Pub Date : 2024-05-04DOI: 10.1177/16118944241248961
{"title":"Forum: Theoretical Concepts of Shaping the Memory, edited by Sabina Ferhadbegović and Katerina Králová","authors":"","doi":"10.1177/16118944241248961","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241248961","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140842554","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-17DOI: 10.1177/16118944241244449
Kateřina Králová, Sabina Ferhadbegović
This article introduces the complex historical and memory landscape of Southeast Europe in connection with the Second World War and its aftermath. In what ways have responses to mass atrocities in the region been shaped, how have they permeated public discourse, and to what extent have they been reflected in the entangled Balkan history? By analysing occupation, genocide, resistance, collaboration, justice, and memory, this introduction lays the ground for exploring the divergent interpretations of events that continue to influence contemporary attitudes toward reconciliation.
{"title":"Responding to Mass Atrocities in Southeast Europe: History and Memory of World War II and Its Aftermath in European Perspective. Introduction","authors":"Kateřina Králová, Sabina Ferhadbegović","doi":"10.1177/16118944241244449","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241244449","url":null,"abstract":"This article introduces the complex historical and memory landscape of Southeast Europe in connection with the Second World War and its aftermath. In what ways have responses to mass atrocities in the region been shaped, how have they permeated public discourse, and to what extent have they been reflected in the entangled Balkan history? By analysing occupation, genocide, resistance, collaboration, justice, and memory, this introduction lays the ground for exploring the divergent interpretations of events that continue to influence contemporary attitudes toward reconciliation.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140608159","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-15DOI: 10.1177/16118944241241446
Franziska Zaugg
Xhafer Deva is one of the most notorious figures in the history of World War II in Kosovo and ‘Greater Albania’. As Minister of the Interior of the ‘Greater Albanian’ state and a Nazi collaborator, he was responsible for the assassination, deportation and expulsion of countless Serbs. At the same time, he fought for the integration of Kosovo into Albania. As such, notwithstanding the mass atrocities for which he is responsible, he is still revered in nationalist circles to this day. In this contribution, Xhafer Deva, a controversial public figure, will be examined and presented against the backdrop of the shifting empires and loyalties during the end of the 19th and the first half of the 20th century.
{"title":"Xhafer Deva: Nationalism, Collaboration and Mass Murder in Pursuit of a ‘Greater Albanian’ State","authors":"Franziska Zaugg","doi":"10.1177/16118944241241446","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241241446","url":null,"abstract":"Xhafer Deva is one of the most notorious figures in the history of World War II in Kosovo and ‘Greater Albania’. As Minister of the Interior of the ‘Greater Albanian’ state and a Nazi collaborator, he was responsible for the assassination, deportation and expulsion of countless Serbs. At the same time, he fought for the integration of Kosovo into Albania. As such, notwithstanding the mass atrocities for which he is responsible, he is still revered in nationalist circles to this day. In this contribution, Xhafer Deva, a controversial public figure, will be examined and presented against the backdrop of the shifting empires and loyalties during the end of the 19th and the first half of the 20th century.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140557290","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-13DOI: 10.1177/16118944241241441
Kateřina Králová, Katerina Lagos
The prosecution of Max Merten (1911–1971), the only Nazi war criminal accused of Holocaust involvement in Greece, coincided not only with the start of the Greek-German negotiations on victim compensation but also with the Eichmann trial. In 1959, the Merten Case provoked a massive public backlash, both because of the gravity of his crimes and because of his impending extradition to West Germany. We argue that in the Cold War atmosphere, when the Merten Case attracted international attention, the actions of internal and external power elites in the West deliberately departed from the concept of transitional justice to use this murky affair to their political advantage. Rather than a fair trial, the aim was to obstruct it in the interests of good relations, political self-preservation, and gradual social amnesia about Greek complicity during the German occupation. In contrast, the Eastern Bloc fed the opposite narrative of rotten capitalism by building on its proclaimed struggle against fascism. By combining archival sources and newspaper coverage of the Merten Case on both sides of the East-West conflict, our article explores which mechanisms were mobilised in public and which incentives were carried out behind the scenes. This allows us to examine multidirectional attitudes in a geopolitical sense, with the main aim of showing the discursive imposition of disinformation operating (in)formally through the channels of political institutions during the Cold War.
