La Chambre introuvable et les principes du régime parlementaire

Summary

Discussions of British policy towards Poland and the Polish question in the years before the first Partition have recently been provided by Michael Roberts and by Hamish Scott. They have given both a narrative and an analysis of British diplomacy and foreign policy in the decade after the end of the Seven Years’ War. It is the purpose of this paper to suggest the resonance which British policy (and the lack of it) and opinion on Poland had for contemporary understanding of the British political system and political culture itself.1 The implications for Britain of the first Partition of Poland were ominous and unsettling for the British polity, and would challenge both diplomatic practice and political prejudices and commonplaces.     

Population Politics in Vilnius 1944-1947: A Case Study of Socialist-Sponsored Ethnic Cleansing

A historian examines a specific case of ethnic cleansing in the immediate aftermath of World War II: the "repatriation" of Poles from the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic between 1944 and 1947. Questions of how "repatriation" was carried out, the motivation on the Polish and Soviet sides, the differences in outcome of this policy in Vilnius and the countryside, and why "repatriation" presents a case of ethnic cleansing are considered on the basis on archival material as well as newspapers, memoirs, and historians' accounts of this case and in the context of the literature on genocide and ethnic cleansing.     

For Your Freedom and Ours: The Polish Question in Wilson's Peace Initiatives, 1916 - 1917

The first eighteen months of the Great War witnessed an unprecedented awakening of interest in the Polish Question, when worldwide attention was drawn to the prolonged devastation of the Polish territories. Thereafter, a steady increase in media comment and criticism, highlighting Poland's plight, fostered public indignation at the continual stalling of humanitarian relief efforts for Polish refugees. Such burgeoning popular sentiment focused wider political attention upon a growing movement for recognition of Polish claims to independence. This particularly proved to be the case for Woodrow Wilson and his administration's budding interest in Poland. Subsequently, nowhere did the Polish Question assume a greater role in diplomatic efforts to mediate for peace than in America, and at no time more than during the year preceding the President's hesitant decision to intervene in hostilities.     

从一国社会主义到中国改革开放

马克思主义创始人考察了人类社会发展的历史,论证了资本主义发达的高度将是社会主义的基础,因而设想,社会主义将会在英、法、德、美等先进资本主义国家最先建立。历史的发展和革命运动的实际却是尚未完成民主主义革命任务、相对落后的俄国,率先建立了社会主义国家。这样,第一次世界大战催生的俄国社会发展顺序的颠倒,就把世界社会主义运动聚焦到怎样建设社会主义国家。斯大林体制的一国社会主义,是特定时代条件下,斯大林将马克思主义应用于俄国实际所建立的社会主义。斯大林宣布苏联已建成完全的社会主义社会,其实只是完成了民主主义革命遗留的历史任务。完成这一历史任务成为斯大林体制的历史负荷。第二次世界大战后建立的社会主义国家,基本上也是民主主义革命任务尚未完成的相对落后的国家。历史的共性是斯大林体制被当作社会主义共同模式的时代条件。世界各社会主义国家共有的、越"左"越革命的幼稚病,是小生产占优势国家背负的、改革斯大林体制的沉重历史包袱。中国改革开放,建设中国特色社会主义,终于为相对落后国家在完成民主主义革命遗留历史任务之后,搞清楚什么是社会主义,从而开创了建设社会主义国家的新时代。     

A Possession for Ever: Charles Bean,the Ancient Greeks,and Military Commemoration in Australia

For many people after the First World War, the classical world of Greece and Rome provided a language of commemoration; those who fought on Gallipoli were often keen to see parallels with the Trojan war of 3,000 years earlier. Charles Bean, Australia's classically-educated war correspondent, Official Historian, and chief visionary behind the Australian War Memorial, was as imbued with the classics as any. What is striking, however, is that Bean largely ignored parallels with Troy, focusing instead almost exclusively on fifth-century BC Athens. Bean wanted more than a language of commemoration; he desired an historical backdrop which would emphasise the place in history of the Australian Imperial Force (AIF). Only the Athenians could provide a fitting parallel for the youthful democracy of Australia.     

