Begegnungen
Schriftenreihe des Europa Institutes Budapest, Band 1:31–66.

KÁLMÁN KULCSÁR

Prospects and Realities

An Outline of a Potential Version in the Political Development of Europe

 

The lessons of the Second World War, later the consequences of the Cold War, in our times the effects of the collapse of the “socialist” political system in Europe and particularly the dissolution of the international political order built up on two pillars (i.e. on the two superpowers) have been providing new and new impetus for trying to create a new international order on global level. Comparing these efforts with the former ones, let alone of the short lived League of Nations between the two World Wars, and the UNO after World War II, the striking difference – at the first glance at least – is, that the former ones wanted to create this order generally on one Continent, mainly in Europe, or by the Monroe doctrine in America.

The efforts made after the Second World War had their good political reasons for introducing a new concept. It is interesting enough to mention, however, that more than one great philosophers of history found the after-war situation suitable not only to discover the significance of some late empires, which had created a political unity of the that time known Oikoumène, and brought important change into the human thinking, but they used the analysis of the characteristics of these empires and spiritual consequences for creating important ideas to be applied in the introduction of a new international order.

Karl Jaspers e.g. started by the analysis of the development of the man’s self-consciousness during the “Axial Period”.¹ That meant that the rational thinking of man separated from mythology, became a process, the end of which produced “the insight into his imperfection and imperfectability. The goal was redemption ... To every position there was the counter position. On the whole, everything remained open. Insecurity became conscious. An unparalleled disquiet took possession of man. The world seemed to consciousness to be growing more and more chaotic. In the end, the collapse took place. From about 200 B.C. onwards great political and spiritual configurations held the field. The Axial Period ended with formation of great States, which forcibly realized this unity (the unified Chinese Empire of Tsin-Shi-Hwang-Ti, the Maurya dynasty in India, the Roman Empire).” (Jaspers 1968.)

“These great change-overs from multiplicity of States to universal empires... The result was a loss of consciousness. The imperial idea was realised in forms founded on religion”.

For these reasons – while he had been convinced of the necessity of the World State Jaspers was trying to find a way leading his vision to the reality, which excluded the empire-type union created by conquest. His solution was a World State constructed by an agreement made by states which had renounced their individual sovereignty in favour of the sovereignty of mankind. In this case the future of mankind would not be an “empire” but a world-order. Furthermore, the “world order would be the continuation and universalization of internal political freedom, but... where sovereignty remains which is not that of mankind as a whole, there also remains a source of unfreedom; for it must assert itself by force against force”. (Jaspers 1973.)

With similar historical analogies Arnold Toynbee drew a similar conclusion, though from different hypothesis. According to him there are two fundamental myths which man is still prisoner of: namely, sovereign states and the conviction that mankind is in perfect control of his exploitation of the biosphere. The political partition (into sovereign states) of the Oikoumène is in sharp contrast with global unification of Oikoumène on the technological and economic planes, let alone the successful saving of the biosphere. “The present-day global set of local sovereign states is not capable of keeping the peace, and it is also not capable of saving the biosphere from man-made pollution or of conserving the biosphere’s non-political plane cannot continue for much longer in an Oikoumène that has already became a unity on the technological and economic planes... However, the Oikoumène cannot now be united politically by the barbarous and ruinous traditional method of military conquest. In 1945 a Oikoumène that was still un-unified politically was overtaken of the nuclear weapon, and the Oikoumène would never be united by use of this deadly weapon...” (Toynbee 1976: 593.)

– The first lesson we are to draw from the study of history (by the help of such great historians, and by taking into consideration the political experiences of the past two hundred years, particularly those of the twentieth century), that the international or world order cannot be created by accidental power, or leadership (Mosconi 1992: 122–129), or what is the same: according only to the interests of the victors of any war.²

– The second lesson to be drawn, therefore, is that, the world or international order could not be created, but by negotiated renounce the sovereignty of states, which means in these same time as

– The third lesson – using the words of Jaspers – the abolition of absolute sovereignty, that is “the abolition of the old concept of State in favour of mankind”.

– The fourth lesson is, logically, that the basic units of a potential world order shall be those regions (be now inside of a state or extending – crossing – the borders of present states) which have common cultural heritage, particularly taking into consideration of the common language, common factors in their organically developed history, and working also in organically developed economic and communication systems. These regions, however, cannot be considered political entities; they will be not more than administrative units.

I am fully aware of the fact, of course, that a world or international order to be constructed according to these “lessons”, might be now not more than ideal model. The creation of this order needs quite a few favourable conditions. The steps to be taken would be accepted only gradually by the states concerned, and according to possibility of taking into consideration those hard interests of the states, which could be able to press them for acceptance of a new system of international order. The analysis of the past and present time from the point of view of political science clearly shows, that history has been creating new and new situations-sometimes as dysfunctional consequences of decisions which originally were supposed or seemed to be rational as to the interests of one or more states and even from the aspect of balanced political interest of a region. The interests, however, used to be recognized, evaluated by politicians, that is human beings and – as Henry Kissinger wrote – “... for the majority states the margin of decision has been greater. The actual choice has been determined to a considerable degree by their interpretation of the environment and by their leader’s conception and alternatives”. (Kissinger 1968: 166). There are situations, however, the danger of which is the potential impossibility of their rational treatment because of the strength of the subjective emotional or ideological³ elements had been involved in their original roots, on the one hand, and because of those factors which influence the decision-making process trying to solve the formerly created situation, on the other.

I am convinced, however, that the creation of an effective global international order – the working on which became more and more important in our time, particularly after the end of the Cold War, and collapse of the Soviet Union (but with the obvious survival of Russia as great power) – must be preceded by regional international orders. Simply because of the conditions for this type of regional cooperation and coming integrations seem to be more favourable, though not without some rather important difficulties.

This is why I try to approach this problem in Europe, the prospects and realities of the European integration process as far as I can consider now the present factors involved in this process, but taking briefly into account the lessons which could be drawn from the former efforts for creating an international order in Europe after the great wars in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

 

I.

The last two centuries of European history have given us some obvious examples for dangers as to the solution of post-war situations. The examples were already more or less well analysed, so I would approach them here only from one point of view. It is well known, that after the Napoleonic wars, the basis of the peace (entirely in the Paris treaty, and together with some other elements involved in the treaties of Vienna Congress) was the principle of balance of power in Europe, consequently to restore the “old” world. The principle seemed to be rational for most of the participants in the negotiations; therefore nobody wanted to “punish” France for the wars and misery of Europe as consequence of the wars initiated by her. The borders of this country not only remained the old ones, but if they were slightly changed, it happened mostly in favour of France. “The case of the equilibrist nature of the decision of Restoration is, then, markedly evident in Castlereagh’s analysis and policy, and becomes even clearer when Talleyrand’s role and ideology are considered. A thoroughgoing balance of power statesman, Talleyrand recognized that a restoration of the Bourbons would choke off French dynamism, the first requisite step in re-creating the European balance of power, it would enable France without loss of face to accept her “anciennes limites”, the second requisite, and it would give her a legitimate and therefore, stable government, a third requisite of the European balance. (Gulick 1955: 171) The negotiations appear to have been free from bitterness (ibid 175), and free of considerations of ideology or revenge, “which remains a classic example of realism in practice” (Fukuyama 1992: 249). In the same time sentiments of those small nations which were to be sacrificed on the altar of balance were of little consideration. This meant e.g. the partition of Poland, some “compensation” for great powers by territories of other nations (e.g. by those of Italy, which was that time not a unified nation or state) etc. The price for the balance had to be paid was the neglect of the rising national feeling. These feelings were possible to be left almost unobserved because of two reasons:

the old “world order” (balance of Europe) was restored,

there were not created artificial states.

This is true, that the negligence of national spirit – which had been raised by the French revolution – in combination with the lack of change of social order, later gave birth to new revolutions, but the principle of balance (and the forces of the European powers) were enough, at least for a while, to restore the world order again, to maintain world order until World War I., though this order included, of course, some but originally not too significant changes. When the changes became significant, the balance of power was questioned by the World War I. In any case, however, Fukuyama evaluated more or less correctly the situation: “After the defeat of Napoleon, the anti-French coalition led by the Austrian foreign minister, prince Metternich, refused to dismember or otherwise extract punitive concessions from France, on the grounds that it would be necessary as a counterweight to future threats to European peace coming from new and unexpected quarters. And indeed, in later years, it was not France but Russia and Germany that sought upset the European status quo.” (Fukuyama 1992: 249) Germany, because the great prime minister of Prussia (later the “Iron Chancellor” of Germany) had been able to recognize the force of rising national feelings and created the second German Empire,⁴ Russia, partly because the Balkan political problems during the Berlin Congress practically remained unsettled, and partly because Russia was able to present herself – according to her own interest as a great power (furthermore because of her Byzantine heritage, and because of the ideology of Pan-Slavism) – as the defender of Serbian interest. Consequently both of these great powers were able to use – among other factors – the rising nationalism.

The second example: the treaties of Versailles after World War I. The principle of balance of power seemed to be alive in Versailles as well, but the idea on which and the instrument by which it was supposed to restore, became significantly different from those of the Vienna Congress.

To begin with: the neglect of national sentiments had taken its toll, and became one of the basic principles of the order to be shaped after the war. The most important element of this new order was determined among the 14 points of US president Woodrow Wilson: the national self-determination. This principle might have been considered a rational one. However – as the small countries had been sacrificed for principle of balance more than a century ago in Vienna – the interest, not only of those of the defeated powers but even some nations inside them were sacrificed on the altar of an ill-conceived “balance” of power, and unfortunately, on that of the vengeance. As the result turned out the principle of the self-determination was not observed in case of the defeated nations. It is well known, that the Hungarians delegation’s proposal for plebiscite had been flatly turned down in the Trianon peace-conference, and by this attitude almost four million Hungarians (most of them living in compact territory all along the other side of the newly defined borders) came under the rule of the so called successor states of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, as well as millions of Germans in the newly created Czechoslovakia, and became two of the largest national minorities in Europe. (See Galantai 1982)

There appeared in such a way artificially created or enlarged states (e.g. Romania, Czechoslovakia, the Serbo-Croatian Slovenian Kingdom, later, from 1929 Yugoslavia) from the former territories of old countries with high percentage of minorities, in some cases from the former national majorities. Consequently, these newly created states had a heterogeneous population with great differences in history, culture, way of life, traditions, languages etc. Last but not least, these newly and artificially created countries made efforts, some of them even by using the state power as a “melting pot” for producing ethnically pure “national” states. For these reasons these countries became unstable in their inner conditions, and remained not only too weak for substituting the Austro-Hungarian Empire for the interests of balance in Europe, but became sources of insecurity and conflicts in the Eastern and East-Central regions of Europe, which were later easily to be used by the Third Reich of Germany. In summary, as in 1815 it had been taken into consideration finally as the principle of basis of legitimacy nothing else, but the monarchies represented the old order, in 1920 it was done the same with the principle of national self-determination, but in a very distorted form, and with a tragic illusion toward the capacity of these newly created states as a basis of balance in Europe.

Among the “reasons” of the decisions of the Versailles and Trianon treaties it cannot be neglected the role of the passions and emotions (included the vengeance), and the introduction of the principle of punishment against the defeated ones, be they states or persons. In case of formers their behaviour was overstressed among the much more complex preconditions and “causes” of the war, in case of the latters, however, after World War I, the punishment was not realized in spite of the prescriptions of the peace treaties. These factors had a far stronger effect on shaping the new international relations than the rational considerations. The importance of these factors at least partly was in connection with the fact, that the “First World War became in ideological war in 1917” (Lukacs 1953: 9), and by this new element the political realism disappeared from the treaties following the World War I. The peace-treaties finally created an inorganic and rather short lived international order, with inbuilt conflicts, tragic consequences.

Among the factors of the successful result of the Vienna Congress there used to be mentioned, that the statesmen of 1814–1815 were fortunate, because “they did not yet have to face and master a whole complex of problems arising from revolutionary forces unleashed in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. The French Revolution had dislocated the equilibrium but had not rendered impossible a return to a balance Europe, the industrial revolution had not yet fatally smashed the ancient and familiar limits of the European in-group, nationalism and liberalism, both antithetical to the mechanical premises of balance power, were neither strong enough nor sufficiently articulate in 1814–15 to confuse the basic design of Vienna. In time, nationalism would give a certain undesirable inflexibility to the units in balance. It would prevent their being increased or decreased in size without exciting the most violent passions, but that time still lay in the future.” (Gulick 1955: 186)

The “rational principle” of the Versailles treaties, the national self-determination in itself was irrational in Eastern part of Europe taking into consideration ethnic conditions of this region. This fact and the distorted realization of the principle were dangerous enough for the balance of power in Europe (even not taking into consideration the effects of the new revolution, the Russian one) and annihilated the basic rationality of a new international order. The consequence is well known: the restoration of the old world of course was out of question – but equally became impossible the introduction of a lasting democratic political system into most countries in Europe. By failure of democratizations of the “successor-states”, there disappeared the very basis, which would have been able to provide for the statesmen of Europe those commonly shared ideological heritage, conception of society and the role of state power in it, those values, etc. which could have been promoted a common attitude for preserving some kind of equilibrium in Europe. Consequently dictatorships were born, antihuman ideologies became ruling principles of politics, and finally the seeds sown by the Versailles treaties produced rather soon the result: World War II.

The Paris treaties after World War II tried to restore the balance of Europe by another ratio, the balance of the great powers, later with that of the “superpower”, all over the world, and by consequence also inside of Europe. The principle of the self-determination of the nations was practically rejected in Europe (in spite of any solemn declarations) as it was practically rejected the chance of the democratic development for the countries in the Eastern periphery and the Central semi-periphery of Europe. The borders of the Versailles treaties – with some small changes – were restored together with the old unsolved problems. The partition of Europe between the western powers and the Soviet Union (including the distribution of Germany and shifting Poland toward the West) started new tensions, and later created the Cold War. Finally, the introduction and that time even the realization of the principle of the “guilty nations” with their punishment into the basic factors of shaping a new international order brought an exceptional possibility for the effects of passions and hatred for a long run which has its role in even the present time.

True enough, that this “balance” of power at least in Europe brought silence for a long while, but – over the Eastern side of the Iron Curtain – this was the silence of a cemetery. It is also true, that under the conditions of the final stage of World War II the military situations determined the main elements of the post-war political order. This military situation, however, was not a strong necessity. The forecast of the later political problems, the evaluation of the processes and lessons of European history (which was analysed in the USA⁵), but the result of which practically was taken into consideration neither by the policy makers nor by the military leadership, (though they sometimes appeared in Winston Churchill’s mind⁶) could have been a factor in shaping another military strategy. Furthermore, it was not a strong necessity to preserve the pre-war borders and perhaps not even the artificially created states in the Eastern semi-periphery of Europe by leaving to form shaping of the international order in this part of the world simply to the Soviet Union.

The consequences of this new international order in Europe were demonstrated in completely different economic and social developments on the two sides of the Iron Curtain. Due to these different developments and due to the fact that the Western powers accepted the democratic values⁷, the new situation (including the potential military menace produced by the Soviet Union) created such strong cooperative European (or Euro-Atlantic) organizations, as the EEC, NATO or Council of Europe. These organizations in the seventies even turned out to be able to integrate such former authoritarian states as e.g. Spain, Portugal, or Greece. These organizations practically (and at least until yet) dissolved the consequences of the two World Wars in the western part of Europe.⁸ On the Eastern side of the Iron Curtain, however, those problems which originally had been the products of the Versailles treaties were only supressed. Nowadays, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, these problems reappeared in very strong, sometimes bloody ways. Once again the world has to face some of the unsolved problems of this region, and in some cases those of the period before World War I. (See e.g.: Hanrieder 1991: 410)

 

II.

Before dealing with these problems, I have to call the attention to the main differences between the present conditions and those of after the Vienna Congress, the Versailles and the Paris treaties. And that is the collapse of an Empire, i.e. the Russian one, which had always its own place in the international order after these peace-treaties (even in the case of the period after World War I, when it turned out, that in spite of the efforts of Winston Churchill, the great powers were not ready to eliminate the menacing new form of Russian imperialism, the Soviet Union in the stage of her making.) After World War II – as I have indicated – the one pillar of the newly created (and a twin-pillared) international balance was the Soviet Union, a superpower, but in reality not equivalent with the United States. It was a rather aggressive power, a significant source of fear, but as it turned out slowly, with such a weak economic and gradually weaker and weaker social background, the lack of the recognition of which misled – for some decades – her western counterparts.⁹ Brzezinski is right: “the twentieth century was internationally much more turbulent than the nineteenth” (Brzezinski 1993: 91), but it remains an open question, how deeply there were involved in this turbulence of the second part of this century the objective factors (e.g. the quantity and quality of the nuclear arms of both sides) and how much the subjective ones, the lack of the clear perceptions and manoeuvring capacities of the western politicians, particularly after Stalin’s death, after the Cuban missile crisis, and how were they trapped into the war in Viet-Nam etc. Anyway, the collapse of the Soviet Union turned out to be a surprise, and created a real turbulent situation, just because nobody seemed to take into consideration this possibility.

I agree with the 1989 statement of Hugh Trevor-Roper, according to which the collapse of an empire had always not only dangerous psychological consequences, and residual post-empire cultural imperialism, but – as the world had such kind of experiences already after World War I – if the “empire can no longer be relied upon to keep the peace ... is likely to become the home of uncontrollable national tensions”. This is about turning out true, even in our time, but without a conclusion drawn by him. He continued his statement as follows: “then I have no doubt that our governments will no longer consider the Soviets our partners in stability, and will switch from talking to Moscow to supporting the dissenting nations of the Empire. This is already happening in our relations with East-Central European countries, especially Poland and Hungary, quite obviously not contained within the imperial mould” (Trevor-Roper 1989: 12).

I think, the surrender of the outer belt of the Empire has been the one of the prices which had to be paid by the Soviet Union for a potential support to be provided by the West, particularly by the US (and as it turned out later by Germany) for maintaining the Empire itself – as well as the other, the introduction of some form of democratization. Though the Soviet Empire has been “serving” the global balance in the recent decades more and more weakening, nevertheless it was usable as the second pillar of a “balance” of power. This balance more or less was able to grant at least for a while and in its some basic factors the international order, particularly in its most important function: a reliable defence against a war using nuclear weapons.

These functions, however, together with the occupation of East-Central and Eastern Europe turned out to be not only very expensive for the Soviet Union, but had an important “inherent weakness”. I am quoting John Lukacs: There is a “prescient remark that Churchill made, already during the war, in November 1944, which has not received the attention it deserves. It was recorded by the Gaulle in his war memoirs. In answer to the latter’s anxious query Churchill said: Yes, the Americans were rather thoughtless in not considering seriously the dangers of Russian expansion in Europe, yes, Russia now was a hungry wolf in the midst of sheep. But after the meal comes the digestion period. Russia would not be able to digest the peoples and their states in Eastern Europe.” (Lukacs 1993: 27) Some signs called the attention of the Soviet leadership for these digestive “problems” – most clearly the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 – but the Soviets also were well aware of the fact, that the “United States did not really wish to challenge the Russian sphere of interest in Europe, surely not at the risk of war” (Lukacs 1993: 28) therefore a very serious dysfunctional consequence of the occupation of a significant part of Europe, and that of the getting the superpower-status “finally became the collapse of the Soviet Empire”.

The recognition by the Soviet Union of its own weakness, its increasing inner problems with the signs of the coming crisis, therefore the impossibility to maintain the former type of the role of a “superpower”, the arms race with the United States, however, came too late. Henry Kissinger wrote correctly, that the USSR “based on two continents, it always identified security with hegemony rather than equilibrium” (Kissinger 1991), meanwhile the Empire – in spite of huge efforts and deprivation of its population – was unable to maintain even the “equilibrium”. Furthermore – though in spite of the supposition of Trevor Roper –, Western powers have been trying to continue the talk with Moscow even providing some economic support in connection with promoting the creation of some sort of the market-economy for a long run, and to give direct assistance to Moscow for overcoming the difficulties of the winter of 1992. Though these negotiations partly had some results, the support came too late, and partly they remained too far from the necessary ones. The Soviet Union collapsed as an Empire with all and other dangerous consequences which appeared in the collapse of other Empires in the past. One has to consider the economic shortages in the country, the low level of organizational and political culture, the stocking and posting of arms, with their quality and quantity and with problems of control etc. Consequently one pillar of the twin-pillared balance, on which the international order even until yet had been established became more or less uncertain in some of its elements was shaken, and started to disappear. It is inevitable to draw the conclusion: the balance not only for Europe, but for the world has to be built up on new principles. There are, of course, alternatives: the first to substitute the Soviet Empire with a Russian one. Lukacs correctly wrote: “The disappearance of Communism in 1991 is an event of very small importance when compared to the dissolution, or even to regression, of the ancient and traditional Great Russian state. Communism is gone; Russia will remain. How much of that empire, how much of that state? That is the big question, and not for Russia alone – for Europe, for America, for the world. A Russian Russia is now coming into being, but what will be its extent and function?” (Lukacs: 1993: 6162). That is the big question, indeed. And the answer – at least until yet – western efforts made for possible to preserve a Russian Empire, which can be strong enough to play the role of the second pillar of the global balance in the Eastern part of Europe and in Asia. These efforts have been making even if in the same time there were to nurse ideas for building up also a third or a forth pillars of this balance, though they might be not so strong as the United States. It seems to be the interest of the United States, however, that Russia could be able to achieve a role of the partner in this part of the world, and trustworthy enough as a power equipped with nuclear weapons.

Hardly could be found in history another situation in which a great power – almost with global dominance – were ready to support its former enemy and competitive partner for regaining its stabile great power status and even to yield to be involved again into the European politics. (See the growing role of Russia in the Balkans, consideration its opinion as to the enlargement of NATO etc.) This means – at least under the present condition – there is no real alternative as to the treatment of Russia. If this empire were to be dissolved even inside of the border of the present Russian Federation, the consequences would become beyond control.

The new situation, however, needs a structurally and functionally renewed system of international organizations, including the United Nations Organization which has been expressing even in its present state the post-war power-relations.¹⁰

There are different potential scenarios to be analysed, and if something is certainly true, that is that these scenarios need deep analyses, without being influenced by the short run components of the world order, or by temporary political consequences of election-years in the USA, economic recessions in some Western countries etc.

 

III.

Any of potential alternatives, however, will be strongly influenced and – I am sure not only in Europe, but with much more significant consequences also on global politics – by the future solution of the Balkan situation. It is rather important therefore to fully understand this situation, the security problems which are partly also in connection with the power vacuum appeared as consequence of the collapse of the Soviet Empire. It became more or less clear by the middle of 1993, that the treatment of this critical situation would depend also on the question, how the European countries, organizations were able to evaluate the ideological problems arising from this situation, and how deeply would be influenced the political approach of the situation by permanent attitudes of the different European states or by the present perception of the role of European organization, and by that of the United States. This is why I have to shortly evaluate the factors which have been involved in coming into existence of the present situation in the Balkans.

It has already been shown – and I was also indicating, that the present problems could be considered almost the same as those of the pre-war period before the World War I., in the first decade of this century. I think some of the factors are really similar, but under quite different conditions. It should be never forgotten that there happened to be fought two World Wars after 1914.

From the point of view of our present topic one of the most important characteristics of the situation before World War I was the phenomenon of the so called “Balkanization”.¹¹ After the withdrawal of the Ottoman Empire, and as consequences of the Berlin Congress of 1878, later the occupation and annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, some small independent states with strong nationalism appeared on the political map of the Balkan Peninsula. Furthermore, there were living such ethnic groups inside the Habsburg Empire (and not only in the Balkan) with also strong national feelings, which wanted autonomy or even independence, for reaffirming their old efforts, e.g. the Romanians in Transylvania.¹² The Empire – in case of acceptance of these demands – should have been reconstructed as a federalist state, even if she were forced to resign of some parts of her territory. The federalization of the Habsburg Empire was the demand of the more or less moderate nationalist politicians particularly before the war. Granting independence for some part of the Empire either even by joining a state outside of her borders, the populations of which were considered to be of the same, at least of similar ethnic origin, or by creating a new and independent state, was the characteristic effort of some of the radical politicians of the nations within the Habsburg Empire, particularly during the second part of World War I and after. The result of these efforts – during World War I – was a series of secret treaties most of them having been in sharp contrast with the openly declared 14 points of W. Wilson, which were officially accepted by the allied powers as the goals of the war. Therefore there were considerable debates among the great powers and with the smaller winners, the outcome of which strengthened the secret treaties and distorted the declared principles (Jelavich 1977: 199). By the distorted realization of the principle of national self-determination there were created artificial states¹³ without any organic historical process, consequently there were introduced by the Versailles Treaties even into East-Central Europe the conditions of a new (partly “hidden”) Balkanization. There are opinions, according to which “in theory” there appeared a potential chance for these new countries for unification in a type of federalist state, but the intolerance against the national minorities, the overstressed idea and practice of sovereignty, finally the efforts made toward autarchy as the basis of actions in external politics of these countries (Pradetto 1990) made its realization impossible. I have to add: the whole basis of the peace-treaties which completely neglected the historical processes, the differences of cultures and the ethnical map of the region,¹⁴ necessarily destroyed not only this potential chance, even if some politicians, e.g. Thomas Masaryk in Czechoslovakia, Oscar Jászi in Hungary¹⁵ were nursing the idea of federation, but – as it is well known now – it created new dangers for the future of Europe. It is not an exaggerated statement, that the seeds of the present bloody conflicts in the Balkans were sown by the Versailles (and later the Paris) treaties.

