factors, the structuring of political arena in both countries in the post-communist period, the ideological background of elite configurations and their consequences for socioeconomic development will be outlined. Elite formation and (re)configuration One characteristic of post-socialist political elites is their heterogeneity. They are made up of individuals and groups with various social and historical origins and ideological orientations: former dissidents with diverse roots, more or less reformist members of the former communist nomenclature, members of professional groups (so-called technocrats), people from the sphere of the Church, and even some members of prewar political elites. According to Agh, the transitional political elite possesses a number of common characteristics such as its distance from the non-elite and a lack of professionalism. For this reason, society perceives it as a unified actor which monopolizes politics and exerts control over all social life (Agh 1996: 45). However, numerous antagonisms and conflicts exist among the various elite segments, especially the competition for control over key resources that the actors are trying to obtain through various social linkages (the search for allies, various coalitions); all of this means we are not dealing with a uniform group. The social conditions in the countries of the former communist bloc are largely characterized by the relationship between so-called old and new elites; i.e., between elites coming from the ranks of the former regime and the relatively heterogeneous elites formed during the process of system transition. It must, however, be stressed that it is often difficult to make a clear-cut division between the old and new elites. Even the former nomenclature has in fact experienced various transformations, and part of it has embraced (at least formally) democratic principles and norms; thus, thought and action patterns that are essentially a relic of the former undemocratic system are often found in recently-founded political parties. …
Introduction Vojvodina is a province in the northern part of the Republic of Serbia. As a flat region along the mid-course of the Danube, Vojvodina is a geographic area with considerable economic potentials. For this reason, it has always attracted different national groups and represents a traditional immigration-receiving region in Europe with an exceptionally heterogeneous ethnic structure of the population. Such a national structure of the population is a result of the overall demographic development of Vojvodina through history and primarily a consequence of migration processes. Series of political developments, such as changes in states' borders and the formation of new states, have rendered Vojvodina a territory of migrations throughout the last century. These migrations have exerted a considerable impact upon Vojvodina's ethnic structure. As a result of planned colonizations in Vojvodina and impromptu migrations, its territory from the end of the 17th century started to be settled by national groups other than Serbs and Hungarians, all of which are present in greater or smaller numbers at the present time. This was followed by a period of mass migrations that were especially pronounced in the second half of the 18th century and in the 1920's (after the First World War), the 1940's (after the Second World War), and the 1990's (refugee migrations from the former Yugoslav republics). The powerful influence of migrations during the given period is further underlined by the fact that contemporary demographic processes on the territory of Vojvodina are in large measure a consequence of these historical events. In the last decade of the 20th century, the break-up of Yugoslavia, accompanied by civil war, caused strong refugee migrations from the other former republics of Yugoslavia into Serbia. The province of Vojvodina received the bulk of this refugee population, in part owing to action of the social migration network that arose as a consequence of the colonization process. The present work represents an attempt to reconstruct the action exerted by migration processes in Vojvodina during the period of 1919-1948 on demographic development of the region. The time period treated in the paper encompasses two colonizations, one of them occurring between the two world wars (1919-1931), the other taking place after the Second World War (1945-1948). The work makes use of the data of censuses taken before and after the Second World War. In view of the different administrative-territorial divisions of Vojvodina in the censuses, census data are cited in relation to the present-day division of the province for the sake of easier comparison. Colonization in Vojvodina during the Period of 1919-1931 Up until 1918, the territory of Vojvodina was an integral part of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. Upon the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, representatives of the Grand National Council of Backa, Banat, Baranja, and Srem voted at a session of the Grand National Parliament held on 25 November 1918 for direct unification with the Kingdom of Serbia. After 1918 the influence of ethnic, nationalistic, religious, and political push factors became even more evident as the winners of World War I reshaped the political map of Europe. The establishing of new nation states also created large numbers of new ethnic minorities (Mynz, 1995). Major changes of the continental political map during the 20th century resulted from World War I, with the Balkan Wars as a prelude, World War II, and the collapse of the Communist Bloc and some incorporated states after the Cold War (Rugg, 1985). The area of great empires was marked by forced intrastate ethnic integration, often painful for the then numerous minorities. World War I allowed some of them to establish their own states (for example, Poland, Hungary, etc.), but brought even more problems to others (for instance, to Romania and Yugoslavia). Eastern Europe entered the century divided between four empires. …
