Only by understanding Central and Eastern Europe’s turbulent history during the first half of the twentieth century can we hope to make sense of the conflicts and crises that have followed World War II and, after that, the collapse of Soviet-controlled state socialism. Ivan Berend looks closely at the fateful decades preceding World War II and at twelve countries whose absence from the roster of major players was enough in itself, he says, to precipitate much of the turmoil.
As waves of modernization swept over Europe, the less developed countries on the periphery tried with little or no success to imitate Western capitalism and liberalism. Instead they remained, as Berend shows, rural, agrarian societies notable for the tenacious survival of feudal and aristocratic institutions. In that context of frustration and disappointment, rebellion was inevitable. Berend leads the reader skillfully through the maze of social, cultural, economic, and political changes in Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Austria, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and the Soviet Union, showing how every path ended in dictatorship and despotism by the start of World War II.
Only by understanding Central and Eastern Europe’s turbulent history during the first half of the twentieth century can we hope to make sense of the conflicts and crises that have followed World War II and, after that, the collapse of Soviet-controlled st
Table of Content
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
FOREWORD
MAPS
I.
The Crisis of Modernization:
The Ideologies of Revolts and
Their Expression in Art, 1900-1918
1.
Catching Up or Lagging Behind?
The Dual Revolution and the Flourishing of Capitalism in Western Europe
The Challenge for the Underdeveloped: Temptation and Threat
Political Responses: Reforms and Revolutions
Latecomers in an Internationalized World Economy
The Role of Railroads and Their Spin-Off Effects
Agriculture and the Export Sectors
International Division of Labor and Its Impact on the Balkans
The Awakening Giant
The Polish and Baltic ‘Miracles’
Hungary’s Semisuccessful Modernization
Industrial Breakthrough in Austria and the Czech Lands
The Semifailure of Central and Eastern European Modernization
2.
The Peculiar Pattern of Central and Eastern European Societies: The Remnants of Noble
and Incomplete Societies
The Deficiency of the Dual Revolution and Its Social Impact
The Large Estate and the Remnants of Noble Society
The Weakness of the Middle Class:Lucken-Positionen and the Emergence of the ‘Jewish Question’
The Incomplete Societies and the Bureaucratic Military Parvenu in the Balkans
Minorities and National Conflicts
3.
The Ideologies of Revolts and Revolutions: The Birth of Nationalist, Communist, and Fascist Ideas
Nationalism
The Eastern European Approach to Nation Building
The Peculiarities of National Ideology: Nation-State versus Kulturnation
From Cultural Movement to Mass Organizations
Communism
The Rise of Western Socialist Reformism
The Emergence of Eastern Revolutionary Leninism
Fascism
Populism and Rising Right-Wing Radicalism in Central and Eastern Europe
4.
Revolution in Art and the Art in Revolution
Art Nouveau, ]ugendstil, Sezession
‘Ornamentation Is Sin’
The Expression of ‘Irrational Reality’ in Literature
The Revolution in Music: Schonberg, Stravinsky, and Bartok
Revolt against Traditional Beauty and Harmony in Visual Art: Kandinsky, Kupka, Bra11Cu§i,
and Archipenko
‘Destruction, Too, Is Creation’
‘Wipe Out the Past Once and for All’:
Constructivism and Suprematism
II.
Class Revolutions and Counterrevolutions: National Revolutions and Their Right-Wing Deformation,
1918-1929
Introduction
5.
Class Revolutions-Counterrevolutions
Russia’s Two Revolutions in 1917
Hungary’s Two Revolutions
Bulgaria’s One and a Half Revolutions
Revolutionary Attempts in the Baltic Countries and Austria
The Wave of Counterrevolutions
6.
Belated National Revolutions
Plans to Create Democratic Confederations
Versailles and the Great Powers’ Policy of Balkanization
The Polish Case
The Independent Baltic States
The Making of Czechoslovakia
The Making of Yugoslavia
Making a Great Romania
The Unstoppable New Waves: National Revolutions without Nations
7.
From National Revolution to Nationalist Authoritarianism
Extreme Ethnic-Religious Diversity
Nationalism Multiplies by Bipartition
Nationalism Breaks Loose: The Link to Right-Wing Authoritarianism
8.
From Bolshevik Revolution to a National-Imperial Modernization Dictatorship
The Hope of a World Revolution
The Road of Transition: The Introduction of War Communism
A New Approach toward Transition: The New Economic Policy
Debates on the Destiny of the Revolution: ‘Socialism in One Country’
The Concept of Forced Industrialization and Central Planning
Merging ‘Socialism in One Country’ and the Program of Forced Industrialization
9.
Economic Nationalism and Its Consequences
Inflation and Despair
Economic Slowdown and Structural Crisis in the World Economy
Stabilization Efforts
The Principle and Practice of Nationalist Economic Policy
Agricultural Protectionism in Central Europe
The Decline of International Trade
Success Stories of the Twenties
The Lack of Technological- Structural Adjustment
III.
The Great Depression and Its Impact: Social Changes; The Triumph
of the Right; The Art of the Crisis and the Crisis in Art, 1929-1939
Introduction
1O.
A Distinctive Great Depression in Central and Eastern Europe
Moderate Industrial Decline
The Agricultural Crisis and Declining Terms of Trade
The Debt Crisis and the Golgotha of the Debtors
Lack of Adjustment to the Structural Crisis
11.
From the Great Depression to Nazi and Stalinist Isolationist Autarchy
Emergency Measures to Aniid Financial Collapse
Government Interventions and Self Sufficiency
The Creation of a German-Led, Isolationist, Regional Agreement System
Isolationism and Self-Sufficiency in the Stalinist Soviet Union
12.
Social Changes: New Forces and Factors
The Peasantry
The Emergence of a Confused Lower Middle Class
The New Strata of Workers and Humiliating Unemployment
13.
Political Impact: The Dirty Torrent of Dictatorships
Engelbert Dollfoss: A Compromise between Political Catholicism and Heimwehr Fascism
Gyula Gombos and His Planned’ Radical Operations’: Hungarv Shifts Further to the Right
Josef Pilsudski and the Dictatorless Dictatorship in Poland
Presidential Dictatorships in the Baltic Countries
Royal Dictatorships in the Balkans
The Characteristics of Fascism and the Authoritarian Regimes in Central and Eastern Europe
From Bolshevik Revolution to a Deformed Party-State Dictatorship
14.
The Art of Crisis and the Crisis in Art
Back to Reality: Protest against a Dadaist World
The Straitjacket of Arts: Nazi-Fascist ‘Retro-Garde”
The Stalinist Cultural Dictate: Mandatory Socialist Realism
Conservative Academism and the Impact of Fascist Art
CONCLUSION
BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEX
About the author
Ivan T. Berend, Professor of History at the University of California, Los Angeles, is former President of the International Committee of Historical Sciences and former President of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (1995-2000). He has published widely on the economy and culture of Central and Eastern Europe.
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