The disappointment of some ethnic groups appeared rather soon, particularly in Yugoslavia (the Croats), in Czechoslovakia (the Slovaks) which would have been forecasted or even evaded, if the constructors of these treaties had known the history of this region and – at least – had they accepted, as a basis of the new borders, the real ethnical distribution of the population. The newly created national minorities, the Hungarians in Romania, in Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia, the Germans in Czechoslovakia, the Albanians and Macedonians in Yugoslavia etc. did not give up the hope of return to their mother countries. The political situation just before World War II and during the war permitted some corrections of borders and even created at least formally independent states (Slovakia and Croatia), but the situation between the two World Wars was mostly restored by the Paris treaties after the Second World War simply because in these corrections and in creating new states there had been the hands of Germany and Italy, and because it was introduced again the element of punishment into the newly created international order. Consequently the possibility of a more rational regional (and international) order disappeared again.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union the “balkanization” on the Balkan Peninsula reappeared and took an even more dangerous form with problematic ideological-political consequences. The ethnic groups which wanted independence of some sort in the re-created Yugoslavia, after the Tito-era, became more disappointed – among others because of the continued exploitation of the more developed republics. As to the ethnical-cultural factors, neither did the line of separation disappear between the European regions inside Yugoslavia nor the differences among the Roman Catholic, Orthodox and Moslem population. Politically, however, reappeared the former Serbian ambition toward creating a Greater Serbia (which was one of the factors of politics resulting World War I) now in an even a more naked and violent form.¹⁶ In the first stage of the conflict there was shared an illusion by the European and international communities that with help of the usual international efforts there would be possible to find some chance to set up limits for the Serbian ambitions. This illusion – at least partly – was the consequence of the end of the Cold War, which supposedly was about to create a more effective version of the international order. On the surface the movement of the “balls” on international field looked like being more calculable, the interest of the great powers seemed more manageable even inside the most important international organization (after the fall of the Berlin wall there was used a veto in the Security Council only once). This illusion vanished, of course, for different reasons, but it could not be denied, that one of them had been the reluctance of the international communities for recognition of and adaptation to the consequences of the basically changed international situation. This turned out clearly inside the organizations of the international community. The lack of attitudes of the member states for providing them with higher authorization for action, and in the same time the lack of their willingness to surrender greater part of their own sovereignty for giving to these organisations broader capacity for decision and implementing the decision etc. did not change according to the requirements of the present global situation. The possibility of a serious limitation of national sovereignty was not even raised (let alone the theoretical works). Finally, in the age of the integrations the basic components of the order remained the national states (I will return to this question later). As another factor of the ineffectiveness of the supposed international order remained the unwillingness of the national states to put at stake their politics of inner affairs, the stability of the position of governments, the public opinion etc. It seems to me that there is an almost insoluble conflict between the demands of international order (which became now requirements as a result of an organic process of global character) and those of the individual countries, the actions of which – at least in most aspects – are obviously determined by their own, sometimes short run interest, even if they became members of integrations, or international organizations.

This turned out to be true enough in case of the Balkan conflicts, which most likely will finally bring about the realization of the old dream of Greater Serbia, in spite of international condemnation, sanctions, the set-up of an International Tribunal etc. At least for a while the victory of the aggressor seems to be inevitable, may be even the success of the ethnic cleansing. And what is a further danger, that even in this case there would remain significant minorities in Serbia as well, as in the new independent countries on the one hand, and the Peninsula is to become more “Balkanized” than any time after Ottoman occupation, on the other. There remained as open question the fate of Macedonia between Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia and the autonomy of Kosovo (with considerable Alban population) and that of the Voivodina (with considerable Hungarian minority).

It is a closed question now, by the internationally accepted separation the fate of the Czech – and Slovak Federal Republic, but an open one the attitude toward the minorities in Slovakia, as well, as the future situation in Transylvania, in the case if the Romanian politics were not able to abandon their efforts for creating a national state (which is even recognized in the Romanian Constitution) and consequently those of Romanization of the Hungarian population (more than two million) and finally if the Romanian government were not able to get rid of the present conception, according to which – in spite of the European ideas – the problem of national minorities should be treated simply as the question of the inner policy. This situation could be more dangerous if there appeared any type of unification of Romania with Moldavia.¹⁷

Finally, it has to be emphasized, that it is a general phenomenon in this region (perhaps with the exception of Hungary, which is practically a homogenous country, with a small number of minorities) that almost no country wanted to provide those rights for the national minorities inside its own border which were demanded for their ethnic communities being national minorities in other countries. One of the “dysfunctional” consequences of the ethnic war and the cruel ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia is now an appearance of a strange attitude – on international – level toward the ethnic problems. The success of Serbia (by an unusually cruel war) in connection with the highly dangerous situation in the Balkans created a kind of fear from and an ambiguous consideration of the ethnic problems. On the one hand there is practically accepted (in spite of international declaration, true enough with not so apparent and cruel methods as it has been used by the Serbs) a forced integration of the minorities into the majority nation, and on the other, any effort made for maintaining the ethnical identity of the minorities, let alone helping these ethnic “groups” – eventually millions – and vigilance toward them by the former mother countries used to be considered already as “ethnic policy”, which is dangerous (quoting the examples in the former Yugoslavia) for the stability of the region or can be considered even “invitation to war”.¹⁸

The inevitable consequence of this attitude should be the practical acceptance of the “ethnic policy” of majorities, and overt decline of the “ethnic policy” connected with the minorities. Furthermore, this means the strengthening of the national states (even in those regions in which it is impossible to create them without forced assimilation), on this stage of the historical development – a least in Europe – on which the national states are supposed to surrender more and more from their sovereignty for sake of an integration-process. This contradiction hidden in the ethnic problems could not be solved, however, but by a real European integration. As it is true enough that it looks like being impossible in our times – even by peaceful negotiations – redrawing the “national” borders created by irresponsible politics and treaties decades ago, at least so well founded, however, the demand for promoting the collective rights of the ethnic minorities by international covenants and monitoring system until emerging of a real integration of regions of larger communities (which have common, historically and culturally developed heritage), in which the importance of border of national states would be really diminished.

 

IV.

I have to raise a question here, to which it was recently called the international attention, and that is the identification of the situation of Hungary e.g. by the already quoted paper of William Pfaff or by the paper of H. B. Huldt (International Institute of Strategic Studies, London) as a new source of potential international crisis. The reasons of this concept are as follows: Hungary has considerable national minorities in the neighbour countries, and inside Hungary the national question, let us say: a rising nationalism has been gaining priority over the democracy.

I have tried to outline the philosophies of the peace treaties during the recent almost two centuries and their consequences which might be able to provide reasons for an eventual Hungarian demand for changing the irrationally drawn borders of the successor countries of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire. It is a well-known fact, however, that Hungary, the Hungarian Government does not want to modify these borders, even if it is continuously calling the international attention to the security of the Hungarian minorities, to the real conditions for maintaining their ethnical identity, and eventually for considering their individual, cultural and territorial autonomies.¹⁹ Hungary is accepted already as a regular member of the Council of Europe, and she wants to be member of the European Union in due time. Therefore she accepted every legal, political and economic obligation coming from these memberships. An integrated Europe would be the best solution also for the Hungarian minorities.

But there is another side of this effort, there is another aspect of the problems of Hungary, more or less shared with some other countries in East-Central, or Eastern Europe.

It must be taken into consideration, that these countries, all of them, just have left – with different results – the “socialist” political system, which was the outcome of the history of Eastern Europe particularly that of Russia, and it was an ill-conceived experiment of the solution of problems of modernization (see Kulcsár 1992). It must be taken into account, that in their political heritage, even if the “socialist” system remained alien in a greater or lesser degree according to the history of the different countries, there survived some elements of authoritarian rule and those of paternalistic political culture. The inherited and new economic difficulties have to be considered and the fact, that these countries have to face a serious task – beside the political transition – that is, to organize a successful privatization of the state- or cooperative property which was of very high proportion (in Hungary after 1949 almost 100%), it must be introduced a market economy, and such a change of the economic structure, as a consequence of which the national economy would be ready for integration into the world processes. Finally we should consider the social and political consequences of the achievement of all these goals, e.g. the inevitable decrease of the GDP, the appearance and the increase of unemployment, the pauperization of considerable part of the population, the potential political tensions produced by these phenomena. There is a danger of strengthening some traditional elements of political culture, as the intolerance toward the national, ethnic, religious or even political minorities, and most likely there would appear efforts by every state to get advantage even at the expense of the others. Therefore it is not completely unlikely that the world – at least in the case of some of these countries – has to face those phenomena, which made impossible – at least for the next future – to realize the “theoretical chance” not only for federation but even for a real cooperation.

The potential crisis situation could appear (not only in Hungary, but in any country of this region) if the critical mass of the population were to be convinced that the Western part of Europe, or – in a broader sense of the word – the developed countries neglected them. (It is well known that these countries went under the Soviet domination due to the facts of the final period of the Second World War, and practically by the consent of the Western powers.) This negligence would appear not only in the lack of a proper economic assistance, but even by refusing to deal with their security problems. Such a feeling has appeared already as consequence of the hesitant and reluctant attitude of the West toward determined action in connection with the ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia. In this case, as an inevitable consequence of frustration would be likely not only the appearance but even the strengthening of fundamentalism, either in form of nationalism, or in some variants of populism. These fundamentalist forces having been traditionally built in the history of these countries, just because of the repeated failures of modernization (not always due to the attitudes of these countries toward it), could become active after a period of frustration. This were to mean potentially even the renewal of separation of these periphery states from core societies of Europe, with the revival of the strong nationalist attitude toward each other, and, of course, with a potential danger for the continent.

This is why a real cooperation of the West is of crucial significance (or – rather – the economically highly developed countries) for promoting the transformation and improvement of the economies of these states – even in spite of their own economic problems and according to an internationally accepted “plan”. I want to emphasize however, that this economic assistance by its ways and its effects has to develop the democratic values, the spirit of cooperation in the former “socialist” countries on one hand, and to promote the spirit of enterprise, the creativity on the other. It is necessary to push these countries forward, and not simply strengthen by giving loans for the governments to be distributed, because this would promote the spirit of paternalism, the miracle expecting passivity, which characteristically have some roots in the history of these regions, and were supported by the “socialist” regimes. This international cooperation in the present situation is even more important than the Marshall plan was after World War II.

The concept of the Marshall plan was to promote the economic reconstruction and economic growth of the defeated or destroyed countries and by this to evade the disappointment from the democratic order, to make sure the integration of these countries into the Western world menaced by the increasing military power of the Soviet Union and by its presence in Central Europe. There has been, however, an essential difference between those countries and the former “socialist” ones: the defeated states had an important continuity: they preserved the private enterprises, the market economy in spite of the totalitarian rule and even in spite of their war efforts. In the last decade of the 20th century there is no more a Soviet superpower, but the complete disintegration of the former “socialist” world means perhaps even a greater danger. We will see, that the only chance for evading the chaos, the likely coming unbalance of Europe, and of the world should be the integration of these countries into a potential new world order step by step, but as soon as possible. By not using this possibility (the combination of economic assistance with the demand for a truly accepted and in practice realized democratic values, political system and a real willingness for cooperation), it would be more than uncertain the integration of these countries into a really working international world order. Zbigniew Brzezinski in his recent book mentioned as one of the potential future scenarios “a new coalition of the poorer nations against the rich” (Brzezinski 1993: XIV). The dangers of a broadening gap between rich and poor nations could be even more menacing and acute inside one continent (e.g. Europe), particularly if the poor ones were to be felt abandoned, than the present gap between North and South (by this I do not want to say, of course, that the latter problem might be neglected). This is why – for pure political reasons, and not only for moral ones – it is an inevitable necessity for the Western World to recognize and seriously consider the problems and their solution in this part of Europe (not simply evade them, even if some of them are disagreeable or from a “higher level” – which is sometimes simply the level of particular interest – they are eventually not entirely understandable or acceptable, e.g. the problem of national minorities). A complex type of a successful assistance sooner or later would prepare these countries – most of them infected now by intolerance, ardent nationalism, some of them by the euphoria of regained independence, etc. – for giving up a considerable part of their national sovereignty, which is inevitable for creating an effective international order. This type of assistance would promote partly the introduction or reintroduction, partly widely acceptance of those principles and values on which the European civilization has been built up for thousand years.

 

V.

In June 19, 1965 an international conference had been organized in Bellagio (Italy) on the problems of world order. The basic problem of the conference was: “is the nation-state a form of social organization that is likely to persist? Is it an obstacle to world order, if so, how can it be overcome?” (Hoffman 1968). The discussion did not bring a real answer, though the “attackers” and the “defenders” of the nation-state produced mostly good arguments. H. Kissinger even remarked “states, whether national or not, necessarily breed conflicts due to the fragmentation of power and to the competition of interest in the world.” (ibid. 16) In any case, the states and mostly “national states” survived the recent more than a quarter of century (after the Bellagio Conference), but it cannot be neglected, that most of them have been giving up larger and larger part of their sovereignty for favour of regional and even for global cooperation. It is true, that “the domestic policies are dominated not so much by the region’s problems as by purely local and purely global ones, which conspire to divert the region’s members from the internal affairs of her area, and indeed would make an isolated treatment of those affairs impossible. As a result, each nation, new and old, finds itself placed in an orbit of its own, from which it is quite difficult to move away: for the attraction of the regional forces is offset by the pull of the other forces.” (Hoffman 1968: 113) Where the limits of a state’s actions – national or not – in this context are, remains to be seen. We could observe different countries in different regional contexts but it seems to me, the general trend is the acceptance of the strengthening of the effects produced by the regional conditions. It is true, that there have been appearing “deviant behaviours” by some states even inside a comparatively strong European Community (now: Union) calling as arguments the national conditions, even the national sovereignty, (see the ambiguous fate of the Maastricht treaty). In the recent quarter of century, however, the limits for the national sovereignty became not only stronger, but also more visible. Therefore beside the question what may be the fate of national state, it is reasonable to put the question of Walt Rostow: are we to face “the coming age of regionalism”? After the decline and fall of the Cold War his answer is simple: “I concluded that the political structure of global community would require greatly strengthened regional institutions if we are to deal successfully with the agenda, history has set for, say, the next half-century.” (Rostow 1990: 37)

In the “age of regionalism”, however, new national states were born and I think the solution of the present problems of the world and those of East-Central and Eastern Europe yet should be only in connection with the “regionalism”.²⁰

This point can be supported by quoting Brzezinski: “...throughout this decade and into the next century, the world’s political affairs will be dominated by issues and conflicts that are products of conditions, histories, and concerns of an essential regional character.” (Brzezinski 1993: 215)

This might be now a daring statement. The countries of these regions have been generally departing from each other at least until yet. Even those countries which started to form some kind of “organized” cooperation, e.g. the “countries of Visegrad” (the Czech and Slovak Republics, Hungary and Poland), remained in fact by their actions on political level. The cooperation of these countries is burdened with some difficult political problems, on the one hand, and in spite of the common “heritage” of the COMECON past, the coordination of their economic activity, the trade among these countries, their mutual investments etc. are hardly significant, on the other. This can be considered, of course, the dysfunctional consequence of forced and not really profitable cooperation in the framework of the former COMECON, and due to the challenges of the world economic system which are common for them but they are trying to respond with separate efforts. They are doing efforts for entering the European Union but trying to be the first, if it is possible. They are in competition in attracting foreign investment etc. In any case, however, there are factors of transition, which do not exclude the growing economic cooperation of these countries, neither among them, nor with other states of the region. It is obvious, however, that no regional cooperation can be grounded without strong economic ties among the potential partners. Consequently the historic elements coming from a more or less common past – though they could be important (in the case of the Visegrad countries also taking into consideration the historic significance of subnational regional interrelations) – were not enough to create a common regional identity, not even by a firm political decision, without recognizing and taking into consideration the contemporary consequences of this – more or less organic – process.

Supposing the growth of economic cooperation, even in this case there are some questions to be answered, which appeared in the political and economic reality during the recent years. (It is no place, however, to deal with all the problems and questions here and now which were raised in the respective literature during these years.) The effective political decisions and the cooperation accordingly, of course, might be able to strengthen the elements working for a supranational regional entity, particularly taking into consideration the common efforts and possibilities for entering a larger regional organization, that is the European Union (which set up some conditions from this aspect, let alone one of the reasons of the “Balladur plan”). There are, however, also new problems and question marks connected with a European Union in a broader sense of the word.

The first question which must be at least outlined was formulated by Allen Sked among the “myths of the European Unity” (Sked 1990/91) as follows: “whether it is true”, that the “Idea of Europe” is above of “nationalism”. Treating this question in a somewhat sceptical way, he indicated the potential advantages of “nationalism” (e.g. giving to people some historic consciousness, eliminating the inner regional differences, creating peace among the social classes etc., which, however, could be only – according to the lessons of history – rather short living achievements). Even he stated, that in the last centuries of lack of the willingness for acceptance of the national state by such powers as the Ottoman Empire or the Austro-Hungarian Empire or even the desire to build up power-construction on continental eventually global level the “Griff nach der Weltmacht” led to the rejection of European civilization and to wars. Admitting that there is some truth in his concept, I think, however, this is a rather one sided approach to the causes of wars even in the nineteenth century, let alone the twentieth one; there was also another factor operating, which he did not mention. That is, the “continental level” of power-construction was always the goal of one nation, even if the basic ideology of this effort had been not exactly or not only national, but racial, as he was referring to efforts of Hitler.

The crucial point is, however, in our times not the ideology, though it could not be denied, that it has always had some important role. Even now the development of a European ideology built on the series of commonly shared values can be observed. In the present days, the decisive factor which used to be cited as basic doubt on the “objectivity” of the development toward the European unity, (among others) is a supposed “trend” which seems to be just opposite to this development. The contents of this “trend” are those phenomena which are expressed now in the dissolution of former artificial states, the birth of new independent countries with considerable national character, eventually with ardent nationalism. The proper answer, however, for this question most likely can be found just in the formulation of this “trend” itself. That is, those formations which were or are now about to be dissolved have been artificial states. Those states, which were born not in an organic way, but on the maps placed on the table of the former peace-makers. Consequently, it is most likely that the road to the European Unity is going on through the birth of these states (with the sufferings, which are always accompanied with the process of birth). Their pains and troubles are particularly great, if the states around them or the international community which are supposed to help this process have been not properly organized, sometimes even not familiar enough with the conditions, which had been historically shaped and defined for centuries. Therefore – and under the influence of long ago accepted political patterns, uncertain interest etc. – they turned out to be hesitating, slow and uncertain in action.

We should not forget, that the recently independent countries had been under such an enormous pressure particularly after World War II, that their desire to be independent, their demand for trying to find a proper national way broke out, appeared not only with elementary power, but brought into this process old insults, sufferings, formerly “unpaid bills”. All this took place in such regions of Europe, where the rationality had never been the predominant element in politics or in attitudes of the peoples toward each other, rather they were ruled mostly by emotions, irrational visions and even with hatred and cruelty.

Putting the question, why so many intelligent and idealistic human beings “could have ever taken seriously the notion of utopia propagated for them respectively by Hitler and by Lenin/Stalin”, Brzezinski raised a very important problem “of the degree to which the innately destructive and irrational side of human nature is susceptible to demagogic mobilization”. This means that there is a capacity of the human being “to rationalize immoral self-interest as necessary and even justified”. (Brzezinski 1993:3536) The self-interest, of course, could be historically shaped emotions, the rationalization of which might also be possible.

The rationalization and justification of self-interest partly based on manipulated emotions can always be a real factor in politics, and I do not think that the Western part of Europe even today is completely free from such kind of problems. (It turned out e.g. that an economic recession was able to mobilize hatred even violence against the foreigners in highly cultured countries.) Until yet, however, this type of political manipulation has been mostly built on the political culture of the countries of the Eastern periphery of Europe, and nothing else but the normal working of a democratic political system would be able to eliminate it. As to the recently born independent states, they need even more: the recognition of their own real interest.

Therefore, it seems very likely, that in the process toward the European unity, these nations must be provided independence at least for such a while which will be sufficient enough for realizing by themselves, that they need a broader cooperation, perhaps regional federation and this can be possible only in a really working democratic political system. Of course, this needs education on a higher level, than now (with the introduction of European values in a period in which each new country is diligent to find and define its own national character). It needs open gates to the world from both sides of the borders. It needs, last but not least, a level of economic development which will be able to provide a higher standard of life for their population. These conditions could be eventually realized, but not necessarily within the former borders of the artificially created states. One cannot exclude those cooperation (eventually “regrouping” of some present countries or regions) which were much better to be fitting in organic processes, which have been living in Europe for a much longer time, than the life (no more than some decades) of the artificial states. The cultural, emotional etc. ties, the former organically developed economic relations, some of which have been supressed by the new national entities, have been belonging to the years of the last two or more centuries might be more important in the future, than the borders of so called “national” states. These processes created or are about to create organic regions on a smaller scale (that means inside the present border of a country) on one hand, or on a higher level, binding together some regions of different countries (this was the original idea of Pentagonale) or even moving now independent countries as entities closer to each other, on the other. This is why it is possible, that the road to European unity leads through regional perspectives, cooperation, even organizations (by the way, similar processes have been going on in the western part of Europe) taking into consideration the subregions inside a country, and super regions consisting of parts or entities of some countries.

The economic, cultural, even political basis of a United Europe has been developing organically in history, but these bases must be used for construction of policy, political cooperation or organizations in a proper way, that is, I repeat, taking into consideration the organic processes and conditions, and eliminating every high handed artificial element and irrational factors, among others the ideological differences, emotional impulses, as basis of actions.

More than a decade ago the Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau said: “cold, unemotional rationality can still save the (Canadian) ship of state” (Clarkson-MacCall 1990: 260). This is true for all the “ships” even now and all over the world, particularly in the post-Soviet Europe. There is, however, something, which must be added to these words. The “cold rationality” would not be really rational, but by taking into consideration also the emotional factors, as realities, treating them in a rational way. Neglecting the emotions – as factors involved in a situation – would turn the rational to be irrational and might be one of the dangerous reasons of the “shipwreck”.

Of course, to reach the European unity through the dissolution of old states, can be only a process full of emotions, and a thoroughly new regional cooperation needs very delicate politics from all participants of these processes. I wanted to give only one example. The line which separated East-Central-Europe from the proper Eastern region of the Continent at the present is not following the state borders. This is true to the former Yugoslavia because e.g. a considerable Serb minority lives in Croatia, or almost the same size of the Hungarian minority in Serbia. This is the case with Transylvania, which has been (when part of Hungary and even now) one of the main sources of Hungarian culture, the most important centre of the religious reformation in Hungary, and this was the place, where – during Hungarian political rule – there was developing a more western- oriented Romanian culture too. In Transylvania almost half of the Romanian population has not been member of the Orthodox Church, as it is general in the Wallachian principalities in the Transcarpathian region.²¹ That means that Transylvania belongs now culturally to the East-Central Europe, politically to Eastern Europe, and in the same time it remained rather important culturally and ethnically for both Hungary and Romania. These types of phenomena are involved in our days in Russian efforts to develop political ties among those countries in which the dominant religious organization is the Orthodox Church. At least some of these historical problems could not be solved, but in a united Europe, in which the state-borders would be supposed to be traversable, or even became spiritualized as a Romanian minister for foreign affairs (Titulescu) said in the twenties of this century, and together with the subregional autonomies were acceptable. This demands now full protection of human rights, the rights of minorities, and much more tolerance, farsighted approach toward the potential solutions of the problems, finally much more readiness for making compromises from every country which is involved.

 

VI.

It cannot be denied, that in our times there are two trends in Europe: one has been going toward the integration, and the other toward the national disintegration. This is why I can quote with every reason the lines of Matthew Arnold:

“Wandering between two worlds, one dead

The other powerless to be born.”

I have to add, however, that after these two lines – after both of them – in the present reality I have to put some question mark. Since the historically “dead” world keeps some rather tragic element in life (as it happens in agonies), the new world is not strong enough either until yet for coping with the tragic phenomena of the old one. Moreover the present situation produced such conditions, some of them are strengthening the element of life of the old world (this does not mean simply the world order before the collapse of the Soviet Union, but the historical processes of the late nineteenth century and those of the period before the Second World War), and some of them are weakening the efficiency of the new world order and its organizations in and outside of Europe. Just for example: the consequences of the transition of the former Soviet Union were putting into the position of powers with nuclear weapons not only Russia, but also some new states. Further examples are the insecurities in role-conception of the United States as to the great power most responsible for maintaining the law and order on international level, the compability of the US interest with this role; the problems of the deepening and – at the same time – of widening cooperation inside the European Community, and its acute and future role-outside-toward the potential new members; the potential new military position of Germany and Japan in connection of defence of international law and order; the economic recession, let alone the unclarified new roles and functions of the United Nation Organization, and those of the European organizations (NATO, WEU, CSCE, EC) e.g. in a European conflict outside of the NATO territory, etc.

These conditions created a very difficult situation for a coordinated and efficient treatment of conflict by the international community, which is considered the first serious one after the end of Cold War, and easily can be evaluated as a pattern for the future. The retreat of Russia from East-Central-Europe, which is almost complete now, and the eventual disintegration of the Russian Empire, as yet a possibility, in our days leave a vacuum which is not likely to be filled by the United States. “It will not be filled by a “United Europe”, something that, in reality, does not exist. It will most likely be filled by Germany” (Lukacs 1993: 97). “Continuity is as important as is change” – Lukacs indicated one of the factors of his potential scenario (Lukacs 1993: 98) and – obviously at least partly he is right. There are quite a few continuous elements in relations of East Central and East-Europe toward Germany. I can even add to this observation, that the geopolitical situation remained also the same. It should not be forgotten, however, that the term “geopolitics” consists of two words. The “geo”, that is the geographical situation did not change. The “politics”, however, even in its connection with the geographical factors could change, and it really changed, first of all, in case of Germany. Germany became a country strongly committed to the European integration, and her present and potential relations with the East-Central and East-European countries have now different character, without any sign of “imperialism”. I am inclining to interpret Lukacs’s statement, that Germany could play an important role in the process of joining these countries to the European Community, and would help their integration into the European Unity. There are of course some other important changes in the political “part” of the region’s geopolitical situation, for example the independent Ukraine, and what is more important the continuity of the Russian policy toward Poland and, the signs of which can be seen even now, toward the Balkans. We should not forget: the disintegration of Russia cannot be excluded, yet only one of the future scenarios and it is far from being the most likely one. Russia eventually could regain her historical great power status, and moreover, I repeat, the present Western politics looks like helping her efforts toward realization of this potential chance.