Introduction In the large secondary literature on Ukraine's noteworthy, eighteenth-century religious philosopher, Hryhorij Skovoroda (1722-94) there are many references to his dualistic world view and his argument about the "three worlds." In short, virtually all who write about Skovoroda acknowledge his use of numbers, in the above examples two and three respectively, in the creation of his philosophy. The purpose of this essay is to analyze more carefully Skovoroda's predisposition to employ numbers and geometric figures in his work and, as a result, to establish the crucial role they played in his thinking. Some effort will also be made to identify the sources for his understanding of the significance of these numbers and figures. The numbers and mathematical concepts to be considered are one, two, three, seven, and infinity and eternity; the geometrical figures to be studied are the circle, the triangle and the square. One The most important number for Skovoroda was one. There are three reasons for this. First, God was the essence of the universe, the first cause, the beginning of everything. Skovoroda, when he considered the universe and its origin, argued that, "the divine mystagogues or cabalists consider the beginning solely as the one God ... as though there was one center and one intelligent circle in a great number of them." (1) Second, Skovoroda contended, in accord with Orthodox theology, that God was one: "the Lord and the Spirit ... and God are one." (2) Finally, with regard to the connection between this one God and His creation Skovoroda enthused that "God and His world and His man are one." (3) Each of these formulations, according to which Skovoroda characterized the divinity as one, needs some elaboration. As far as the idea that God was the single beginning, it is worth noting that Skovoroda did not mean this in temporal or chronological terms. He emphasized his opposition to this concept when he wrote about the first verse in Genesis: "In the beginning God created heaven and earth" (Genesis 1:1). By Skovoroda's analysis this verse was, taken literally, a lie because in his view "matter is eternal" and, therefore, "only an infantile mind can say that at some particular time the world was not or would be...." (4) God was the single beginning in the sense that He was the essence of the universe, without which the universe could not exist. As for the idea that the Lord, the Spirit and God are one, Skovoroda exhibited a profoundly Orthodox view of the Trinitarian God, one in which he clearly demarcated the three hypostases of the divinity even as he recognized God's essential oneness and indivisibility. Skovoroda, in doing this, distanced himself from the "filioque" formulation of the Western or Nicene creed. He made his Orthodoxy on this issue clear when he argued that, "Trinity in unity and unity in trinity must be a unity," but added that, "All creation is flesh ... which answers to its appropriate divine essence." (5) Or, in other words, each hypostasis of the Trinity had a different relationship to materiality and therefore each person of the Trinity had a certain function or role within the Trinity. Skovoroda did not mix these roles as did the "filioque" formulation of the Nicene creed which argued that the Spirit descended from the Father and the Son and so mixed the roles of the three persons of the Trinity. With regard to God being one with his man and his world, it is necessary to begin with Skovoroda's certitude on this crucial matter. Concerning God and man he wrote that, "God is in human flesh. He exists authentically in our visible flesh, the eternal in the finite, one in all and whole in each." (6) Skovoroda wrote about God and the world in the same spirit: "Is He not the being in everything? He is the true tree in the tree, the grass in the grass, the music in the music ... He is everything in all. (7) But while Skovoroda asserted the oneness of God with man and the world, he clearly saw, at the same time, that they were not absolutely one. …
