Abstract
In order to grasp the beginnings of the Polish version of integral nationalism, an important key is to reconstruct the role of its main ideologue, Roman Dmowski (1864–1939). His early political thinking did not differ much from certain canons of nationalist reflection in the Europe of the 1890s that bore fundamental cross-border similarities that overrode local characteristics. In Dmowski’s first publications, idealistic antirationalism was interwoven with an extreme individualism inspired by Friedrich Nietzsche and the French thinker Alfred Fouillée. Like many radicals of the era, Dmowski rejected not only the materialism and Manchesterian version of the free market economy of the first half of the nineteenth century, but also the set of values inherited from the French Revolution. Instead, nationalists like Dmowski absorbed important elements of popular Social Darwinist theories, among them the ideas of Ernst Haeckl and Hippolyte Taine, but above all those of Ernst Renan and Gustave Le Bon.1
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Notes
For the very first series of programmatic articles of the future leader of the Polish National Democracy see R. Skrzycki and R. Dmowski, “Z ekonomii interesów duchowych I”, Głos, No. 7, 1/13 February 1892, pp. 75–76; Ibid., “Z ekonomii II”, Głos, No.8, 8/20 February 1892, pp. 86–87; Ibid., “Z ekonomii, III”, Głos, No. 9, 15/17 February 1892, pp. 97–98. See also B. A. Porter, “Who is a Pole and where is Poland? Territory and nation in the rhetoric of Polish National Democracy before 1905”, Slavic Review, Vol. 51, No. 4, Winter 1992, pp. 1092–1093; Ibid., When Nationalists Began to Hate, London, 2000, pp. 180–181;
G. Krzywiec, Szowinizm po polsku. Przypadek Romana Dmowskiego (1886–1905), Warszawa, 2009, pp. 79–103.
See R. Dmowski and R. Skrzycki, “Idea w poniewierce”, Głos, No. 8, 9/21 February 1891, pp. 86–87.
See G. Krzywiec, “‘Idea w poniewierce’. Pierwszy artykuł polityczny Romana Dmowskiego”, Archiwum Historii Myśli Społecznej i Filozoficznej, Vol. 53, 2007, pp. 147–167.
Dmowski’s anti-Semitism from his early youth is noted by all his biographers. Compare: R. Wapiński, Roman Dmowski, Lublin, 1988, pp. 15–16;
K. Kawalec, Roman Dmowski, Wrocław, 2002, pp. 7–13;
A. Micewski, Roman Dmowski, Warsaw, 1971, pp. 13–24.
See also: A. Walicki, “The troubling legacy of Roman Dmowski”, East European Politics and Societies, Vol. 14, No.1, 2000, pp. 26–27.
See H. W. Smith, The Continuities of German History. Nation, Religion and Race in the Long Nineteenth Century, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008, pp. 167–210.
In many studies Dmowski’s views are presented as a case of conservative, Christian Judeophobia. See among others: S. Paulson, Roman Dmowski, R. S. Levy ed., Antisemitism. A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution, Vol. 1, A.-K., Santa Barbara-Denver-Oxford, 2005, p. 182;
G. Pickhan, Handbuch des Antisemitimus. Judenfeindschaft in Geschichte und Gegenwart, Hrsg. W. Benz, Band 2/1, Personen, A-K, Saur, 2009, pp. 179–180;
A. Kossert. “Founding father of modern Poland and nationalistic antisemite: Roman Dmowski,” R. Hayes et al., In the Shadow of Hitler: Personalities of the Right in Central and Eastern Europe, London, 2011, pp. 89–105.
The best introduction to early doctrine of the Endecja is Barbara Toruńczyk’s study, “Myśl polityczna i ideologia Narodowej Demokracji”, B. Toruńczyk (intro. and ed.) Narodowa Demokracja. Antologia myśli politycznej “Przeglądu Wszechpolskiego”, London, 1983, pp. 26–34.
On general terms see P. S. Wandycz, The Lands of Partitioned Poland, 1785–1918, Seattle and London, 1974, pp. 288–295.