The political evaluation of a situation, however, always contains subjective factors.

I was quoting already Henry Kissinger’s statement on the importance of subjective elements in politics and those of politicians. It is rather understandable, that the components of these subjective elements have their roots of former training, collected personal and institutional experiences, inevitably in emotions etc. But the solution of problems of a political situation needs the realization and recognition of the historical processes, the attitude of politicians and also the political education of the people accordingly, which is not always rewarding from the point of view of the direct political interests. It is very important, therefore, that most of the present leading politicians in Europe are strongly committed to some form of the institutionalized European integration.

There are, however, also some other conditions of reaching the united Europe taking into consideration of both present trends. I mention now only two of them, without their real analysis.

The first one is the successful creation of similar regional cooperation with their organizational consequences in other parts of the world. In some parts of our globe societies and states organically are more or less ready for this type of cooperation (e.g. the North American Continent, perhaps with Mexico, the Latin American countries, at least some of them, in one or two parts of the Far Eastern region, maybe in the not too distant future, in the Maghreb countries – depending on the force, on rising or decline, of Islam fundamentalism – a secular Turkish-type cooperation among the Turk countries of the former Soviet Union and Turkey itself etc.). If these regions – and their regional cooperation, eventually organizations – were able to follow a more developed European pattern (which of course needs some coordination) and this does not mean only the distribution of labour among them, but also the slow, and continuous decreasing their number, there would be a good chance for shaping a global organization, with real possibility of action, when it were inevitable to prevent the potential conflicts, and treat them internationally not after when they turned out bloody and so bitter that they became hardly to be approached, and the chance to solve them decreased almost hopelessly.²²

I am fully aware that this idea needs a lot of change on organization-level of international community, that it needs a permanent monitoring system, the operation of which in itself demands the sacrifice of national sovereignty (let alone the possibility of international intervention). I also know that such a system would not be working successfully (let alone eventually in some developed regions), but under some globally more balanced economic conditions. It is no doubt, that there are factors in politics, economics, social conditions, ideologies and even in human and political psychology, working against such a development. But even if there are growing intolerance and hatred against the aliens, also in the Western countries, if there are hopes and illusions for the possibilities stressed by isolationist politicians, if there are raising fresh nationalism, ideological fundamentalism, constitutional and other traditions, debates over borders, rule of tribes on national level, very different political cultures, etc., all these are short run phenomena in the sense of Braudel’s concept of plural time, and on the long run the basic trend of integration would be stronger and stronger.

There have been appearing more and more signs which are showing the inevitable necessity of cooperation (let alone, that the ideas of regionalism, those of the European unity have been deeply entrenched in the development of Euro- Atlantic political thoughts). Not only should the danger of nuclear weapons be mentioned, but also the requirements of a unified world economic system, the demands of adaption to it. (In the 1950s the world-trade was only 6-7% of the world GNP, but this proportion became more than 20% in the eighties and this trend is continuing.) The scientific and technological processes and their consequences in organizations are affecting production and consumption on global level. The needs of collective security (because it is impossible now to maintain the illusion of security only for a single or a few nations) also need to be met on global level. The collapse of “socialist” regimes and the former Soviet Union produced not only dangers and new problems, but an exceptional chance to reorganize the international community, taking into consideration as basis those values which are to be shared by almost every politician (as it happened to be among the participants of the Vienna Congress) and led by an increasing force of favourable public opinion in more and more parts of the world. I do not think, of course, that now is the “end of the history” – even not in the sense of Fukuyama’s statement. I don’t accept that the liberal democracy as a basis for the political system has already won the battle against other forms of politics everywhere. It could be hardly argued that the demands of the second stage of modernization (in the sense of Rostow’s theory – see Rostow 1960) definitely needs those social characteristics (creative imagination and work, innovation, readiness for cooperation etc.) which could be provided until yet only by a political system based on liberal-democratic pattern. Sometimes, however, even the need of modernization would be questioned. There are dangers of authoritative, or totalitarian systems, even dictatorships from different social and ideological sources, but most likely they may emerge, if ever, only for a shorter while at least in Europe or in the Atlantic community. Even if they were to appear in transition processes of former “socialist” countries, they would be short run phenomena and due to temporary failures in transition, which might be strengthened by some traditions. Briefly, there are global processes promoting the regional and global cooperation in spite of the significant forces working against it in our times. Consequently there is a chance to use possibilities coming from the present situation to lay down the basic stones of a new European and maybe also those of a new international order, supposed that there would be done successful efforts for “synchronizing” the time among the different regions and subregions (at present with great differences) of one continent – in our case in Europe – at least and finally among those of the world.

An important paper is trying to treat the European unity and its regional interrelations in connection with the conditions of other regions and global problems (see: Rosecrance 1991: 374–383), with the final conclusion: “The concert of nations today includes the greatest concentration of power that the world has seen since 1815... The great agglomeration of power will draw nations in, not force them apart. The balance of power has yielded to overbalance. Regions and regionalism will therefore flower in participation with rather than in opposition to the new centralizing tendency in modern world politics and economics.” (ibid. 383) We would see, that similar ideas appeared in Brzezinski’s new book, even if he was stressing the potential conflicts among the regions. (Brzezinski 1993: 206–215)

There are, however, some arguments against the effects of the global economic and political trends. The first of these arguments is stressing the present force, even revival of nationalism or new importance of national states, which are supposed to make the global processes relatively significant.

Liah Greenfeld wrote: “Economic globalization is unlikely to weaken the grip of nationalism on humanity; it is largely irrelevant to the problem of nationalism. The nation remains worthwhile, even when it is economically or otherwise irrational, and if the nation’s worth is going to be transcended, it is most improbable that will be on account of economic development. The fact that, from an economic point of view, the world may be turning into a “global village” does not at all contradict this conclusion. Economic globalization is entirely consistent with nationalism.” (Greenfeld 1993: 59) She produced examples by the problems of EEC, concluding that when the demands of cooperation left the economic field and threatened the national sovereignties, “the attitude dramatically changed”. (ibid. 60) It is most likely true, that there is no such a direct connection between the world-economic development and the “worth” of national sovereignties, as it was supposed by some theoreticians (particularly not taking into consideration the phenomena of ideological fundamentalism), but the effects of the uniform world-economic system (described by I. Wallerstein) has been influencing for a longer while the role and situation of nations and nation-states, and there are significant effects which continuously change the social and cultural bases of sovereignty as well as that of the economic one. The effects, of course, are not supposed to appear promptly, but on a longer run, the unifying factors very likely would be stronger, than the short run phenomena (e.g. now emerging inside the EC) quoted by the paper of professor Greenfeld.

There is some truth also in the conception, according to which the nationalism, better said, the rising of national states have been connection with the dissolution of Empires. (In the 19th century in Latin America, after World War I, the distribution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and after World War II, the decolonization, finally in our time the collapse of the Soviet Empire.) It is also true, however, that not only this phenomenon has been involved in the rise of national feelings, in making efforts to shape independent “national” states. (For these potential socio-political contents of nationalism see: Hall 1993: 1–28). I would like to add only one more aspect: due to the belated development of some societies, we have to take into account – at least during the last half a century – new and new waves of nationalism, which could promote the process of modernization of the newly independent countries, mobilizing new social forces, on one hand, but it could be an enormous obstacle in the process of modernization, if it had “Gemeinschaft-like” contents, populism, and therefore looking to the past, with false historicism. In this latter case, the emerging national states and nationalism usually produced a strong attitude and policy against the minorities, and it might even promote ethnic cleansing in different ways.

The national feelings, better said the national states on a quite different level of development can be trying to introduce more national interest even into the organization and activity of the EEC, and sometime they emerge a new form of nationalism appearing in Western countries. This phenomenon is partly a reaction to the too quick promotion of the political unity of Europe planned by the Maastricht treaty, which turned out to be a shock for those nations, the national identity of which might be stronger, than that of others, and it is partly a reaction toward the new nationalism rising up in the Eastern part of Europe, where this nationalism is mostly due to the belated development, and to the new situation of the collapse of the Soviet Union. This created a new situation, in which the potential immigrants coming from the Eastern part of Europe strengthened the feeling of necessity to defend the national identity as well, as the defence of the economy against the potential Eastern production. (I even do not exclude the possibility that the problems with the Maastricht Treaty have been in connection with the supposed disappearance of the feeling of danger from the Soviet power, which obviously was one factor of the growing cooperation of the Western countries.) Finally, a phenomenon as e.g. the inability of a political system for coping with the social problems (corruption, system of “clientele”, some social consequences of modernization) also can contribute to the rising nationalism. A “modern society... has to adapt itself to continuously changing demands, to absorb them in terms of policy making and to assure its own continuity in the fact of repeated new demands and new forms of political organization... The ability to deal with continuous change of political demands is the crucial test of... sustained growth.” (Eisenstadt 1966: 2021) The lack of this capacity of the political system creates a widening gap between the society and its political system. This situation – as it was shown by the example of Italy – could be also a source of extreme nationalism.²³

Recently there appeared as another factor (against the European integration process) some doubts on a united European civilization, considered it even a myth (Sked 1990/91), arguing that nobody was able to define such a concept. I think, however, that its final roots have been not only a European, but an Atlantic civilization, which can be defined mostly on the basis of the Judo-Greco- Christianity, which produced also the ideas of enlightenment, particularly the concept of Human Rights, some important trends in Philosophy, Arts, Literature, and last but not least the development of science and technology. This civilization however (partly) had important components from some other ones, particularly from the Islam Culture in Spain, partly it has been fertilizing some other very important cultures outside Europe and the Atlantic community, the spiritual achievements of which remained also significant parts of the treasures of humanity, and which are going to be important parts of a global culture. During the debates of an interesting conference (see Note 13) two important questions were raised:

– Whether the search for the basis of European identity which would provide the United Europe a common emotional and cultural basis could be considered to be dangerous for eliminating those groups (immigrants with different religious e.g. Islam belief), even countries with Islamic cultures (Turkey, Bosnia-Herzegovina) or countries historically under Byzantine influence from the European community. Taking into account the basic humanistic character of the European (or Atlantic) culture, one of the characteristic features of which was its receptive character, I am sure, that this process will continue, even as to the values of other “Great Traditions”, and – gradually – the most important component of the European identity will be the tolerance. It must be hardly stressed, that peripheral countries of Europe could be members of a continuously growing European community only step by step, achieved some generally accepted conditions, also from this point of view.

– The second question in formulation of Dr. G. Kirsch: “European integration was from the beginning essentially a child of reason, not of emotion. To a large extent it still is. As a consequence, the European Community still is less of a supranational institution and more of supranational state organization”. (Kirsch 1992: 7) As a further consequence of this, it was argued, the question, according to which the European identity had not been accepted, but by the strengthened bureaucracy of the common organizations and institutions of Europe. This is a real subject to be discussed, but (a) if we accepted Dr. Kirsch’s theory on “state created the nation”, this can mean – as it is in reality – the beginning of a process (with some historic components) toward the “emotional unity”, or at least toward the necessary loyality;²⁴ (b) the success of this process depends on historic situations at the present time and in the next future, which can strengthen the common elements of the common past, the factors of economic and other cooperation (e.g. education) and can give favourable chance for the “creative” activity to the “European bureaucracy”.

It might be strange, but those factors, which now were supposed to influence the European integration negatively – e.g. nationalism, national states, sovereignty etc. – had been the production of an originally united European civilization, that is, they were growing out from common roots. From this point of view, the European civilization produced the same values, but in the different regions of Europe these values found fertile soil in different periods. The identity was produced by the “European” or “Euro-Atlantic” culture, and behind this identity – even emotionally – have been staying those “economic and technological as well as the political and cultural facts”, which “seem set to reaffirm the ancient solidarity of most of Europe for which this survey has provided objective historical evidence. In a global context this unity of European civilization is its most significant aspect and explains the formidable impact of Europeans on the world; their vitality, originality and resilience.” (Bowle 1970: 362)

The receptive character of the European culture made possible not only its impact on the other cultures but also a mutual fertilization, which would give a good chance in the future for the development of a global identity, that is for a universal human being.²⁵

 

VII.

As I have been reading books and papers and participating in conferences on the twentieth century I have become also uncertain on realities of my own ideas. Even if we freed ourselves from the so called “secular religions” “belief in salvation by (the “reasonably” made) society” (Drucker 1993: 7) or from the “metamyth” (Brzezinski 1993: 19), – the euphemistic terms for Nazism and bolshevism – are we at the same time attracted by some other rational prospects? Peter Drucker is more optimistic with his “Knowledge Society” and its consequences from nation-state to regionalism, which would not replace, but to sideline the nation-state. Because: “Increasingly, the new challenges facing every government are challenges that simply cannot be dealt with by national or even international action. They require transnational agencies, which have a “sovereignty of their own”. (Drucker 1993:142) Internationalism is no longer a utopia, “it is already on the horizon – if barely so”. Regionalism already is a reality (Drucker 1993: 149), even he is stressing now: we are not facing the new world order... rather we are facing a new disorder – no one can know for how long” (Drucker 1993: 113). One of the most important elements: “a universally educated one”, who is supposed to be different from the humanist type educated person. The later can be the preservation of the heritage of mankind, “but bridge to the past not enough. The educated person needs to be able to bring his or her knowledge to bear on the present not to mention molding the future.” (Drucker 1993:212)

The great heritage of the past will have to be an essential element, but much more than the Western (Judeo-Greco-Cristian) tradition. It needs to include the great heritage of Chinese, Japanese, Islam, briefly also the non-Western culture. However, “the future may be ‘post-Western’, or ‘anti-western’, but it cannot be ‘non-Western’, because, according to Drucker its material civilization and its knowledges all rest on Western foundations...” “Post-capitalist society is both a knowledge society and a society of organizations, each dependent on the other and yet each very different in its concepts, views and values. Most, if not all, educated persons will therefore have to be prepared to live and work simultaneously in two cultures–that of the “intellectual”, who focuses on words and ideas, and that of the “manager”, who focuses on people and work.” (Drucker 1993: 215)

The more pessimistic Brzezinski (no wonder, with his experiences in politics) looks at the future with a more reality-based eye. “The shape of mankind’s political future will much depend on the philosophical and cultural evolution of the successful but also self-centred West, on the degree to which the post-communist transformation confirms or refutes the wider relevance of the democratic model, and on the extent to which the world’s largest social experiment is, or is not, assimilated into wider global cooperation. In a world of ideological confusion and of social polarization, the spectre of geopolitical fragmentation thus clearly threatens. Global geopolitical dynamics are interacting with the inchoate yearnings of political awakened mankind for some certainties about its future and for some universally accepted criteria of justice. That agenda is not only daunting; it justifies concern that the dilemmas of global disorder may become the defining determinants of the new age.” (Brzezinski 1993:200)

The global control and that is his real conclusion, at least for a long while, seems to be illusion. There has been shaping different regions, with different problems. Some regions, e.g. North America could be a powerful economic bloc organized on the basis of the North American Free Trade Area, or Europe, probably integrated economically, but “with its political unity lagging considerably behind economic integration”, some simply dominated by one single power, as Japan, some as a “shapeless Moslem crescent” without real cohesion but also resentments against the West etc. (Brzezinski 1993: 207–212). The global political dilemmas, therefore, cannot be solved by a “catalogue of policy recommendations. It can only emerge as a consequence of a new historical tide that induces a change both in values and in conduct, in effect, out of a prolonged process of cultural self – re-examination and philosophical re-evaluation, with over time influences the political outlook both of the West and of the non-Western world. That process can be encouraged by an enlightened dialogue but it cannot be politically imposed.” (Brzezinski 1993: 221)

Considering and accepting the role of nation state “as primary focus of civic loyalty, the basic source of historical and cultural diversity (which I doubt – K.K.), and the prime force for mobilizing the individual’s commitment”, the nation states look like not being suitable for organizing global peace, to promote global welfare etc. The solution: “to institutionalize the progressive emergence of such a common global community, new forms of enhanced cooperation will have to evolve along two major axes: the trilateral relationship among the world richest and democratic states of Europe, America and East Asia (notably Japan)²⁶, and through the United Nations as wider and more representative framework of global politics ... The central purpose of trilateral cooperation should not be just to preserve existing privileges but rather promote more basic progress of human conditions. (Brzezinski 1993: 222–223) And finally: Recognition both of the complexity and the contingency of the human condition thus underlines the political need for shared moral consensus in the increasingly congested and intimate world of the twenty-first century.” (Brzezinski 1993: 231)

The real contradiction in both “grand visions” is that when they denied the “secular religions” or “megamyths” the basis of which has been the unlimited force of human “ratio”, they accepted the same as the basis of global order. Even if Drucker substituted it by the “educated person” or Brzezinski introduced the moral factor into his conception.

I do not want to deny the role of human intelligence and education in politics, and I appreciate those limits coming from a cultural pluralism and the importance of moral principles which both eminent authors recognized as necessities of gradual development toward the global unity.

These recognitions among the human beings, among the politicians, however, might be the products of the basic trends on regional and global levels. And these trends, even if we accepted them as real ones, and do not project them into the history of our own ideas as Karl Popper said (Popper: II. 278) are full of conflicts, insecurities, potential changes, even they could be turned out of very temporary character as the “megamyths” of professor Brzezinski. After so much illusions, euphoria, but also after disappointments and frustration it is difficult to say, but I accept: the mankind and its politicians should have visions for the future, but combined with the pragmatic actions for the resolution of conflicting situations, with a sense of proper timing, and not neglecting those principles (both moral and legal) which are already the stable productions of years of development of humanity.

Returning to my original topic, there is a real possibility of an integrated Europe (in spite of the other trends on the continent which are most likely short run). Based on historical experiences, and the generally accepted values, favourable conditions for unity are slowly emerging. The necessary intellectual cultural and political consensus which might be able to promote the trend itself toward a scenario of economic integration and political unity of Europe is becoming a reality, and there is a good reason emerging for it: the hard interests of the European countries, even if these interests were not recognized everywhere and by everybody (politicians and population) equally soon.

 

Notes

1

The Axial period means a new interpretation of the “axis of history” instead of “axis” of the Christian philosophy of history, for which the “axis” was the coming of the Son of the God. In Jaspers’ concept between 800 and 200 B.C. mankind gained an awareness of himself, including its capacities and limits. During the Axial period the same spiritual process took place, simultaneously, in the West, in China and in India.

2

According to Mosconi, the “accidental leadership” (which is not identical necessarily with a victorious power in war) could be able to influence a federal unity in Europe (e.g. de Gasperi tried to establish a democratic European community, with the creation of a representative Assembly, and with a European Army) by highlighting or identifying a situation. The real solution of the problem, however, shall be a direct election for the European Parliament (which is working now) and particularly the attribution of the constituent mandate to the European Parliament.” (Mosconi 1992: 122–129)

3

The great statesmen were generally able to free themselves from even very deeply accepted ideological ties. Lukacs wrote on Churchill: “Because he was a statesman and not an ideologue, his contempt for Communism neither hampered nor confused his considerations.” (Lukacs 1990: 146) Isaacson – in a biography – also made a similar statement on Kissinger: “Power rather than righteousness, he became to believe, determined the world order. Nations that acted based on national interests were less dangerous than those that crusaded on the basis of ideology or their own perception of moral justice. (Isaacson 1992: 761)

4

Bismarck, however, was satisfied with the existence of the German Empire. His nationalism was unquestionable, but he did not want war any more. On his eightieth birthday he was visited by more than five thousand young people to pay him their homage. He told them: “We Germans had no longer any reason for war. We had what we needed. To fight for more, from a lust of conquest and for the annexation of countries which were not necessary for us always appeared to me like an atrocity, I am tempted to say like a Bonapartistic and foreign atrocity, alien to the Germanic sense of justice.” (See: Snyder 1967: 396)

5

These investigations, analyses and documents were evaluated by a Hungarian historian in 1991. (See: Romsics 199l: 32–67)

6

Churchill’s ideas on a different military strategy were well known even among his military leaders. He had been arguing even with A. Brooke, the British Chief of Staff on the Mediterranean strategy, and tried to make a lot of efforts for a landing on the Balkan Peninsula, or Northern Italy. His policy – though it was always necessarily subordinated to the war efforts (directed by American–British cooperation and by Stalin’s strategy) at least from 1943 was fully aware of the danger of the Russian presence in Central Europe. But it could be hardly debated, that the pattern for decisions of Yalta and Potsdam was already set at Teheran. Churchill’s more realistic attitude (in comparison with his American ally) was acknowledged also by such biographers, who were not too lenient toward the British Prime Minister. (See e.g. Charmley 1993: 521, 603–644)

7

This democratization was not an automatic process, there were used different methods with different consequences, and it took some years and the effective economic support by the Marshall Plan after the Second World War. (See: Herz 1982)

8

It is true, that the presence of the USSR in the centre of Europe, the construction of the Berlin Wall were very important factors in forging the unity not only of the Western Part of Europe, but in strengthening the Euro-Atlantic Idea and transforming it into reality. But I do not think, that by the disappearance of the Soviet Union the “Atlanticism’s day has passed” even if could be questioned this idea, as it had been done by Pfaff and might be raised new alternatives instead of its present form. (Pfaff 1989/90: 65)

I am inclining much more to accept the reasons of Wolfe, according to which the Atlanticism, its most important organization being the NATO, should accept the new situation of our time and different role against the new dangers. The “transformation of Europe does not diminish the Atlantic community. The Process of European integration has always been seen as compatible with Atlanticism. Much more important, a new group of countries, one that has been excluded for a generation, now wants to participate in it. The norms and principles of Atlanticism seem secure. Democracy, constitutionalism, and liberal economics are the catchword of the hour.” (Wolfe 1990–91: 162) This means – among others – that the Atlantic community has got an exceptional historical chance to promote the transformation of East-Central and Eastern-Europe. When I was invited to participate – as an observer – at the meeting of North Atlantic Assembly in Banff (Canada), May 13–18, 1992, the main problem of North Atlantic Organization – as it turned out from almost every approach to the new situation – has been the adaptation to the situation after the changes in Eastern part of Europe, particularly the collapse of the Soviet Union. The demands of the adaptation appeared as the claim for cooperation among the European organizations, particularly as to the relation between the NATO and the CSCE. It was raised the problems of the interpretation of regional possibilities for security-demands toward the NATO, the territory and means for its activity, the problem of prevention of conflicts, the question of peace-making (eventually by force), that of the peace-keeping, the potential integration of the NATO into a newly structured international community etc. Though this session of the Assembly was organized not for decision making but for preliminary discussions, it was obvious, that very important decisions have to be made taking into consideration the new regional and global conditions. Recently it turned out, however, the enlargement of and changes inside of the NATO were delayed, and in the further construction and commitment of the NATO there has not been negligible factor the influence of the Russian policy.

9

Recently the book of the former American Secretary of State Georges Schultz proves convincingly how slow and cautious this process had been, and how courageous was – from this point of view – the Reagan administration in its negotiations with its Soviet counterparts. (Schutz 1993)

10

The author of this paper had been participating at a conference on the “Global Refugee Policy at the Aspen Institute organized by the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy” (Wye Center, Queenstown, Maryland, February 20–22, 1992). During the discussions of this Conference he was raising the problem of the active, i.e. the preventive aspects of this policy, and it was debated even the potentialities of a monitoring system for discovery and control of the sources of conflicts and the chances of reorganization of international community and its institutions (included the UNO organizations) according to the new challenges of the world. The problems of the structural and functional changes of the UNO became largely discussed inside the UNO and also in academic circles, taking into consideration interesting and different aspects. The end of the Cold War – wrote e.g. S. Kumar – has created uncertainties of various kinds. The greatest uncertainty, however, has been created for the non-aligned world. “The non-aligned countries can no longer hope to rely on the support of one of the superpowers in case of the hostility of the other, either diplomatically or military.” Therefore the change of the UNO because of the challenges to the world order became rather urgent for them. (Kumar 1992: 113–121)

11

The concept of “Balkanization” originally meant the appearance of small states on the Balkan Peninsula by the decline of the Ottoman Empire, and later by the end of the World War I., linked to the dissolution of Habsburg Monarchy. These situations have been full of conflicts, wars, mutual bloodshed and cruelty. But it means, however, also a special culture (which developed under the influence of the Byzantine and later the Ottoman Empire). One of the important features of this culture, first of all, those of political culture was the paramount place of emotions, lack of rationality (consequently the lack of general respect for contracts, legality and constitutionality), high degree of paternalism etc.