In the fall of 2005 a major shift of took place in Poland. Both parliamentary and presidential elections wrought the control over the elective and legislative branches from the post-communist Democratic Left Alliance (Sojusz Lewicy Demokratycznej, SLD) to a right-wing party Law and Justice (Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc, PiS). (1) In April 2006 the winning party formed a coalition with two smaller populist parties: Self-Defence (Samoobrona) and League of Polish Families (Liga Polskich Rodzin, LPR), marking the beginning of what was proclaimed to be the IVth Republic of Poland. What made the change possible? What was the role of religious media in this election and in the first year of the new political situation? The present study focuses on the role played by the conservative Catholic Radio Maryja and other media closely associated with it: daily and TV Trwam. Scholars and journalists often risk doubtful generalizations while discussing church-state relations in Poland. Many fail to appreciate the internal divisions between different groups of Catholics, as well as within the church hierarchy, while the church is no longer a monolith it used to be under the communist regime. This article tries to show a more nuanced view of this issue by analyzing the mounting and still unresolved conflict between the conservative religious radio station, largely independent and uncontrolled by the church, and the Polish Episcopate. This analysis should give a fairly complete, though complicated picture of church-state relations in Poland after 1989 in general, and after the recent elections in particular. Radio Maryja--A Historical Outline Radio Maryja is an influential radio station formally run by the Order of Holy Redeemer (Ojcowie Redemptorysci), but de facto managed by the hand of its Director, Father Tadeusz Rydzyk. Ordained in 1971, Rydzyk spent several years in Germany (between 1985 and 1991), where he became acquainted with religious media and came to understand the importance of the fourth power in a democratic society. Upon his return to Poland he founded Radio Maryja, which began broadcasting on December 11, 1991. The Radio grew very quickly: initially it operated locally, obtaining permissions from individual bishops, until it got a national coverage in 1994. The Radio and daily Nasz Dziennik (Our Daily) are part of a larger structure run by the priest; his initiatives comprise an informal association of regular listeners of the Radio, called Rodzina Radia Maryja (The Family of Radio Maryja), which has it's monthly under the same title, and a extensive network of local cells. Nasz Dziennik, established in 1998, quickly became the most influential religious paper in Poland. It is the only Catholic daily and has an estimated 200,000 copies sold every day. Since its conception it was strictly associated with Radio Maryja. Other institutions and enterprises include two foundations, a publishing house, and the Higher School of Social and Media Culture (Wyzsza Szkola Kultury Spotecznej i Medialnej), training journalists since 2001. In 2003 Father Rydzyk launched TV Trwam, which translates as I persist. During the 16 years of its history the Radio has been an active and, at times, significant actor on the Polish public forum. In 1997 it opposed the ratification of a new constitution (which was perceived as not explicit enough in its invocatio Dei) and the new administrative division of the country (presented as the new partition of Poland); it also opposed Polish membership in liberal European Union, the sale of land to foreigners and major privatizations of state-owned companies (including the famous Gdansk Shipyard, a birthplace of Solidarity movement in 1980). In its foreign policy the Radio was often critical toward Germany, while advocating closer cooperation with Russia and the US. In addition, Father Rydzyk did not refrain from direct involvement in party politics: he assisted at the birth and relative success of Liga Polskich Rodzin (League of Polish Families) in 2001, an ultra-conservative party initially aimed at preventing Poland's accession to the European Union, and later switched his approval to more influential PiS. …
Introduction It is rare to write on poverty and underdevelopment in an European Union (EU) member state, but it is timely. The consolidation of both democracy and the market economy is far from being a closed issue in Hungary, given the current economic, social, political and spatial processes. Hungarian economic and political elite consider the EU cohesion funds as the opportunity for regional development. The New Hungary Development Plan 2007-2013 of the Hungarian government and the National Development Policy Concept both have explicit emphasis on sustainable development of regionally integrated rural areas based on the availability of EU funds. Strengthening regional cohesion, improvement of regional competitiveness and regional realignment are all big pledges embedded into the process of regional development as foreseen by these documents. In this attempt, the Hungarian government puts an emphasis on the need for a developmentary state, which should respectively put in place the conditions of market-conforming and sustainable economic and social development in guarantee for the interests of future generations. (1) In parallel to these goals at the macro-level, there are also micro development programmes; a certain example of which is the development project for Cserehat initiated by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the previous Hungarian Ministry of Youth, Family, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities (ICSSZEM). In this paper, I will illustrate the extent of rural poverty in Hungary on the basis of my research in Cserehat and discuss whether the current institutionalism regarding the distribution