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New Issue – European History Quarterly

Posted on by Vanessa Freitas

The new issue of “European History Quarterly” is now available online and includes the following articles:

War Stories: French Veteran Narratives and the ‘Experience of War’ in the Nineteenth Century by Philip Dwyer

“The Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars were the first in history to be written about in great numbers by the common soldier. This article, which focuses on French reminiscences of the wars, examines a variety of memoirs published from the late eighteenth through to the twentieth century. During this time we see a different approach to war and how it was recalled and remembered, more personal, more experiential than ever before. This article argues that the historical accuracy of these veteran narratives is unimportant. Instead, they reveal much more about how the wars were portrayed, and how they were remembered. Important too is what these narratives reveal to historians about the (inner) lives of soldiers during the wars, and what veterans in hindsight thought and felt about particular events. Here too the reality of the ‘experience of war’ is not as important as the cultural construct that is presented. As such, war narratives are an important source for the ways in which veterans and French society preferred to remember and process the past.”

 

Noble Status and Royal Duplicity in the Crown of Castile, 1454–1504 by Michael J. Crawford

 

This article examines the seemingly opposing actions of Castile’s late medieval monarchs, who both authorized the noble status of hidalgo for supporters and developed rules and legal procedures to limit the proliferation of this status. Addressing both royal policy and disputes over status in the territory of Seville during the second half of the fifteenth century, it demonstrates how local authorities strategically employed laws and appeals to royal courts to resist the recognition of those who claimed hidalgo status and to deny them related privileges. The actions of these monarchs and their subjects reveal the nature and limits of royal absolutism in matters of social status in the late fifteenth century and the degree to which the development of state judicial apparatus affected the local recognition of status and the growth of state power

Carton de Wiart’s Second Military Mission to Poland and the German Invasion of 1939 by E.D.R. Harrison

Poland’s strategy for fighting Nazi Germany has always been controversial. Was it necessary to confront the invaders close to the frontier, or should Poland’s forces have stayed much further back to allow a more viable defence? The head of the British Military Mission to Poland in 1939, Major-General Adrian Carton de Wiart, argued strongly but in vain for a defence in the interior. The Polish army proved inadequate against German forces using new lightning operations. The promised major offensive by France did not materialize. Carton de Wiart failed in his efforts to expedite material assistance from Britain, whose political and military leadership wrote off the Poles. Carton de Wiart and his officers continued to report to the War Office until Soviet intervention on 17 September brought an end to the Military Mission. After leaving Poland, the Mission produced invaluable accounts of the new German warfare but these had little influence on army practice. So there was a failure to learn from the fall of Poland.

 

Imperial Myths between Nationalism and Communism: Appropriations of Imperial Legacies in the North-eastern Adriatic during the Early Cold War by Sabina Mihelj

 

In contemporary scholarly discussions, political uses of imperial pasts are typically associated with the rise of modern nation-states and nationalist principles of identity formation. Although clearly important, this approach can lead us to neglect the appropriations of imperial myths based on other types of ideological frameworks. In communist Eastern Europe, official representations of the past followed the imperatives of a historical-materialist vision of history, which, at least in its initial form, necessitated a rejection of both imperialism and nationalism. It is therefore reasonable to expect that communist appropriations of imperial legacies were significantly different from those found in Western Europe at the time. This article examines these different uses of imperial pasts – informed by either communism or nationalism or both – by focusing on the competing perceptions of imperial history and heritage at the Italo-Yugoslav border during the early Cold War

 

European Social Science History Conference

Posted on by Vanessa Freitas

ESSHC logo

The ESSHC 2012 will take place in Glasgow, Scotland, from Wednesday 11 April to Saturday 14 April 2012.

The European Social Science History Conference is organized by the International Institute of Social History (IISH), an institute of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts & Sciences. The ESSHC aims at bringing together scholars interested in explaining historical phenomena using the methods of the social sciences

Here is the link for more details: http://www.iisg.nl/esshc/

European Architectural History Network (EAHN): Second International Meeting

Posted on by Vanessa Freitas

 

The Second International Meeting will take place in the Palais des Académies on Brussels, from 31 May to 3 June 2012.