{"title":"Nazi Crimes, Max Merten and his Prosecution as Reflected in Greece and beyond","authors":"Kateřina Králová, Katerina Lagos","doi":"10.1177/16118944241241441","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241241441","url":null,"abstract":"The prosecution of Max Merten (1911–1971), the only Nazi war criminal accused of Holocaust involvement in Greece, coincided not only with the start of the Greek-German negotiations on victim compensation but also with the Eichmann trial. In 1959, the Merten Case provoked a massive public backlash, both because of the gravity of his crimes and because of his impending extradition to West Germany. We argue that in the Cold War atmosphere, when the Merten Case attracted international attention, the actions of internal and external power elites in the West deliberately departed from the concept of transitional justice to use this murky affair to their political advantage. Rather than a fair trial, the aim was to obstruct it in the interests of good relations, political self-preservation, and gradual social amnesia about Greek complicity during the German occupation. In contrast, the Eastern Bloc fed the opposite narrative of rotten capitalism by building on its proclaimed struggle against fascism. By combining archival sources and newspaper coverage of the Merten Case on both sides of the East-West conflict, our article explores which mechanisms were mobilised in public and which incentives were carried out behind the scenes. This allows us to examine multidirectional attitudes in a geopolitical sense, with the main aim of showing the discursive imposition of disinformation operating (in)formally through the channels of political institutions during the Cold War.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140551951","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-13DOI: 10.1177/16118944241241429
Johanna Ilmakunnas, Anne S Overkamp, Jon Stobart
The aristocracy and their use of commercial credit are seldom explored in the European comparative context despite important studies of the French aristocracy and their credit relations with shopkeepers, tradesmen and fashion merchants. This article studies the aristocracy and commercial credit in England, Germany and Sweden, by drawing on the normative literature and the account books, receipted bills, correspondence and diaries of several families occupying different echelons of the nobility. We examine the extent and nature of aristocratic engagement with shop credit, the ways in which they manipulated and managed this credit, and their motivations for doing so. We argue that the aristocracy was involved in a modern commercial credit economy and that this was central to their position in society and way of life. Our analysis of the ideals communicated through conduct books and parental advice and the actual credit practices of the aristocracy show that they took their credit arrangements seriously. They had to abide by the rules of commercial credit and settle their accounts: sometimes promptly, most often in a timely manner and only occasionally after considerable delay. The article offers a comparative framework for further and broader studies on the aristocracy within economic history.
{"title":"To their Credit: The Aristocracy and Commercial Credit in Europe, c.1750–1820","authors":"Johanna Ilmakunnas, Anne S Overkamp, Jon Stobart","doi":"10.1177/16118944241241429","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241241429","url":null,"abstract":"The aristocracy and their use of commercial credit are seldom explored in the European comparative context despite important studies of the French aristocracy and their credit relations with shopkeepers, tradesmen and fashion merchants. This article studies the aristocracy and commercial credit in England, Germany and Sweden, by drawing on the normative literature and the account books, receipted bills, correspondence and diaries of several families occupying different echelons of the nobility. We examine the extent and nature of aristocratic engagement with shop credit, the ways in which they manipulated and managed this credit, and their motivations for doing so. We argue that the aristocracy was involved in a modern commercial credit economy and that this was central to their position in society and way of life. Our analysis of the ideals communicated through conduct books and parental advice and the actual credit practices of the aristocracy show that they took their credit arrangements seriously. They had to abide by the rules of commercial credit and settle their accounts: sometimes promptly, most often in a timely manner and only occasionally after considerable delay. The article offers a comparative framework for further and broader studies on the aristocracy within economic history.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140551976","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-13DOI: 10.1177/16118944241241427
Nikola Tohma
This article focusses on the narratives of collective victimhood and martyrdom in the memories of refugees from the Greek Civil War (GCW, 1946–1949) to post-1948 communist Czechoslovakia (later, the Czech Republic). It analyses literary production by refugees, that is, ego-documents, popular history books and fiction, assessing refugees’ motivations in writing their own histories. It investigates the role of collective victimhood and its effect on the diaspora's identity, its aims and its functions. It determines that the narratives of martyrdom were an early representation by GCW refugees to portray themselves as heroic partisans and anti-fascist fighters and gain the high ground on the moral side of the conflict. Such perceptions, however, have in some cases persisted among communist-oriented authors to this day. This article distinguishes them from more personal expressions of collective victimhood, allowing for a plurality of interpretations of their refugee experience as well as a greater variety of motivations for capturing it in written form for a broader audience. This study aims to show how fluid and permeable these narratives of collective victimhood have been and how fundamentally they have affected the constitution of the GCW diaspora's identity.