of the EU funds can solve the problem of regional underdevelopment or not. To observe how over-bureaucratised structures without a systematic approach in the new EU members copes with the new actors and institutions of rural development will be a new challenge for social scientists. After the local election in Autumn 2006 and in view of the EU cohesion funds, the discussion in Hungary on how to (re) organise various development councils at the local level and how to involve the local governments into the implementation of the government policies for development at the central level accelerated. Therefore, on the one hand, given the pending political crises and the extremely polarised political scene between the opposition right-wing Fidesz and the left-liberal coalition between MSZP and SZDSZ, every single step towards change is prone to have very complex political implications. In rural Hungary, on the other hand, civil society, local businesses, local governments, minority self-governments and alike participate in rural development projects funded by the EU as the actors. In order to observe the efforts and the positioning of such structures, I have been a participant observer at events for micro development project stakeholders, which were organised by the Cserehat Programme at Homrogd in March and Encs in August 2006. I have also visited certain project sites in Cserehat and held interviews in Hungarian during Summer and Autumn 2006 both with the mentors of projects, UNDP representatives and grant recipients in various micro-regions. In brief, the organisation and the implementation of the Cserehat programme towards regional development illustrates a picture of micro-development efforts in Hungary with human capacity building and rural development as its two main aims. Development cannot be understood as being directed towards some fixed, static aim; it is towards dynamic processes. Alongside, it is not towards passive adaptation, but active adaptability. And it is not directed towards a self-sufficient survival, but towards the permanent competitiveness in relation to the outside world. These points imply that development (re)produces the conditions for further development, and hence creates a momentum. Retaining a momentum of development is the current phase of Europeanisation for the new members of the EU. …
After 1958, Romania assumed to itself the rise of a brand new internal and external politics, unthinkable up to that time. In the context of the aggravation of the conflict between Moscow and Peking, when Khrushchev and Mao were girding themselves, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej realized a masterstroke. Beginning in 1962, Romania became more and more detached from Moscow. For the other part, the Valev incident had represented the apogee of the Soviet-Romanian cold war. Khrushchev ordered a boycott of Romania, but this boycott actually hastened the Romanian orientation to the West. (1) In 1959 trade missions headed by senior communist officials explored the possibilities of increased trade with France, Great Britain, Italy, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland and even the United States and concluded agreements with several West European companies. The drive was continued in 1960 with increased energy and even greater success. By the end of that year, official statistics indicated a decrease in Romania's trade with the Soviet Union from approximately 46 percent in 1959 to 40 percent in 1960; a corresponding increase in Romania's trade with the Western countries was recorded. Intellectuals and technocrats were sent abroad to proclaim in fluent French, English or German the historic legitimacy of the Communist regime and to seek recognition of that doctrine for the Romanian side. Select foreigners were invited to Bucharest to convince themselves of the validity of the Communists' claim. Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej's basic purpose was to secure the economic assistance necessary for political emancipation from Moscow. But he was also willing to allow, in small doses, cultural interaction between Western European countries and the Romanian People's Republic. (2) This allowed him to lead a unique policy of disengagement vis-a-vis the Soviet Union and of communism--this combination characterizing the Gheorghiu-Dejism that was analyzed by Professor Stephen Fischer-Galati. It had originated in Gheorghiu-Dej's appreciation of the events of the Autumn of 1956--the Hungarian revolt and Polish riots--which made him wish to be less dependent on the unpredictable and divided Soviet leadership, through widening his popular basis and strengthening the national feeling among the ordinary citizenry, and later by using the new tendency to polycentrism in the communist world and developing relations with the West. (3) The re-orientation of Romanian external politics coincided, after 1960, with significant mutations in internal Romanian politics, beginning with the relaxation of the police regime. The prisons had begun releasing prisoners in 1962 when, according to official statistics, 1304 persons were liberated; in 1963 another 2892 persons were set free and in the first months of 1964 year the last 464 political prisoners were released (many of them were imprisoned after 1944, others had