The Home Rule Bills and Minorities Policy, 1886–1914

Abstract

This chapter explores assertions of the parallel between Ireland and Poland in the context of the Home Rule Bills of 1886, 1893, and 1912 and the gradual division of Europe’s Great Powers into two political blocs. This period saw the emergence of reservations about the alleged parallel between the two countries. Frustrations with the slow progress of Home Rule and with the coercive practices of the British authorities encouraged advanced nationalists to assert, despite increased Germanisation and Russification measures, that the Irish were in a worse position than the Poles. Indeed, as World War I approached, nationalists interested in military assistance from Germany defended the increasingly repressive policy of the Prussians towards their Polish minority in order to assuage fears of the consequences of a German victory in the war.