{"title":"The Role of Martyrdom and Victimhood in the Memory of the Greek Civil War Refugees in Czechoslovakia through the Prism of ‘Refugee’ Literature","authors":"Nikola Tohma","doi":"10.1177/16118944241241427","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241241427","url":null,"abstract":"This article focusses on the narratives of collective victimhood and martyrdom in the memories of refugees from the Greek Civil War (GCW, 1946–1949) to post-1948 communist Czechoslovakia (later, the Czech Republic). It analyses literary production by refugees, that is, ego-documents, popular history books and fiction, assessing refugees’ motivations in writing their own histories. It investigates the role of collective victimhood and its effect on the diaspora's identity, its aims and its functions. It determines that the narratives of martyrdom were an early representation by GCW refugees to portray themselves as heroic partisans and anti-fascist fighters and gain the high ground on the moral side of the conflict. Such perceptions, however, have in some cases persisted among communist-oriented authors to this day. This article distinguishes them from more personal expressions of collective victimhood, allowing for a plurality of interpretations of their refugee experience as well as a greater variety of motivations for capturing it in written form for a broader audience. This study aims to show how fluid and permeable these narratives of collective victimhood have been and how fundamentally they have affected the constitution of the GCW diaspora's identity.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140708407","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-08DOI: 10.1177/16118944241241443
Zoltán Tibori-Szabó
In May 1944, at the age of 33, the lawyer and writer Ottó Kornis was crammed into a cattle car in his native Transylvanian town, Kolozsvár (in Romanian: Cluj; after 1974: Cluj-Napoca) with 72 of his fellow Jewish citizens, his parents included. They were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. His parents were murdered upon arrival. Out of all the passengers in that cattle car, only he and four other Jews survived the hell of the death and forced labour camps. As soon as he returned home, he wrote a book about his experience titled Smoke ( Füst), which was published in November 1945 in Cluj by the Minerva Literary and Printing Institute and was one of the very first books about the Nazi camps. The present study deals with Kornis’ career and fate from the early years of his youth until his death at the age of 38, only four years after the end of the war. It is a microhistory that explores the career and work of a celebrated and award-winning, then completely forgotten author. His life story reveals the central problems that preoccupied most of the survivors who returned from the Nazi camps to multi-ethnic Transylvania; it also helps to document the literary memorialisation of the Holocaust during the early post-war period.
