Ela Kwiecinska

The concept of the civilizing mission has been generally associated with a justification of Western colonialism. The main premise of the civilizing mission lies in the conviction that improving the world depends on including as many non-Europeans as possible in the achievements of the so-called superior “Western civilization.”  My goal is to show how the concept of the civilizing mission – once used in the colonial politics of Western empires – was transferred in various ways to another geographical area, namely in East-Central Europe: both as an intellectual idea and as a tool for legitimizing political power.  I will demonstrate various strategies through which members of the German, Polish, and Ukrainian intelligentsia transferred, appropriated, contested and internalized the civilizing missions directed towards them by other European empires. East-Central European “enlightened” elites developed a hierarchy of inferiority and superiority in relation to the West; accordingly, Eastern Europe became a single unit only in the eyes of Westerners.

The concept of the “civilizing mission”has been generally associated with justification of Western colonialism. The main premise of the civilizing mission lies in the conviction that improving the world depends on including as many non-Europeans as possible in the achievements of the “superior Western civilization”. In fact, the main purpose of those who impose their own civilizing mission on others has been often to justify political hegemony and territorial conquest.

The secret revolutionary society of the Brotherhood of Saints Cyril and Methodius (1845–1847) was the first modern Ukrainian political organization. Its political aims were an abolition of serfdom, overthrowing the Russian tsar and democratisation of Russian tsardom. Among the Brotherhood’s members were the ‘founding fathers’ of Ukrainian national movement: Mykola Kostomarov (1817–1885), Taras Shevchenko (1814–1861), Panteleimon Kulish (1819–1897). In this paper, I describe the Brotherhood’s intellectual vision of the future Ukraine as an populist utopia of a Slavic federation of peoples-nations that would be based on freedom and equality guaranteed by unorthodox Christian ethics. Furthermore, I compare the two Brotherhood’s symbols of oppression of Ukrainian peoples, a Russian tsar and a Polish lord. I consider the Brotherhood’s populist utopia in a transnational perspective and in this regard, I demonstrate its intellectual links to other post-Napoleonic revolutionary societies and authors in Europe. I show how the Brotherhood merged the local Ukrainian Cossack myth and folk culture with internationalist slogan of the French Revolution ‘liberty, equality, fraternity’.

The claim of a “civilizing mission” is usually associated with Western colonialism and the establishment of the mandate system after the First World War. This chapter aims to show how such “civilizing mission” discourses were used in another geographic region, East-Central Europe, and how they collided with the principle of national self-determination. I will first detail how influential members of the Polish delegation at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, and other Polish statesmen, employed the argument of a “Polish civilizing mission” to contest the establishment of a Ukrainian state and claim control over territories, where Polish rule would secure the development of other nations through Poles’ supposed cultural superiority. I will also consider the response of Ukrainian statesmen and authors who, while appropriating nativist and anti-colonial rhetoric,  portrayed their nation as a victim of Polish occupation and colonization.

References to the idea of a “Polish civilizing mission” emerge from primary sources, meaning that it is not simply a modern research term imposed on the past. For contemporary authors, “mission” referred to transferring the cultural tenets of “civilization” from an allegedly “superior” to an “inferior” nation. As Maciej Janowski notes, the “civilizing mission” was often evoked to legitimize political power in modern East-Central European history. The quality of being a so-called "Kulturnation" brought with it the entitlement to bring “civilization” to “non-civilized” peoples and to retain their territories under a paternal administrative regime that sought to promote progress. I will be using a broad range of source materials, including international legal documents, diplomatic correspondence, newspaper articles, philosophical literature, and map collections, in order to examine this political and legal discourse and how it was used to shape the post-1919 Polish-Ukrainian border.

Galicia was called by its 19th-century contemporaries 'an India of Europe' as it was the poorest province of the Habsburg Empire. This paper presents a global history of ideas and people that connects India's colonial experience with Eastern Europe. Although different in size, both countries were ruled by the imperial centres that considered them as 'backward' and in a need of the 'civilizing mission'. Vienna German-speaking centre stigmatized Polish-Ukrainian-Jewish Galicia periphery as 'barbaric East'. My aim is to show how some ideas of 'development', 'civilization' and 'barbarity' produced by the British to India were transferred and appropriated into Galicia. I will critically examine those ideas through the postcolonial prism. In this regard, I will demonstrate a Galician-Indian parallel in the biography and work of Stanisław Szczepanowski who held an ambivalent position that linked British colonial experience in India with attempts to 'civilize' Galicia.

Not only the “Russian occupants” “While Polish poets and writers perfectly managed to show various Russians and various Russias, historians faced more difficulties with this,” writes Mirosław Filipowicz in the introduction to Anna Bazhenova’s study Historians of the Tsar’s University of Warsaw 1869–1915: Scholarship and Politics. Following Filipowicz, I also see a need for writing a history of Russians and Russia that goes beyond the narrative of an “eternal enemy.” Bazhenova’s book is one of the studies that promises to offer a more complex vision of the past, and its topic seems to be a good illustration of the entangled nature of Polish-Russian history. Bazhenova carefully examines the cohort of history professors who worked at the University of Warsaw during the years 1869–1915, when the university lost its national Polish character. Russian became the language of instruction and most of the professors came from other regions of the Russian Empire. The few exceptions were Polish...