12

The controversial situation before and after the so called “compromise” between the Habsburgs Monarchy and Hungary (1867) could not be characterized better, than by the example of Transylvania (that time the part of Hungary) where existed a favourable legal situation for minorities, and potentialities for creating a well-educated Romanian intelligentsia – mostly trained in Hungarian universities – even if in the same time there appeared some political efforts of “Magyarization” (see: Jelarich 1977: 242–294). For the circumstances of peace-treaties after the World War I., see (ibid. 305–310). For the both problems: Köpeczi 1994)

13

I have to give some explanation for this term “artificial state”. Dr. G. Kirsch in a Conference on “Federalism and the Nation State” (Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto, June 4–6, 1992, Toronto) stated, the core of state is reason not emotion, and a nation is a group of people, who share the feeling they belong together without knowing, in fact without even asking why, and who want to have their own state. This definition implies that a nation can only exist with regard to the concept the state. He stated furthermore, that though history gives examples of nations creating the matching states, there are examples of states creating nations to go with the states (e.g. France by the Revolution, or the German nations by the politics of Bismarck, etc.). (Kirsch 1992: 4–6) From this point of view a state in principle had the possibility for creating artificially a nation. Though, I can accept this opinion.

l4

The Eastern periphery of Europe has been historically divided into two regions. The Western borderline of Eastern Europe more or less follows the present border of the Baltic states and the Eastern political border of Poland, the Eastern border of the historical Hungary with Transylvania as well, in other words, the range of the Carpathian mountains to the river Danube and the river Sava. Thus it includes a large (European) part of the former Soviet Union, the old territories of Romania, i.e. the Wallachian Principalities, Serbia and Bulgaria. This region had been under Byzantine and Asian influence in respect of culture, political structure and law. The reformation, the classical Roman law, etc. did not penetrate into it. East Central Europe has been the region between the lines outlined above and the rivers Elbe and Leitha and the Western borders of the former Roman province of Pannonia, included the Baltic states, Poland, certain German territories, Bohemia, the historical Hungary (including Transylvania, Slovakia and Croatia), and Slovenia. The societies of this region have been fundamentally Western oriented, the principles of Roman law were decisive in their legal system, reformation had its roots here, etc. Nevertheless, partly because of their original social characteristic, and partly because of repeated pressures to adjust themselves to Eastern Europe, they have retained several East European traits in their social structure, political culture, etc. These East European traditional characters were strengthened by the Soviet occupation and the forced introduction of the Soviet model after World War II. See: Anderson 1974., Szűcs 1983., Kulcsár 1986: 15–62., Kulcsár 1992: 22–71.

This difference of the regions of Europe, of course, does not mean a chance for a direct political interpretation, e.g. for creating a new “iron curtain” on the western “border line” of East-Central Europe, or efforts to exclude those countries which are on the eastern side of this line. But the evaluation and analysis of the present political processes, phenomena or even some political actions could not be successful but with taking into consideration the historically formed characteristics of these regions.

15

In the final stage of World War I, there appeared the idea of the transformation of the Austro-Hungarian Empire into a federation, and this idea was living even later in the thoughts of some East-Central European politicians, e.g. Thomas Masaryk (Czech statesman) or Oszkar Jászi (Hungarian scholar and politician). This idea, however, was refused by the potential participants of such a federation, as well, as by the Entente powers. The idea of a Danubian federation, however, remained living, and reappeared even after World War II., only to be refused again mostly under Soviet influence, for Soviet interest. For the problems (see: Wagner 1970: 115–244).

16

The effort to create a Greater Serbia went back to the history well before the Ottoman Empire, and was haunting the political ideas and actions almost from the newly independent Serbian Principality, later Kingdom, until it started to be realized by 1918. It is well known, that this effort was one of the causes of World War I., and by killing the Austro-Hungarian Crown-Prince Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo (1914) it became the direct reason for starting the “Great War”.

17

Moldavia was the most neglected part of Romania. Even between the two world wars it was underdeveloped in comparison with the other parts of the country, let alone the most developed region: Transylvania. Therefore the Moldavians hardly were ready to take their former position in a Great Romania, particularly at our times, when the economic situation in Romania became more miserable than any time after the First World War and the political conditions for a new territory would not be attractive either. For the time being – at least – the Moldavians have voted for independence.

18

William Pfaff has given in his recent papers good reasons for fear of new or potential ethnic conflicts, particularly in relation with the Hungarian national minorities in Hungary’s neighbour countries (Pfaff 1993), but these reasons are only strengthening the efforts of the Hungarian governments for construction international instruments suitable to deal with these problems.

19

According to a usual Hungarian concept, the autonomy of the Hungarian minorities (in Transylvania, in Southern Slovakia and in the Northern part of Voivodina inside Serbia) should consist of three elements: a/ personal autonomy for individual decision i.e. granting the right to the person to define to which ethnic-national community wants to belong (this decision, however, should not influence the citizenship, which is a different, legal connection with the state), b/ cultural autonomy for the national minority for promoting the preservation of its national identity (that is: education, artist and other cultural activities), c/ territorial self-government in those unities of public administration in which the national minority is the local or regional majority. This concept is, however, for not an immediate and particularly not a “forced” realization, and it is denied now unanimously by the Romanian, Serbian and Slovakian governments in spite the fact, that for instance the Serbian government demands even more for the Serbian minorities in Croatia, (for the so called Crajina), let alone Bosnia-Herzegovina. The reason of rejection is that in case of granting territorial autonomy (particularly granted for Hungarians living along the Hungarian border almost in pure ethnic communities) would lead to a declaration of these communities to return to the mother country. By granting the autonomy, of course, it would be possible to include legal limits, which were not to permit the secession and they could be enforced by European organizations. It is interesting, however, that before the Trianon peace-treaty during a tripartite (Italian-Romanian-Hungarian) negotiation, Romania herself proposed such autonomy for the countries with Hungarian majorities in the already occupied (by the Romanian troops) Transylvania. (Romsics 1987) As to the opinion of a British expert concerning the problems of autonomy of national minorities, see Sunley 1933: 32–33.

20

Let me mention an interesting phenomenon of the extreme nationalism among some of the East Central or Eastern European ethnic communities of the USA or Canada. These communities have been living for 70, 45 or 35 years in democratic countries, most of them are accepted by or even fully integrated into their new homeland. Some of them, particularly the more or less frustrated persons have been nursing outdated ideas of ardent nationalism as to their original countries, sometimes in connection with the extreme political forces of their former homeland. The source of this attitude – I repeat – the frustration of different types, and consequently a special version of fundamentalism. I have to stress, however, if a state created artificially – as Yugoslavia or for a degree the former Czechoslovakia–it had practically no chance to form a nation from ethnically, culturally and religiously so much different population, which were component of other states for a long time. The artificially formed state, without historically organic process, even did not have the reason, without which it could not be successful as a national state. W. Pfaff wrote: “The ethnic state is a product of the political imagination; it does not exist in reality. Ethnic nationalism is a product of certain idea of the national originated in German romanticism and the German cultural and intellectual reaction to the universalizing ideas of the French Enlightenment and Revolution and other revolutionary wars.” And furthermore: “No nation in Europe is ethnically pure. All are intermixtures of successive migrations of peoples. The nineteenth century idea of the ethnic state was nonetheless made the basis of the First World War settlements in East-Central and Southeastern Europe and was enshrined in the U.N. Charter in 1945.” (Pfaff 1993: 99–100) Taking into consideration Pfaff’s opinion, the artificial states created after the World Wars, became double-artificial: having been built up on an imaginary factor, even distorted the realization this political imagination. It might be added, that in these cases the bureaucracy or the army (as in the former Yugoslavia) had the real interest, which was considered the reason or ration of the state, and – as it turned out – was not enough for developing an emotional solidarity.

21

In the years of first decades in our century the Romanian orthodoxy became an anti-western ideology which in the name of the Romanian spirit, in the name of Rinmoirea orientalismului (the revival of orientalism) attacked the Protestantism as the expression of the western individualism, industrialism. (Jonescu 1924:36) It is also true, however, that some initiator of the Romanian populism, which stressed the significance of the folk-culture in villages were coming from a part of the Transylvanian intelligentsia. This populism together with the Orthodoxy on Byzantine traditions tried to create a special Romanian spirit against the modernization. (Pászka:344–346.)

22

Therefore it could not be easily denied the danger of “micronationalism”, which is supposed to be accompanied with the regionalism in Europe, and, indeed, there emerged a tendency now of creating mini-states created by the dissolution of the former artificial states. Though I think that regionalism can be a way leading toward to the European Union, and the regions later might be even some administrative units inside of the Union instead of the present national states, I acknowledge the dangers of the mini-states. Finally, however, I agree with the statement made by G. Montani, that the “struggle for European federalism and local federalism can only progress side by side, since the achievement of a federal Europe is necessary to eliminate the suffocating centralising power of the national state”. (Montani 1993: 15). I accept also his sentence, that it would not be sensible to provoke new secessions, hatred and wars, which easily could create new division inside the present states, and would make more difficult to enlarge the European Unity. Therefore, it were necessary now the democratic development of autonomies, particularly on local level by strengthening the democracy inside the states. Unfortunately it was not possible to eliminate those forces which have been emerged now in artificial states struggling for ethnic autonomy, even for new states after the pressures of decades or even hundreds of years. The direct and urgent task in these cases would be to create the legal and institutional framework for treating such cases by international organizations mostly on European level, which would help to adjust these processes into the great trend of integration of Europe.

23

The results of the Italian general election in the Spring of 1994 have been showing not only the consequences of a rigid political system, but the explosion of the rightist nationalism took up to the surface the neo-fascist ideas which are rather dangerous for the European integration process, and even to the existing order of European Union.

24

One of the proposals for constructing loyalty could be the abolishment of national citizenship, and creating a European citizenship, even in the case, if they were able to identify themselves as English, Italians, or Tyrolean etc., but this latter identification would have only of cultural character. (Montani 1993: 11). Now, because the Maastricht Treaty has introduced the European citizenship, even though at the same time it accepted the citizenship of the national states, it made a significant step forward a post-national identity also in a political sense of word.

25

This is what Karl Jaspers proposed: World order – world citizenship.

26

Though, I do not want to put a question mark after the character of Japan as a democratic country. Surely after the Second World War the American occupation and the control of “Allied Supreme Commander” made an enormous contribution to develop the legal framework of a democratic political system, and formally there are no differences comparing it with other democratic political system. It is only natural, however, that this system preserved some basic elements of an authoritarian rule in the practice. For example the essential one party rule, since the Liberal Party hardly was even seriously questioned by the opposition, until the summer of 1993, there are special consequences of hierarchies, the significance of patron – client relation etc. And what is perhaps the most interesting, that the traditional traits helped Japan to be different in advance of modernization. There is no place to discuss this problem (in spite the fact that it would be important for the new democracies in other parts of the world). I am quoting only one important observation. “The key to what makes Japan so different from the other advanced industrial democracies is its institutional innovations. Japan has outperformed the rest of world in inventing new institutions through which the relationships of modern capitalism are realized. Japan has altered, experimented with, and reinvented both democracy and capitalism to such an extent that it evolved a qualitatively different structure as a nation state from the norm in the West.” One example: “Japan’s conflicts are usually rooted less in disagreements over principle than in complaints that some person or agent is disrupting settled practices or disturbing social harmony...” there is a “relative slight reliance on the rule of law in social regulation...” etc. (Johnson 1990:56–57)

 

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Begegnungen
Schriftenreihe des Europa Institutes Budapest, Band 1:17–24.

DOMOKOS KOSÁRY

Integration or Disintegration in Europe: West and East

When a historian answers a question, his answer is supposed to be based on his professional knowledge of the past. But the questions are often put by the present. They are connected with the problems of his own age, his own world-problems which need a historical approach to be better understood. They have to be put into a historical perspective and to be traced back to their origins.

Nation–States

Recent works of the British–German historian, Professor Ernest Gellner have shown that nation, nation-state, nationalism are relatively recent phenomena of historical evolution. In 1900, a Hungarian historian, Gyula Pauler wrote an otherwise quite solid book under the title: History of the Hungarian Nation up to Saint Stephen – that is, our first king in the early eleventh century. No Hungarian historian would choose the same title for a similar book today. Now we know that the modern nations of our days have been formed – after certain antecedents – in the last two or three centuries. Loyalty in the Middle Ages was a tie binding people firstly to local communities, to religion, to personal and family links.

For this reason, they perceived to a lesser extent their belonging to a wider ethnic, linguistic “nationality” – although well marked signs also of this kind of loyalty could in fact be observed already in those times. In France, at first, the inhabitants of certain provinces were called “nations”. It was from the 13th century on that the concept of a common homeland, communis patria, appeared along, in a wider sense, with the concept of natio. This, however, devoted only a restricted stratum of society, the privileged nobility. It was the appearance of the nation state which fundamentally changed the situation. At the end of the 18th century, the French Revolution swept away the royal absolutism and feudal privileges. The representatives of the Tiers Etat took in hand, in the name of the nation, the direction of the French state and society. In principle, one single nation lived within the state: the French. And there was a single official language, the French. In reality, of course, there could be found, even within the French state, also other ethnic elements, hardly speaking French.

This nation-state became the main model of other national movements as well, even in East Central Europe, where its preconditions were rather defective. Firstly, the social and economic level was less advanced. Also they did not have independent and unified states. Even the one-time independent states became parts of greater, multinational empires. This was the case of Hungary which, along with Bohemia, belonged, after 1526, to the Habsburg monarchy, or that of Poland which was partitioned at the end of the 18th century. In the South-East, Serbia and the Rumanian principalities had been since long under Ottoman rule. And – last but not least – the given political frontier coincided even less with the ethnic ones. The various ethnic elements lived in this region even more intermingled. This fact, the multinational character of many parts of this zone led to national tensions and conflicts ever since the early 19th century.

Whatever difficulties their process of development had to face, all these nations came to exist, and their existence is to be regarded as a lasting historical fact. The best historical works dealing with the evolution of the nations all share the view that, although the dangerous excesses of nationalism must be repudiated, it would be a great mistake to consider national evolution a kind of avoidable aberration – to quote Professor Gellner’s words. Or to quote another specialist, my late friend Professor Hugh Seton-Watson, the throwing aboard of national heritage would entail political decadence, since it would suppress rich sources of human culture. It seems therefore that we have to come back to the idea of István Széchenyi, founder of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, who maintained that each nation represented a special value for humanity, not only our own nation.

Europe is composed of many nations. And if the process of integration will successfully go on and extend over new regions, this diversity will even be increased. Europe will never become a uniform, single nation. Integrated Europe can only be a free association of existing nations, great or small, which will all preserve their identity within the common greater framework characterized by traditional plurality and, consequently, by mutual respect, tolerance and better information. A double – national and European – loyalty can well coexist in harmony.

Recently, several authors expressed the opinion that the days of the nation- state are counted. According to Eric Hobsbawm (Nations and Nationalism since 1780, Cambridge 1990), the globalization of economy made the nation-states to lose their former economic role. David Harvey (The Condition of Postmodernity, Oxford 1989) pointed out that since 1945 transnational relations and activities passed over the national frontiers and sovereignties, as far as global capitalism and postmodern culture is concerned, and that finance capital will obtain a greater coordinating role in the new world economy than the nation-states.

Globalisation

There is, of course, a great deal of truth in these statements. However, the activities of finance capital did not restrict themselves to national boundaries in the past century either, and transnational capitalism is not quite a recent invention of the postmodern era.

We have the impression that the globalisation of economy will have, of course, a great impact on the role of the existing states, but not immediately, in the near future, and that it will modify and restructure rather than eliminate their functions. At least, this is the broadly speaking unanimous opinion of a team of specialists which recently analysed this problem in a special number of Daedalus, a review edited by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

It was mainly in Western Europe and not all over globe that the scope of action of the functions of the nation-state was, to an extent, reduced – in consequence of the process of European integration.

The European Communities were born in a historic moment under the impact of two main factors. The first was that two great nations, the French and the German, having suffered tragic losses in two consecutive, catastrophic World Wars, concluded that it would be better to give hands to and cooperate with each other. The more so, as another factor, an external danger appeared, as a common enemy: the expanding military power of the Soviet Union. The Soviet had already swallowed, after the Second World War, the eastern parts of Central Europe. The enemy was threatening and the fate of the subjugated East-Central European nations was rather bitter. But this dangerous phenomenon offered, to the West, certain advantages as well. It gave an impetus to the Western nations to cooperate. It helped this way the formation of the common market. It also took over the control of and the responsibility for the conquered poorer, eastern part of Europe. It was easier to get rich in the West without having to deal with the problems of the less developed eastern zone.

It is, of course, not our task here to go into the details of the process of European integration. These nation-states and non-nation-states – Belgium is not a nation-state – gave up and pooled certain parts of their national sovereignty while they still retained important functions. The essential fact remains that gradual integration proceeded successfully and it was regarded, from far, by the lost brother in the East, with nostalgic envy.

A certain slowing down in this process could be observed at the turn of the eighties and the nineties. For two reasons. Political regulations of the integrating process have bitten for the first time deeper into the national sovereignties. Probably an even more important factor was, however, the sudden and un- expected collapse of the Soviet Union. The common danger, this useful enemy ceased to exist, at least in its existing form. We cannot exclude, of course, new scenarios with other forms of danger, from local military conflicts which could become serious to the re-emergence of a new power reviving old imperial traditions of expansion.

Former Soviet Countries

In any case, we hope that the process of integration will be continued. Another new problem arose, however, from the fact that the nations of the East- Central zone got rid of the foreign rule and now wished to rejoin their western brother. But they were in a rather poor state of health, especially from an economic point of view. Their former market economy had been suppressed. Their new artificially planned industry lost the collapsing Soviet or Russian market. Democratic political institutions could be more or less easily reorganised. However, under the impact of the shock effect of the long and often cruel oppression they have experienced in the past decades including the severe reprisals which followed the Hungarian revolution of 1956, these societies, with their offended national feelings, became inclined to approach their problems from an emotional, sometimes irrational, instead of a balanced, practical, rational point of view. And this fact helped old and new nationalist, populist tendencies or even passions to arise, in some places of course more than in others. The more so as the former communist regimes have always had an inclination to coquetting and manipulating with old, romantic, nationalist slogans. This was probably the sugar icing with which they tried to sweeten the pill of Marxism-Leninism, too bitter to be swallowed alone. Now, after the political change, the old, remaining communist forces, where they existed – and in some places they existed – joined hands with the nationalists. This alliance is quite evident in some cases, the details of which. I shall refrain from specifying.

The tragic events in what had been Yugoslavia evidently show that the European Community was not prepared to deal with these problems effectively. Instead, divided in this matter, they were unable to take action. The more so, as the European Community is a giant from an economic point of view, but politically still a child and militarily an embryo. And the lack of necessary counter-measures is always helping the aggressors, those who try to create faits accomplis by sheer force and brutal methods. It also encourages those people, in other countries, who are inclined to follow this example.

The South-Slav conflicts and the fortunately peaceful and civilized divorce of the Czechs and Slovaks gave the impression to some western observers that in the eastern zone of Europe, a process of disintegration is taking place. According to them the two halves of Europe are moving in an opposite direction: integration in the West, disintegration in the East. And so, these two parts can never be united. As a historian, I should like to modify, to correct a little this opinion. Before the compromise (Ausgleich) of 1867 between Austria and Hungary, a Hungarian statesman, Ferenc Deák, said that if a waistcoat is wrongly buttoned, it has to be unbuttoned entirely in order to be buttoned up again, this time correctly. I think this statement is valid in the present situation of East- Central Europe as well.

In the cases of both Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia, one had to deal with artificial, false federations created after the First World War when the peacemakers, evoking the national principle, wanted to replace with smaller states old multinational Austria–Hungary, an ex-ally of Germany. In reality, however, neither of these two states were nation-states. They inherited the multinational character and many problems of the old monarchy, and combined them with some new pretensions of a nation-state. We also have to add that in this zone of Europe, with its multiethnic and mixed character, in a region where it was more or less impossible to separate the various nations by a political frontier, practically neither of the new states could be called complete nation- states. One-third of the Hungarian nation found itself separated from the mother country by the new frontiers.

I have to tell you that I am not quite convinced that multinational political frameworks have always played a bad role in the world. In some cases they could fulfil a historical function – think of the common market of the old Habsburg monarchy.

Back to History?

It is surprising how much resistance this old-fashioned political structure could put up – it needed four years of war and the military defeat of the Central Powers to disintegrate. The defeat, of course, put an end to all previous essays of modernisation.

Anyhow, after the First World War East–Central Europe was politically and economically divided. The small states, weakened by national conflicts, were not strong enough to oppose external pressure and were swallowed up by two consecutive dictatorships successively: first by Hitler, and later by Stalin.

But – to return to our starting point – certain events which we are witnessing in some parts of East-Central Europe represent a critical reaction of history against some unsuccessful political attempts. With the dissolution of certain political creations the same process is being continued which started in East-Central Europe with the dissolution of the old monarchy after the First World War. The waistcoat is being unbuttoned in order to be re-buttoned up again in a correct way. Because it is quite improbable to imagine that the new small states, like Slovakia, Slovenia or Croatia, the births of which we can welcome as a normal historical phenomenon, should wish to isolate themselves from the European integration in the future. There are evident signs that all these states, together with their neighbours, are hoping and intending to join the EC sooner or later. The economic, political, cultural progress and the security of all these states, Hungary included, can only be assured within the greater common framework of an integrated Europe. To remain outside, to be marginalised both from economic and political point of view would be a very dangerous experiment indeed.

The dangers of conflict are not an inevitable result of the creation of these new states. The real danger comes from another process, which sometimes goes parallel, and is partly connected with, but which shall have to be clearly distinguished from the birth of the new states. This other phenomenon is an aggressive, exclusive and xenophobic nationalism which appears here and there in this region and which is not a necessary and inevitable concomitant of any nation and of any state. This nationalist tendency, whenever it appears, is incompatible both with the idea of an integrated Europe and with genuine national interest. European and real national interests are not opposed to each other, they can well coexist in harmony. Conflicting with both of them is, however, that obsolete and arbitrary kind of concept of nation-state, which insists on full sovereignty, rejects all international regulations as an interference in its internal affairs, while rendering possible for a dominant national group to consider the given state as its own exclusive property, and as its own unitary, homogeneous nation-state, to deprive other national groups of their cultural and other rights, and to look upon minorities as disturbing elements which should be eliminated as soon as possible. This nationalist concept is harmful to all the nations concerned and incompatible with the basic principles of an integrated Europe. No one is supposed to enter a decent restaurant without having some decent clothing on and without observing some basic rules of behaviour. No country of this region can expect to be able to join the European community without a functioning system of infrastructure and communication, and without observing the rules of environment protection. And – we have to add – without observing the rules of minority protection – rules prescribed by an international system of norms still to be formulated and respected. We are speaking here, of course, of a regional problem in East–Central Europe, where frontiers have moved, and not of Western Europe, with its immigrant problem. Here the states wishing to join the European Community will have to guarantee for all their eventual national minorities the right to use and cultivate their languages, to develop their cultures, to organise their own self-governed institutions, including, eventually, universities as well, in case of large groups, like two millions of Hungarians in Romania; and including free circulation of people, ideas, publications, and information. I particularly wish to emphasize this point because it is often misinterpreted. We are not interested in any territorial problem, in changing any political frontiers, but exclusively in the granting to the national minorities, individual and collective human rights. This does not endanger in any way the integrity, security and internal order of any states. On the contrary, it helps to develop friendly cooperation between all parties concerned much better than any oppressive measure dictated by anxiety.

International Organisations

We know, of course, that human rights were – and still are – often interpreted as individual rights exclusively. However, in certain cases – and that of the national minorities is one of them – individual rights cannot be effectively implemented without the support of collective rights. Let us refer to the peacemakers who, after the First World War, still had an idea of the troubles that might arise from their decisions. Therefore, they compelled the new states of this region to adopt (1919–1924) a system of minority protection. This system was imperfect and in many respects ineffective, but it could have been, later on, improved. Instead, the great change which came about after the Second World War went just in the opposite direction: instead of introducing a new, more efficient system, even the existing one was abolished. At the 1947 Paris peace negotiations it was not intended any more to supplement the new treaties with agreements on the protection of minorities. The problems of the latter were considered as the internal affairs of the respective states. The minorities were delivered into the hands of the governments in power. In this new situation also extremist, chauvinistic ambitions, moreover inhuman, Stalinist methods had got a free way which, by declaring certain ethnic minorities as war criminals, led to moral and legal absurdities, and also a long series of tragedies. Masses of innocent people were expelled, displaced from their native lands, their homes.

I think no one in Western Europe could understand why in our days old Hungarian villages should be forbidden to use also their original name on the signposts in a certain neighbouring country and how this pitiful problem could become a real political issue in the parliament of the concerned state.

For a long time, even the most important international bodies and organisations could hardly take any serious steps to adopt the principle of the protection of national minorities. In the last two decades or so, however, the balance of opinion slowly started to change. We hope that the change will soon be completed.

Eastern and Western Alternatives

Europe stands today, both in the West and in the East, before a difficult choice.

The nations of the eastern zone have to decide if they want to advance towards the 21st century, or to go back to the 19th century. The latter alternative would probably be easier for them for evident reasons, but in the long run it would be much more dangerous. It would involve a return to the early raw capitalism and the social and national conflicts of the 19the century, in an even worse variety, without the great achievements of that period. It would widen the distance separating them from the West. Their more difficult, but much more promising alternative is to adapt their socio-economic structure to the modern system of the West and to ease national tensions by accepting cultural plurality in their national states.

The West also has a difficult choice. It has to decide if it really wants to extend the framework of the European Community to include its eastern neighbours as well, or prefers to stay behind its protecting walls. Again, the latter alternative may seem easier, since the eastern zone, with its economic difficulties and national tensions could be regarded as a heavy burden. Hence certain hesitations, postponements, the tightening of precautionary measures. As if Portugal, when it joined the European Community, had been, more advanced than Bohemia or Czechia, for instance, today. As the chairman of the Hungarian Council of the European Movement, I had some personal experiences with nice declarations and practical difficulties. We even have the impression as if the international scene almost regretted the Soviet withdrawal from East-Central Europe, or at least, the fact that Russia is not in a position to take over the responsibility of supervising this region. In the long run, however, this would be the more dangerous alternative, even to the West. Not only because the European Community would deny its own original purpose and best traditions. The essential problem is that even the West itself would not be able to continue developing, if in its immediate vicinity, in a considerable zone, in one of its own great potential reserves of force, and assets in the global competition, misery and instability would prevail, an open wound on the back of Europe. We believe that it is in the West’s own interest to complete itself gradually, to include East- Central Europe in a not too distant future and so, in a stronger position, to face the next problem.