been there from 1941 on). (4) All of these changes, remarkable if we compare them with the situation in the 1950's, determined a climate of relative social agreement and national consensus as the hopes of liberation from communism seemed, now, indefinitely postponed. With the escalation of polemics which had begun with the Soviets, and because the moment was auspicious, the Romanian Communist Party achieved very quickly a series of measures, which may be called derussification. The action culminated in 1963, when the institutes created in 1948 were closed, when the Russian names of streets and cinemas were changed, when Stalin-Town received its old name, Brasov. Countless streets and institutions which had received Russian names were renamed throughout the country. Only a few streets and institutions kept their Russian names--for example--in Bucharest, the Tolbuhim Boulevard, and the Zoia Kosmodemianskaia Secondary School. In Bucharest different American exhibitions were opened, western books were translated, foreign (Western) franchises were bought, and Western films and songs took the place of Russians ones. …
At the end of the Second World War, the Hungarian peasantry-like the whole of the domestic society--had to virtually restart their life in a changing, often dangerous environment. The population of the countryside had not been hit by the Anglo-Saxon air raids as badly as for instance the population of the capital, but the Hungarian villagers provided the metropolitan citizens as well as the withdrawing German and the raiding Russian troops with food and forage. The latter took away or drove away the animals of the peasants, and they also frequently destroyed their production equipment. The military campaigns and deportations taking place in the country during 1944/45 caused the death of about 900 000 people, (1) and as a result of the requisition and looting by the armies, 44 percent of the bovine, 56 percent of the horse, 79 percent of the swine and 80 percent of the sheep stock was destroyed. (2) Due to the autumn battles the peasantry failed to carry out field-work and to harvest certain crops. Subsequent to the departure of the front, public security was hardly any better in the countryside than in the cities: looting Soviet soldiers and gangs comprised of--often armed--civilians terrorized the population. However, the slow normalization of the public states and the establishment of the national assemblies taking over the tasks of the local governments could not solve the numerous problems of the village population. The land question--that had been postponed for decades--was to be arranged, and besides that, it was expected that the looming land distribution would go hand in hand with certain inner deportations. Hungary had some territories--for example Viharsarok and some North-Eastern regions--where there was not sufficient amount of available land, so a part of the agrarian population living there was directed somewhere else. Besides, there was something to be done about the ex-Bukovinian Szeklers, who escaped from Bacska County to the Trans-Danubia as well as about the Hungarians driven away from the Uplands from the beginning of 1945 on the basis of the Benes decrees. The statements of the victorious Great Powers and certain signals by the Hungarian Allied Control Commission (3) led by Marshall Kirill Vorosilov suggested that the fate of the domestic German population--whose majority were agricultural workers--would dramatically change. The Potsdam Conference between July 17 and August 2, 1945 made this question clear: a decision was made about the deportation of the Eastern-European Germans to Germany. In the summer of 1945, a couple of months after the end of WWII and more than a year after the mass deportation of the Jewish population, another population movement was looming in the Carpathian Basin and in Hungary. Bukovinian Szekler families appeared in the Schwab villages of the Valley (Volgyseg), and the Slovakian neighbours of the ousted Uplands Hungarians had already moved into their houses, and the settlement of the agrarian proletarians of Eastern-Hungary slowly began as well. A little bit later, in January 1946, the first railway carriages carrying the deported Germans set off from around Budapest towards the occupied Mother Land. All these created immense tension in the territories involved in the deportations, and these serious conflicts needed to be solved as soon as possible. The question among others was: what kind of organisations, institutions would assume the task of eliminating these problems? The parties of the 1945-1948 coalition period were not merely political groups, but they all had at different degrees serious economic/ social influence through their delegates to the national committees as well as the land-claiming and production commissions. In jurisdiction and law enforcement, they--especially the left-wing parties--also had a high member representation, thus these political organisations had a broad instrument reservoir to solve this serious conflict. …
