Yet Another Wire Entanglement

Author(s):  
Klaus Richter

This chapter looks at the effect of territorial fragmentation, starting from the level of the local economy. Subsequently, it traces its repercussions to international politics, which led to the formation of a new international image of East Central Europe as inherently fragmented and particularistic. The chapter assumes a multi-dimensional approach to the creation of new borders between Silesia and Estonia through military developments, through bilateral, multi-lateral, or international dynamics, and puts a strong focus on local agency, e.g. in the case of merchants, who were among the most important agents to mitigate the impact of borders and re-establish severed networks. Moreover, the chapter explores how the proliferation of borders and scepticism concerning territorial size shaped a highly normative and pessimistic international discourse about the survivability of the new ‘small states’, which many regarded to be merely provisional states sooner or later to be reintegrated into recovering Germany and Russia

1999 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Kramer

The death of Josif Stalin was followed by momentous changes in the Soviet bloc. Part 1 of this two-part article considers how and why these changes came about, looking at the interaction between domestic and external events. It explores the nature of Soviet decision making, the impact of events in East-Central Europe, the implementation of Moscow's new policy, and the use of Soviet troops to put down a large-scale uprising in East Germany. Politics, Power, and U.S. Policy in Iran, 1950–1953


2002 ◽  
pp. 149-166
Author(s):  
David Turnock

Borders in East Central Europe have become much more permeable over the past ten years as formalities have been simplified and many new crossing points have opened. At the same time, cooperation in border regions has increased, thanks mainly to the EU 'Interreg' programmes, to include a range of business cultural and conservation interests. In many cases these arrangements have been formalized through Euroregions which have become an indicator of good international relations. The paper reviews these trends with reference to examples and pays particular attention to environmental projects and the joint planning initiatives being undertaken in a number of Euroregions. At a time when regional policy has been generally weak, cross-border cooperation has contributed significantly to cohesion and it is also a good indicator of stability in the region. However, the impact has been greater in the north than in the Balkans and the first round of EU eastern enlargement will have implications for cooperation across the new external borders.


Author(s):  
Klaus Richter

The chapter examines national policies to economically empower the titular nations and thus establish a national merchant class. It argues that these policies bore rather different results: the marginalization of minorities and the creation of states that were major economic agents. It explores how attempts of foreign powers to exploit the new Polish and Baltic states economically interacted with the emerging governments’ efforts to take control of the region’s raw materials from the disintegrating commercial monopolies of the German occupation. Using the example of timber and flax trade, the chapter retraces how territorial fragmentation spurred distinct policies that shaped states within East Central Europe, but also an international image of the region: the collapse of sovereignty spurred the commercial engagement of outside powers, which in turn contributed to domestic efforts to secure sovereignty, seal off the territory, and organize commerce within the titular nations.


1988 ◽  
Vol 36 (3) ◽  
pp. 449-462 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Scruton

‘The New Right’, as it has come to be known, derives from at least two major intellectual sources, free market theory and social conservatism. The question how far these are compatible is frequently raised. The aim of this two-part article is to explore the impact of ‘New Right’ thinking in East Central Europe (specifically in Czechoslovakia, Poland and Hungary) in order to show that, in the conditions of ‘real socialism’, free market and social conservative ideas seem to arise naturally from the same root conceptions. The first part deals with Czechoslovakia-specifically with the thought of Patocka, Have1 and Bratinka, and with the conservative wing of the Charter movement. It argues that, while many writers would specifically reject labels like ‘conservative’ or ‘right-wing’, the actual content of their thought is very close to that of the New Right in the western hemisphere. In particular, the call for a ‘depoliticization’ of society, for responsible accounting, and for a lived historical identity which will be both national and European, are indistinguishable from long-standing themes of social conservatism.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabor Ujvari ◽  
Stefano M Bernasconi ◽  
Thomas Stevens ◽  
Sandor Kele ◽  
Barna Pall-Gergely ◽  
...  

