Abstract
Central and Eastern Europe played an important role in British interwar international thought. This article contrasts the visions of the region found in three key texts written by British scholars in the interwar period. Two of these, Halford Mackinder’s 1919 Democratic Ideals and Reality and E. H. Carr’s 1939 Twenty Years’ Crisis, share a common approach based on an abstract understanding of the nature of international order, even while they disagree on their prescriptions for Central and Eastern Europe. Starting from abstract principles, they then apply their findings to Central and Eastern Europe. By contrast, in her 1938 Czechs and Germans Elizabeth Wiskemann works in the other direction. Through a detailed analysis of the politics of the Bohemian historic provinces she comes to conclusions that can be applied to ideas of world order. Wiskemann’s detailed analysis and Mackinder’s and Carr’s more abstract proscriptions provided different viewpoints on the international relations of interwar Central Europe, although ultimately all three visions were overtaken by events.
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Notes
Deutsch-Tschechische und Deutsch-Slowakische Historikerkommission (see http://www.dt-ds-historikerkommission.de/, last accessed on 25 September, 2019).
This issue of context and the shifting historical definition of the field of IR is explored in the 2017 International Relations special issue on IR and intellectual history (see especially Bain and Nardin 2017).
For further discussion of the many and contradictory ways realism and idealism are used in the interwar period see Ashworth (2006).
Carr’s analysis on this point is also driven by his goal of exposing what he sees as liberal hypocrisy. For more on this aspect see Wilson (2000: 183‒86).
This past familiarity with detailed knowledge comes out more in Carr’s earlier book on international relations after the peace treaties (Carr 1937).
See, for example, his comment to Halifax on the way back to Downing Street from Heston Aerodrome and his support for continued rearmament, both quoted in Overy (2009: 123‒24).
On the Southeastern European origins of David Mitrany’s functional approach see Ashworth (2005).
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Acknowledgments
I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers, who gave valuable advice and corrections. Thanks are also due to Sean Molloy, who organised the panel at the 2019 ISA convention at which an earlier version of this paper was presented. Thanks also to Maria Malksoo for encouraging me to complete the final version. Finally, just to note that I use ‘Central Europe’ or ‘Eastern Europe’ depending on the territorial focus of the writer, but ‘Central and Eastern Europe’ for the whole region.
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Ashworth, L.M. Czechs and Germans in the twenty years’ crisis: Mackinder, Carr and Wiskemann on Central and Eastern Europe after the peace. J Int Relat Dev 24, 848–865 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41268-021-00237-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41268-021-00237-9