“The time has come for scholars who share research and teaching objectives in architectural history to gather at a single pan-European meeting. In accordance with the EAHN mission statement, this meeting proposes to increase the visibility of the discipline, to foster transnational, interdisciplinary and multicultural approaches to the study of the built environment, and to facilitate the exchange of research results in the field. In 2010, the first EAHN conference was successfully held in Guimarães, Portugal. The second EAHN-conference will take place from May 31st to June 3rd in Brussels, in a distinguished historical venue; the Palais des Académies. Though the scope of the meeting is European, members of the larger scholarly community are invited to submit proposals related not only to Europe’s geographical framework, but also to its transcontinental aspects.
The main purpose of the meeting is to map the general state of research in disciplines related to the built environment, to promote discussion of current themes and concerns, and to foster new directions for research in the field”

Here is the link for more information: http://eahn2012.org/

 

New Issue – European Integration online Papers (EloP)

Posted on by Domenico Molina

The new issue of “European Integration online Papers (EloP)“ is now available online. 

 

 

Exploring the Energy-Environment Relationship in the EU: Perspectives and Challenges for Theorizing and Empirical    Analysis

Environmental concerns have played a key role for institutionalizing energy policy at the level of the European Union. There is thus a tendency in research literature to assume that the objectives of these cognate policy areas are compatible and mutually reinforcing. There have been only few efforts, however, to critically assess the quality of this relationship. The contributions to this mini-special issue reveal that the instruments employed in these two policy fields are markedly different. Environmental policy instruments are mostly based on the command-and-control logic whereas environment-related European energy policy is characterized by the use of ‘softer’ measures. The second main finding is that despite the centrality of climate change concerns in the rhetoric of the European Commission, an effective integration of environmental goals into energy policy is difficult to achieve.
Combating complexity: the integration of EU climate and energy policies
In this article, we analyse EU energy policy from the perspective of the EU’s long-term commitments to combat climate change. We focus on the policy integration of climate concerns – ‘climate policy integration’ (CPI). We seek to answer the question: what is the extent of CPI in energy policy, and what factors can explain this level of CPI? After outlining a conceptualisation of CPI that argues for applying a principled priority standard for the assessment of the level of integration of climate policy objectives in other policy sectors, we apply an analytical framework, with factors derived from general theories of European integration and literature on environmental policy integration, to explain the strength of CPI in two sub-energy sector case studies – renewable energy policies and internal energy market policies. CPI is found to be insufficient in both cases, and two factors are highlighted as particularly crucial for furthering CPI: political commitment to CPI, and the strong participation of climate advocates in the policy process. The article suggests that the expansion of EU competence in energy policy does not necessarily provide a guarantee for full and complete CPI.
Choosing environmental policy instruments: An assessment of the ‘environmental dimension’ of EU energy policy
Although they have formerly constituted distinct traditions in the European integration process, EU regulatory activities in environmental and energy policy have now become highly interwoven. Environmental concerns increasingly influence the formulation of the EU’s energy policy, especially given the twofold challenge of securing sufficient energy supply whilst also addressing the necessity of combating climate change. In this context, a key question is, how exactly does the EU approach environmental policy objectives as part of its energy policy? Is the ‘environmental dimension’ of EU energy policy subject to a different regulatory approach than EU environmental policy in general? This paper addresses these questions from a neo-functionalist perspective by comparing the different types of policy instruments adopted by the EU in the two interrelated areas over the past four decades. Overall, this work finds that the EU continues to rely heavily on traditional command and control regulation in the context of air pollution control, whereas the environmental dimension of EU energy policy is frequently controlled by new, less interventionist forms of governance.