Once upon a time, according to Romanian jokesters, the American CIA and FBI competed with Nicolae Ceausescu's Securitate to prove superiority in apprehending criminals. They released a rabbit into the forest and all agreed that the first agency to catch it would win the contest. CIA planted informants throughout the forest, questioned all plant and animal witnesses, and eventually concluded that the rabbit never existed. FBI tried next, but with no leads after two weeks, burned the forest completely, rationalizing that the elusive rabbit deserved to die. Then the Romanian first secretary sent in the Securitate. After one hour, a huge bear, bruised and bleeding, limped out of the forest, with paws high over his head, whimpering, Okay! I'm a rabbit! joke, writ large, juxtaposes American impatient, short-term thinking with Romanian ruthlessness, a Ceausescuan world in which one is guilty until proven innocent and where torture-induced confessions prove guilt. Delighted in 1967 when Ceausescu refused to sever ties with Israel during the Six Day War, established diplomatic relations with West Germany, and denounced the Soviet intervention in Czechoslovakia a year later, Washington decided to reward him--sending U.S. President Richard Nixon to visit Bucharest (August 2-3, 1969); inviting Ceausescu thrice to visit Washington (October 1970, December 1973; and April 1978); and conferring Most Favored Nation status to Romania (August 1975). (1) Time Magazine put Ceausescu's face on the cover of its March 18, 1966 issue and quoted the future dictator: The word freedom can be spoken in many languages, but it has the same meaning [...] People must be fully equal, have the right to express their opinion, and be able to take part in the guiding of society. (2) With their simplistic enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend mindset, Washington officials failed to understand that Ceausescu's ostensibly liberal foreign policy stance masked horrendous abuses of human rights at home--exporting food despite acute shortages at home, censuring writers and religious groups, arranging fatal accidents for strike leaders; (3) firing thousands of disgruntled miners; outlawing contraceptives and abortions, resulting in tragic deaths and swelling orphanages; (4) bulldozing Hungarian villages in Transylvania, and transforming Romania into the poorest of Warsaw Pact countries in order to pay off ten billion dollars in foreign debt. A surfeit of books and articles--and jokes--exist about Ceausescu, while surprisingly few address his predecessor, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej. Perhaps this is due to Ceausescu's defiance of Moscow, the stark dichotomy between his foreign and domestic policies, length of his incumbency, flagrant nepotism, and televised execution by firing squad on December 25, 1989. (5) As Romanian scholar Vladimir Tismaneanu put it, In the avalanche of incriminating material relating to the Ceausescu family dictatorship, there is a tendency to forget who presided over the Stalinization and Sovietization of the country [...] name of Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej has only been mentioned occasionally. (6) One can go still further. There is also a tendency to forget who made Romania's greater independence vis-a-vis Moscow possible and who first established the pattern of foreign policy openness and liberalness coupled with domestic repression. Romania under Gheorghiu-Dej has commonly been viewed as one of the most loyal of Soviet allies in 1956. (7) However, it was Dej who--inspired by the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Austria in 1955--masterminded the exodus of Soviet troops (1958) and KGB advisors (1964) from Romania and conceived the April 27, 1964 declaration of independence. Indeed, Romania became the only Warsaw Pact country from which both Soviet troops and advisors were actually withdrawn during the Cold War. (8) Ceausescu's later audacity toward Moscow would have been highly unlikely had Soviet troops still been stationed throughout Romania. …
Introduction The Liberation Army of Kosova (Ushtria Clirimtare e Kosoves, UCK) or 'KLA' (1) has been the best known Albanian rebel movement in the former Yugoslavia during the 1990s. Its most important offshoots have been the National Liberation Army (Ushtria Clirimtare Kombetare, UCK) or 'NLA' (2) in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) (3) and the Liberation Army of Presevo, Medvedja and Bujanovac (Ushtria Clirimtare e Presheves, Medvegjes dhe Bujanovcit, UCPMB) in southern Serbia. Between 1979 and 2001 most Albanian rebel groups were born, grew and withered, though some groups existed since the 1970s and even earlier. Still the arrival of the Kosova Liberation Army surprised Western policymakers. Analysts are uncertain about the intentions of this rebel movement and its offshoots and political successors. This paper contains a structured comparative analysis of the two major Albanian militant formations: KLA (Kosovo Liberation Army) and NLA (National Liberation Army). The analysis presents the Albanian grievances in Kosovo and FYR Macedonia and critically examines the origins, structure and success of the two Albanian militant groups. The analysis ends with an evaluation of the current state of popular grievances and the current state of these two organizations. The Nature of Albanian Violence The Albanians nurture a culture of violence well tailored to guerrilla i.e. hit-and-run warfare. The mostly Muslim Albanians have a long history of resistance against