On the Polish political scene of these days concisely see R. E. Blobaum, “The rise of political parties, 1890–1914”, M. B. Biskupski, J. S. Pula and P. J. Wróbel ed., The Origins of Modern Polish Democracy, Athens, 2010, pp. 70–87.
On the 1905 Revolution in Russian Poland, P. S. Wandycz, Ibid., pp. 308–319. First of all though, see R. E. Blobaum, Rewolucja. Rewolucja. Russian Poland, 1904–1907, Ithaca and London, 1995. On the role of the Revolution on Polish–Jewish relations see T. R. Weeks, “Russians, Jews, and Poles: Russification and antisemitism 1881–1914”, Quest. Issues in Contemporary Jewish History. Journal of Fondazione CDEC, n.3 July 2012 url: www.quest-cdecjournal.it/focus.php?issue=3&id=308, especially part: “Revolution 1905”.
See P. Trees, Wahlem im Weichselland. Die Nationaldemokraten in Russisch– Polen und die Dumawahlen 1905–1912, Stuttgart, 2007, pp. 107–110; R. E. Blobaum, Rewolucja, pp. 190–195
For a detailed account of bloodletting in Łódź in this period see W. Karwacki, Łódź w latach rewolucji, 1905–1907, Łódź, 1975, pp. 157–160. For a worthwhile though politically involved testimony of these events from the local Endeks’ perspective see as well: “Wolnoś ć czy zbrodnia?” Rewolucja 1905– 1907 roku w Łodzi na łamach gazety “Rozwój”, ed. M. Sikorska-Kowalska, Łódź, 2012. In general about these events see also Blobaum, Rewolucja, pp. 223–225.
On the events seen as a fratricidal bloodbath there is a plethora of personal testimonies from the epoch. In the Communist period in Poland there were some attempts to tackle these events, though, in most cases done in a half successful way. For example, S. Kalabiński, Antynarodowa polityka endecji w rewolucji 1905–1907, Warszawa, 1955. Nonetheless, the events still demand in-depth sociohistorical analysis. See my own contributions regarding the subject: Von der Massenpolitik zum (kalten) Bürgerkrieg. Der Fall der Nationaldemokratie im Königreich Polen (1905–1914) und danach, K. Stuve and M. Műller eds, Grenzziehungen, Netzwerke: Die Teilungsgrenzen in der politischen Kultur der polnischen Zweiten Republik. Michael G. Müller, Kai Struve, Institut für Geschichte der Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg; in Verbindung mit dem Zentrum für Historische Forschung Berlin der Polnischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 09.11.2012–10.11.2012; Ibid., Z taką rewolucją musimy walczyć na noże. Rewolucja 1905 roku z perspektywy polskiej prawicy, ed. K. Piskała and W. Marzec, Rewolucja 1905. Przewodnik Krytyki Politycznej, Warszawa, 2013, pp. 326–352;
In general on the Revolution of 1905 as an actual beginning of the European Civil War see as well S. Payne, European Civil War, 1905–1939, Wisconsin, 2010, pp. 16–17.
See I. Oppenheim, “The radicalization of the Endecja anti-Jewish line during and after the 1905 revolution”, Shvut, No. 9 (25), 2000, pp. 32–66;
see as well T. Weeks, “1905 as a watershed in Polish-Jewish relations”, The Revolution of 1905 and Russia’s Jews, ed. Stefani Hoffmann and Ezra Mendelsohn, Philadelphia, 2008, pp. 128–139.
For an excellent analysis of these events see: S. Ury, Barricades and Banners. The Revolution of 1905 and the Transformation of Warsaw Jewry, California: Stanford, 2012, pp. 198–210.
R. Dmowski, Separatyzm żydów i jego źródła, Warszawa, 1909,
(quoted from) R. Wapiński, “The Endecja and the Jewish Question”, Polin, Vol. 12, (1999), p. 276.