W II RP Polacy postrzegali Ukraińców przez pryzmat wspólnej przeszłościw ramach I Rzeczpospolitej z jednej strony i „polskiej misji cywilizacyjnej” z drugiej, z czego wyłoniły się dwa kierunki polityki wobec mniejszości narodowych: „inkorporacyjny” proponowany przez Romana Dmowskiego i  Narodową Demokrację oraz „federalistyczny” propagowany przez Piłsudskiego. Inaczej można je także nazwać także endecką wizją „asymilacji narodowej”, która zmierzała do „umacniania” polskości „na Kresach”oraz piłsudczykowską „asymilacją państwową”, która przedkładała lojalność wobec państwa bez względu na narodowość, przynależność etnicznączy wyznanie.

Muzeum Józefa Piłsudskiego w Sulejówku z Fundacją Polska Debatuje, jako
partnerem, zainicjowali działanie Klubów Debat Historycznych. Ich celem jest kształtowanie umiejętności prowadzenia debat, w których tworzeniu logicznej argumentacji i jej wymianie towarzyszy otwartość na racje drugiej strony oraz szacunek dla dyskutanta. Opracowane przez specjalistów zeszyty do debat historycznych stanowią – obok podręcznika – znakomite wsparcie w przygotowaniach do debatanckich spotkań i turniejów. W każdym znajdą się propozycje dwóch debat z rozpisaną argumentacją, wprowadzenie do tematu sygnalizowanego tytułem zeszytu oraz materiały źródłowe. W tym roku dotyczą one budowy niepodległego państwa polskiego– II Rzeczpospolitej.

У березні 2022 я почала викладати на факультеті історії Варшавського університету. Я читаю лекції з історії України ХІХ століття польським студентам та історію польсько-українських відносин українським студентам їхньою рідною мовою. У зв’язку з великою хвилею українських біженців до Польщі після повномасштабного вторгнення, Варшавський університет та інші польські університети відкрили програму «Солідарні з Україною», за якою українці можуть навчатися безкоштовно. Їм пропонують курси польської мови і такі самі права на стипендії, як у поляків. Загалом у Варшавському університеті цією можливістю скористалося близько 500 осіб на 2000 місць. На факультет історії загалом подалися лише десятеро українських студентів (на всі програми).

Po podlanym ksenofobią okresie po aktach zaborczych przyszła epoka romantyzmu. Po klęsce powstania listopadowego, w 1832 r. przechodziły przez Niemcy grupy powstańców uciekających przed carskimi represjami. Polacy byli idealizowani przez niemieckich romantyków za umiłowanie wolności i prowadzenie straceńczej walki przeciwko despotycznemu reżimowi Rosji. Jawili się jako przeciwieństwo mieszczańskiego etosu Ordnungu (porządku), skrzętności i racjonalnego planowania. Niemieccy romantycy wyrażali kosmopolityczną solidarność również z innymi bratnimi narodami walczącymi o wolność od imperialnego ucisku, np. z rewolucją lipcową we Francji i rewolucją belgijską (1830 r.) czy wojną o niepodległość Grecji (1821-32). Podziw dla oporu innych ludów pozwalał na eskapizm dusz niemieckich romantyków, które czuły się skrępowane okowami sztywnej burżuazyjnej moralności. Organizowano zatem-w szczególności w Badenii i Wirtembergii-Polenvereine, stowarzyszenia na rzecz pomocy Polakom. Powstańcy listopadowi byli opiewani w Polenlieder (polskich pieśniach). Np. Philipp Jakob Siebenpfeiffer w utworze "Hinauf, Patrioten, zum Schloß, zum Schloß" (Naprzód patrioci, na zamek!) wychwalał ich jako wzór dla Niemców w walce: "Widzieliśmy Polaków, ruszyli w bój, Gdy losu kości zostały rzucone, Opuścili swoje miasta, ojca dom, W zaborczych szponach barbarzyńcy: Przed cara ponurym obliczem Nie poddaje się kochający wolność Polak.

Offering classes in Ukrainian by my department became a significant milestone, if not a pivotal turn for the University of Warsaw, which is the most prominent university in the country. Last year, before the invasion this would have been hardly conceivable: the only foreign language of instruction was English.

In the long run, I hope that the offer targeted at Ukrainians will help to raise new voices in Poland—ones that do not belong to the ethnic majority. I also hope that after their graduation, my students will acquire cultural awareness and social tools to participate actively in Polish public life.

Above all, Poland seems to perceive Ukraine as its alter ego. Poles look at Ukrainians and see themselves from the past. Massive armed revolutions against Russian rule started in Poland already in the 19th century. The revolutionaries failed, but they took the risk and demonstrated courage. Then there was a war in the 1920s, a more successful one. On the level of cultural memory, Poles understand what is going on in Ukraine today and why Ukrainians have chosen to fight.

Another reason behind the support of Ukrainians is the human factor. Poles simply sympathize with people who are suffering, being displaced, or have lost their property. Not to mention that many Polish families have histories of surviving the Second World War with its destruction and atrocities. Poles understand what it means to live in utterly destitute conditions caused by Russia.