{"title":"Ottó Kornis, a Forgotten Author and Survivor of the Nazi Camps","authors":"Zoltán Tibori-Szabó","doi":"10.1177/16118944241241443","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241241443","url":null,"abstract":"In May 1944, at the age of 33, the lawyer and writer Ottó Kornis was crammed into a cattle car in his native Transylvanian town, Kolozsvár (in Romanian: Cluj; after 1974: Cluj-Napoca) with 72 of his fellow Jewish citizens, his parents included. They were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. His parents were murdered upon arrival. Out of all the passengers in that cattle car, only he and four other Jews survived the hell of the death and forced labour camps. As soon as he returned home, he wrote a book about his experience titled Smoke ( Füst), which was published in November 1945 in Cluj by the Minerva Literary and Printing Institute and was one of the very first books about the Nazi camps. The present study deals with Kornis’ career and fate from the early years of his youth until his death at the age of 38, only four years after the end of the war. It is a microhistory that explores the career and work of a celebrated and award-winning, then completely forgotten author. His life story reveals the central problems that preoccupied most of the survivors who returned from the Nazi camps to multi-ethnic Transylvania; it also helps to document the literary memorialisation of the Holocaust during the early post-war period.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140539031","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-08DOI: 10.1177/16118944241241433
Camille Creyghton
In the 1830s and the 1840s, Paris was a gathering place for numerous political exiles from different nationalities, including Germans, Italians and Poles. The French capital offered them the opportunity to publish, debate and transnationally exchange ideas with one another in ways that were impossible in their home countries. This article develops a research perspective on these exiles that connects intellectual history with urban history and migration history. It proposes a localized intellectual history that studies how political thought emerges in interactions enabled by specific geographical contexts, in this case the Parisian urban landscape and metropolitan culture. The article first argues why the proposed connection between intellectual, urban and migration history needs to be made. Subsequently, three case studies are used to explore the methodological opportunities of this localized intellectual history: the salon of Marie d’Agoult, the Collège de France and the editorial offices of the German exile newspaper Vorwärts. While the three places largely differ in the kinds of sociability that they offered, the intended public and, by extension, the ways in which they stimulated the formation and exchange of ideas, they appear to be connected by the people who frequented them. It will be argued that focussing on these places enables us to study the process of intellectual transfer and how it is informed by the characteristics of very local geographies, which serve as junctions in the transnational contexts in which modern political ideas, such as nationalism itself, are produced.
{"title":"Transfer of Ideas and Exile Sociability in Paris, 1830–1848: A Localized Intellectual History","authors":"Camille Creyghton","doi":"10.1177/16118944241241433","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241241433","url":null,"abstract":"In the 1830s and the 1840s, Paris was a gathering place for numerous political exiles from different nationalities, including Germans, Italians and Poles. The French capital offered them the opportunity to publish, debate and transnationally exchange ideas with one another in ways that were impossible in their home countries. This article develops a research perspective on these exiles that connects intellectual history with urban history and migration history. It proposes a localized intellectual history that studies how political thought emerges in interactions enabled by specific geographical contexts, in this case the Parisian urban landscape and metropolitan culture. The article first argues why the proposed connection between intellectual, urban and migration history needs to be made. Subsequently, three case studies are used to explore the methodological opportunities of this localized intellectual history: the salon of Marie d’Agoult, the Collège de France and the editorial offices of the German exile newspaper Vorwärts. While the three places largely differ in the kinds of sociability that they offered, the intended public and, by extension, the ways in which they stimulated the formation and exchange of ideas, they appear to be connected by the people who frequented them. It will be argued that focussing on these places enables us to study the process of intellectual transfer and how it is informed by the characteristics of very local geographies, which serve as junctions in the transnational contexts in which modern political ideas, such as nationalism itself, are produced.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140539059","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-04-07DOI: 10.1177/16118944241241442
Tea Sindbæk Andersen
The internal Yugoslav massacres and genocide committed during the Second World War left the postwar Yugoslav state with a complicated legacy. How could the new authorities rebuild the country, drawing on the heroic memory of the victories of the communist-led partisans against the wartime occupiers and collaborators, while at the same time explaining the large-scale war crimes and genocide committed by Yugoslavs against other Yugoslavs? This article surveys the ways in which the internal Yugoslav war crimes were described and explained as part of public memory of the Second World War in Socialist Yugoslavia. It explores how the history of massacres and genocide coexisted with the glorious partisan myth and how the history of these massacres in a way contributed to creating a usable memory out of the Second World War. Moreover, it shows how wartime memory was profoundly changed when the history of internal Yugoslav massacres was increasingly understood as part of what Jasna Dragovic-Soso has called a ‘theme of genocide’ during the last decades of the socialist state. The article suggests that the thematisation may have been a logical and necessary rethinking of Second World War history. Yet, it also argues that the substantial revisiting of this history was sometimes accompanied by irresponsible manipulation which contributed to enabling highly problematic types of memory politics both during and after Yugoslavia's existence.