On Litvaks see F. Guesnet, “Wir műssen Warschau unbedingt russisch machen. Die Mythologisierung der russisch — jűdischen Zuwanderung ins Königreich Polen zu Beginn unseres Jahrhunderts am Beispiel eines polnischen Trivalromans”, ed. E. Behring et al., Geschichtliche Mythen in den Literaturen und Kulturen Ostmittel — und Sudosteuropas, Stuttgart, 1999, pp. 99–116;
F. Golczewski, Polnisch-Judische Beziehungen 1881–1922. Eine Studie Zur Geschichte Des Antisemitismus in Osteuropa, Wiesbaden, 1981, pp. 97 and ff.
T. Weeks, “Fanning the flames: The Jews in the Warsaw press, 1905–1912”, East European Jewish Affairs, Vol. xxviii, No. 2, 1998–1999, especially, pp. 79–81.
On the criminalizing of Jewishness in the Warsaw press see R. Blobaum, “Criminalizing the ‘Other’: Crime, ethnicity, and antisemitism in early twentieth-century Poland”, ed. R. Blobaum, Anti-Semitism and its Opponents in Modern Poland, Ithaca and London, 2005, pp. 88–92.
K. Stępnik, “Powieść antysemicka w ostatnich latach Kongresówki”, Krytyka, Vol. 39 1992, p. 79.
See T. R. Weeks, Nation and State in Late Imperial Russia; Nationalism and Russification on the Western Frontier, 1863–1914, De Kalb Illinois, 1996, pp. 152–171.
J. Żyndul, “Bejlisy, czyli polska reakcja na proces kijowski”, Kwartalnik Historii Żydów, No. 232, 2009, pp. 397–410. For the best introduction to the Beilis Affaire,
see also R. Weinberg, Blood Libel in Late Imperial Russia, The Ritual Murder Trial of Mendel Beilis, Bloomington, 2013.
R. Blobaum, “The politics of Antisemitism in Fin–de–Siècle Warsaw”, Journal of Modern History, Vol. cxxiii, No. 2, 2001, p. 283.
Among others see: R. Blobaum, “The Politics of Antisemitism in Fin– de–Siècle Warsaw”, pp. 294 ff; P. Trees, Wahlem im Weichselland. Die Nationaldemokraten in Russisch–Polen und die Dumawahlen 1905–1912, Stuttgart, 2007, pp. 361–383; S. D. Corrsin, “The Jews and left and the state Duma’s elections in Warsaw in 1912: Selected sources”, Polin, Vol. 9, 1996; Ibid., Warsaw before the First World War: Poles and Jews in the Third City of Russian Empire, 1880–1919, Boulder, 1990, pp. 89–104; Ibid., “Polish– Jewish relations before the first world Warsaw”, Gal–Ed: On the History of the Jews in Poland, Vol. 11, 1989, pp. 31–53;
P. Korzec, Juifs en Pologne, La question juive pendant l’entre–deux–guerres, Paris, 1980, pp. 42–45;
W. Pobóg-Malinowski, Narodowa Demokracja 1887–1918. Fakty i Dokumenty, London, 1998, pp. 209–211;
M. Sobczak, Narodowa Demokracja wobec kwestii żydowskiej na ziemiach polskich przed I wojną światową, Wrocław, 2009, pp. 185–230.
See T. Weeks, From Assimilation to Antisemitism, 143. In general see as well S. D. Corrsin, Warsaw: Poles and Jews in a Conquered City, ed., M. F. Hamm, The City in Late Imperial Russia, Bloomington Ind., 1986, pp. 127ff.
On the election press campaign in detail see S. D. Corrsin, “Polish-Jewish relations before the First World War. The case of the state Duma elections”, Gal-Ed, Vol. IX, 2001. pp. 31–53.
Józef Lange, Postęp a nacyonalizm, Warszawa, 1913, p. 78 (quoted from) J. Jedlicki, Resisting the Wave. Intellectuals against Antisemitism in the Last Years of the “Polish Kingdom”, Antisemitism and its Opponents in Modern Poland, p. 75.
