Year: 2019
Type: article
Abstract: When the dust settles, those left to contemplate how the post-Cold War world order unravelled will dedicate a special chapter to the involution of the United Kingdom from leader and partner to petty European state.We live in a world where authoritarian regimes control the future of many around the world, and where even members of the European Union now consider moving towards authoritarian forms of power control in relation to the courts, mass media, refugees and sexual minorities.My piece contemplates possible legacies of the Brexit process for postcommunist countries such as Poland, Hungary and Romania, which to me are framed more by long-term indifference than closeness.In addition to my scholarly expertise in Eastern European history, the observations below are informed by my personal experience of living in Romania until 1985 and in the UK from 1989 to 1990.I have returned to Romania very frequently since then and lived there for extended periods of time in the 1990s and 2000s and have also often travelled back to the UK for short periods of time.In the nineteenth century, when ethnic groups living under colonial or imperial regimes of one kind or another in Europe started to envision the possibility of controlling their own futures as national states, the UK was not their model.Napoleon's sweeping military victories against the old empires and his populist embrace of nationalism resonated with many among the thin layer of Romantic nationalists in Poland, Romania and Greece.Some in Hungary looked towards the United States as a possible benefactor, while Greece was the only Balkan state to keep its gaze and great power lobbying firmly focused on the UK and its rich and famous Philhellenes.Over the twentieth century these attitudes changed.Romania's doubling in size after the First World War at the expense of Hungary followed the intense lobbying activities of the Romanian Queen, Queen Victoria's granddaughter.Marie's close familial relationships with other European monarchs and especially her English cousin, George V, helped seal the deal.The Romanian attitude towards British interests in Europe was radically altered after this success, especially given the problems encountered at Versailles in relation to Romania's favourite great power, France.The Polish attitude in relation to France and the UK likewise shifted, especially during the Second World War.Neville Chamberlain's performance at Munich in May 1938 was nothing short of disastrous for the Polish state, whose leadership and population had hoped the Western allies and the UK in particular would stand up to Hitler in order to guarantee their own integrity.Many lost faith in the ability of the British after the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia.But during the Second World War Winston Churchill's leadership revived hope of British support among the Polish underground (the Home Army), while the Jewish population grasped at every possible intervention by the Allies to be saved from the Nazi occupied territories.The British provided relief for some of the populations targeted by the racist policies of the Nazi regime.When after 1945 the United States emerged as the clear leader of the capitalist side of the Cold War, many in Eastern Europe who saw communism as a form of foreign occupation shifted their lobbying and pleas for support against the Soviet Union towards Washington.But the British presence in Eastern Europe was always an important element in the game of chess between the two superpowers.In Yugoslavia, closer ties between Josif Broz Tito and the UK enabled the renegade communist leader to get away with standing up to the Soviet Union.Direct financial
Source: Contemporary European History
Author: Maria Bucur
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2911230362