We could hardly wish something better to each other than a new Europe where both West and East, having chosen the more difficult but more promising alternatives, are living together in peace and in prosperity.

 

Domokos Kosáry, President of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences gave the first ”József Eötvös Memorial Lecture” of the Institut in 1992. Árpád Göncz, President of the Republic of Hungary attended the event. Both this speech and the director’s, Ferenc Glatz opening words are published among the ”Mitteilungen”, 103–106.

Begegnungen
Schriftenreihe des Europa Institutes Budapest, Band 1:67–80.

HORST HASELSTEINER

Föderationspläne in Südosteuropa

Ein in der staatsrechtlichen Theorie und in der politischen Zielsetzung wiederholt in den Vordergrund gerücktes Gliederungsprinzip für die Neugestaltung Südosteuropas ab dem 18., verstärkt im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert, war der Föderalismus. Dies hatte mehrere Ursachen, mehrere Motivationsebenen, auf die in der Schlusszusammenfassung eingegangen wird.

Der moderne Föderalismus ist ein vielschichtiges Phänomen. Eine einheitliche, allgemein akzeptierte Theorie des Föderalismus fehlt bis heute.¹ Dies wirkt sich vor allem bei den angebotenen Begriffsumschreibungen aus. Dennoch sei als Arbeitshypothese eine bewusst breit gefasste Definition an die Spitze gestellt: Der Föderalismus kann als innerstaatliches, überstaatliches und gesamtgesellschaftliches Gestaltungsprinzip bezeichnet werden, das der Regelung und dem Ausgleich der Beziehungen zwischen Teilbereichen und dem Ganzen dient.

Nun zu den Schwerpunkten des Beitrages: Es sollen beispielhaft jene Überlegungen und jene Versuche nachgezeichnet werden, die im Staatengrenzen überschreitenden, grenzübergreifenden Bereich des Föderalismus in Form der staatenbündischen Konföderation konzipiert waren. Aus der Fülle der Überlegungen und Projekte werden vier demonstrativ herausgegriffen:

– das serbische „Načertanije aus dem Jahre 1844

– Konföderationsvorstellungen im Donauraum und der Plan Ludwig Kossuths von 1862,

– die Balkan-Union der Konferenzen von 1930–1933, und schließlich die Balkan-Föderation 1944–1948.

Es ist bekannt, dass diese Ansätze und Versuche nicht verwirklicht wurden. Dennoch ist es lohnend, sich damit auseinanderzusetzen, da gerade durch die Analyse der nichtrealisierten Alternativen der konkrete historische Ablauf schärfere Konturen erhält.

Das „Načertanije von 1844

Eine der frühen Anregungen von außen zur Föderalisierung Südosteuropas ging von Paris aus. Sie ist verknüpft mit der führenden Persönlichkeit der polnischen Emigration von 1830, mit Adam Georg Fürst Czartoryski (1770–1861). Er entwickelte einen weitgespannten Plan mit folgender Grundüberlegung: Sein Hauptziel war 1. die Wiederherstellung des historischen Königreiches Polen. Daraus ergab sich 2. die Frontstellung gegenüber den Teilungsmächten, insbesondere gegen Russland und Österreich. Mit der Unterstützung Frankreichs und Großbritanniens und unter Beibehaltung der Integrität des Osmanischen Reiches schlug Czartoryski 3. die Aussöhnung und Zusammenarbeit aller kleineren Nationen zwischen der Ostsee und der Ägäis bis zum Kaukasus vor. (Damit ist er als Vorläufer und Inspirator der späteren „Intermarium”-Pläne einzustufen.) Als Endziel schließlich sah der Fürst 4. den Zusammenschluss der Völker dieser Großregion in einer Konföderation vor. Wesentlich beeinflusst im föderativen Teil seiner Vorstellungen wurde Czartoryski vom zwischen 1835/40 erschienenen Werk des französischen Politikers und Schriftstellers Charles de Tocqueville „De la démocratie en Amérique”; ein Phänomen, das bisher wenig bearbeitet wurde.²

Der konkrete Anstoß in Richtung Südosteuropa, Balkan, der Südslawen, in erster Linie an die Serben adressiert, erfolgte 1843. In seiner Denkschrift „Conseil sur la conduite à suivre par la Serbie” entwickelte Czartoryski Vorschläge für die innen- wie außenpolitische Grundhaltung des Fürstentums Serbien. Diese Konzeption wurde von seinem Agenten, dem Tschechen František Zach (1807–1892, dem späteren serbischen General und Kommandanten der Militärakademie in Belgrad und Prinzenerzieher) in Belgrad erläutert. In einer Reihe von Besprechungen mit dem Innenminister und Vertrauten des serbischen Fürsten Alexander Karadjordjevič (1806–1885, Fürst 1842–1858), mit Ilija Garašanin (1812–1874), legte Zach die Grundlinien dar und verfasste auf Ersuchen Garašanins ein zusammenfassendes eigenes Papier. Im Wesentlichen auf Grundlage des Zachschen Entwurfs (90% des „Načertanije” sind Zachsche Gedankengänge) aber unter anderer Akzentsetzung konzipierte Ilija Garašanin sein berühmtes „Načertanije”. Gedacht war es als privates, vertrauliches Programm zur Orientierung des Fürsten. Es wurde erst 1906 vom serbischen, nationalen Historiker Milenko Vukič evič im Belgrader „Delo” veröffentlicht; in der Monarchie war es bereits 1883 bekannt.

Inhalt und Zielrichtung des „Načertanije” seien in einigen Punkten zusammengefasst:

1. Auf der Basis des „heiligen, historischen Rechtes” soll das Serbische Reich Stefan Dušans wiederhergestellt werden. Dies sei keine „revolutionäre und umstürzlerische Tat”, denn durch die Ereignisse 1389, durch das Amselfeld, das Kosovo polje sei die historische Legitimität nur unterbrochen worden.

2. Die Voraussetzung für diese Restauration bildet der als sicher angenommene, unmittelbar bevorstehende Zerfall des Osmanischen Reiches.

3. Bedroht wird diese angestrebte Reichsbildung durch die unverkennbaren Aspirationen Österreichs und Russlands zur Expansion, durch die Absicht, die Balkanhalbinsel auf der Linie Vidin-Saloniki aufzuteilen. Die Frontstellung zu den hier angesprochenen „Teilungsmächten” sah Garašanin allerdings ein wenig differenzierter: Die Habsburgermonarchie wird als bleibender, unversöhnlicher Gegner eingestuft, beim orthodoxen Russland lässt der serbische Minister die eventuelle Möglichkeit einer späteren Kooperation offen.

4. Da den westeuropäischen Mächten Frankreich und Großbritannien die Etablierung eines eigenständigen christlichen Balkanreiches nach dem Kalkül Garašanins besser ins Konzept passt als die Etablierung Österreichs und Russlands, rechnet er mit der Unterstützung durch die beiden Mächte.

5. Der Sukkurs durch die übrigen benachbarten Balkanchristen, vor allem der jugo- bzw. südslawischen, ist anzustreben. Dies soll in konzentrischen Kreisen Schritt für Schritt verwirklicht werden, in Form eines Anschlusses an die Zentralmacht Serbien, wenn es sein muss in Form eines föderativen Anschlusses.³

Bemerkenswert für die Einordnung und Bewertung des Načertanije sind jene Auslassungen und jene Modifizierungen, die Garašanin im Vergleich zum Zachschen Plan bzw. Czartoryskis „Conseil” vorgenommen hat. Kaum eingegangen wurde auf die Beziehungen Serbiens zu Kroatien, auf die Stellung der Kroaten in Bosnien und der Hercegovina, die Kroaten als pars pro toto der übrigen Jugoslawien gesehen. Ausgespart blieben die innenpolitischen Voraussetzungen in Serbien für die Annäherung an die anderen Bevölker bzw. für die angestrebte Konföderation, wie überhaupt der föderative Ansatz des „Načertanije” eindeutig schwächer ausgeprägt war, der Aspekt der Einigungsbewegung unter serbischer, großserbischer Führung im Vordergrund stand. Garašanin sprach von einem „föderativen Bündnis Serbiens mit den anderen Völkern, die es umgeben”. Hervorzuheben ist auch die Reserve, der Vorbehalt, den der serbische Minister gegenüber den Bulgaren erkennen ließ, die aber trotz dieses Misstrauens angesprochen und miteingebunden werden sollten. Wirtschafts- und handelspolitische Überlegungen spielten nur sehr am Rande eine Rolle. Sie weisen allerdings in eine eindeutige Richtung und zeichnen eine später relevant gewordene Zone der Auseinandersetzung mit der Donaumonarchie vor: Der Zugang zur Adria über Skutari nach Ulcinj/Dulcigno stand im Mittelpunkt.

Resümierend ist festzuhalten:

1. Der föderative Gliederungsgedanke ist zwar recht schwach ausgeprägt, er ist aber vorhanden.

2. Die Frage, ob das „Načertanije” ein großserbisches, ein jugoslawisches oder ein südslawisches Programm vertritt, ist in der bisherigen Historiographie durchaus unterschiedlich beantwortet worden. Eine differenzierte Beurteilung, die weder dem Versuch einer vorwiegend, „jugoslawischen” bzw. „südslawischen” Etikettierung folgt noch einer exklusiven Einordnung als „Großserbisches Programm”, wird wohl anzustreben sein. Denn bei aller klaren Dominanz des großserbischen Elementes dürfen die zumindest in Ansätzen abzulesenden jugoslawischen, auch die etwas blasser ausgefallenen südslawischen Tendenzen nicht übersehen werden.

3. Die in der Denkschrift Ilija Garašanins niedergelegten Prinzipien und Zielvorstellungen spielten in den folgenden Jahrzehnten für die serbische Politik gegenüber der Donaumonarchie, und darüber hinaus für die Haltung der Serben gegenüber den anderen Jugoslawen bzw. gegenüber den Südslawen eine entscheidende Rolle.

Konföderationsvorstellungen im Donauraum und der Plan Ludwig Kossuths 1862

Im Revolutionsjahr 1848/49 waren die Grundvoraussetzungen für eine Neugestaltung des Donauraumes scheinbar gegeben. Wieder war es die polnische Emigration unter Fürst Czartoryski, die die Vertreter der kleineren Völker an einen Tisch zu bringen versuchte. Auf der Konferenz von Paris am 18. Mai 1849 wurde der Versuch unternommen, ein Arrangement, eine Aussöhnung zwischen den Magyaren, Rumänen und den Jugoslawen: den Serben, Kroaten und Slowenen unter Einbindung der Westslawen herbeizuführen. Eine konföderale Lösung unter weitgehender Wahrung der Integrität Ungarns und bei Anerkennung der nationalen Sondergruppen wurde vorgeschlagen. Eine neue stabile, konsensuale Ordnung dieser drei- bis viergliedrigen Konföderation oder Föderation sollte die Habsburgerherrschaft endgültig verdrängen und eine russische Intervention und Expansion verhindern. Von Ludwig Kossuth wurde dieser Kompromiss abgelehnt, er sah die Einheit des ungarischen Staates gefährdet. Den nichtmagyarischen Nationen schien das Bewahren der Integrität Ungarns zu sehr im Vordergrund zu stehen. Die Ereignisse im Sommer 1849 und die Kapitulation bei Világos setzten einen vorläufigen Schlusspunkt. Kossuth und andere führende Vertreter der Revolution von 1848/49 gingen in die Emigration und teilten das Schicksal der Polen.⁴

Nach 1849 setzte in der Emigration dann eine rege bi- und multilaterale Verhandlungstätigkeit ein, einige föderative Konzepte wurden vorgelegt. Bereits im Jänner 1850 trafen Garašanin, der piemontesische Agent Carosini und Kossuth zu Kooperationsgesprächen in Belgrad zusammen. Auf österreichischen Druck hin wurden die Beratungen abgebrochen. Zwei rumänische Vorschläge vom Jahresanfang 1850 von Ion Ghica und Nicolae Bălcescu liefen auf eine Konföderation der „Vereinigten Donaustaaten” hinaus und beriefen sich auf schweizerische bzw. amerikanische Muster. Sie wurden von Ludwig Kossuth genauso zurückgewiesen, wie er sich zunächst weigerte, mit dem von Giuseppe Mazzini im Juli 1850 gegründeten „Mitteleuropäischen Demokratischen Komitee” zusammenzuarbeiten. Auf einen weiteren Konföderationsversuch im Demokratischen Komitee, neuerlich vorgelegt von Nicolae Bëlcescu, reagierte Kossuth schließlich mit einem ersten Projektentwurf. Am 25. April 1851 legte er im osmanischen Exil in Kutahija sein „Exposé des principes de la future politique de la Hongrie” vor. Er trat für eine breitangelegte Konföderation ein, die auch die Westslawen und alle Balkanvölker – und dies unter der Souveränität der Osmanen – umfassen sollte. Dieser lose Staatenbund sollte gegen Habsburg und gegen Romanov gerichtet sein. Bei der Stellung des ungarischen Teiles zeigte sich Kossuth trotz aller versuchten Flexibilität nur wenig entgegenkommend: Die Integrität der Länder der Stephanskrone blieb gewahrt, der Gesamtföderation und Ungarn wurden leichte Anfänge des Personalitätsprinzips, konfessionelle und kulturelle Rechte der nationalen Gruppen nach dem Muster des osmanischen Millet-Systems und die Erweiterung der Lokal-, Verwaltungs- und Gemeindeautonomie konzediert. Den nichtmagyarischen Adressaten erschienen diese Konzessionen als nicht ausreichend. Die Kontaktgespräche zwischen der ungarischen Emigration, den Serben und Rumänen wurden in den Folgejahren zwar weitergeführt, erbrachten aber kaum reale Lösungsansätze. Die Ursachen dafür lagen in den nach wie vor bestehenden Auffassungsunterschieden bezüglich der Integrität Ungarns, in der Teilverwirklichung der rumänischen Zielvorstellungen durch die Vereinigung der Donaufürstentümer in den Jahren 1859/1861. Und schließlich in der Tatsache, dass Napoleon III. die Emigration und die Donau- und Balkanvölker zwar zur Zusammenarbeit ermutigte, sie aber bloß als Werkzeug seiner Politik (gegen Russland bzw. gegen Österreich) in den Jahren 1853–1859 benutzte.⁵

Der Einfluss der radikal national-revolutionären Kreise Italiens auf die Föderationskonzeptionen in Südosteuropa darf nicht gering veranschlagt werden. Auf Mazzinis „Mitteleuropäisches Demokratisches Komitee”, das radikale Demokraten und Revolutionäre aus ganz Europa vereinigte, wurde bereits hingewiesen. Schon im Jahre 1833 veröffentlichte Mazzini im „Giovine Italia” den Vorschlag, Ungarn möge sich an die Spitze einer „Freien Konföderation” mit Bulgarien, Serbien und Bosnien stellen. 1857 plädierte er in seinen „Vier Slawischen Briefen” in der „Italia del Popolo” für die Errichtung eines südslawischen, föderativen Staates, der Kroatien, Kärnten, Serbien, Montenegro, Dalmatien, Bosnien und Bulgarien umfassen sollte. Und 1866 schließlich, im Jahr der Krise für die Habsburgermonarchie und für das Osmanische Reich (Aufstand auf Kreta) trat er für die Ersetzung der beiden alten, überlebten Reiche durch eine Donaukonföderation und eine Slawo-Hellenische Föderation ein, um – wie er begründend meinte – die drohende Ausbreitung des reaktionären, antidemokratischen russischen Panslawismus hintanzuhalten. Aus ähnlicher Motivation heraus trat der nach dem Revolutionsjahr 1848 15 Jahre auf der Balkanhalbinsel (hauptsächlich in Griechenland) lebende venezianische Revolutionär Marco Antonio Canini für eine Kette von „zwischeneuropäischen Konföderationen auf demokratisch-republikanischer Grundlage” ein. Da vor allem im Donauraum und auf dem Balkan keine reinen Nationalstaaten möglich seien, sollten sich Polen-Litauen erneut, die Donaukonföderation und eine Föderation des Orients konstituieren.⁶

Der bekannteste Plan einer Donaukonföderation stammt aus dem Jahre 1862 und wird mit dem Namen Ludwig Kossuth verknüpft. Er beruht zwar weitgehend auf Kossuthschen Vorstellungen, die wir bereits kennengelernt haben. In der bekannt gewordenen Form stellt er aber im Kern das Ergebnis einer Reihe von Besprechungen dar, die Marco Antonio Canini mit Georg Klapka, einem weiteren prominenten Mitglied der ungarischen Emigration, abwickelte. Auf dieser Grundlage führte Canini am 1. Mai 1862 ein ausführliches Gespräch mit Kossuth. Die diesbezüglichen Notizen Caninis werden durch eine Indiskretion in der Mailänder Zeitung „Allenza” veröffentlicht. Kossuth protestierte zwar dagegen, billigte aber die im Artikel festgelegten Prinzipien. Vorgesehen war ein Staatenbund auf konföderativer Basis mit einem nun konkret ausformulierten, breiteren Anteil der gemeinsamen Angelegenheiten (Heerwesen, Außenpolitik, Wirtschaft, Finanzen und Zoll, Maße und Gewichte, Verkehrswesen) und komplementär dazu volle innere Kompetenzen der Teilstaaten. Der ungarische Staat war als Hegemonialmacht dieser Konföderation vorgesehen. In der Problematik der Integrität Ungarns waren nun marginale Änderungen festzustellen:

a) eine Vereinigung Kroatiens mit Serbien wurde angedeutet;

b) ein Plebiszit in Siebenbürgen über die staatsrechtliche Zugehörigkeit eventuell in Aussicht gestellt;

c) die südungarische Vojvodina (Wojwodschaft, Batschka, Banat) sollte auf alle Fälle bei Ungarn bleiben.

Der Minoritätenschutz ging über Position Kossuths vom April 1851 nicht hinaus. Wie bekannt, war die Reaktion auf Kossuths Donauföderationsplan überwiegend negativ. Neben den Nichtmagyaren inner- und außerhalb Ungarns sprachen sich nun auch Teile der ungarischen Emigration, die führenden liberalen Politiker in Ungarn selbst – sowohl die Vertreter der Beschluss- als auch der Adresspartei – dagegen aus. Als Illusion erwiesen sich die Erwartungen Kossuths: durch die angebotene Sicherung der jeweiligen nationalen Selbständigkeit, durch das angestrebte Schutz- und Verteidigungsbündnis die Abschirmung gegen Pangermanismus und Panslawismus glaubhaft zu machen und durch die offengelassene Möglichkeit des Anschlusses der anderen Balkanvölker einen Lösungsansatz für die Orientalische Frage zu bieten und damit sein Konzept attraktiv und akzeptabel zu machen.⁷

Die Balkan-Union der Konferenzen von 1930–1933

In den zwanziger Jahren unseres Jahrhunderts wurden der Föderationsgedanke und das Konzept der sozialen Reform bzw. der sozialistischen Revolution von den Agrarparteien und von den Linksgruppierungen, den Sozialisten und Kommunisten getragen. Damit wurde im Vergleich zu den beiden ersten Beispielen die Idee der engeren Zusammenarbeit und des Zusammenschlusses der Balkanstaaten von einer breiteren Bevölkerungsschicht getragen – dies gilt vor allem für die radikalen Agrarparteien in Kroatien (Stjepan Radič) und Bulgarien (Aleksandur Stoimenev Stambolijski).⁸ 1923 und 1928/29 setzten sich in den beiden angesprochenen Balkanstaaten die Anhänger des Zentralismus und jene Gruppierungen durch, die eher der politischen Rechten zuzuordnen sind. Ende der zwanziger Jahre war man aber von einer befriedigenden Lösung der national-politischen und vor allem sozio-ökonomischen Probleme weit entfernt. Ja im Gegenteil, die Weltwirtschafskrise und vor allem die zunehmenden Schwierigkeiten der Agrarstaaten verschärften die Situation. Als neue Trägerschicht für die Bewältigung der anstehenden Probleme traten nun Persönlichkeiten des liberalen Lagers und gemäßigte Sozialdemokraten an. Das Ziel war jetzt nicht die radikale soziale Reform, eventuell der revolutionäre Umsturz, sondern Ausgleich und Friede nach innen und nach außen, vor allem die Bewältigung der sich auftürmenden wirtschaftlichen Probleme. In diesem Sinne wollte man die öffentliche Meinung gewinnen und den Druck der Öffentlichkeit auf die Regierungen wirken lassen. Sie sollten veranlasst werden, ihre Differenzen zu bereinigen, engere Beziehungen zueinander anzuknüpfen und in allen Bereichen, in der Wirtschaft, in der Sozial-, Verkehrs- und Bildungspolitik, im Gesundheitswesen und auch außenpolitisch zusammenzuarbeiten. Das Fernziel sollte eine Konföderation der Balkanstaaten in einer Balkan-Union sein.

Die Initiative für das Zusammenrücken ging vom griechischen Politiker Alexandros Papanastasiu (1879–1936) aus.⁹ Er setzt das Zusammentreten von offiziösen, halboffiziellen „Delegierten-Konferenzen” der sechs Balkanstaaten durch: von Jugoslawien, Rumänien, Bulgarien, Albanien, Griechenland und der Türkei. Die Zusammensetzung der Länderdelegationen wurde mit den jeweiligen Regierungen abgesprochen. Die Delegierten agierten auf den Zusammenkünften dann allerdings in Eigenverantwortung. Die Bedeutung der Konferenzberatungen wurde durch die Anwesenheit der Botschafter der Balkanstaaten unterstrichen. Für die vier Balkankonferenzen im Oktober 1932 in Bukarest und im November 1933 in Saloniki wurde eine eigene Organisationsstruktur mit Generalversammlung, Rat, Sekretariat und Nationalen Gruppen ausgearbeitet. Die meritorischen Beratungen erfolgten in sechs Kommissionen: Politik, Kultur und Wissenschaft, Soziales und Gesundheit, Kommunikation und Verkehr, Wirtschaft, Heerwesen und Militär. Trotz aller sachbezogenen Schwierigkeiten und bilateralen Differenzen leisteten die Kommissionen seriöse Arbeit und legten den Regierungen der Balkanstaaten eine Fülle von fundierten Einzelvorschlägen vor.¹⁰

Es ist kaum möglich, auf alle Bereiche der Tätigkeit der Balkan-Konferenzen einzugehen. Exemplarisch darf daher kurz auf die Wirtschaftskommission und auf die Arbeit im politischen Bereich eingegangen werden.

Auf die äußerst schwierige ökonomische Lage der Balkanstaaten – man denke an die Weltwirtschafts- und Agrarkrise mit dem auftretenden Preisverfall und den Exportproblemen – wurde bereits hingewiesen. Die Sachlage verschärfte sich noch durch die Tatsache, dass alle betroffenen Staaten eine ausgesprochene Agrarstruktur aufzuweisen hatten – der Prozentanteil der in der Landwirtschaft Beschäftigten betrug in Bulgarien 81 Prozent, in Jugoslawien 79 Prozent, in Rumänien 78 Prozent und in Griechenland 54 Prozent. Sie traten daher auf den sich bietenden Exportmärkten als Konkurrenten auf.¹¹ Dadurch bedingt waren die Wirtschaftsstrukturen der Staaten nicht komplementär, daher ergaben sich auch Probleme bei der wirtschaftlichen Zusammenarbeit untereinander und bei einer allfällig angestrebten Zollunion. Ein Zeichen für diese Schwierigkeiten: Ihr wechselseitiges Handelsvolumen machte nur ca. 1/10 des Gesamthandels aus. Dennoch wurden zahlreiche Vorschläge zur Kooperation und zur Problembewältigung vorgelegt und angenommen. Beispielhaft seien hier angeführt: die Errichtung einer Balkanischen Handels- und Industriekammer, einer Balkanischen Landwirtschaftskammer, eines Inter-Balkan Getreidebüros und einer gemeinsamen Börse, eines Tabak-Büros, einer Zentral-Union der Genossenschaften. Des Weiteren wurden Vorarbeiten für eine Währungsunion eingeleitet. Im Jahre 1933 schließlich wurde in Saloniki der Entwurf eines regionalen Wirtschaftsvertrages für den Balkan vorgelegt. Er sah die Intensivierung des Handels untereinander durch Meistbegünstigung vor und strebte ein akkordiertes, gemeinsames Auftreten auf Drittmärkten an. Überdies wurde angeregt, eine permanente Wirtschaftskommission für die anstehenden Fragen zu installieren.