New Issue – Zeithistorische Forschungen (Studies in Contemporary History)

Posted on by Domenico Molina

The New Issue of “Zeithistorische Forschungen” of September 2011 is now available online and includes the following articles:

Verena Steller Zwischen

Geheimnis und Öffentlichkeit                                Die Pariser Friedensverhandlungen 1919und die Krise der universalen Diplomatie

The ‘old’ diplomacy of the nineteenth century relied on face-to-face-interaction as a universally acknowledged language of diplomacy. This globally accepted character of diplomacy was challenged by the universal experience of crisis, violence, and destruction brought about by the First World War: The public held the ‘old’ European secret diplomacy responsible for the war. Once public trust had been lost, diplomacy fell into a crisis of legitimacy and representation. The public sphere and the media demanded that decision-making processes in diplomacy be visible and transparent – a claim summarised in President Wilson’s emblematic New Diplomacy. Against the backdrop of current debates about a ‘new’ history of diplomacy, this article analyses the Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and especially the two official occasions of direct interaction between the Allied and German delegations at Versailles, where the Paris Peace Treaty was presented and signed. The article looks at the way in which the common language of diplomacy was lost during the course of these negotiations, which long-term factors were responsible for its disappearance, and how the war acted as a catalyst for these fundamental changes.

Kerstin von Lingen                                                                                                     „Crimes Against Humanity“
Eine umstrittene Universalie im Völkerrecht
des 20. Jahrhunderts

In 1945 in Nuremberg, the Allies advocated the new principle that human rights take precedence over national law, according to the idea that states should be held accountable for their deeds by means of justice. In this case, Nazi Germany was to be held responsible for crimes committed during the Second World War. Since the mid-1990s, further trials based on this rule have taken place in Rwanda, Yugoslavia and Cambodia. The trial of state elites for war crimes and ‘crimes against humanity’ in court has been very controversial and is still not accepted in many parts of the world today. This article presents the three main stages leading to transitional justice: first, the failed trials in Leipzig after the First World War; second, the International Military Tribunals in Nuremberg and Tokyo; third, the debate about the ratification of the International Criminal Court in Den Haag and the strong opposition to it in the USA, which has continued since 2002. Criticism focuses on the degree to which states are prepared to hand over parts of their national sovereignty, especially in justice, to supranational organisations.

Lasse Heerten                                                                                                                        A wie Auschwitz, B wie Biafra
Der Bürgerkrieg in Nigeria (1967–1970) und die Universalisierung des Holocaust

In the summer of 1968, the publication of images of starving ‘Biafran children’ turned the Nigerian Civil War into an international media event. The power of this ‘image act’ was partially fuelled by the fact that many contemporaries associated these images with photographs taken during the liberation of the concentration camps in 1945. This article outlines the international political communication about Biafra and analyses references to the emerging cultural memory of the Holocaust on the basis of media reports, activists’ publications and archival sources. The inscription of Biafra into the iconography of the Holocaust led to the establishment of a new rhetoric of Holocaust comparisons which made both events, the Nigerian Civil War and Nazi crimes, visible as genocide. This rhetoric effectively drew attention to the conflict, but fell short of apprehending its complex reality. When it became clear that Biafra was no ‘new Holocaust’, the power of the images and their accompanying rhetoric waned.

Andrea Rehling                                                                                             Universalismen und Partikularismen im Widerstreit:
Zur Genese des UNESCO-Welterbes

The origins and development of the World Heritage Convention are closely related to the conflicts which accompanied the revision of the postwar international order in the 1960s and 1970s. This article examines political debates about what constituted the ‘heritage of mankind’ in order to explain the shifting notions of particularism and universalism. Exemplary conflicts show that understandings of the categories ‘culture’ and ‘nature’ changed between 1950 and 1980, as a result of which two different rationalities underpinned the World Heritage Programme. In addition, the article analyses the expectations expressed in anticipation of the worldwide influence which this governance institution was to acquire. These shifting categories and public expectations may explain why the regional allocation of World Heritage Sites and the relation between cultural and natural heritage on the World Heritage List are uneven and inconsistent. The article makes a contribution towards the historical semantics of the concepts of ‘culture’, ‘nature’ and ‘heritage’ in the twentieth century.