<p>The generally cold climate of the last glacial period was interrupted by numerous abrupt shifts to warmer interstadial conditions in the North Atlantic. The effects of this Dansgaard–Oeschger (D–O) type climatic variability have been found in a number of European and Asian terrestrial paleoclimate archives, including speleothems, lakes and loess deposits. However, only very few of the already sparse precisely dated records provide quantitative information on stadial-interstadial temperature variations over this time period. This is a major impediment to resolving the cause and geographical propagation of D-O events, as well as to understanding the impact they have on continental climates and environments.</p><p>Here we present carbonate clumped isotope (<em>Δ<sub>47</sub></em>)-based active season paleotemperature (AST) estimates from land snails recovered from Greenland Stadial/Interstadial (GS/GI) 5 and 3 age loess at the Dunaszekcső loess site (Hungary), based on a uniquely detailed AMS <sup>14</sup>C age dataset, alongside a new flowstone (PK-6, Bükkösd, Hungary) stable isotope-based temperature change record <sup>230</sup>Th-dated to 30-26 ka. Stadial ASTs of the investigated periods were found to be in the range of 7–13 °C, corresponding to <em>T<sub>annual</sub></em> of 0–6 °C and <em>T<sub>July</sub></em> of 11–17 °C, agreeing well with the range of model simulation results for the region. Interstadial AST values reconstructed for GI-5.1 and 3 (16–18 °C) indicate warm summers (<em>T<sub>July</sub></em>: 20–22 °C) and relatively high annual mean temperatures (<em>T<sub>annual</sub></em>: 9–11 °C), matching present-day values. The PK-6 flowstone δ<sup>18</sup>O<sub>calcite</sub>-based temperature change estimates (~0.2 ‰ °C<sup>–1 </sup>δ<sup>18</sup>O/T gradient) reveal a 7–10 °C <em>T<sub>annual</sub></em> rise for the warmest phases of GI-3 and 4 compared to stadial temperatures, in very good agreement with the land snail <em>TΔ<sub>47</sub></em> values.</p><p>Our results show that stadial-interstadial climate variability in East Central Europe was of comparable magnitude to that in Greenland. We propose that large scale ocean-atmospheric variability (NAO-AMO) imparts a major control on transmitting abrupt North Atlantic climate event signals into continental Europe during the last glacial.</p><p> </p><p>This study was funded by the Hungarian National Research, Development and Innovation Office to GÚ (OTKA PD-108639) and SK (OTKA KH-125584). TS is grateful for the support of the Swedish Research Council (2017-03888).</p>


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-97
Author(s):  
Lili Zách

Abstract The interwar years in Ireland were marked by the widening of international relations following the newly independent Irish Free State’s entry to the League of Nations in 1923. This paper aims to provide insights into a lesser-known part of Irish diplomatic history, focusing on how, besides Geneva, Dublin also became significant as a meeting point with Central European small states from the mid-1920s. It will trace how the foundation of the Honorary Consulate of Hungary in Dublin demonstrated Irish interest in widening economic relations and furthering cultural connections with Central Europe, even if honorary consulates traditionally fulfilled primarily symbolic purposes. Based on so far unpublished archival materials and press records, this article will assess cultural and diplomatic links cultivated under the consulate of Hubert Briscoe, highlighting the significance of independence and Catholicism as a perceived connection between Irish and Hungarian national identities. Ultimately, this article argues that Irish images of East-Central Europe may add to our current understanding of Irish nationalism in the first decades of Irish independence.


Author(s):  
Heiner Lück

The Saxon Mirror and the Magdeburg Law figure among the most important German cultural products in the legal sphere. The Magdeburg Law developed at the end of the twelfth century as the result of an unverifiable tenth-century mercantile law, suitable not only for merchants but also for the urban population. The Saxon Mirror was written between 1220 and 1235 as a fixation of Saxon land law. In complex processes of legal transfer, the Magdeburg Law and the Saxon Mirror merged into countless versions of Saxon-Magdeburg law, which local rulers, scribes, legal practitioners, and jurists adapted to local conditions. The chapter explains how this process occurred in Silesia, Poland, lands of the Teutonic Order, Bohemia, Moravia, Hungary, and in cities such as Kulm, Thorn, Krakow, and Lemberg. In some of these regions of central and east central Europe, the impact of Saxon-Magdeburg law persisted for up to 700 years.


2019 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 208-223
Author(s):  
Marek Trella ◽  
Tomasz Czerwiński ◽  
Arkadiusz Wołos

Abstract The aim of this paper is to present and discuss the results of a survey of fishers exploiting dam reservoirs to determine the conditions of conducting fisheries associated primarily with climate change. Overall, questionnaires were obtained from 18 enterprises (of which 16 were chapters of the Polish Anglers Association) regarding a total of 30 reservoirs with a combined surface area of 29,666 ha, which is 49% of the total surface are of this type of basin in Poland, the largest country in East-Central Europe. This sample is highly representative of all the fisheries conducted in this basin category in Poland and in other East-Central European regions. The following questions referring to the impact of climate change were defined and analyzed based on the answers obtained from the questionnaires: survival of hatchlings, fry, and adult fish; the spawning success of selected fish species; selected hydrological and biological reservoir parameters, the possibility of using and the effectiveness of fishing gears; the length of the recreational fishing season; the size of recreational and commercial fisheries catches of different fish species. Information regarding the impact of reservoirs on fish migrations was also obtained.


2014 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 173-205 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Jasienski

This article examines the impact of Ottoman fashions on the clothing worn by men in early modern Poland and Hungary, and argues that fashion was an optimal tool for advertising political allegiance. Ottoman garments were coveted by the nobilities in East-Central Europe, and often displayed in portraiture, because they were imbued with associations of anti-absolutism and autonomy, even if the Ottomans themselves were reviled as invasive infidels. However, the legibility of the political statement these fashions made was limited to their local contexts—when viewed by foreigners they were perceived as exotic and Otherly. Various factors enabled the popularization and subsequent politicization of Ottomanizing styles, including the Polish and Hungarian nobilities’ self-fashioning as Eastern, and 
the widespread availability of Ottoman and Iranian commodities through import, as war booty, and through local imitation. This essay hopes to expand our understanding of the range of early modern responses to the Ottoman East, while challenging the notion of Europe as a uniform entity to which it was opposed. 



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