The Dove Flies East: Whitehall, Warsaw and the 1950 World Peace Congress

In 1950 the Cold War turned hot in Korea, the threat of atomic annihilation hovered menacingly and the spectre of another world war haunted Europe. The establishment of the World Peace Council that year was one response to these fears. In November 1950 the Council decided to hold a World Peace Congress in Sheffield. The British Labour government sabotaged this Congress and forced it to shift to Warsaw. This article analyses this event which, to date, has received no scholarly attention. It argues that the attitudes and actions of the protagonists were a microcosm of the Cold War in that each side, East and West, saw the Congress as an opportunity to achieve moral authority, political leverage and strategic advantage over the other. The article also highlights the role of the state in controlling major political events during the Cold War.     

战后东南亚"南强北弱"经济格局成因分析

二战后,东南亚诸国都制定经济发展战略,重建国民经济体系。但是,到20世纪80年代末90年代初期,北方印支三国及缅甸的经济发展水平远远落后于南方各国,东南亚地区形成了“南强北弱”的经济格局。究其成因,主要外因有:西方殖民主义者殖民统治方式的不同对东南亚区域内经济发展的不平衡起了加剧作用,美苏在东南亚的“冷战”及相关战争使印支三国失去相对和平的经济恢复环境;内因则是南北方国家经济发展体制与发展战略方面存在差距。     

The Turkish Republic's Jihad? Religious symbols,terminology and ceremonies in Turkey during the Korean War 1950–1953

On 25 July 1950, a month after the beginning of the Korean War, the newly elected Democratic Party (DP) in Turkey announced that a brigade would be sent to assist South Korea as part of the UN mission led by the United States. The main argument of this article is that although the DP regime is considered a secular and Kemalist one, the state continued the Ottoman tradition and practice of using Islam to gain support for the war and to mobilize the Turkish nation. To do so, the article will show the similarity of both the means and the content of religious propaganda used in the Korean War to those used in the Ottoman jihad in the First World War. This article suggests that parts of the public understood the war as a religious conflict and not just as an ideological one thus indicating the success of the religious messages and their efficiency.     

Ahmad Amin and nationalism

With the breakup of the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War, three republics in the South Caucasus (Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan) achieved independence for the second time during the twentieth century. Their first experience was contentious and short-lived, had little or no support from the Western powers and was brought to end by the newly formed Soviet Union with the tacit approval of Turkey. While Georgian, Armenian and Azerbaijani national aspirations were quashed in the early post-First World War era, Zionism was given encouragement with the establishment of the Palestine Mandate. When Israel was established it was given immediate recognition by the Soviet Union, but most Jews from Georgia and Azerbaijan – Armenia's population was very small in comparison – only made their way to Israel during the last years of the Cold War. On the other hand, following the Second World War, some members of the Armenian Diaspora, including those in the Arab world, immigrated to the Soviet Union. While Soviet-Israeli relations had been strained since the Six-Day War, the end of the Cold War not only brought better ties between Russia and Israel, but it allowed Israel to establish relations with the other successor states of the former Soviet Union. Many of those countries sought ties with Israel (and the other Western states) to insure their continued independence from Russia, while, at the same time, Arab-Israeli relations improved and Turkey and Israel drew closer together. Iran was regarded with suspicion by Azerbaijan and along with Georgia, which wanted to enhance its ties with the West, drew closer to Turkey. Both countries have benefited from the transport of oil. Jews from Georgia and Azerbaijan have kept close connections with their former countries, where anti-Semitism was never the problem it was in Russia. Armenia has remained the closest to Russia with its conflict with Azerbaijan over Nagorno Karabakh and its distrust of Georgia. However, Armenians experienced genocide at the hands of the Ottomans and have sought support from Israel over that issue.     

