scholarly journals Analysis of spatiotemporal changes of agricultural land after the Second World War in Czechia

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vít Zelinka ◽  
Johana Zacharová ◽  
Jan Skaloš
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Agricultural Land ◽  
Population Change ◽  
Temporal Analysis ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Agricultural Landscapes ◽  
German Population ◽  
World War ◽  
Landscape Type ◽  
Second World

AbstractThe term Sudetenland refers to large regions of the former Czechoslovakia that had been dominated by Germans. German population was expelled directly after the Second World War, between 1945 and 1947. Almost three million people left large areas in less than two years. This population change led to a break in the relationship between the people and the landscape. The aim of the study is to compare the trajectories of these changes in agricultural landscapes in lower and higher altitudes, both in depopulated areas and areas with preserved populations. This study included ten sites in the region of Northern Bohemia in Czechia (18,000 ha in total). Five of these sites represent depopulated areas, and the other five areas where populations remained preserved. Changes in the landscape were assessed through a bi-temporal analysis of land use change by using aerial photograph data from time hoirzons of 2018 and 1953. Land use changes from the 1950s to the present are corroborated in the studied depopulated and preserved areas mainly by the trajectory of agricultural land to forest. The results prove that both population displacement and landscape type are important factors that affect landscape changes, especially in agricultural landscapes.

‘We Forgot All Jews and Poles’: German Women and the ‘Ethnic Struggle’ in Nazi-occupied Poland

2001 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 447-461
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Harvey
Keyword(s):  
Division Of Labour ◽  
Second World War ◽  
German Population ◽  
World War ◽  
Nazi Regime ◽  
Baltic States ◽  
Ethnic Germans ◽  
The Baltic ◽  
Second World ◽  
Jewish Populations

During the Second World War, the Nazi regime sent thousands of German women to occupied Poland to work with the ethnic German population, comprising native ethnic Germans and resettlers from the Baltic states, eastern Poland and Romania. They were to be trained to act as model colonisers for the newly conquered territories. Meanwhile the non-German population was subjugated and terrorised. This article examines what German women witnessed in Poland and how far they can be seen as complicit in acts of violence and injustice committed against Poles and Jews. To what extent did a gendered division of labour prevent women actively being involved in or witnessing acts committed against the Polish and Jewish populations? Did a construct of ‘womanly work’ help women to ‘look away’ from the evidence of oppression and persecution?

scholarly journals German Jews in Jelenia Góra immediately After the End of the Second World War

2018 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marek Szajda
Keyword(s):  
Central Committee ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Second World War ◽  
German Population ◽  
World War ◽  
German Jews ◽  
Polish Jews ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
German Jewish ◽  
Second World

This article presents the history of German Jews, survivors of the Extermination period, in Jelenia Góra in the years 1945–1947, that is from the establishment of the Jewish committee just after the end of the Second World War until the disappearance of this community two years later. This is the story of a group composed of people liberated from concentration camps as well as hiding in their homeland, including the “Mischling”. In the text, different aspects of the functioning of the German Jewish population are discussed in the context of the influx of Polish Jews from the territories of central Poland and the USSR, their relations with the Central Committee of Jews in Poland and the Voivodeship (the term corresponding to ‘province’ in many countries; translator’s note) Jewish Committee in Wrocław, as well as the state administration. The most interesting issue is the problem of the legal and social status of Jews who were striving to be recognised as victims of the Third Reich on equal terms with others, in this case most of all Polish Jews. Finally, almost all German Jews left the city during the deportation of the German population.

Epiphanic "The Third Wave Experience" - Ron Jones and students

2020 ◽  
Vol XI (1 (30)) ◽  
pp. 185-211
Author(s):  
Agata Marciniak
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
German Population ◽  
Third Wave ◽  
World War ◽  
Nazi Regime ◽  
The Third ◽  
School History ◽  
History Teacher ◽  
Second World ◽  
Experiment Analysis

The Third Wave Experience was an experiment created by California high school history teacher Ron Jones in 1967 to explain how the German population could accept the Nazi regime before the Second World War. The paper presents in detailes the course of this experiment, analysis and assessment of teacher's attitudes and activities as well as factors conditioning students involvement. Analyzes conducted in the paper indicate an epiphanic character of The Third Wave Experience.

scholarly journals Wollt ihr den totalen Krieg? Legal, Political, and Moral Aspects of the Resettlement of German Population

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 9-119
Author(s):  
Jerzy Kranz
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
Legal Responsibility ◽  
The Political ◽  
German Population ◽  
Main Question ◽  
World War ◽  
Historical Responsibility ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Second World

