Tomasz Stryjek

Piotr Madajczyk

Grzegorz Motyka

Wanda Jarząbek

Mariusz Zajączkowski

Joanna Szymoniczek

The book is the result of the National Science Centre’s project entitled ‘Social engineering. Projects of nation-state building and their representation in historiography and historical memory: Croatia, Germany, Poland and Ukraine in the twentieth century’. The project was conducted at the Institute of Political Studies of the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN). The aim of the participants in the project, developed jointly by the Department of German Studies and the Department of History of Eastern Territories, was to provide a broad perspective on nation-building processes in Central Europe in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and to determine the place of projects on population policy (social engineering) in these processes. The authors also analyse the role of the memory of these projects in developing nation states in this region of Europe in the second half of the twentieth century and contemporary times. The subjects analysed cover a broad spectrum of issues related to the emergence of modern states, demography, eugenics, racial hygiene, statistics, geography and specific policies – from supporting the birth of preferred groups to genocide. The book concerns both the development of modern societies and the problems of nationalism, racial ideology and the idea of ‘the body of the nation’.

Social Engineering in Central and South-East Europe in the Twentieth Century Reconsidered

Andrzej Paczkowski

Wojciech Materski

Krzysztof Persak

Przemysław Adamczewski

Konrad Świder

This book contains an overview of many publications by employees of the Institute of Political Studies of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw in the field of Eastern studies. We have selected texts on the recent history of Eastern Europe, the Soviet Union and communist rule, as well as contemporary Russia and Polish-Russian relations. By making these available to English-speaking readers, on the one hand, we want to present a small part, due to limited space, of the Eastern studies conducted by the Institute and, on the other, pay tribute to their distinguished representative, Richard Pipes. In 2019, according to the last will of this historian, scholar and sovietologist, who died on 18 May 2018, the Institute received his book collection of over three and a half thousand items, mainly concerning Russia and the Soviet Union. These are works of high scientific rank that the scholar collected for over half a century. Acquiring the book collection was the first step towards establishing the Professor Richard Pipes Laboratory. This was possible thanks to funding obtained by the Institute at the end of 2019 from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education as part of the Dialogue programme.

From past through memory to politics

Poland, Soviet Union, Russia

Grzegorz Motyka

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