Reflections on Chomsky and Revisionist Views of Pre-War Japan

Abstract

Noam Chomsky's article on Japan will evoke, as is customary with his writings, angry reaction from some quarters and silent patronizing disdain from others—namely, the specialists. Some will accuse him of ignoring the Chinese case; others, of failing to explain clearly what the pacifist alternative was. Yet, it would be tragic if the scholars in our field ignored the profoundly moral and complex interpretive problems raised by this essay about the responsibility for war. With the perspective of time, and of failure, we have gradually reached more rational interpretations of the origins of the First World War, and of the Cold War. It is obviously time we did the same for the Second World War. In this connection, I wish to add comments both on Japan and on U.S. foreign policy, which, while differing in emphasis from Professor Chomsky's article, are not meant as criticisms of it.     

No Future for Germany's Past? Collective Memory and German Foreign Policy

Like most aspects of German politics and society after 1945, post-war German foreign policy has traditionally been greatly influenced by the legacy of Germany's National Socialist past and the Second World War. The semi-sovereign and divided nature of the West German state along with the strong argumentative force of collective memory in foreign policy discourse ensured a strong presence of Germany's historical legacy in both institutional and discursive terms resulting in a foreign policy which was characterised by self-limitation, a strong commitment to multilateralism and a civilian foreign policy culture. This article will argue that the interpretation of German collective memory of the Holocaust and the Second World War underwent significant changes under the red–green governments between 1998 and 2005, in particular with regard to the use of force. Although German collective memory continued to be present during this period, it lost its predictability and was used in a variety of crises to justify a range of responses, including military action.     

Communications

How do people handle their regret at having believed that a foolish war was not just acceptable but necessary? Japan after World War II provides an instructive example. Many contrite Japanese revisited the aesthetic realm, looking for ways to interpret culture that did not convey the values of fascism, such as glorifying willing surrender to a powerful leader. They saw their task as engendering an individual aesthetic and therefore political subjectivity, so that Japanese would in the future more bravely resist state violence at home and abroad. These individuals saw culture as intrinsically political rather than as a refuge from politics. Recognizing the difficulty in countering fascist culture through ideas alone, they also created what economists today call “capacity building” institutions to help them do so, such as Japan's first museum dedicated solely to modern art, the Kamakura Museum of Modern Art, established in 1951. The founders of the Kamakura Museum self-consciously set out to create a new institution that would embody a democratic aesthetic and so prevent—they hoped—Japan from repeating the disastrous experience of war. The curators argued for diverse and dynamic modernities, a concept that parried both the idea that artistically Japan was a pale copy of modern Europe and the notion of a single national culture in Japan or elsewhere. At the same time, however, the legacy of the war was visible in an entirely different and less admirable way in the museum curators’ stance toward Asian modernity beyond Japan and its evasion of Japan's responsibility for the wartime devastation of China.     

近二十年波兰外交转型刍议

近二十年来,伴随着政治和经济领域的转型,波兰外交亦经历了一个发展演变的过程。总体看来,这一过程既带有东欧国家的普遍共性,亦表现出波兰自身的鲜明个性。对1989年以来波兰外交在不同阶段上的变化背景及走向加以考察,并且进一步分析波兰与主要邻国之间的外交关系,在此基础上就后冷战时期波兰外交转型的目标、业已取得的成就与面临的问题及与国内政治发展之间的关系等做出分析与解读,可以更好地理解转型时期波兰外交政策和实践的总体特点和发展轨迹,对于把握波兰外交的未来走向有着重要意义。     

“Zomia”范式的政治人类学意义及其未来

斯科特的《逃避统治的艺术》一经出版即获得了学界的诸多关注,成为东南亚研究必读书目之一,但同时也受到学者们不同角度的批评。《逃避统治的艺术》重新定义了"Zomia"即东南亚山地的区域研究内涵,并指出二战前该区域内存在着一种山地居民为免于国家统治而从生计方式、政治结构、历史和宗教等方面建构的"逃避"机制。尽管我们可以指出斯科特使用史实的错误(如坚持"南诏泰族说")或缺失,也可以批评他忽略了历史变迁的复杂性,但其研究的独到之处依然值得我们借鉴。从方法论来看,斯科特在长期消化文献材料的基础上大胆提出理论假设,这是学术创新的必要路径。斯科特继承了利奇关于克钦人"贡萨"—"贡劳"社会结构的学术遗产,激进地建构了东南亚山地居民以"逃避"为核心的生存模式,堪称西方无政府主义人类学的一次宏伟实验。"Zomia"研究范式也给了我们很多启示,比如应该勇于跨越边界,从关系主义视角来考察研究对象。通过中国西南和东南亚—南亚地区的比较研究,以交互性和流动性为中心考察其历史与当下的政治经济与社会人文形态,探求新的知识生产格局,有望成为中国人类学和民族学作出新贡献的"民族志学术区"。最后,在"post-Zomia"时代,处于各民族国家包围下的山地族群如何在现代化、全球化的时代背景下通过与国家部门和主流社会持续的遭遇、协商和妥协来寻求自身的发展空间,将会成为今后重要的研究方向。     