powerful rulers and neighbours. Secular nationalism dominates their thinking since the 1878 League of Prizren under Abdyl Bey Frasheri called for a unified Albanian state. (4) Albanians have had to do without any state until the establishment of Albania in 1912. Enver Hoxha (5) and Sali Berisha (6) did support Albanian separatists in Kosovo and FYROM Macedonia. Yet by and large irredentists had to sustain themselves. Albanian families (shpi), clans (fis) and political movements are closely-knit and close-mouthed so as to survive and sustain underground activities. (7) They are only talkative when they feel safe and in their interest to tell their side of the story. (8) Albanians have had few successful 'state builders'. Even their national hero Skanderbeg, who defeated Ottoman forces from 1443 until his death in 1468, remained a 'mere' rebel chief in his northern Albanian stronghold. (9) Socially we can speak of a culture of the gun. Albanians customarily keep and use weapons for the blood feud, a major part of their Kanun centred on besa (oath-of-honour), the traditional 'Law of the Mountains' or 'Kanun of Lek Dukagjin'. (10) Albanians have a low threshold to take up arms for any public or private cause. Albanians frequently use their weapons to 'settle' property disputes in post-war Kosovo; people are killed by them. (11) Real and perceived grievances sustain such a propensity to violence. This at times degenerates into violent crime, banditry, terrorism (violence against civilians) and other humanitarian and human rights violations. Grievances of Albanians in Kosovo The interethnic relations between Serbs and Albanians in Kosovo within the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY) deteriorated sharply after the student riots at the University of Pristina on 11 March 1981, nearly a year after the death of Tito. Hundreds of Albanian students demanded better living conditions. Thousands of factory workers, miners and farmers joined the protests, shouting Kosovo--Republic! and We want a Unified Albania!. Blagoje Nikolic even speaks of a full-scale armed rebellion between April 1 and 3 and a lingering insurrection afterwards. (12) Dissatisfaction with poor living standards--which became worse during the economic crisis of the 1980s--translated into radical political demands which separatist groups like the Group of Marxist-Leninists of Kosova (GMLK) and the Movement for the National Liberation of Kosova (MNLK) had pursued for years. …
Introduction Located along the historical crossroads between Europe and Asia in Southeastern Europe, because of its geopolitical situation and history, the small, newly independent Republic of Moldova has tried to follow a foreign policy centering on maintaining a balance between East and West. Moldova's dominant foreign policy problem since independence has been the Transnistrian conundrum, one of the so-called frozen conflicts, a legacy of the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Dnestr Moldovan Republic (DMR), or Transnistria, a self-proclaimed, unrecognized republic, consists of the eastern border region of the former Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic on the left bank of the Dnestr River, along with the city of Bendery on the right bank that Transnistria captured with the invaluable support of the Russian Fourteenth Army in the short but bloody civil war in the late spring of 1992. Transnistria is hardly a household word. Few people have ever heard of the place, let alone know anything about it. Yet because of Transnistria's geopolitical situation it has become somewhat of a mouse that roared. Over the past five years or so, this so-called museum of Soviet communism has been a nagging problem for the European Union (EU), NATO, the United States, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) that refuses to go away, not to mention the fractured Republic of Moldova. During the Soviet era, Transnistria was the heartland of Moldovan industry. Moreover, Transnistria, a Russian client state, has provided Moscow with a powerful lever in trying to strengthen its hold on Moldova and to bring it further into Russia's sphere of influence. The purpose of this article is to examine the attempts to solve the Transnistrian conundrum from the Kozak to the present and the tortuous diplomacy of the small Republic of Moldovan to maintain its territorial integrity and independence. Kozak The closest Moldova has come to solving the problem by diplomacy involved the Kozak of November 2003, which was to form the bases of a federated Moldovan-Transnistrian state. (1) During the summer of 2003, Russia's President Vladimir Putin had his first deputy chief of the Presidential Administration and confidant Dmitry Kozak, who had little, if any, experience in diplomacy, conduct secret shuttle diplomacy with President Vladimir Voronin of Moldova and President Igor Smirnov of Transnistria. It was a bold initiative by Putin, who, along with Voronin, ignored the other settlement co-mediators at first; however, the other co-mediators, becoming aware of what was afoot, wanted to merge an OSCE draft with that of Putin, but to no avail. The Russians presented their final draft, entitled Memorandum on the Basic Principles for the State Structure of the United State, to William Hill, ambassador of the