{"title":"World War II and the Theme of Genocide in the Public Memory of Socialist Yugoslavia","authors":"Tea Sindbæk Andersen","doi":"10.1177/16118944241241442","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944241241442","url":null,"abstract":"The internal Yugoslav massacres and genocide committed during the Second World War left the postwar Yugoslav state with a complicated legacy. How could the new authorities rebuild the country, drawing on the heroic memory of the victories of the communist-led partisans against the wartime occupiers and collaborators, while at the same time explaining the large-scale war crimes and genocide committed by Yugoslavs against other Yugoslavs? This article surveys the ways in which the internal Yugoslav war crimes were described and explained as part of public memory of the Second World War in Socialist Yugoslavia. It explores how the history of massacres and genocide coexisted with the glorious partisan myth and how the history of these massacres in a way contributed to creating a usable memory out of the Second World War. Moreover, it shows how wartime memory was profoundly changed when the history of internal Yugoslav massacres was increasingly understood as part of what Jasna Dragovic-Soso has called a ‘theme of genocide’ during the last decades of the socialist state. The article suggests that the thematisation may have been a logical and necessary rethinking of Second World War history. Yet, it also argues that the substantial revisiting of this history was sometimes accompanied by irresponsible manipulation which contributed to enabling highly problematic types of memory politics both during and after Yugoslavia's existence.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-04-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140733939","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-01-08DOI: 10.1177/16118944231222721
Stephan Rindlisbacher
Opposing the treaties signed after the Paris Peace Conference, the Soviet state and the nascent Turkish Republic saw themselves as potential allies. The Treaties of Moscow and Kars in 1921 were the legal expressions of this. Among other things, both signatory powers agreed that a bilateral commission would demarcate their newly established mutual border in the South Caucasus. This article provides insights into the daily work of the Joint Turkish-Soviet Border Commission that met, after repeated delays, from March 1925 to September 1926. Based on the minutes of this commission stored in the National Archive of Armenia, it explores the following questions: Who were its members? What was its daily business? What sort of challenges occurred and how were they dealt with? This allows us to place this commission in context. Even though the Commission members stuck publicly to the terms of friendship and cooperation, they had conflicting geopolitical interests. Potential conflicts were deliberately silenced. Furthermore, regional representatives from the Transcaucasian Federation (on the Soviet side) or from the Kurdish minority (on the Turkish side) were marginalised in the decision-making processes. After one and a half years, the Commission was able to demarcate the bilateral border. From this perspective, its work was a success. The boundaries established in 1925/26 still exist today, separating Turkey from the three South Caucasian republics.
{"title":"Between Proclamations of Friendship and Concealed Distrust: The Turkish-Soviet Border Commission, 1925–1926","authors":"Stephan Rindlisbacher","doi":"10.1177/16118944231222721","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/16118944231222721","url":null,"abstract":"Opposing the treaties signed after the Paris Peace Conference, the Soviet state and the nascent Turkish Republic saw themselves as potential allies. The Treaties of Moscow and Kars in 1921 were the legal expressions of this. Among other things, both signatory powers agreed that a bilateral commission would demarcate their newly established mutual border in the South Caucasus. This article provides insights into the daily work of the Joint Turkish-Soviet Border Commission that met, after repeated delays, from March 1925 to September 1926. Based on the minutes of this commission stored in the National Archive of Armenia, it explores the following questions: Who were its members? What was its daily business? What sort of challenges occurred and how were they dealt with? This allows us to place this commission in context. Even though the Commission members stuck publicly to the terms of friendship and cooperation, they had conflicting geopolitical interests. Potential conflicts were deliberately silenced. Furthermore, regional representatives from the Transcaucasian Federation (on the Soviet side) or from the Kurdish minority (on the Turkish side) were marginalised in the decision-making processes. After one and a half years, the Commission was able to demarcate the bilateral border. From this perspective, its work was a success. The boundaries established in 1925/26 still exist today, separating Turkey from the three South Caucasian republics.","PeriodicalId":44275,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Modern European History","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2024-01-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139445465","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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