{"title":"Mini-States and Micro-Sovereignty: Local Democracies in East Central Europe, 1918–1923","authors":"Z. Mazur","doi":"10.1017/s0960777323000188","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"As recent scholarship has shown, most of East Central Europe remained at war for several years after the official armistice in November 1918, complicating the transition from empires into nation-states. This article addresses another aspect of the state-building process. As opposed to centralising power emanating from capitals such as Prague, Warsaw and Budapest, I argue that local politicians and village leaders made their own territorial and sovereignty claims. Rather than whole nations, it was small communities that first defined self-determination. Here I present a loose typology of such localities (ethno-linguistic republics, non-Bolshevik workers’ councils, and radical agrarians), and show that conflicts between mini-states and burgeoning nation-states shaped the development of the latter.","PeriodicalId":46066,"journal":{"name":"Contemporary European History","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.8000,"publicationDate":"2023-04-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Contemporary European History","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1017/s0960777323000188","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"HISTORY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
As recent scholarship has shown, most of East Central Europe remained at war for several years after the official armistice in November 1918, complicating the transition from empires into nation-states. This article addresses another aspect of the state-building process. As opposed to centralising power emanating from capitals such as Prague, Warsaw and Budapest, I argue that local politicians and village leaders made their own territorial and sovereignty claims. Rather than whole nations, it was small communities that first defined self-determination. Here I present a loose typology of such localities (ethno-linguistic republics, non-Bolshevik workers’ councils, and radical agrarians), and show that conflicts between mini-states and burgeoning nation-states shaped the development of the latter.
期刊介绍:
Contemporary European History covers the history of Eastern and Western Europe, including the United Kingdom, from 1918 to the present. By combining a wide geographical compass with a relatively short time span, the journal achieves both range and depth in its coverage. It is open to all forms of historical inquiry - including cultural, economic, international, political and social approaches - and welcomes comparative analysis. One issue per year explores a broad theme under the guidance of a guest editor. The journal regularly features contributions from scholars outside the Anglophone community and acts as a channel of communication between European historians throughout the continent and beyond it.