H. A. Strauss, “Poland-Culture of Anti-Semitism”, H. A. Strauss, ed., Hostages of Modernization: Studies on Modern Antisemitism, 1870–1933/1939. Austria-Hungary-Poland-Russia, New York: Berlin, 1993, pp. 963ff. On a much more factual level see K. Zieliński, Stosunki polsko-żydowskie na ziemiach Królestwa Polskiego w czasie pierwszej wojny światowej, pp. 416–427.
T. Snyder, The Reconstruction of Nations. Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania, Belarus, 1569–1999, New Haven & London, 2003, p. 59.
See L. Sadowski, Polska inteligencja prowincjonalna i jej ideowe dylematy na przełomie XIX i XX wieku, Warszawa, 1988, p. 233;
M. Dajnowicz, Orientacje polityczne ludności polskiej północno-wschodniej czę ści Królestwa Polskiego na przełomie XIX i XX wieku, Białystok, 2005, pp. 155–167;
see also A. Polonsky and M. Riff, Poles, Czechoslovaks and the “Jewish Question” 1914–1921: A Comparative Study: Germany in the Age of Total War, ed. V. R. Berghahn and M. Kitchen, New Jersey: Totowa, 1981, pp. 63–65.
S. Volkov, Germans, Jews and Antisemites. Trials in Emancipation, Cambridge, 2006, pp. 67–155.
On the concept of “Judaization” in modern anti-Semitism in Germany, see S. Aschheim, “The Jew within: The Myth of Judaization in Germany”, ed. J. Reinharz, The Jewish Response to German Culture, Hanover, 1985, pp. 212–241.
On similarities and differences between Polish and Russian nationalist movements of those days as regards anti-Semitism see S. Goldin, “Jews as cosmopolitans, foreigners, revolutionaries, Three images of the Jew in Polish and Russian nationalist ideology at the end of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries”, European Review of History, Vol. 17, No. 3. 2010, pp. 431–440.
S. Pieńkowski, Dwa żywioły. Głos w sprawie żydowskiej, Warszawa, 1913.
Dmowski, Upadek myśli konserwatywnej, Warszawa, 1914, pp. 118–119.
R. Dmowski, Germany, Russia and the Polish Question (Niemcy, Rosja i kwestia polska), Warszawa, 1907, p. 30
(quoted from) A. Polonsky, “Roman Dmowski and Italian Fascism”, ed. R. J. Bullen et al., Idea into Politics. Aspects of European History, 1880–1950, London and Sydney, 1984, s. 134.
See M. Sobczak, Stosunek Narodowej Demokracji do kwestii żydowskiej w latach 1914–1919, Wrocław, 2008, pp. 23–39.
T. Komarnicki, Rebirth of the Polish Republic. A Study in the Diplomatic History of Europe, 1914–1920, Melbourne, London, Toronto, 1957, pp. 48–51.
S. Rudnicki, “The society for the advancement of trade, industry and craft”, Polin, Vol. 15, 2002, p. 314.
For the very first reactions of Poles on the Bolshevik Revolution see P. S. Wandycz, Soviet-Polish Relations, 1917–1921, Cambridge, Massachusetts 1969, pp. 41–64;
F. Golczewski, Polnisch-Jűdische Beziehungen 1881–1922, Wiesbaden, 1981, pp. 159–170;
C. Fink, Defending the Rights of Others. The Great Powers, the Jews, and International Minority Protection, 1878–1938, Cambridge, 2004, p. 82.
See as well M. Zaremba, Wielka Trwoga. Polska 1944–1947. Ludowa reakcja na kryzys, Kraków, 2012, pp. 53–70.
For the most comprehensive account see K. Lundgreen-Nielsen, The Polish Problem at the Paris Peace Conference. A Study of the Great Powers and the Poles, 1918–1919, trans. A. Boruch Johansen, Odense, 1978, pp. 32–46;
Wandycz, p. 145. For more popular account of those events see as well M. MacMillan, Paris. Six Months that Changed the World, New York, 2002, pp. 213–228.