Privatised Keynesianism: An Unacknowledged Policy Regime

There have now been two successive policy regimes since the Second World War that have temporarily succeeded in reconciling the uncertainties and instabilities of a capitalist economy with democracy's need for stability for people's lives and capitalism's own need for confident mass consumers. The first of these was the system of public demand management generally known as Keynesianism. The second was not, as has often been thought, a neo-liberal turn to pure markets, but a system of markets alongside extensive housing and other debt among low- and medium-income people linked to unregulated derivatives markets. It was a form of privatised Keynesianism. This combination reconciled capitalism's problem, but in a way that eventually proved unsustainable. After its collapse there is debate over what will succeed it. Most likely is an attempt to re-create it on a basis of corporate social responsibility.     

"A Very Present Menace"? Attlee, Communism and the Cold War!

With the end of the Cold War and the further opening of archives, the role of Western communist parties and their relationship with the former Soviet Union has been the subject of fresh scrutiny. This article examines the conviction of the British Labour Government and its security services that the Communist Party of Great Britain represented, at least in the early Cold War period, a "very present menace". The article discusses the policies of the Soviet Union in Europe and the Communist Party in Britain and explores how these shaped the perspectives of the Attlee Government, especially during the London dock strike of 1949. When placed against this background, Attlee's anti-communism can no longer be accepted, as most commentators do, as simply a product of Cold War paranoia.     

The contribution of Karol Górski in introducing research on the estates into Polish historiography

SUMMARY

In this article Janusz Ma??ek reviews the work of Professor Karol Górski, whose life work over a period of more than 50 years was to develop awareness of the significance of the history of estates in Pomerania, Poland and the Baltic region, and to develop and encourage comparative studies of the history of estates in the Polish universities. His work led him into close interest and active participation in the work of the International Commission to which he made valuable contributions.     

Before the Surgeon-General's Report: Public Discourse in Australia Over Tobacco Addiction to 1964

Long before the contemporary debate over nicotine addiction, doctors, alternative health professionals, journalists and moral reformers in Australia discussed this issue in the media. It was assumed that tobacco was a powerful drug, and difficult to give up. Growing acknowledgment of addiction to tobacco was linked to 1) the rise of the cigarette, instead of pipe smoking; 2) the rise of use of other drugs in the aftermath of World War I; 3) the impact of the temperance movement and other moral reformers. The use of the term "addict" increased over time. The 1964 U.S. Surgeon-General's Report claim that tobacco smoking was merely a "habit" temporarily inhibited public discussion of addiction. Scientific research and political will over the addiction issue lagged behind commonsense observations of the effects of smoking.     

Forgetting the Führer: the Recent History of the Holocaust Denial Movement in Germany

The crimes committed by National Socialist Germany during the Second World War place Germany in a unique position for the Holocaust denial movement, and combine its so-called "academic" aspect with its political core. In no other country has the movement attracted so much publicity for its pernicious mixture of lies, distortions and half-truths as it has in Germany since the late 1980s. The introduction of laws in 1985 and 1994 that target " die Auschwitzlüge " (Auschwitz-Lie) changed the frequency of Holocaust denial in German public life, if not its nature. This article is an analysis of the German Holocaust denial movement since 1988, with an emphasis on the most important individuals and events that have influenced the movement's direction in this period. It also includes an examination of the laws that seek to stop its spread.