Redrawing Nations: Ethnic Cleansing in East-Central Europe, 1944-1948(The Harvard Cold War Studies Book Series)

After World War II, some 12 million Germans, 3 million Poles and Ukrainians, and tens of thousands of Hungarians were expelled from their homes and forced to migrate to their supposed countries of origin. Using freshly available materials from Polish, Ukrainian, Russian, Czechoslovak, German, British, and American archives, the contributors to this book provide a sweeping, detailed account of the turmoil caused by the huge wave of forced migration during the nascent Cold War. The book also documents the deep and lasting political, social, and economic consequences of this traumatic time, raising difficult questions about the effect of forced migration on postwar reconstruction, the rise of Communism, and the growing tensions between Western Europe and the Eastern bloc. Those interested in European Cold-War history will find this book indispensable for understanding the profound-but hitherto little known-upheavals caused by the massive ethnic cleansing that took place from 1944 to 1948.

Table of Contents:
Chapter 1 Series Foreword Chapter 2 Introduction Chapter 3 A Century of Forced Migration: The Origins and Consequences of Ethnic Cleansing Part 4 Part I: Creating a Polish Nation-State Chapter 5 Forced Migration and the Transformation of Polish Society in the Postwar Period Chapter 6 "Cleansing" Poland of Germans: The Province of Pomerania, 1945-1949 Chapter 7 Who Is a Pole, and Who Is a German? The Province of Olsztyn in 1945 Chapter 8 De-Germanization and "Re-Polonization" in Upper Silesia, 1945-1950 Chapter 9 Gathering Poles into Poland: Forced Migration from Poland's Former Eastern Territories Chapter 10 Expulsion, Resettlement, Civil Strife: The Fate of Poland´s Ukrainians, 1944-1947 Chapter 11 Overcoming Ukrainian Resistance: The Deportation of Ukrainians within Poland in 1947 Part 12 Part II: Retribution and Expulsion in Czechoslovakia Chapter 13 The Mechanics of Ethnic Cleansing: The Expulsion of Germans from Czechoslovakia, 1945-1947 Chapter 14 To Prosecute or to Expel? Czechoslovak Retribution and the "Transfer" of Sudeten Germans Chapter 15 The Social and Economic Consequences of Resettling Czechs into Northwestern Bohemia, 1945-1947 Part 16 Part III: German Refugees and the New German States Chapter 17 Compelling the Assimilation of Expellees in the Soviet Zone of Occupation and the GDR Chapter 18 Social Conflict and Social Transformation in the Integration of Expellees into Rural Brandenburg, 1945-1952 Chapter 19 The German Refugees and Expellees from the East and the Creation of a Western German Identity after World War II Chapter 20 Conclusion

About the Author :
Philipp Ther is professor in the Department of History and Civilisation at the European University Institute. Ana Siljak is managing editor of the Journal of Cold War Studies.

Review :
Powerful. . . . These compelling essays . . . incorporate new archival researches and transnational historiographic reflection, and the authors consistently underscore the broader implications of the expulsion, resettlement, and awkward integration of millions of people for our understanding of nation building and global political strategies. Redrawing Nations offers a useful overview of a difficult part of the Cold War puzzle, thanks to two excellent introductions and several highly instructive essays. One of the first comprehensive English-language histories of the ethnic cleansing of Germans, Poles, and Ukranians in Eastern and Central Europe at the end of World War II. This collection of well-researched essays thoroughly covers the cruel, vindictive, and oftern violent transfer of populations, in which millions of people lost their homes, their posessions and their lives. Redrawing Nations is a significant book on an important subject. A terrific compendium. There is nothing like this important and extremely useful book available in English. The archival work is pioneering, and the insights gleaned from the archives help us all understand better the much-underrated significance of the issues related to the deportation of Germans, Ukrainians, and Poles from their homelands in post-World War II East-Central Europe. The book should be read not only by contemporary historians and students of nationalism, but also by students of literature concerned with the subterfuges of Social Realism, and by politicians who want to comprehend better the present political unease of east central Europe. Redrawing Nations will deservedly become a standard text. ...fine and highly welcome compendium. A valuable volume. Unique in moving beyond the purely diplomatic context to look at the profound social, economic, and political changes that forced migration brought not only to receiving but also to expelling states. Moreover, it's publication in English makes the most recent research by central European scholars on the subject available to a far wider audience. A worthy first volume for the Harvard Cold War Studies Book Series. This book should encourage policy-makers to think twice, or three times, before recommending such a solution. A striking historical report of forced pupulation transfers in Europe after World War II. A thorough and highly-readable examination of a history we know less well than we think. For the specialist, this book cites documents and provides detailed demographics not previously available. For the generalist, the book provides insights into policies often overshadowed by other events of the immediate Cold War period but which are relevant to current conflicts elsewhere in Europe and the world. Either reader would benefit from this book. Redrawing Nations merits a read. Provides the reader with a good account of the forced population transfer in East-Central Europe after the Second World War. Replete with plenty of empirical detail, the publication of Redrawing Nations is to be welcomed. The present volume is an unusually good and valuable collection of scholarly work on history's most ambitious ethnic-cleansing project. This is a significant and groundbreaking collection...one of the first English-language sources on a body of research that is slowly beginning to come to terms with the phenomenon of ethnic cleansing in the twentieth century.