Ähnliche wirtschaftspolitische Vorschläge wurden in der Krise der Zwischenkriegszeit von französischen Ministerpräsidenten André Tardieu und dem ungarischen Nationalökonomen und Finanzexperten Elemér von Hantos für den Donauraum vorgelegt. Der erfolgreichen Realisierung stellten sich – ähnlich wie bei den Balkanstaaten – die Sonderinteressen der betroffenen Staaten und die mangelnde Kooperationswilligkeit der europäischen Mächte und der USA entgegen.¹²

Die größten Divergenzen traten erwartungsgemäß im Bereich der politischen Zusammenarbeit auf. Der status-quo-Politik der Siegerstaaten des Ersten Weltkrieges stand das Bemühen Bulgariens entgegen, eine Teilrevision des Friedensvertrages von Neuilly durchzusetzen. Zusätzlich belastend wirkten das Problem der Minoritäten und die Makedonien-Frage. Die Allianz und das Naheverhältnis Albaniens zu Italien wurden in erster Linie von Jugoslawien moniert. Die Kommission sah sich veranlasst, bilaterale Gespräche der Balkanstaaten und ein jährliches Treffen der Außenminister vorzuschlagen. Verfassungsentwürfe für die angestrebte konföderierte Balkan-Union in den Jahren 1930–1932 wurden von den Konferenzteilnehmern nicht akzeptiert. Als Ausweg wurde ein Fragebogen über die Verfassungsstruktur der Union an die einzelnen Ländern-Delegationen ausgesandt. Es gab bloß eine einzige Rückmeldung: Griechenland, d.h. Papanastasiu sprach sich für einen „Staatenbund” nach dem Muster des „Deutschen Bundes”, nicht nach jenem der Schweiz, der USA bzw. des Deutschen Reiches aus. Da es zu keiner Einigung über die Struktur abzuschließenden Balkan-Union kam, sahen sich vier der Balkanstaaten, nämlich Jugoslawien, Rumänien, Griechenland und die Türkei veranlasst, ähnlich der Kleinen Entente im Jahre 1934 den Balkanpakt als Instrument des Antirevisionismus abzuschließen. Damit war die erhoffte Balkan-Union, eine alle Staaten umfassende Konföderation, durch ein multilaterales Bündnissystem ersetzt worden.¹³

Die Balkan-Föderation 1944–1948

Gegen Ende des Zweiten Weltkrieges und in der ersten Nachkriegszeit vollzog sich in Jugoslawien, Bulgarien, Albanien und Rumänien ein gesellschaftspolitischer Wandel. Mit der Etablierung des Kommunismus hatte sich die Basis der Zusammenarbeit der Balkanstaaten nach ihrem eigenen Selbstverständnis geändert.

Betrachten wir die Ausgangsposition Jugoslawien unter Josip Broz-Tito. Primäres Ziel war 1. die Etablierung der kommunistischen Gesellschaftsordnung des neuen, föderativen Staates.

2. Wurde versucht die politische, ideologische und wirtschaftliche Verbindung zur Sowjetunion auszubauen. Parallel dazu strebte man – bei aller selbstbewussten Wahrung der Eigenständigkeit – die Eingliederung in den „Ostblock” an, in dem Jugoslawien unter der Führung der UdSSR eine mitgestaltende, eine führende Rolle spielen wollte.

3. In Anlehnung an die Pläne und Vorstellungen der kommunistischen Parteien des Balkans in der Zwischenkriegszeit und der Haltung der Komintern wollte man eine Annäherung der Balkanstaaten erreichen. Denn auf neuer marxistischer Basis und mit internationaler Solidarität könne man nun die starken Spannungen und den alten Streit um Sonderprobleme (Makedonia z.B.) viel leichter beseitigen. Das Ziel war eine „Balkan-Föderation”, das Umlegen des innerjugoslawischen, neuen, sozialistischen Föderalismus auf die unmittelbaren Nachbarn, ja auf ganz Südosteuropa und eventuell sogar darüber hinaus. Den Anfang sollte die jugoslawisch-bulgarische Föderation machen.

Der erste konkrete Vorstoß erfolgte von jugoslawischer Seite. Im November 1944 befand sich Edvard Kardelj an der Spitze einer jugoslawischen Delegation in Sofia. Im Rahmen der bilateralen Gespräche legte er mit geschickter Berufung auf den Versuch Aleksandur Stoimenov Stambolijskis (1923) die Idee einer Föderation vor. Bulgarien und Jugoslawien sollten einen gemeinsamen Staat mit gemeinsamer Volksvertretung und Regierung bilden. Bulgarien sollte als 7. Teilrepublik der Föderation beitreten, das jugoslawische und das „bulgarische” Mazedonien vereinigt werden. Noch waren die Bulgaren etwas zurückhaltend. Sie wollten die Parität zwischen dem jugoslawischen und dem bulgarischen Teil Gegenwart wissen. Sie ließen aber durchaus erkennen, dass sie an einer Annäherung, an einer Zusammenarbeit und an einem eventuellen Zusammenschluss interessiert seien. Es kam zu einer Intensivierung der bilateralen Gespräche, der wechselseitigen Zusammenarbeit. Vor allem aber häuften sich die positiven Meinungsäußerungen zur Föderation auf beiden Seiten. Tito und Dimitrov rechneten fest mit der Zustimmung der Sowjetführung zum vorgesehenen Föderationsprojekt, in das die Jugoslawien gerne auch Albanien miteingeschlossen hätten.¹⁴

Am 1. August 1947 wurde in Bled nach Gesprächen zwischen Tito und Georgi Dimitrov ein Abkommen über die Ausarbeitung eines Beistandspaktes und einer Zollunion unterzeichnet. Diese beiden Verträge wurden nach vorheriger Information der Sowjetunion am 27. November 1947 von Tito und Dimitrov in Sofia unterzeichnet. Bei dieser Gelegenheit gab Tito folgende Erklärung ab: „Wir werden eine so allgemeine und enge Zusammenarbeit herbeiführen, daß die Frage einer Föderation nur noch eine Formalität sein wird...”¹⁵

In der Zwischenzeit hatten allerdings die Spannungen zwischen der jugoslawischen und der sowjetischen Führung zugenommen (gemischte Gesellschaften, Verhalten der sowjetischen Berater, Äußerungen über den Volksbefreiungskrieg, Aufbau eines eigenen Agentennetzes in Jugoslawien – Selbstbewusstsein der Jugoslawen, zahlreiche bilaterale Gespräche mit anderen Ostblockführern, eigener Weg bei der Kollektivierung etc.).

Anlass für eine dezidierte und konkrete Meinungsäußerung der Sowjetunion zu den Föderationsabsichten bot ein Radiointerview Georgi Dimitrovs am 21. Jänner 1948, nach Abschluss der bulgarisch-rumänischen Zollunion in Bukarest. Dimitrov deutete zwar an, dass die Etablierung einer Föderation oder Konföderation der Volksdemokratien auf breiterer Basis noch „verfrüht sei”. Er fuhr dann weiter fort: „Wenn die Frage reif geworden ist – was unweigerlich einmal der Fall sein wird –, werden unsere Völker sie lösen, und zwar die volksdemokratischen Nationen: Rumänien, Bulgarien, Jugoslawien, Albanien, Tschechoslowakei, Polen, Ungarn und Griechenland – merken sie sich das, auch Griechenland! Sie werden dann entscheiden, was einmal sein soll – ob eine Föderation oder Konföderation, und ebenfalls wann und wie sie abgeschlossen werden soll. Ich kann nur sagen, dass bereits heute unsere Völker alles dafür tun, die Lösung dieser Frage für die Zukunft außerordentlich zu erleichtern. Ich darf noch besonders betonen, dass unsere Völker, wenn es einmal zu einer solchen Föderation oder Konföderation kommen sollte, die Imperialisten vorher nicht um Rat fragen und auf ihre Opposition nicht hören, sondern die Frage selbständig lösen werden, so wie es ihr eigenes Interesse und das Interesse der internationalen Zusammenarbeit mit den anderen beteiligten Nationen verlangt.”¹⁶

Die sowjetischen Reaktionen waren eindeutig ablehnend. In einer Pravda-Erklärung vom 28. Jänner 1948 hieß es, „...dass diese Länder keine derart fragwürdige und künstlich erzeugte Föderation oder Konföderation oder etwa eine Zollunion nötig haben; was sie brauchen, ist die Konsolidierung und Verteidigung ihrer Unabhängigkeit und Staatshoheit durch die Mobilisierung und Organisierung der demokratischen Kräfte ihrer Völker im eigenen Inneren...”¹⁷

Georgi Dimitrov war gezwungen, sich bereits zwei Tage später von seiner Erklärung vom 21. Jänner zu distanzieren. Doch damit allein gab sich Stalin nicht zufrieden. Spitzendelegationen der beiden Balkanländer wurden nach Moskau zitiert. Dimitrov leitete die bulgarische Delegation, Tito war nicht gekommen, die Jugoslawen waren durch Djilas, Kardelj und Bakarič vertreten. In einer langen Nachtsitzung am 10. Februar verurteilte Stalin in scharfer Form das Vorgehen und die Haltung der beiden Staaten, vor allem ihre Föderations- und die darüber sachlich und räumlich hinausgehenden Konföderationsbestrebungen. Sie wären in keiner Weise mit der UdSSR abgestimmt worden. Damit war das Verdikt über die neuen Föderationsbemühungen ausgesprochen, der definitive Bruch mit Tito am 28. Juni 1948 setzte den endgültigen Schlusspunkt.¹⁸

Die vorgebrachten Beispiele und die vielen unerwähnt gebliebenen Föderationsvorschläge für Südosteuropa werfen eine Fülle von Fragen auf über die Motivation der Propagatoren, die Trägerschichten selbst und deren Zusammensetzung, die Ideologie und Genesis des südosteuropäischen Föderalismus, dessen Beeinflussung von außen, seinen Stellenwert und seine Einordnung, ob er – abgesehen vom binnenjugoslawischen Modell – nur als vergeblich angestrebte Utopie, als Gestaltungsprinzip mit mystischer Problemlösungskapazität, als idealistisches, eschatologisches Ziel einzustufen ist, und schließlich über jene Ursachen, warum diese grenzübergreifenden Föderationsbemühungen nicht verwirklicht werden konnten.

Zu den Motivationselementen des Föderalismus:

– Ausgangspunkt war zweifellos die Auffassung, dass sich auf Grund der multiethnischen Struktur in Südosteuropa eine rein nationalstaatliche Lösung der Grenzfragen nicht befriedigend, nicht alle Großgruppen befriedigen erzielen lässt.

– Die Völker strebten danach, die national-politische Fremdbestimmung und die so empfundene Unterdrückung durch die vorgegebenen multinationalen, zentralen Großreiche (Habsburgermonarchie und Osmanisches Reich) durch eine konsensuale Selbstbestimmung und durch den wechselseitig zugestandenen Freiheitsraum in einer selbst festgelegten, freiwillig eingegangenen Konföderation zu ersetzen. Dies stand unter dem häufig und immer wiederkehrend angesprochenen Motto: „Der Balkan den Balkanvölkern”!

– Der letzte Ansatz leitet zu einer weiteren Motivationsüberlegung über: Die Konföderation als stabilisierende, friedenssichernde Emanzipations- und Schutzgemeinschaft der kleineren Völker gegen die Dominanzansprüche der überlagernden bzw. bedrohenden Großmächte in der Nachbarschaft.

– Und diese homogenisierte, stabilisierte größere Gemeinschaft konnte viel chancenreicher nach außen auftreten: als politisch, wirtschaftlich und geistig umfangreichere und potentere Gruppierung, als selbstbewusste Kraft.

– Die Harmonisierungswirkung wurde aber auch für den Binnenbereich erwartet: die Verständigung über die bisher aufgetretenen wechselseitigen Probleme und Differenzen.

Wer waren die Protagonisten, die Trägerschichten des föderalen Gedankens?

– In einer ersten, frühen Phase – einsetzend bereits am Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts – sind vom Geist der Aufklärung, der radikalen Aufklärung der Französischen Revolution geprägte Einzelpersonen zu nennen, wie z.B. der Grieche Rigas Pheraios Velstinlis.

– Ihnen folgten die Vertreter einer begüterten, z.T. in den Randgebieten des Osmanischen Reiches ansässigen bzw. vornehmlich in Zentralorten außerhalb der Türkei sitzenden Kaufmannschicht (Odessa, Bukarest, Ofen und Pest, Triest, Venedig, Wien etc.).

– Die neuaufsteigende bürgerliche, z.T. frühliberale, aber auch die konservativdynastisch eingestellte Intelligenz der einzelnen Balkanvölker berief sich auf alte, mittelalterliche Legitimität, auf das historische wie auch auf das Naturrecht.

– Anstöße kamen aus den Krisen der Emigration bzw. aus dem nichtsüd-osteuropäischen Bereich (Czartoryski, Zach, Canini, Klapka, Kossuth, Mazzini etc.). Hier wären vor allem auch die zahlreichen Konföderationspläne der Emigration während und nach Ende des Zweiten Weltkrieges zu erwähnen.

– Bereits auf eine breitere Basis konnten sich die Persönlichkeiten des radikalen Lagers stützen, seien es die Agrarparteien, seien es die Linksgruppierungen der Zwischenkriegszeit und nach 1945 die Kommunisten.

– Die führenden Köpfe des liberalen Lagers wie der gemäßigten Sozialdemokratie wurden in der Weltwirtschaftskrise in erster Linie und im Gegensatz zum 19. Jahrhundert von wirtschafts- und finanzpolitischen Überlegungen bei ihren Föderationsabsichten geleitet.

Zur ideologischen Basis des südosteuropäischen Föderalismus und zu den bisher noch nicht erwähnten Einflüssen von außen sind zu zählen:

– Die Orientierung nach ausländischem Muster, nach der Schweiz, nach den Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika, nach dem Deutschen Bund etc.

– Die Abstützung auf theoretisch angelegte Überlegungen zum Föderalismus wie zum Nationalismus, die zwar zum Teil bekannt ist, die aber noch einer genaueren Untersuchung bedarf: der Einfluss von Montesquieu, Kant, Schlözer, Herder, der Slawophilen und Panslawisten, von Tocqueville, Proudhon, der radikalen russischen Denker, von Constantin Frantz, Gierke und Aristide Briand.

– Zu beachten ist die eigenartige Wechselbeziehung, in welcher die beiden Integrationsbewegungen der Neuzeit zueinander stehen: der Nationalismus und der Föderalismus. Dies dokumentiert sich gerade in Südosteuropa ganz deutlich. Denn beide Konstruktionsprinzipien bewegen sich in Richtung Einheit, Homogenität, Sicherheit und Friedenssicherung, gehen aber von gegensätzlichen Prämissen, von unterschiedlichen Erwartungshaltungen aus: Nationalstaatliche Integration und das Streben nach föderativen Zusammenschluss stehen in dialektischer Beziehung zueinander wie These und Antithese.

Zum Abschluss ein kurzer Blick auf die Gründe des Scheiterns der Konföderationsbestrebungen in Südosteuropa: im außenpolitischen und im inneren Bereich. Außenpolitische Ursachen sind die Hegemonieansprüche einer oder gar mehrerer Großmächte, der Entzug der zeitweise gewährten Unterstützung durch eine Großmacht, die die Balkanvölker und deren Emigration nur als Werkzeug für der eigene Politik angesehen hatte, und die einer Konföderation wenig günstige gesamteuropäische und globale Situation. Dazu kommt noch, dass des Öfteren die „uniformierte”, mit der tatsächlichen Entwicklung im Inneren nicht vertraute Utopie der Außenstehenden, vor allem der Emigration, abgelehnt wird.

Die inneren Ursachen sind ebenfalls vielfältig und können nur demonstrativ angerissen werden. Die inneren Differenzen zwischen den südosteuropäischen Völkern respektive Staaten, das Überschneiden der wechselseitigen Expansionsbestrebungen der jeweiligen Binnenimperialismen führten häufig zu Mentalreservationen bei den Föderationsvorschlägen: Die eigene Zielsetzung stand im Vordergrund, den anderen gegenüber war man bloß zu Scheinkonzessionen bereit. Vor allem erwiesen sich die traditionellen, nationalen Antagonismen, die Feindbilder, die Heterostereotypen als wirkungsstärker als der Wunsch nach Verständigung, nach Vereinigung im Sinne des Großraumdenkens. Dadurch standen die kaum verdeckten Vormachtansprüche der einen oder anderen Seite einem ausbalancierten Gleichgewicht innerhalb der Konföderation entgegen. Über den Aufbau und das Funktionieren des angestrebten Bundes, ob er eher eine Föderation oder eher eine Konföderation sein sollte, herrschten nur diffuse, manchmal widersprüchliche Vorstellungen. In den meisten Fällen fehlte den Föderationsbestrebungen die nachhaltige Unterstützung breiter Bevölkerungsschichten. In Anbetracht der zahlreichen Schwierigkeiten kam man gar nicht soweit, die konkret anstehenden Probleme der Zusammenarbeit einer fundierten Sachlösung zuzuführen. Die Konföderation blieb aufschlussreiche Utopie.

 

Anmerkungen

1 Ein summarischer Hinweis auf die Literatur soll genügen: Georg LAFORET, Föderalismus und Gesellschaftsordnung. Umrisse einer Philosophie des Föderalismus (Augsburg 1947); Franz W. JERUSALEM, Die Staatsidee des Föderalismus (Tübingen 1949); Robert A. KANN, Ein Beitrag zur Problematik des abendländischen Föderalismus. – Bewegung und Gegenbewegung. In: Österreich und Europa. Festgabe für Hugo Hantsch zum 70. Geburtstag, hrsg. vom Institut für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung und von der Wiener Katholischen Akademie (Graz/Wien/Köln 1965, 587–611); Franz DEUERLEIN, Föderalismus. Die historischen und philosophischen Grundlagen des föderativen Prinzips (München 1972); Klaus von BEYME, Föderalismus. In: Marxismus im Systemvergleich, hrsg. von C.D. KERNIG, Politik 1. red. Klaus von Beyme, 250–275; Karl Heinz WALPER, Föderalismus (Berlin 1966); Hans LENTZE, Föderalismus und Zentralismus in der europäischen Geschichte. In: Der österreichische Föderalismus und seine historischen Grundlagen (Wien 1969), 5–19.

2 M. MUKIEL, Czartoryski and Eropean Unity 1770–1861 (Princeton 1955); vgl. noch: Joachim Kühl, Föderationspläne im Donauraum und in Ostmitteleuropa (München 1958) 17 ff.; Rudolf WIERER, Der Föderalismus im Donauraum (Schriftenreiche des Forschungsinstituts für den Donauraum 1, Graz/Köln 1960) 59 f.

3 Wolf Dietrich BEHSCHNITT, Nationalismus bei Serben und Kroaten 1830–1914. Analyse und Typologie der nationalen Ideologie (Südosteuropäische Arbeiten 74, München 1980) 54–65; Charles JELAVICH, Garašanin Nač ertanije und das großserbische Programm. In: Südostforschungen 27 (München 1968) 131–147; Dragoslav STRANJAKOVIC, Kako se postalo Garašaninovo „Nač ertanije” (Wie Garašanins „Nač ertanije” entstanden ist). In: Spomenik 91 (Beograd 1939) 65–115.

4 Vgl. KUKIEL, Czartoryski.

5 KÜHL, Föderationspläne 19–24; WIERER, Föderalismus 60–64; Robert A. KANN, Das Nationalitätenproblem der Habsburgermonarchie. Geschichte und Ideengehalt der nationalen Bestrebungen von Vormärz bis zur Auflösung des Reiches im Jahre 1918 (Veröffentlichungen der Arbeitsgemeinschaft Ost, 5, Graz/Köln 1964) 2. Bd., 118 ff.: Gyula MÉREI, Föderációs tervek Délkelet-Európában és a Habsburg Monarchia 1840–1918 (Föderationspläne in Südosteuropa und die Habsburgermonarchie 1840–1918) (Budapest 1965) 70–85; Endre KOVCS, A Kossuth emigráció és az európai szabadságmozgalmak (Die Kossuth-Emigration und die europäischen Freiheitsbewegungen) (Budapest 1967).

6 Lefton S. STAVRIANOS, Balkan Federation: A History of the Movement Toward Balkan Unity in Modern Times (Hamden, Conn. 1964); KÜHL, Föderationspläne: WIRER, Föderalismus.

7 MÉREI, Föderációs tervek; KOVÁCS, Kossuth-emigráció; Jen KOLTAY-KASTNER, A Kossuth emigráció Olaszországban (Die Kossuth-Emigration in Italien) (Budapest 1960).

8 Zu Radič vg.: STAVRIANOS, Balkan Federation 214 f.; Andreas MORITSCH, Die Bauernparteien bei den Kroaten, Serben und Slowenen. In: Europäische Bauernparteien im 20. Jahrhundert (Stuttgart/New York 1977) 359–402; Milan MARJANOVIČ , Stjepan Radič (Beograd 1938); Bogdan KRIZMAN, Stjepan Radič . Zivot, misao, delo. In: Korespondencija Stjepana Radiæa, 1. Bd (Zagreb 1972) 65–70. – Zu Stambolijski vgl.: STAVRIANOS, Balkan Federation 197, 202–206, 208–211; WIERER, Föderalismus 165 f.; Kunju KOZUCHAROV, Aleksandur Stambolijski. Biografič en oč erk (Sofia2 1968).

9 KÜHL, Föderationspläne 94 f.; STAVRIANOS, Balkan Federation 224 ff.

10 STAVRIANOS, Balkan Federation 223–236; KÜHL, Föderationspläne 94–98; vgl. desweiteren: T.I. GESHKOFF, Balkan Union. A Road to Peace in South-Eastern Europe (New York 1940): R.J. KERNER, H.N. HOWARD, The Balkan Conferences and the Balkan Entente 1930–1935 (Bekely 1936); N.J. PADELFORD, Peace in the Balkans. The Movement Towards International Organization in the Balkans (New York 1935).

11 League of Nations. Economic Commitee. The Agricultural Crisis 1 (Geneve 1931) 261 f.; STAVRIANOS, Balkan Federation 235–238.

12 WIERER, Föderalismus 177 ff.; KÜHL, Föderationspläne 46–50; Horst HASELSTEINER, Föderationen in Ostmittel-Europa. In: Festschrift zum 50 jährigen Bestand des Privatgymnasiums der Brüder der Christlichen Schulen (Wien 1978) 68 ff.

13 Holm SUNDHAUSSEN, Geschichte Jugoslawiens 1918–1980 (Stuttgart/Köln/Mainz 1982) 87 ff.; STRAVRIANOS, Balkan Federation 235–238.

14 Osteuropa-Handbuch: Jugoslawien, hrsg. von Werner MARKERT (Köln/Graz 1954) 162–165; Adam B. ULAM, Titoism and the Cominform (Cambridge 1952) 93 ff.; Hamilton F. ARMSTRONG, Tito and Goliath (Wien 1954) 310–315; SUNDHAUSSEN, Geschichte Jugoslawiens 149–159; WIERER, Föderalismus 186 f.

15 Osteuropa-Handbuch. Jugoslawien 162.

16 Vladimir DEDIJER, Tito. Autorisierte Biographie (Berlin 1953) 305 ff.; Jens HACKER, Der Ostblock. Entstehung, Entwicklung und Struktur 1939–1980 (Baden-Baden 1983) 395 f.

17 DEDIJER, Tito 306 f.; HACKER, Der Ostblock 396.

18 Adam B. ULAM, Expansion and Coexistence: Counterpoint in Soviet Foreign Policy. In: Problems of Communism 8/1959, 1–6; Milan BARTOS, Yugoslavia’s Struggle for Equality. In: Foreign Affairs 28/1949/50, 427–440; Piotre S. WANDYCZ, Recent Traditions of the Quest of Unity: Attempt Polish-Czechoslovak and Yugoslav-Bulgarian Confederations 1940–1948. In: Jerzy LUKASZEWSKI ed., The People’s Democracies after Prague. Soviet Hegemony, Nationalism, Regional Integration? (Bruges 1970) 35–99; DEDIJER, Tito 306 ff.; HACKER, Der Ostblock 396.

Begegnungen
Schriftenreihe des Europa Institutes Budapest, Band 1:89–102.

PÉTER HANÁK

Warum Fin de Siècle?

Die Bedeutungsänderungen eines Begriffs

Wenn ich sage: das Ende des Jahrhunderts (oder wissenschaftlicher: Fin de Siècle), verstehe ich darunter eindeutig das Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts, dabei gingen die vergangenen zwanzig Jahrhunderte alle einmal zu Ende, dennoch hob sie ihre Entwicklung nicht auf den Rang eines kulturgeschichtlichen Zeitalters. Warum gerade das Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts? Und dies nicht nur in der klassifizierenden Erinnerung der Nachwelt, sondern auch im Bewusstsein der Zeitgenossen. In der Tat wussten auch sie oder spürten zumindest, dass nicht nur eine runde Einheit der Zeitrechnung abgelaufen, sondern ein Zeitalter zu Ende gegangen war. Fin de Siècle tauchte als das Zeitalter bezeichnendes Substantiv um die Mitte der 80er Jahre des 19. Jahrhunderts in Paris auf. 1884 wurde ein Stück mit diesem Titel aufgeführt, dass das Unbehagen der jüngeren Generation als das vom Ende des Jahrhunderts nannte. Im gleichen Jahr erschien der Roman À Rebours (Die Kehrseite) des zu dieser Zeit beliebten Schriftstellers Joris-Karl Huysmans, der als klassisches Vorbild des Lebensgefühls Fin de Siècle erwähnt und nachgeahmt wurde. Aus dem Substantiv wurde bald ein Attribut, das zum Ausdruck einer spezifischen Stimmung des Zeitalters, der Müdigkeit, dem Chanson, der Sängerin, der Prostitution und der Jugend des Fin de Siècle diente.

Was verstanden nun die Verfasser und Verbreiter des Begriffs unter dem Attribut Fin de Siècle? Im ersten und ursprünglichen Sinn war es Ermüden, Enerviertheit und Neurasthenie, die überwiegend in Neurose gefasst war. Zu Vertreibung oder zum Vergessen der neurotischen Lebenslangeweile diente der Gebrauch von Verschrobenheit, gefragter Weltgewandtheit (Dandyismus), raffinierter Genüsse, Betäubungs- und Aufmunterungsmitteln mit Neigung zur Sünde und Perversion. In all dem sah und verdammte der ehrbare Bürger moralische Verseuchung und übersteigerten Hedonismus, wo er doch hinsichtlich zweier Eigenschaften den konventionellen (und vorbildlich verheimlichten) bürgerlichen Hedonismus überflügelte. Die einer war die Anbetung der Kunst und der Kultus der Schönheit, die Ästhetisierung des Verfalls, die andere die sich im Ablehnen und Verwerfen der Konventionen, in der Bürgerverärgerung offenbarende, passive, mit vielen Posen und Manieren dekorierte und eher informative Opposition.