Germany had started the Second World War in an intentional and conscious manner, obviously being aware that every action can have unpredictable and unwanted consequences. The Potsdam decisions were taken by the Great Powers after assuming supreme authority in Germany. They constituted a manifestation of the Allies’ rights and responsibilities. The territorial changes of Germany and the transfer of population were part of the general regulation of the effects of the Second World War. These decisions were not a simple matter of revenge. They must be perceived in a wider political perspective of European policy. The resettlement by Germany of ethnic Germans to the Reich or to the territories it occupied constituted an instrument of National Socialist policy. This German policy turned out in 1945 to be a tragic irony of fate. The resettlement decided in Potsdam must be perceived in the context of German legal responsibility for the war’s outbreak. The individual perception of the resettlement and individual guilt are different from the international responsibility of the state and from the political-historical responsibility of the nation. In our discussion we made the distinction between the individual and the collective aspect as well as between the legal and historical/political aspect. We deal with the guilt of individuals (criminal, political, moral), the international legal responsibility of states, and the political and historical responsibility of  nations (societies). For the difficult process of understanding and reconciliation between Poles and Germans, the initiatives undertaken by some social circles, and especially the church, were of vital importance. The question of the resettlement became a theme of numerous publications in Poland after 1989. In the mid 1990s there was a vast debate in the media with the main question of: should we apologize for the resettlement? Tracing a line from wrongdoing/harm to unlawfulness is not  easy. In 1945 the forcible transfer of the German population was an act that was not prohibited by international law. What is significant is that this transfer was not a means of war conduct. It did not apply to the time of a belligerent occupation, in terms of humanitarian law, but to a temporary, specific, international post-conflict administration. Maybe for some people Potsdam decisions will always be seen as an illegal action, for others as an expression of strict international legal responsibility, for some as a kind of imperfect justice, and still for others as an opening of a new opportunity for Europe.

German Population in the Ethnic Policy of “People’s Poland”

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (40) ◽  
pp. 9-24
Author(s):  
Andrzej Szczepański
Keyword(s):  
Third Reich ◽  
Primary Objective ◽  
Second World War ◽  
The State ◽  
German Population ◽  
World War ◽  
The West ◽  
Post War ◽  
Ethnic Policy ◽  
Second World

After the Second World War, according to various sources, there were between 3.5 and 4.5 million citizens of the former German Third Reich within the borders of Poland. According to the agreements of the so-called Big Three, made during the Yalta and Potsdam conferences, this population was to be resettled within the borders of post-war Germany. The mass deportation actions lasted from 1946 to 1949 and covered the vast majority of the population, but still about 200,000 people remained in their previous places of residence. In the following years of the existence of "People's Poland", they also gradually left the country, emigrating to the West. The primary objective of this paper was to attempt to characterize ethnic policy towards the German population in the post-war Poland. Over the years, the attitude of the state towards this group has fluctuated considerably, being characterized both by repressive measures and by the possibility of enjoying a relatively undisturbed existence.

scholarly journals “In many cases, the definition of rags for what they are dressed, is too beautiful”: material support of German refugees from the USSR on the territory of the Reich at the end of the Second World War

2021 ◽  
pp. 89-105
Author(s):  
Volodymyr Martynenko
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
Psychological State ◽  
German Population ◽  
World War ◽  
Domestic Security ◽  
Eastern Front ◽  
Ethnic Germans ◽  
Business Entities ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Second World

Throughout the fall of 1943 – the spring of 1944 almost the entire German population was taken out of the occupied Soviet territories by the German authorities. The immediate reason for this, as is known, was the loss of strategic initiative on the Eastern Front. By the autumn of 1944, the number of all evacuated ethnic Germans was about 360,000. Most of the German contingent was sent to the territory of Warthegau district. All the rest were in several other regions of Germany. The Warthegau administration began active preparations for the reception of German refugees already in early January 1944. Immediately after arriving in the Reich, they, according to the established procedure, underwent a medical examination, pest control and only then went to the camps. Many German officials described the situation of the evacuated Germans as catastrophic, paying attention to what was immediately evident – a lack of clothes and shoes. Besides, the German authorities were concerned about the arrangement of the life of the new migrants, the bulk of whom was planned to be used as agricultural workers. The SS leadership tried to solve the problem of material and domestic security of German refugees from the USSR by attracting its resources and through support from various business entities. As a result, by the end of the war, the German authorities had not been able to completely solve the problem of the material and social security of ethnic Germans from the USSR. The main reason was the lack of resources and the almost complete reorientation of many enterprises to defense needs. Domestic disorder hugely negatively affected the moral and psychological state of many migrants. In turn, the lack of clothing and shoes often led to refusals to go to work. With growing discontent among the settlers at the end of 1944, the Nazi authorities tried to fight mainly through propaganda, trying to convince them that sooner or later, after the victory of Germany, their life would become much better.

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