OSCE mission to Chisinau, on November 14. Voronin, calling the draft realistic, initialed each page and promised his signature. Under what was played up as an asymmetrical federation, which Voronin had outwardly insisted on all along, Transnistria would have its own separate constitution, legislature, budget, tax system, and other attributes of an independent state. Moldova would be a neutral and demilitarize state. A federal Parliament in Chisinau would be created with the addition of an upper house or Senate. The lower house would have statewide proportional representation after 2020, but until then three separate regional constituencies, Transnistria, the autonomous region of Gagauz-Yeri, and the remaining federal territory, would elect their own members. The upper house would also be based on regional units with half of the 26 seats automatically going to Transnistria and Gagauz-Yeri, (9 and 4 seats respectively). (2) But with the Senate's extensive veto powers, the constitutional authority to appoint all cabinet ministers and constitutional court appointments designed to protect Transnistria and its leaders, and with a three-fourths Senate vote necessary to confirm federal organic laws until 2015, Transnistria would practically be in a position to prevent the federal government from functioning. …
This article focuses on Karl Emil Franzos's depiction of Jews, Poles, and Ukrainians (1) in Galicia, and explores how his ideas about German culture and the Aufklarung (German Enlightenment) helped shape his stories. The article examines Franzos's two earliest major collections of stories, Aus Halb-Asien (1876) and Die Juden von Barnow (1877), in which he provided many German-speakers with their introduction to Galicia. An analysis of the depiction of the province and its peoples in these widely read books thus offers important insight into the way many Austro-Germans (and Germans beyond the Habsburg Monarchy) came to view this region and its peoples. Furthermore, a study of Franzos helps broaden our understanding of how German-acculturated Habsburg Jews negotiated issues of assimilation and identity by examining an individual born and raised in Galicia rather than Vienna, Bohemia, or western Hungary, from where most of these Jews hailed. Karl-Emil Franzos was born on October 25, 1848, and raised in Czortkow, a small East Galician village not far from the Russian border. Franzos's father expressed a strong German cultural and national identity and rejected traditional Jewish religious beliefs and cultural practices. Franzos admired his father, and largely adopted his world view. The younger Franzos held to his faith in Germandom until very late in his life. However, by the 1890's, antisemitic sentiments had become so widespread and so virulent among Germans that it finally shook his faith in German assimilation as the solution for Jews. Nevertheless, Franzos never made those doubts public, and in fact spoke out against Jewish nationalism and Zionism in his last years. (2) Throughout much of the 19th century, German nationalism and liberalism went hand in hand in Central Europe. The young Franzos learned that German culture and liberalism were the highest ideals for which a person could strive. Franzos's father once told him, are a German son and you will live in (3) According to Franzos, his father's German nationalism aroused the ire of the local Poles, who opposed his vision of a liberal, centralized, Germanized Austria united with Greater Germany. Dr. Franzos also sympathized with the plight of the poverty-stricken Ukrainians and so treated their medical needs free of charge. His son, Karl-Emil, wrote positively about the Galician Ukrainians' fight against a Polish nobility that had historically exercised political and economic domination over Franzos's conviction that German culture represented the highest expression of humanity helped shape his representation of village life in Galicia. Despite his affiliation with German culture and lack of religious observance, he remained proud of his Jewish identity, expressing what we might now recognize as a Stature or ethnic consciousness as a Jew. He learned from his father to value the history and ethical values of the Jewish people, although interestingly he had little interaction with other Jews in the village. (4) Franzos noted, synthesized Germandom and Jewry into one single whole, of both I heard only, the most honorable, that which could enflame my enthusiasm. (5) However, Franzos denounced the religious and cultural practices of Orthodox Jews as backward and superstitious, instead advocating that they modernize and, as his family had done, embrace the culture of the German Enlightenment. It is worth noting that he mentioned hearing only honorable things about 'Jewry' rather than 'Judaism,' as he separated the religion from the people. For him, remaining a Jew was a matter of duty to his fellow Jews, as his father had emphasized, [they] are still seen in an unfavorable light, are in need of good and educated men who ennoble and defend them. (6) His father's paternalism comes through clearly in Franzos's own writings about traditional Jews. Finally, he was a archetypal Jewish-German liberal assimilationist, who viewed national identity as a matter of choice and cultural affiliation, not birth. …
