Border Changes In 20th Century Europe

This volume explores border changes in contemporary European history, a topic of growing importance indicated by the current flow of publications in border studies. Boundary changes played also an important role in the formation of European regions. Thirteen authors investigate selected case studies mostly drawn from Central and Eastern Europe.

Focussing European borders: The book provides insight into a variety of changes in the nature of borders in Europe and its neighborhood from various disciplinary perspectives. Special attention is paid to the history and contemporary dynamics at Polish and German borders. Of particular interest are the creation of Euroregions, mutual perceptions of Poles and Germans at the border, EU Regional Policy, media debates on the extension of the Schengen area. Analysis of cross-border mobility between Abkhazia and Georgia or the impact of Israel's »Security Fence« to Palestine on society complement the focus on Europe with a wider view.

This book offers a comprehensive and comparative analysis of the history of passports, border surveillance, border crossing, and other elements of European border regimes in the 20th century. Border regime is interpreted widely, including inbound and outbound travels, permanent and temporary movements, distance and local border traffic, borderland fortifications, penalties for borderland offences, and also restrictions of free movement, even inside a given country. Based on archival sources from Hungary and the Czech Republic, extensive literature and more than two decades of research, the author distinguishes between two basic border regimes: the restrictive eastern and the permissive western systems, and a transitional zone between them. The historical development of these regimes is discussed in the framework of waves of globalisation and territorialisation. Border Regimes in Twentieth Century Europe offers the first-ever systematic comparison of European border regimes for students, scholars, and any readers who are interested in travel history, border studies, globalisation, area studies and 20th century Europe, including everyday history. By presenting their different historical experiences, the book contributes to a better understanding between old and new member states of the European Union, as well as between member and non-member states.

During the last two centuries, the political map of Europe has changed considerably. More recently, there are remarkably contrasting tendencies concerning the functions and densities of borders. The borders inside the European Union lost their importance, whereas Central and Eastern Europe saw the birth of a multitude of new state borders. The long-term study of border regions, therefore, is a fascinating subject for geographers, historians, social scientists, and political scientists. The main thesis of this book is that the rise of the modern nation-state reinforced the separating function of state borders by nationalising the people on both sides of it. This process gained strength in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and was challenged in the second half of this century by processes of supra-national integration, globalisation and the revolution in communication and transport, as the case studies from different parts of Europe of this book will show. Audience: This book will be of interest to academics, researchers and practitioners in geography, history, political sciences, European studies and East-European studies.

Borders and border regions are shaped by many phenomena connected with both co-operation and conflict. The neighbourhood, cross-border contacts, illegal migration, border crossings, prejudices and stereotypes, border guards, and perceptions of borders are some of the key words that characterize the articles in this volume. The book deals with European border regions that have experienced numerous changes over the 20th century. Because of this changeable, frequently painful past, different human stories – mostly tragic or romanticized – individual and collective memories, mythologies with heroes, and divergent perceptions of history developed. Most authors in this volume deal with conflicts and co-operation that can either be remembered or forgotten.

An excellent examination of how the collapse of the Soviet Union and the impact of globalization have brought about changes not only to the territorial configuration sovereignty of states and their boundaries, but also to traditional notions of state, boundaries, sovereignty and social order These essays focus on the key regional and geopolitical characteristics of this global reordering, with an emphasis on Eastern Europe and South Asia. They discuss the territorial reordering which is taking place at the level of the state as boundaries are redemarcated in line with ethno-territoral demands; as borders are transversed by the movement of peoples, information and finance; and as the lines of territorial demarcation are perceived not only in terms of their fixed characteristics but as part of a process through which regional and ethnic identities continue to be formed and reformed. Each section ends with articles which focus on literature on geopolitics and boundaries. This is an invaluable addition to our understanding of contemporary world affairs.

Compelling and accessible, this Very Short Introduction challenges the perception of borders as passive lines on a map, revealing them instead to be integral forces in the economic, social, political, and environmental processes that shape our lives. Highlighting the historical development and continued relevance of borders, Alexander Diener and Joshua Hagen offer a powerful counterpoint to the idea of an imminent borderless world, underscoring the impact borders have on a range of issues, such as economic development, inter- and intra-state conflict, global terrorism, migration, nationalism, international law, environmental sustainability, and natural resource management. Diener and Hagen demonstrate how and why borders have been, are currently, and will undoubtedly remain hot topics across the social sciences and in the global headlines for years to come. This compact volume will appeal to a broad, interdisciplinary audience of scholars and students, including geographers, political scientists, anthropologists, sociologists, historians, international relations and law experts, as well as lay readers interested in understanding current events.

This book charts the incidence of territorial changes and military conflicts from 1816 to 1980. Using statistical and descriptive analysis, the authors attempt to answer three related sets of questions: * When does military conflict accompany the process of national independence? * When do states fight over territorial changes and when are such transactions completed peacefully? * How do territorial changes affect future military conflict between the states involved in the exchange?