See P. M. Dąbrowski, Uses and Abuses of the Polish Past by Józef Piłsudski and Roman Dmowski, “The Polish Review”, Vol. LVI, No. 1–2, 2011, pp. 90–94.
Quoted from J. Borzęcki, The Soviet-Polish Peace of 1921 and the Creation of Interwar Europe, New Haven & London, 2008 pp. 29–30.
R. Dmowski, Polityka polska i odbudowanie państwa, Vol. 1 ed. T. Wituch, Warszawa, 1988, p. 200.
R. Dmowski, Problems of Central and Eastern Europe, London, 1917, p. 79.
Among the exceptions one should mention the extensive literature on “White Russians.” For an extensive discussion on the problem see M. Kellogg, The Russian Roots of Nazism: White Émigrés and the Making of National Socialism, 1917–1945, Cambridge, 2005, pp. 118–208.
J. Niklewska, “Anglicy przychylni i nieprzychylni Romanowi Dmowskiemu w świetle korespondencji z lat 1915–1917”, Niepodległoś ć i Pamięć, No. 21, 2005, pp. 56–76;
see also P. Latawski, Roman Dmowski, the Polish Question, and Western Opinion, 1915–18: The Case of Britain, ed. P. Latawski, The Reconstruction of Poland, 1914–1923, London, 1992, p. 1.
S. Johnson, Pogroms, Peasant, Jews. Britain and Eastern Europe’s Jewish Question, 1867–1925, New York, 2011, especially chapter “Ideological challenges: British interactions with Polish National Democracy”, pp. 113–120.
Dmowski, List Dmowskiego do Wasilewskiego, 18 July 1917 Roman Dmowski w świetle listów i wspomnień, Vol. II, London, 1972, pp. 69–70.
On the conflict in detail see P. C. Latawski, “Dmowski-Namier Feud, 1915– 1918”, Polin, Vol. 2, 1987, pp. 37–49. Latawski, Roman Dmowski, p. 9. See also A. Ng, “A portrait of Sir Lewis Namier as a young socialist”, Journal of Contemporary History, Vol. 40, No.4, October 2005, pp. 628–631.
Latawski, Roman Dmowski, p. 6; see as well Bernard Pares, My Russian Memoirs, London, 1931, pp. 481–482; E. C. Black, Squaring a Minorities Triangle: Lucien Wolf, Jewish Nationalists and Polish Nationalists, The Reconstruction of Poland, pp. 13–40; C. Fink, Defending the Rights of Others, pp. 92–93.
See H. Defries, Conservative Party Attitudes to Jews, 1900–1950, London, 2001, pp. 70–72.
K. Urbach, Age of No Extremes? The British Aristocracy Torn between The House of Lords, and Mosley Movement, European Aristocracies and the Radical Right 1918–1939, ed. K. Urbach, London, 2008, p. 67.
See P. Wandycz, “Roman Dmowski, endecja i koncepcja polityki wschodniej w latach II Rzeczpospolitej”, Studia z dziejów ZSRR i Europy Środowej, Vol. 5, 1969, p. 76.
Sobczak, Stosunek Narodowej Demokracji do kwestii żydowskiej w latach 1914– 1919, pp. 80–94; J. Tokarski, Wizje przyszłości. Wizje bolszewizmu w Rosji, 1917–1921, Warszawa, 2012, pp. 124–150.
R. Dmowski, The Jews and the War, 1924 translated by John Kulczycki (excerpts from Polityka polska i odbudowanie państwa, Vol. 2 Hannover 1949, Antisemitism in the Modern World. An Anthology of Texts, ed., R. S. Levy, Toronto, 2001, pp. 182–189. See also, M. B. Biskupski, “Poles and Jews in America and the Polish Question, 1914–1918”, Polin, Vol. 19. 2007, pp. 90–92. Compare as well “Dmowski, Paderewski and American Jews (A Documentary Compilation)”, Polin, Vol. 2, 1987, pp. 95–116.