„Der wahrste Typ meiner Generation”, wie ihn Hofmannsthal charakterisierte, „hat eine subtile Seele, ermüdet jedoch bei zu heftigen Gefühlen, ist lebendig, hat aber keinen starken Willen, ist graziös, jedoch mit früh alternder Ironie, Neigung zum Guten und hier und dort mit einer gewissen inneren Ebbe”. Der genusssüchtige und die Schönheit anbetende Dandyismus drückte Lebensstil und Lebensgefühl aus, die Bedeutung erweiterte sich also von der temporalen Bestimmung zum Partizip.

Im Laufe der Zeit wurde jedoch die Isolation der jungen Schriftsteller als Isolierung, ihr Ausfall als Auszug und ihre Opposition als Programm bewusst. Ihre Pariser Zeitschrift erhielt den Titel La Décadence und ihre Haltung schon bald das Attribut „dekadent”. „Nous acceptons sans sensibilité comme sans orgueil le terrible mot de décadence”, schrieb Paul Bourget 1896 mit nicht geringem Selbstbewusstsein. Und damit war er nicht nur in Paris, sondern auch in Berlin und Wien nicht allein. Im Namen seiner eigenen Generation, ein paar tausend jungen Künstlern, schrieb Hofmannsthal gerade über eines der Bücher von Bourget: „Um 1890 werden die geistigen Erkrankungen der Dichter, ihre übermäßig gesteigerte Empfindsamkeit, die namenlose Bangigkeit ihrer herabgestimmten Stunden, ihre Disposition, der symbolischen Gewalt auch unscheinbarer Dinge zu unterliegen, ihre Unfähigkeit, sich mit den existierenden Worten beim Ausdruck ihrer Gefühle zu begnügen, das alles wird eine allgemeine Krankheit unter den jungen Männern und Frauen der oberen Stände sein.” Sie hatten das Gefühl, dass ihnen ihre Ahnen anstelle der stolzen und brennenden Liebschaften aus dem Zeitalter von Renaissance und Barock, des heißen Lebensverlangens und der großen Gefühle der Romantik nur hübsche Möbel und überfeine Nerven hinterlassen hatten. Ihnen, der Generation der „Spätgeborenen”, „aber ist nichts zurückgeblieben als frierendes Leben, schale, öde Wirklichkeit, flügellahme Entsagung. Wir haben nichts als ein sentimentales Gedächtnis, einen gelähmten Willen und die unheimliche Gabe der Selbstverdoppelung.”

Anstelle der öden, gemeinen Wirklichkeit das ästhetisch schöne, das künstlerisch gelebte Leben: danach suchte und sehnte sich die dekadente Generation vom Ende des Jahrhunderts, fand es allerdings nur in den Spielen ihrer Vorstellung, nur in der Traum-Wirklichkeit des Gartens. Davon handeln eigentlich die modellwertigen, großen literarischen Werke vom Ende des Jahrhunderts.

Der Held des erwähnten Romans von Huysmans, Herzog des Esseintes, der reiche kunstverständige Sonderling, verlässt im wahrsten Sinne des Wortes die reale Welt und baut in seinem Schloss eine imaginäre Privatwirklichkeit aus, die nicht von Tradition und Logik eingerichtet wird, sondern von der Phantasie, noch dazu von einer neurotischen Phantasie, die das Außergewöhnliche und sogar das Unnatürliche als ihr Zuhause betrachtet. In dieser Welt meint er, in die Literatur und die Künste eintauchend, das Wesen zu finden: Das Kunstwerk ist realistischer als das Existierende, die Erinnerung an das Erlebnis intensiver und spannender als das Geschehene, die Substanz der vorgestellten Realität dichter und wahrer als das Original. Das höchste Verlangen des Herzogs ist, sein ganzes früheres Leben in den Spielen der Vorstellung zu vergessen, nur ruft das durch das Medium der Phantasie gefilterte Wiedererleben der Erlebnisse die unauslöschliche Vergangenheit und sogar die Konfrontation mit der Vergangenheit hervor. Am Ende seines Lebens sieht er ein, dass eine Loslösung von der Natur ebenso scheitern muss, wie das Verwischen der Vergangenheit. Schließlich kehrt er zur Theologie zurück und bekehrt sich in Glauben.

Das berühmte Werk vom zweiten bezeichnenden Schriftsteller des Fin de Siècle, Oscar Wilde, ist das Portrait von Dorian Gray. Dorian ist ein schöner und reicher, verantwortungsloser und von ethischen Hemmungen freier Londoner Beau. Begierig liebt er das Leben, ohne es zu kennen, trotzdem begehrt er die Totalität, die für ihn „ewige Jugend, unendliche Leidenschaft, raffinierte und heimliche Wonnen, wilde Freuden und noch wildere Sünden” sind. Seine Liebe, seine Freunde und die für ihn schwärmenden Jugendlichen ruiniert er und richtet sie zugrunde, doch sein sich zeitweise hin und her bewegendes Gewissen beruhigt er mit seiner eigenen Lebensphilosophie. Er ist der Meinung, dass die Schönheit der Empfindsamkeit nie verstanden wurde und die „Empfindungen nur deshalb tierisch bleiben, weil die Menschen sie durch Fasten zu unterwerfen, durch Quälen zu töten versuchten, anstatt sie zu Bestandteilen einer neuen Mentalität zu machen, deren vorherrschender Charakterzug das feine Gefühl der Schönheit ist”. „Ein neuer Hedonismus muss kommen, der das Leben neu erschafft und es vom groben, hässlichen Puritanismus befreit ... Das Asketentum, das die Gefühle tötet, und die gemeine Ausschweifung, die sie dämpft, braucht es in kleinster Weise kennenzulernen. Es muss jedoch den Menschen halten”, damit er sich auf die großen Momente des Lebens konzentrieren kann. Das hielten Dorian und seine engen Freunde für Lebenskunst. Indessen blieben die Sünden und Leidenschaften irgendwo in den unbewussten Kammern der Seele, rebellierten zeitweise und verunstalteten die schönen Züge im mystischen Portrait von Dorian und verzerrten dann bei seinem ebenso rätselhaften Tod sein vergreistes Gesicht.

Unser dritte Beispiel, Hugo Hofmannsthal, kannte gewiss die vorigen zwei Romane, als er sein erstes Erfolgsstück, das Versdramolett Der Tor und der Tod schrieb. Er ist noch keine zwanzig Jahre alt, jedoch bereits einsam, müde, voller Enttäuschung und Lebensangst. „Ich habe bisher nie eine große Freude oder einen großen Schmerz gehabt”, genau wie Claudio, der adlige Jüngling, die Hauptgestalt des Stücks. Claudio verließ und betrog jeden, den er liebte, seine Mutter, seine Liebe, seinen Freund. Schließlich, auf den Ruinen seines verpfuschten Lebens, mit dem schlechten Gewissen der nicht erkannten Gefühle ringend, kommt ihn der Erlöser holen: der Tod. Da wird ihm der Sinn des Lebens bewusst und erleichtert reicht er seine Hand: „Sei du das Leben, Tod!” Die Heilung liegt darin verborgen, schreibt der Dichter in seinen Aufzeichnungen, „daß der Tod der erste wahrhaftige Ding ist, die ihm (Claudio) begegnet... dessen tiefe Wahrhaftigkeit er zu fassen imstande ist. Ein Ende aller Lügen, Relativitäten und Gaukelspiele. Davon strahlt dann auf alles andere Verklärung aus.”

Die erwähnten (und noch viele hundert Gleichgesinnte) sind die Helden des Fin de Siècle, die Wahrheits- und Bewahrheitungssucher, die sie allerdings nicht in der äußeren Welt, nicht in den heißen Liebschaften von Renaissance und Barock und nicht in der heldenhaften Leidenschaft der Romantik zu finden meinen, sondern in der geschlossenen inneren Welt ihrer selbst. Diesen einsamen Helden (oder den ihr Schicksal mit Empathie verfolgenden Lesern) wird schließlich bewusst, dass die Leidenschaft ihrer Einsamkeit Sünde und unnatürlich ist und den Existenzgeboten des menschlichen Geschlechts widerspricht. (Bezeichnend ist der englische Titel von À Rebours: Against Nature.) Gleichzeitig sehen sie ein, dass das Verabsolutieren des Ästhetischen in der Kunst und besonders in der Lebenskunst durch das Vermeiden oder Verneinen der sozialen Bindung und der dazu geordneten Ethik äußere und innere Konflikte verursacht, die zum Verfall und zur Zerstörung führen. Hieraus ergibt sich die Todesnähe der Kunst vom Ende des Jahrhunderts.

In der Interpretation des Todes als Möglichkeit unterscheiden sich die Dekadenten vom Ende des Jahrhunderts. Die eine Tendenz betrachtet den Tod als absoluten Endpunkt und sogar als Weltgericht und vertritt damit extrem den von der europäischen Mentalität herrührenden Antibuddhismus. In Wildes zitiertem Roman murrte Lord Henry zur Charakterisierung des moralischen Verfalls des Zeitalters lediglich: „Fin de Siècle. »Fin de Globe«, sagte die Hausherrin [Lady Narborough]. »Wäre es doch Fin de Globe«, seufzte Dorian. »Das Leben ist eine große Enttäuschung.«” Die depressiven Dekadenten erwarten gleichzeitig mit dem Ende des Jahrhunderts ein Ende der Welt und wünschten es sich wahrscheinlich auch. Die andere Tendenz humanisierte den Tod und fasste ihn als lebensfreundliches Prinzip, als Immanenz des Lebens auf. An dieser Stelle erwähnen wir die Dramen und Novellen des Wiener Arthur Schnitzlers, deren Handlungen überwiegend vom Tod bewegt werden, der unser Leben als Gefährte, als Räsoneur begleitet. Der Tod ist einer der besonderen Punkte im ewigen natürlichen Kreislauf: gleichzeitig Ende und Anfang. Die in den letzten Jahren des Jahrhunderts von Westen her beginnende und sich in Mitteleuropa vervollkommnende Sezession kündigte nicht das Ende der Kunst, sondern ihre Erneuerung an. Sie ging nicht nach Art der hinduistischen Heiligen zum Sterben in die Wüste, sondern folgte dem Beispiel des römischen Plebejers: an eine neue Mons Sacer, an die Kultur zog aus dem ausgestorbenen Haus des positivistischen Naturalismus, des Akademismus aus. Diese Besessenen des Fin de Siècle bildeten den literarischen Kreis Junges Wien, die Künstlergruppe der Sezession. Die Sezession brachte die Botschaft vom Ende eines großen kulturellen Zeitalters und vom Anfang eines neuen.

Zerfall der liberalen Weltordnung

Eine künstlerische Geschmacksänderung allein schafft und erklärt keine globale kulturelle Zeitalterwende. Wir haben gesehen, wie das „Ende des Jahrhunderts” vom Substantiv zum Attribut, von der temporalen Bestimmung zum Partizip und wie dann daraus das Programm einer lockeren Generationsgruppierung wurde. Wie aber wurde daraus eine Weltanschauung, ein Lebensgefühl und im größten Teil der mittleren und oberen Klassen sogar eine Mode? Dies lässt sich kaum von der inneren Entwicklung der Kunst ableiten, selbst dann nicht, wenn eines der fundamentalen Prinzipien der Geschmacksänderung l’art pour l’art, die Selbstjustiz der Kunst war. Die Autonomie ist in ihrem Wesen eine ästhetische und zum Teil thematische Frage, die allerdings nie unabhängig von der tiefschichtigen Bewegung der Gesellschaft (Zeugen dafür sind die großen Stilperioden), von deren Lebensweise und Mentalität ist, die sich wiederum aus technologischen, Effektivitäts-, politischen, religiösen und anderen Faktoren zusammensetzen. Bei der Erforschung der Genese vom „Ende des Jahrhunderts” dürfen wir auch diejenige gesellschaftliche Umgebung nicht umgehen, in der die Großen der Gründerzeit, die Söhne der Gründerväter aufgezogen wurden. Wir dürfen die strukturellen Veränderungen und Konflikte der liberalen wirtschaftlichen und gesellschaftlichen Ordnung, die das feste System nicht nur in seiner Stabilität, sondern auch in seinem Selbstvertrauen zum Wanken brachten, nicht als gegeben und bekannt betrachten. Der Misskredit der Freiheitsidee und die sich vertiefende Krise des ganzen liberalen kapitalistischen Systems wurden nicht nur und auch nicht primär von den Urfeinden, der plebejischen Gleichheit in roten Mützen und den sozialistischen Kindern oder den kritischen Salven des sich erneuernden Konservativismus der Deklassierten verursacht, sondern von den Betriebsstörungen im Mechanismus der freien Konkurrenz und den sich aus der eigenen Entwicklung der Freiheitsidee ergebenden Antinomien. Die freie Konkurrenz schlug nämlich im Laufe der Zeit immer stärker auch auf die Mittelklasse der Bourgeoisie zurück, verschärfte die inneren Konflikte und bahnte den aufstrebenden, antiliberalen Kräften der Massendemokratie den Weg. Die Selbsteinschränkung der Freiheit wiederum steigerte den Einfluss des Staates und der starken Interessengruppen, die Zentralisierung und die Macht der Monopole und der Bürokratie.

Und was mindestens ebenso wichtig ist: Ob es die Freiheit nun einschränkte oder nicht, das Ethos der systemschaffenden Bourgeoisie erwies sich sowohl im öffentlichen Leben als auch im Privatleben als unterwürfig und für die neue Generation vom Ende des Jahrhunderts als inakzeptabel. Die Krise des Systems trat nicht nur in der Antisozialpolitik und im Veralten der Wertordnung, sondern auch innerhalb der Familie und des Einzelnen in Erscheinung. Das schockierende Zeichen dafür war die Lockerung der Bindungen der bürgerlichen Familie und der Verfall des „liberalen Ego”.

Rebellionen

Die bürgerliche Familie war eigentlich das Produkt des Jahrhunderts der industriellen Revolution und der modernen Urbanisation. Nach der Trennung von Arbeitsplatz und Wohnort wurde der letztere zu einem richtigen Zu Hause, wie auch der „Haushalt” zur Familie wurde, in der die Rollen und die Positionen genau voneinander getrennt waren. Der Mann war das absolute Familienoberhaupt, der die Kämpfe des Lebens ausfechtende Brotgeber, der sorgende Gatte und Vater. Die Frau durfte, von der Arbeit, aus dem öffentlichen Leben und bei den Entscheidungen ausgeschlossen, zur Entschädigung in der Rolle der treuen, trauten und gütigen Mutter (Hausengel) glänzen. Diese Familienstruktur bot der Frau ein sicheres, obzwar einem Gefängnis gleiches, Prestige bietendes, wenngleich es auch das Prestige einer Haushälterin war, gefühlsreiches, wenn auch langweiliges Leben. Die Mehrheit der Mittelklassebürger akzeptierte dieses Frauenideal im Zeitalter des viktorianischen Verhaltenskodex und der Scheinmoral des Biedermeier lange, bis hin zur Wert- und Geschmacksänderung des Fin de Siècle. Danach begann und breitete sich unwiderstehlich die bürgerliche Frauenrebellion aus.

Eine Grundform der Rebellion können wir als die „Ibsensche” bezeichnen, denn die Nora blieb jahrzehntelang Diskussionsthema, literarisches und alltägliches Vorbild. Die Formel für den Nora-Typ ist eigentlich einfach: „ich muss versuchen, Mensch zu sein”, sagt sie, als sie die sichere und vielleicht traute „Kinderstube” verlässt. Nora lässt sich allerdings nicht aus dem Kontext des Ibsenschen Oeuvres herausreißen. Nach ihr kommen Hedda Gabler, die Frau des Meeres, Solness und Borkman: Tragödien eines verfehlten Lebens, verpasster Gelegenheiten und verworfener Wünsche.

Ein einfacherer, aber mehr politischer Typ war der feministische. Zum Ende des Jahrhunderts brachen aus den mittelständischen Jugendlichen mit elementarer Kraft die Berufung zum Lernen und zum Überschreiten der Rolle als Hausengel und das Verlangen nach Arbeit hervor, das sich bald zu einer Forderung erhärtete und zu einer Bewegung organisierte wie die der für politische Emanzipation kämpfenden Suffragetten. Noch alltäglicher und praktischer (ergo wirksamer) war die Kleidungsreform-Bewegung. Die Initiative ging in der Mitte des vergangenen Jahrhunderts (mit bis zum Ende des Jahrhunderts mäßigem Erfolg) von Amerika aus. Dann verbanden sich Frauenbewegung, Modedesign und Medizin gegen Krinoline, Turnüre und oben und unten geschlossene, enge, stickige, mehrere Kilo schwere Bekleidung, vor allem gegen das Korsett. In den 90er Jahren brach eine wahrhaftige Antikorsett-Kampagne aus, die in einem friedlichen dreißigjährigen Krieg den vollständigen Sieg errang. Inzwischen durchbrach auch die Frauenmode die jahrhundertelange Tradition: Die Kleider wurden nun bereits aus leichten Stoffen gefertigt, schmiegten sich lockerer an den Körper, unten wurde der Rock oben die Ärmel kürzer, der Halsausschnitt öffnete sich und der Körper wurde freier.

Diese Reformbewegung war eng mit der Sternstunde der Naturheilkunde, der modernen Körperkultur und der Hygiene verbunden. Ende des Jahrhunderts trat die Bewegung Luft-Licht-Bad ihren Eroberungszug an, dessen Erfolg das Baden, den Strand, das Sonnen und das Sporttreiben im Freien innerhalb eines Vierteljahrhunderts nicht nur zur Mode, sondern zu einem unerlässlichen Bestandteil der Lebensweise werden ließ. Kurzum, die Reformkleidung und die Körperkultur machten vor allem den Körper der Frau freier und gesünder und selbstverständlich auch schöner und attraktiver. Dadurch hatten die Reformbewegungen in der Befreiung der verheimlichten und verbotenen Sexualität Zeitgenossen und sogar Verbündete.

An dieser Stelle traf sich die Reform der Kleidung und Körperkultur mit der anderen, allgemeineren Form der Rebellion, der Profanierung der Sexualität, der Befreiung vom religiösen Anathema der Sündhaftigkeit. Literatur und Kunst, die gesamte großstädtische Lebensweise gesellt sich hier an die Seite der Rebellen.

Den Frauen schlossen sich bald die Kinder an, für die der familiäre Zwang und die bürgerliche Scheinmoral ebenfalls unerträglich geworden waren. Die gebildetsten, empfindlichsten Mitglieder der zweiten und dritten Generation der reich gewordenen Bourgeoisie entflohen diesem familiären Milieu und der sie erwartenden Beschäftigung, dem Geschäft, der Geldjagd. Die Anhänger der zu jener Zeit gängigen Psychoanalyse entdeckten in dieser Ödipus-Rebellion ihre markante Offenbarung. Darin konnten auch einige Wahrheitselementen liegen, denn der Ödipus-Komplex war, wenn er auch nicht mit diesem wissenschaftlichen Namen bezeichnet wurde, mindestens seit Noah bekannt. Auch in der Blütezeit des Kapitalismus gab es hin und wieder schöngeistige Jugendliche, die sich vor der „Geschäftemacherei” in Acht nahmen, sich jedoch als Erwachsene besannen und auf den Stuhl des Direktors setzten oder ins Eckhaus einheirateten und die Kontinuität der bürgerlichen Familie und Moral aufrechterhielten. Warum brach der ödipale-Hass ausgerechnet zum Ende des Jahrhunderts aus ihnen hervor? Warum ist auch dieser Komplex einer des Fin de Siècle?

Ich bin der Meinung, die gesellschaftliche Motivation war zu dieser Zeit stärker als die psychologische. Die neue Generation des Großbürgertums, deren Mehrheit human gebildete Jugendliche mit Universitätsabschluss waren, blieb gegenüber den Ideen des Sozialismus und Argumenten des Antikapitalismus nicht empfindungslos, schon allein deshalb nicht, weil sie die Rechtmäßigkeit der Detentionen und Emotionen durch eine von innen heraus, aus ihrem eigenen Trauma erwachsende Empathie erlebten. Die flüchtende, Gerechtigkeit suchende Rebellion der Intellektuellen der Sezession stieß in ihnen mit der Wucht des großbürgerlichen Status zusammen und sie bemühten sich, den Konflikt entweder durch Aufgeben des Status oder durch das Sühneopfer des großzügigen Mäzenatentums zu lösen. Dieser moralische Konflikt wurde durch das auffallend häufige Dissidieren des Söhne aus dem emporkommenden jüdischen Großbürgertum gefärbt, wenngleich auch in dunklem Ton. Es reicht aus, hier die Deutschen George Simmel, den Philosophen, Carl Sternheim, den Schriftsteller, Fritz Mauthner, den Sprachwissenschaftler oder die Österreicher Karl Kraus, Ludwig Wittgenstein, aus dem Kreis Junges Wien Arthur Schnitzler, Felix Salten, Stefan Zweig, aus Prag Franz Kafka und aus Budapest Lajos Hatvani und György Lukács zu erwähnen. Trotz der zahlreichen Beispiele sollten wir die Generationsrebellion nicht als irgendeine exklusive jüdische Erscheinung betrachten. Sie riss auch Prominente aus dem christlichen Großbürgertum mit sich wie Thomas und Heinrich Mann, Friedrich Alfred Krupp und August Thyssen.

Außer der sozialen und moralischen Motivation nahmen auch die wissenschaftlichen Zweifel und Entdeckungen des Zeitalters starken Einfluss auf die Suche nach dem Weg der Weltanschauung am Ende des Jahrhunderts.

Änderung des Weltbildes

Wie verblüffend dies auch in den Ohren der vor allem humanen Intellektuellen klingt, in der Veränderung des Weltbildes vom Ende des Jahrhunderts spielten nicht Literatur und Kunst, sondern die Wissenschaften die Hauptrolle. Heben wir an dieser Stelle nur zwei Gebiete hervor, die Physik und die Psychologie. Die überraschenden Entdeckungen der zweiten Hälfte des vergangenen Jahrhunderts stellten die ausgezeichneten Physiker der Zeit vor allem in den Bereichen Elektromagnetismus und Thermodynamik vor Verlegenheit auslösende Fragen. Aufgrund der newtonschen Gesetze der klassischen Physik ließen sich die Erscheinungen des Elektromagnetismus, die Beständigkeit der Lichtgeschwindigkeit sowie die Existenz und Bewegung von kleineren Teilen als das Atom nicht erklären. Die Forscher von Maxwell und Herz bis Michelson und Lorentz ahnten, was Ernst Mach als erster darlegte, dass der von Newton vorausgesetzte bewegungslose Äther und der darauf bezogene absolute Raum und die absolute Zeit unhaltbare physikalische Begriffe sind. Schließlich gab Einstein, wie bekannt ist, eine auch mathematisch bewiesene Erklärung dafür, dass Raum und Zeit nur in einem festgelegten Bezugssystem (Koordinatensystem) gültig sind. Nach seiner Relativitätstheorie ist der Raum nichts anderes als das elektromagnetische Feld der sich bewegenden Körper, d.h. Raum und Zeit sind die konsubstantielle Erscheinung von ein und derselben Bewegung, so wie sich auch die Materie und die Energie gegenseitig ersetzen lassen und konsubstantiell sind.

Wenn wir dazu die Entdeckung, Verwendung und die Theorie der radioaktiven Strahlen, die Entdeckung der Elektronen und die Quantentheorie hinzunehmen, können wir kühn behaupten, dass das zu Jahrhundertwende entstandene neue physikalische Weltbild eine ebensolche qualitative Veränderung mit sich brachte wie die newtonsche Physik, ihre Wirkung auf das Schicksal der Menschheit jedoch übertraf diese bei weitem. Wenn dieses Weltbild den relativierenden Skeptizismus des Fin de Siècle stark beeinflusst hat, was als sicher anzunehmen ist, dann konnte das innovative Zweifeln des Fin de Siècle wiederum Einstein dazu inspirieren, in den axiomatischen Fragen der Physik auch die Grundlagen der Erkenntnistheorie kritisch zu überprüfen.

Wie die Physik mit der Erklärung des Elektromagnetismus, so bahnte die Psychologie durch die Untersuchung der mystischen Krankheit des Zeitalters, der Hysterie, durchaus einen Weg. Die Psychologie war lange ein Teilgebiet der Philosophie. Aus ihrer stiefmütterlichen Situation wurde sie durch die Medizinwissenschaft, vor allem die Psychiatrie befreit. Die Schule von Charcot in Paris setzte in der Heilung von seelischen Verletzungen bereits die Hypnose und das Gespräch ein. Das Funktionieren, die Theorie und die Therapie der bewussten und unbewussten seelischen Vorgänge wurden von Sigmund Freud und seine Schüler im Wien Ende des Jahrhunderts ausgearbeitet. Die Entdeckungen und Methoden der freudschen Tiefenpsychologie sind verblüffend, umstritten und beliebt genug, so dass wir von ihrer Beschreibung an dieser Stelle absehen können. Wir werfen nicht einmal einen Blick in die Polemik der wissenschaftlichen Relevanz des Freudismus. Aus der Sicht unseres Themas ist wichtig, dass die von Freud skizzierte Persönlichkeitsstruktur und die Funktionsregeln vom gesunden und vom kranken Nervensystem die Grundlagen zu einem neuen psychologischen Menschenbild legten und diese in einen originalen, kulturellen anthropologischen Entwicklungsablauf betteten. Vielleicht ist es nicht notwendig, besonders zu betonen, und ausreichend lediglich zu erwähnen, dass die Weltliteratur und Freud beziehungsweise Freud und die Literatur des 20. Jahrhunderts in einer engen Mitverfasserbeziehung standen.