M. Levene, War, Jews and the New Europe: The Diplomacy of Lucien Wolf, 1914–1918, Oxford, 1992, pp. 186–203. See as well Latawski, p. 123; Wandycz, p. 89.
R. Wapiński, “The Endecja and the Jewish Question”, Polin, Vol. 12, 1999, pp. 270–283, 278.
N. Davies, White Eagle, Red Star: the Polish-Soviet War, 1919–1920, forew. by A. J. P. Taylor, London, 1972, T. Snyder, The Reconstruction of Nations, Ibid., pp. 61–62;
see as well A. Hertz, The Jews in Polish Culture, translated by R. Lourie. With a Foreword by Czesław Miłosz, ed., L Dobroszycki, Evanston IL, 1988, p. 204.
W, Bartoszewicz, “Z notatek….” Myśl Narodowa, No. 5 1939, p. 73;
J. Żół-towska, Dziennik. Fragmenty wielkopolskie, ed. B. Wysocka, Poznań, 2003, p. 103. See an account of Tadeusz Gluziński, a leader of the nationalist youth, then one of later leaders of the National–Radical Camp (Organizacja Narodowo-Radykalna) about his first meeting with Dmowski whether in 1920 or in early 1921. “Wspomnienie Gluzińskiego”, Kronika Polski i Świata, No. 2, 1939, p. 245 (quoted in:) Roman Dmowski w świetle listów i wspomnień, Vol. II, p. 245. Actually, there is a great deal of such personal memoirs and testimonies.
On Dmowski as a Polish representative among Western allies see, for example: P. Latawski, “Roman Dmowski, the Polish question, and western opinion”, The Reconstruction of Poland, 1914–1923, pp. 1–12; P. S. Wandycz, “Dmowski’s policy and the Paris Peace Conference: Success or failure?”, Ibid.; see also M. Levene, War, Jews, and the New Europe: The Diplomacy of Lucien Wolf , Oxford, 1992, pp. 186–203;
S. Johnson, Pogroms, Peasants, Jews. Britain and Eastern Europe’s Jewish Question, 1867–1925, New York, 2011, especially pp. 157–166.
For the Polish case in Eastern European comparative see A. Gerrits, “Antisemitism and anti-communism. The myth of ‘Judeo-Communism’ in Eastern Europe”. East European Jewish Affairs, Vol. 25, No.1, 1995, pp. 62–66.
For more discussion see as well E. Ablovski, “The 1919 Central European revolutions and the Judeo Bolshevik myth”. European Review of History, Vol. 17, No.3, 2010, pp. 473–489.
For general introduction to the problem J. Schroder, “Der Erste Weltkrieg und der ‘jüdische Bolschewismus’”, ed. G. Krumeich, Nationalsozialismus und Erste Weltkrieg, Essen, 2010, pp. 77–96.
A. Pilch, “Rzeczpospolita Akademicka”. Studenci i polityka 1918–1933, Kraków, 1997, pp. 44ff.
Compare as well testimonies of some protagonists of this new nationalist generation, for example, J. Giertych: Wspomnienia ochotnika 1920, Warszawa, 2012 first ed., 1958; Ibid., Curriculum vitae, Warszawa, 2011, p. 28;
J. Rembieliński, Dniepr i Wisła. W dziesiątą rocznicę bitwy pod Warszawą, Warszawa, 1930;
J. Mosdorf: Akademik i polityka. Warszawa, 1926;
T. Bielecki: W szkole Dmowskiego, Gdańsk, 2000, p. 257. All of them were actually leaders of different wings of Polish fascism.
S. Rudnicki, From “Numerus Clausus” to “Numerus Nullus” Polin Vol. 2, 1987, pp. 246ff.
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Krzywiec, G. (2015). Eliminationist Anti-Semitism at Home and Abroad: Polish Nationalism, the Jewish Question and Eastern European Right-Wing Mass Politics. In: Rosenthal, L., Rodic, V. (eds) The New Nationalism and the First World War. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137462787_4
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