Physik und Philosophie sind einander fern liegende Gebiete. Können Zweifel darüber entstehen, ob sie aufeinander eingewirkt haben? Eine Gnade oder Laune des Schicksals ist es, dass sich ausgerechnet am Ende des Jahrhunderts ein ausgezeichneter Physiker fand, der sich nicht nur nebenbei und auch nicht wie ein Amateur sowohl mit der Philosophie als auch mit der Psychologie befasste: Ernst Mach. Seinen Namen erwähnten wir bereits im Zusammenhang mit der Kritik an der newtonschen Physik. Mach zog zuletzt nicht nur die objektive Existenz von Raum und Zeit, sondern auch die der Welt und der Gegenstände in Zweifel. In seiner Arbeit mit dem Titel Analyse der Empfindungen stellte er die Gegenstände (auch die wahrnehmende Person, das Ich) als Komplex der Empfindungen dar. Machs Phänomenologie betrachtete sowohl die Werte schaffende Seele als auch die Materie als Abstraktion. Er war also weder Idealist noch Materialist, sondern betrachtete das Verhältnis der Gegenstände und Empfindungen, der Welt und des Wahrnehmenden und die sich daraus ergebenden funktionellen Zusammenhänge als entscheidend. Dieser Relativismus und die „impressionistische” Erkenntnistheorie hatten einen gewaltigen Einfluss auf die europäischen und vor allem österreichischen und tschechischen Schriftsteller und Künstler vom Ende des Jahrhunderts.

Sezession

Zwischen reformierendem Geist vom Ende des Jahrhunderts und dem Historismus beziehungsweise dem traditionellen Geschmack des Naturalismus waren die Konfrontation und der Bruch unvermeidlich. In England begann dies bereits zu Beginn der zweiten Hälfte des Jahrhunderts beim Auftreten der Präraffaeliten und in Belgien und Frankreich in den 80er Jahren. Danach folgte der „Künstlerauszug” 1892 in Berlin und München und 1897 in Wien. In der Architektur wendete sich die Rebellion gegen die längst vergangene Zeitalter zitierende „Stilarchitektur”, in der Malerei gegen den überholten Akademismus und den modischen Impressionismus, und in der Literatur gegen den Naturalismus. Die Sezession paarte das Schöne mit dem Nützlichen, das Ästhetische mit dem Realen und die Realität mit der Phantasie. Artem impenedere vitae verkündete: Die Kunst muss im alltäglichen Leben ein Zu Hause finden, nicht nur in der Kirche und im Museum. „Es darf nicht sein, dass wahre Moral, Glück und Kunst erblühen, wo die Städte ... den Körper des Landes wie grässliche Geschwüre bedecken und ihn aufzehren”, warnte der Meister der Präraffaeliten, John Ruskin. „Wenn wir unser verlorenes Gefühl ... für die kräftigen und festen Formen und die sinnvollen Konstruktionen wiederfinden wollen, müssen wir sie dort suchen, wo die »schönen Künste« nicht eindringen können, ... wo sich die künstlerische Absicht der Nützlichkeit zuwendet: in unserem Heim, schrieb der Pionier der neuen Wohnkultur, van de Welde. „Wir kennen keinen Unterschied zwischen der »hohen Kunst« und der »Massenkunst«, der Kunst für die Reichen und der für die Armen. Die Kunst ist Gemeingut ... notwendige Lebensoffenbarung des intelligenten Volkes”, verkündete der erste Aufruf der Wiener Sezession.

Außer der spektakulären Geste des Bruches und des gemeinsamen Programms der Erneuerung gab es jedoch zwischen den einzelnen Regionen, Ländern und den einzelnen Kunstrichtungen große Unterschiede. Was das Thema und die Form, die Lebens- und die Todesnähe betrifft, unterschieden sich die Ziele und die Wege scharf voneinander. Obgleich sowohl die Architektur als auch die Malerei von der Sezession ausgingen, gelangte die erstere schon bald zu einer die einfachen, geometrischen Formen, schmucklose, glatte Fronten, sonnige, saubere Wohnungen realisierende modernen Baukunst und die Malerei zu avantgardistischen formbrechenden „Ismen”.

In der Architektur der Sezession trafen drei große Strömungen aufeinander. Das zuvor verachtete Gewerbe, die Ingenieurs-Baukunst brachte die neuen Baustoffe – Eisen, Beton, Glas und mit ihnen die nicht einmal erträumten Möglichkeiten bravouröser Lösungen. Die englischen Präraffaeliten schufen das Model des modernen Familienwohnhauses (cottage house): die der funktionellen Zweckmäßigkeit der Wohnung dienende Konstruktion und ordneten ihr die äußere Gestaltung, die herkömmliche Symmetrie der Front und die klassischen Bauteile unter. Ihre sehenswerte Stilprägung erhielt die Sezession allerdings von der Phantasie der rebellierenden Künstler: die unregelmäßige Massenanordnung und ihre geometrische oder gewundene und geblümte Ornamentik. Die sezessionistischen Architekten beteten eine neue Dreifaltigkeit an, die Einheit von Material, Konstruktion und Form.

Die sezessionistische Architektur fasste in der Monarchie mit überraschender Schnelligkeit Fuß und nicht als exotische Seltenheit. Der Hauptgrund für den Erfolg war das Zeitalter selbst, das Ende des Jahrhunderts, das die Masse der ausfallenden und ausziehenden Intelligenz auswählte und verstieß und reich an hervorragenden Talenten war. Der bedeutendste Wiener Meister ist Otto Wagner. Aus seiner Schule gingen Josef Hoffmann, Josef Maria Olbrich, der Prager Jan Kotera und der Budapester Ödön Lechner hervor. Die Überwindung des Historismus bestand für ihn nicht in der Rückkehr zur Vertrautheit der kleinen Gemeinde in einer idealisierten mittelalterlichen Stadt, sondern in der innovativen Anpassung an die irreversible Urbanisation und die stürmische technische Zivilisation. „Aller modern geschaffene muss dem neuen Material, den Anforderungen der Gegenwart entsprechen. Wenn es zur modernen Menschheit passen soll, es muss unser eigenes, besseres, demokratisches selbstbewusstes, ideales Wesen veranschaulichen und den kolossalen technischen und wissenschaftlichen Errungenschaften, sowie dem durchgehenden praktischen Zuge der Menschheit Rechnung tragen” – schrieb er in einem Architekturhandbuch. Die wichtigsten Forderungen des Menschen von heute sind Komfort und Hygiene, möglichst größte Bequemlichkeit und Sauberkeit. „Jede Bauform ist aus der Konstruktion entstanden und sukzessive zur Kunstform geworden.” Wagner experimentierte in Wien mit der geblümten und gerankten, der vergoldeten und der geometrisch angeordneten Ornamentik und fand schließlich zur Harmonie aus funktioneller Innenarchitektur und ästhetischer Formgebung, architektonischen Elementen und alltäglichen Gebrauchsgegenständen, Klinken, Öfen und Fenstern.

In Wagner und seinen Jüngern lebte das Verlangen nach der Schaffung eines neuen, einheitlichen Stils und eines Gesamtkunstwerks. Er arbeitete nicht nur mit Malern, Bildhauern, sondern auch mit Kunstgewerblern und den Möbel-, Glas- und Textilprojektanten und Kunstschmieden der Wiener Werkstätte eng zusammen. Zwar waren die Wohnungseinrichtungen, Vasen, Tapeten, der Schmuck und die Kunstgegenstände des alltäglichen Lebens nur für die Reichen erschwinglich, doch hatten Architektur und Heimkultur der Sezession noch einmal und letztmalig einen einheitlichen, schönen, wohnlichen, tragbaren und erträglichen Stil geschaffen.

Auch heute ist fraglich, ob die Moderne, Adolf Loos und der Ornamente ausrottende Purismus des Bauhaus richtig waren. Wären in Stahlbeton geschlossene, mit Glas gedeckte moderne Büros, Geschäfte und Wohnungen schöner und zweckmäßiger gewesen?

Das Geheimnis des mitteleuropäischen Erfolgs der Sezession liegt darin verborgen, dass sie an keinerlei historische Regeln gebunden und den lokalen und nationalen Variationen gegenüber frei und offen war. Darauf hatten die ungarischen (polnischen, russischen) Architekten seit Jahrzehnten gewartet. „Eine ungarische Formsprache gab es nicht, sondern es wird eine geben”, beschwörte der ungarische Meister der Sezession, Ödön Lechner, den Geist Széchenyis herauf. Endlich gab es einen noch nicht entwickelten, nach Formen suchenden Stil, der für die Volkskunst kein hochmütiger Fremder, sondern ein gastfreundlicher Freund war! Wenn wir doch nur das Keramikdach der Postsparkasse in Pest, die Stierkopfverzierungen, die wellige Krönung, die aus volkstümlichen Webereien übertragenen, Tulpenblumenmuster, oder die elegante Kartierung des Instituts der Erdkunde, dessen besondere hausförmige Fenster und Verzierungen betrachten, können wir eine sich von der in Wien unterscheidende, jedoch originelle und künstlerische Variation erkennen. Einige gingen in der Adaption der Volkskunst über Lechner hinaus und versuchten, selbst die Konstruktionsbestandteile des siebenbürgischen Bauernhauses in die großstädtischen Gebäude vom Anfang des Jahrhunderts zu verpflanzen. In speziellen Fällen konnte dies bei Künstlervillen, Schulen und im Tierpark Künstlern wie Károly Kós, Ede Thoroczkai Wigand, Dénes Györgyi oder Dezső Zrumeczky auch gelingen, allerdings vertrug das archaische Bauernhaus das Gewicht der Schrittzunahme und der stadtbildlichen Disharmonie insgesamt nicht.

In der ungarischen Sezession ist es bewundernswert, dass sie nicht in der Hauptstadt auf dem Niveau der großbürgerlichen und staatlichen Repräsentation stecken blieb, sondern sich innerhalb eines kurzen Jahrzehntes im ganzen Land von Máramarossziget bis Szeged und Marosvásárhely ausbreitete. Der ornamentierte Palast von Géza Márkus, das Rathaus von Lechner und Pártos in Kecskemét, der Kulturpalast von Marcell Komor und Dezső Jakab in Marosvásárhely, das Rathaus und die Synagoge der beiden in Szabadka und die evangelische Kirche von Károly Kós in Kolozsvár bezeugen, dass es einst eine Sezession der Donaugegend gab, die mit der Volkskunst dekoriert eine sehr originelle und auf hohem Niveau stehende regionale Variation schuf.

Wie die Wiener Meister, so kamen auch die jungen Architekten der Lechner-Schule zur Vereinfachung der sezessionistischen Überwucherung, zur Harmonie von Funktion Form und zu einer diskreten, stilisierten Ornamentik, die gleichzeitig auch die Frontgliederung erfüllte. Das Geschäftshaus Rózsavölgyi von Béla Lajta, seine Schulgebäude und sein Pfründhaus sind die ästhetischen Andenken und Erinnerungen an den organischen Übergang zur prämodernen Architektur. Waren das, was danach kam, die protzigen neobarocken Villen, ungarischer und moderner? Waren die auf nackte Blöcke reduzierten, schmucklosen Reihenhäuser des Bauhaus wohnlicher?

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Wie davon bereits die Rede war, wich der Weg der Malerei entschieden von der in Richtung der gesellschaftlichen Ansprüche und der Verbesserung der Lebensqualität verlaufenden Architektur ab. Während der Architekt am Ende des Jahrhunderts von Höfling zum städteplanenden Akteur des öffentlichen Lebens wurde, verließ der Maler den Hof, den Salon und die Stadt und flüchtete in die provinzielle Einsamkeit (oder die von Tahiti). Die Sezession griff auch in der Malerei auf die Präraffaeliten (Rosetti, Burne-Jones) und die Symbolisten (Gustave Moreau) zurück, von denen sie die Themen und die Mittel des Malerischen fertig erhielt. Insofern war also die Sezession (als Art Nouveau) nicht brandneu: ihre Maler waren von Ästhetischen und vom Mystischen, von der Erotik und vom Tod und von den mit ihnen verbundenen elementaren Symbolen und verzaubernden Dekorationen ergriffen. Auf dem Bild des Begründers der Wiener Sezession, Gustav Klimt, erscheint die nackte Wahrheit (nuda veritas) in der Gestalt eines schönen Frauenaktes. Seine Malereien und vor allem seine graphischen Studien sind wahrhaftig von nackter Erotik durchzogen, die häufig die Grenzen der Pornographie berührt. Nur ist bei ihm die Erotik kein Selbstzweck, sondern erlebte Philosophie und zwar der Träger eines tiefen pessimistischen Gedankens. Klimt erlernte von dem ihm mental nahe stehenden Schopenhauer den Gedanken vom hoffnungslosen Kreislauf des Lebens. Der ewige Kreislauf von Fruchtbarkeit und Vergänglichkeit, Tod und Geburt wird von Eros und Thanatos bewegt. Auf diese Weise ist, was für die Menschheit das Gesetz der Natur ist, für das Individuum das niederschmetternde Bewusstsein vom Ende. Dagegen bietet nur die Liebe im Moment der Zeitlosigkeit Trost. Von hier kommt das rein Ästhetische des Eros und die Anwesenheit des Todes und eine ambivalente Todeserotik auf den bedeutenderen Werken Klimts, den Abbildungen der Judith-Salome und vor allem auf seinen von der Wiener Universität bestellten, aber nie akzeptierten Wandmalereien (Philosophie, Medizin, Rechtswissenschaft.)

Das andere Thema Klimts vom Fin de Siècle ist das Ineinanderverwachsen von Traum, Phantasie und Wirklichkeit. Wachsein und Traum, Einbildung und Wirklichkeit trennen sich selbst mit Hilfe der Komposition aus Farben und Konturen nicht voneinander. Die meisten Bilder, selbst die Landschaftsbilder haben eine Ebene und es fehlt hinter ihnen die perspektivische Tiefe, was durch den überflutenden Reichtum der Dekoration noch mehr hervorgehoben wird. Der Künstler wollte auch mit dieser Ikonenhaftigkeit den symbolischen Zusammenhang der philosophischen Gedanken und der malerischen Komposition ausdrücken.

Die Wiener Sezession florierte ein kurzes Jahrzehnt lang, danach war sie auf die angewandte Kunst angewiesen und in der Malerei leitete eine härtere und ernstere junge Generation zur Avantgarde über. Egon Schiele, Oskar Kokoschka und ihre Mitstreiter zerstörten den Schönheitskult und wiesen anstelle des verschönernden Traumes die Hässlichkeit der nackten Realität, die Brutalität der Todeserotik und die Leiden der Seele vor. Doch das war nicht mehr das Ende des Jahrhunderts, sondern die mit bösen Vorahnungen volle Kunst des 20. Jahrhunderts.

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Das Ende des Jahrhunderts und die Sezession von Budapest entwickelten sich auf eigene Weise und waren aufgrund der zeitlichen und gedanklichen Verspätung abschnittsweise gegliedert. Zur Zeit der Entfaltungen des geistigen Endes des Jahrhunderts herrschten bei uns noch der anekdotische adlige Literaturgeschmack, die die heldenhafte Vergangenheit belebende historische Malerei und die Liederwelt der nationalen Romantik vor. In dieser kulturellen Umgebung galt das Erscheinen einer neuen, großstädtischen Zeitschrift (Die Woche) im Jahr 1890 tatsächlich als Sezession. Die Mehrzahl ihrer Verfasser waren bereits Bürger oder Verbürgerlichte, waren der Vergangenheit entrissen und sahen die Schatten und auch das Elend der Großstadt, jedoch wussten sie von Dekadenz, Einsamkeit, Liebe und Tod ebenso viel, wie sie sich von Arany, Ibsen, höchstens von Zola und Maupassant abgeguckt hatten.

Sezession war dann 1896 der Auszug von Simon Hollósy und seiner Schüler nach Nagybánya. Es war ein echter Bruch mit dem Akademismus: Plein Air, Lichtstudien, impressionistische Initiativen, aber noch mehr angezogen wurden die Leute von Nagybánya wie später die von Szolnok und Gödöllő von der malerischen Landschaft und der Malergemeinschaft und nicht vom Zwang der Isolation in die metaphysische Einsamkeit. János Vaszary, József Rippl-Rónai oder István Csók ließen die Farben und Zierden der Sezession auf dem einen oder anderen ihrer Bilder zwar aufleuchten (und werden auch die Pioniere der Sezession genannt), allerdings waren dies nur formelle Zeichen und kein inhaltlichen Bestandteile, wie dies selbstbewusst auch für die sezessionistische Schule von Gödöllő gilt.

Das verspätete Ende des Jahrhunderts erschien bei uns irgendwann um die Mitte der ersten Jahrzehnte vom neuen Jahrhundert, dann jedoch mit vulkanischer Kraft. Wenn sich eine revolutionäre Erneuerung mit Namen und Gruppen in Zusammenhang bringen lässt, dann würde ich die ungarische künstlerische Zeitenwende mit Endre Ady und dem Westen, Gyula Krúdy, Lajos Gulácsy und Béla Bartók verbinden. Adys Stellung ist unbestritten. Nicht nur er zählte sich zu diesem Lager, in dem er sagte, dass „meine Sezession der Kampf des Fortschritts gegen den Zopf ist”, und in die Verse geschlossene Sehnsucht nach Ferne, Paris, wilder und heiliger Liebe, nach Gott und Tod, nach dem Leben, das eilig vor ihn floh. Krúdys Stellung ist ebenso unbestritten. Auch er kennzeichnete seinen Platz auf dem ungarischen Globus selbst: Er war ein Sindbad, der ohne Meere „auf den toten Wassern der Vergangenheit Abenteuer bestritt”, in einer farbenprächtigen Traumwelt, die realistisch war wie die Welt der kleinen Kneipen in Buda und in der sich nicht nur die Gegenwart zu einem bittersüßen Abenteuer auflöste, sondern wo auch die Zukunft zusammen mit ihren schönen Hoffnungen, Utopien und ihrem Willkommen aufhörte. Bartók brauchte ebenfalls keine besondere Aufnahmeprüfung bestehen, schon mit dem Schloss des Blaubarts und dem Wunderbaren Mandarin wurde er Ehrenmitglied im Klub der musikalischen Erneuerer. Einige Worte sind jedoch für Lajos Gulácsy zu verlieren, der wohl der echteste ungarische Sezessionist war.

Lajos Gulácsy, das abgerutschte Mitglied der ungarischen Gentry, erbte von seinen Vorfahren nur Träume, Schulden und Geisteskrankheit. Er lebte nicht in einem Schloss, sondern im achten Stadtbezirk in zwei Zimmern in der Rigó utca. Aus der Gesellschaft seiner Zeit brauchte er sich nicht zurückzuziehen, denn er hatte nie in ihr gelebt. Er war ein geborener Außenstehender und ein geborener Maler. Er hätte Gabriele Dante Rosetti von Ungarn sein können, wenn er fünfzig Jahre früher geboren wäre. Er wurde 1882 geboren, als Rosetti starb. Vielleicht ist die Seele von Rosetti in ihn eingezogen, denn er sehnte sich sein ganzes Leben lang nach Italien, in das Florenz Dantes. Quattrocentofarben, traurige Liebschaften, Francesca und Paolo, jungfräuliche Extasen, verwelkte Rosen und Frauen. Feine Pastellschattierungen, trübselige Menschen, nie dagewesene Landschaften, Gärten, die von Zauberern und Clowns. Er selbst spielte auch Dandy, benahm sich exzentrisch und trieb Possen. Er lebte närrisch und starb im Irrenhaus. Er war der erste und der letzte König im Land der Glücklichen, Na Conxypan, das er selbst erfunden hatte.

Das ungarische Ende des Jahrhunderts, die ungarische Sezession unterschied sich von der europäischen und besonders von der Wiens durch zwei wesentliche Züge. Der größte Teil der Intelligenz stand mit einem Bein noch in der feudalistischen Vergangenheit, drängte und erwartete mit schwindendem Glauben die Verbürgerlichung. Selbst in ihrer Bedrängnis wandte sie sich nicht von der Gesellschaft und trotz ihrer Exkommunikation nicht von der Nation ab.

Ende des Jahrhunderts und Intelligenz

Durch die Gärten und Werkstätten vom Ende des Jahrhunderts streifend stoßen wir ständig auf die seltsame Erscheinung, dass aus der betonten Enerviertheit und aus der mit Stolz getragenen Neurose, mit einem Wort aus der Dekadenz eine lebensstarke, epochemachende Kultur entstand. Das dekadente Lebensgefühl des Fin de Siècle lebte sogar in enger Symbiose mit dem sorglosen, begierigen Lebenswunsch der Belle Epoque zusammen, woraus es sich nicht schämte, reichlich zu schöpfen. Wer und welche Schichten erfanden und verbreiteten dann die Stimmung vom Ende des Jahrhunderts und Ende der Welt? In den obigen Ausführungen ist die Antwort verborgen, wir müssen nur das Wesen herausschälen: die kreative humane Intelligenz. Diese Schicht ging (oder fiel?) selbstverständlich aus vielen verschiedenen Wiegen hervor. In England war es, wenn wir Wilde Glauben schenken dürfen, die funktionslos gewordene, herumschlendernde Aristokratie und in Frankreich waren es die Schriftsteller, Künstler und Kunstliebhaber, die vor den der ersten weit verfremdeten Sitten der dritten Republik Abscheu bekamen. In Deutschland und Österreich deklassierten sie sich aus dem Bildungsbürgertum, aus dessen Prestige und Position sie ausgefallen sind. Anfang des 19. Jahrhunderts bildete eine über ein Diplom verfügende, freie Intelligenz, die in der nationalen Vereinigung, in der Modernisierung und in der Verbürgerlichung des Kaiserreiches beziehungsweise des mit den Ungarn ausgeglichenen österreichischen Reiches eine große Rolle spielte, das Rückgrat der Schicht. Die schnelle Modernisierung brachte allerdings in den Mittelschichten der Intelligenz tiefgreifende strukturelle Veränderungen mit sich. Die moderne Verwaltungsbürokratie, die zu Machtfunktionen kam, entstand beziehungsweise wurde um das alte josephinische Beamtentum erweitert. Gleichzeitig wuchs die technische Intelligenz heran und vermehrte sich, die die Wirtschaft mit großer Kompetenz leitete. Derzeit sank das Bildungsbürgertum herab und wurde selbst in kultureller Sphäre aus der Leitung verdrängt. Wenn es loyaler Untertan blieb, konnte es sich einen Rest seines Ranges und Einkommens bewahren. Wenn es sich jedoch nicht mit den Eroberungszielen des wilhelminischen Reiches oder mit dem in Österreich entflammenden deutschen Nationalismus und den Liberalismus zerfressenden Antisemitismus identifizierte, dann „marginalisierte” es sich und gelangte endgültig an die Peripherien.

Was geschah nun in Ungarn? Wohin verschwanden einflussreiche Beamtengarde der Komitate und die adlige Intelligenz? Infolge des Zusammenbrechens der beiden Stützpfeiler Komitat und Grundbesitz, wurde der überwiegende Teil von ihnen in die Ämter gezwungen und zum Diener des Staates und verteilte sich in dieser seiner Eigenschaft in der etatistischen nationalen Bürokratie. Ein anderer Teil von ihnen kam auf die Diplomlaufbahn, als Rechtsanwalt oder Ingenieur, und fand den seinem Rang entsprechenden Platz in der vornehmen Mittelschicht. Ein wertvoller Teil jedoch wurde Schriftsteller, Journalist, Lehrer, Künstler, Schauspieler oder Musiker, d. h. Teil der humanen Intelligenz und in dieser Gesellschaft vermengte sich mit der aufstrebenden bürgerlichen (häufig gerade assimilanten) Intelligenz. Wenn er den Mut hatte, sich vom Establishment der Großrundbesitzer und der Großkapitalisten und auch von der Regierungspartei von Siebenundsechzig, ja auch von der nationalen Opposition von Achtundvierzig unabhängig zu machen, und wenn er mit den Radikalen oder vielleicht auch mit den Sozialisten sympathisierte oder sich zu gar nichts bekannte, dann fiel er ohne jegliche Möglichkeit auf Rettung aus seinem Establishment, vereinsamte und wurde an die Peripherie getrieben.

Wir haben ja bereits darauf hingewiesen, dass die ungarische Intelligenz der Jahrhundertwende selbst in ihrer Stellung an der Peripherie bestehen blieb und auch die Werkstatt nicht verließ. In den Jahrzehnten vor dem Krieg schaltete sie sich sogar (anders als die von Wien) aktiv in die Politik ein und unternahm noch einmal den Versuch, die soziale Emporhebung der Gesellschaft mit der nationalen Erneuerung zu verbinden. Mit dieser aktiven geistigen Teilnahme schritt sie allerdings bereits in das 20. Jahrhundert, dessen lauernde Gefahren sie ziemlich zeitig erkannte.

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Erneut nähern wir uns dem Ende eines Jahrhunderts, dem Ende eines schweren Jahrhunderts. Es gibt jedoch keine neue erneuerte Stimmung des Fin de Siècle, keine Erwartung eines neuen, weder eines lebensstarken noch eines dekadenten. Zum Schluss bietet sich hier die Frage an: Warum gibt es heutzutage kein Fin de Siècle?