Interwar Democracy Research Articles

Introducing the Democratic Electoral Systems data, 1919-1945

This data note introduces an update to the widely-used Democratic Electoral Systems (DES) data that encompasses the period from 1919 to 1945. The data include 243 legislative lower house and presidential elections in 34 interwar democracies. Information on these elections falls into four categories: first and foremost, DES contains variables that capture the institutional rules that define how elections are organized. Second, the data captures the consequences of electoral rules in the form of summary statistics of electoral outcomes. Third, we include democracy classifications for four major democracy datasets so that users can choose their preferred democracy definition when working with the data. Finally, the DES dataset contains multiple identification variables that allow linking the DES data to a wide variety of other datasets. This update to the DES data is fully compatible with prior releases for the post-war period 1–3 .

Introducing the Democratic Electoral Systems data, 1919-1945.

This data note introduces an update to the widely-used Democratic Electoral Systems (DES) data that encompasses the period from 1919 to 1945. The data include 243 legislative lower house and presidential elections in 34 interwar democracies. Information on these elections falls into four categories: first and foremost, DES contains variables that capture the institutional rules that define how elections are organized. Second, the data captures the consequences of electoral rules in the form of summary statistics of electoral outcomes. Third, we include democracy classifications for four major democracy datasets so that users can choose their preferred democracy definition when working with the data. Finally, the DES dataset contains multiple identification variables that allow linking the DES data to a wide variety of other datasets. This update to the DES data is fully compatible with prior releases for the post-war period 1- 3.

Reframing the Lupeni Strike of 1929: State Intervention and Organized Labor in Romania’s Jiu Valley

The article examines the Lupeni strike action of 1929. While Communist-era historiography exalted the strike as a political action led by party members, the strike was atypical for local labor organization. Placing the strike in the wider context of 1920-1931, the article traces the interaction between local organized labor, the coal companies of the Jiu Valley, and state agents, both locally and in Bucharest. In the post-1918 period, the unions pressed for miners to receive reasonable compensation; given the state’s demand for coal and the companies’ need for labor, this initially fostered compromise. The Romanian state was willing to tolerate local labor unions led by Social Democrats, while using repression — including the army — to suppress strikes and ensure an uninterrupted coal supply. Shifts in the market and coal production, however, reduced the need for miners — resulting in the fragmentation of local unions. In 1929 the combination of a relatively liberal regime, coal companies seeking rationalization of their work force, and a radicalized fringe group resulted in the strike. While rejecting pre-1989 depictions of the strike, the text argues that labor history helps to reveal the limits of Romanian interwar democracy in ways that political and legal approaches may not.

Czechoslovak interwar democracy and its critical introspections

Czechoslovak interwar democracy and its critical introspections

A very Yugoslav paradox? The strange afterlife of interwar democracy (and authoritarianism)

A very Yugoslav paradox? The strange afterlife of interwar democracy (and authoritarianism)

The Lost Language of Democracy: Anti-rhetorical Traits in Research on Democratisation and the Interwar Crisis of Democracy

The article points out that the concept of democracy as used by people at large has been ignored in the research on democratisation and interwar democracy. It also shows some of the ways in which the rhetoric of democracy has been sidestepped, discussing some structuralist and other preconditionalist accounts in which the focus has been on the questions of modernisation and legitimacy as well as on political culture and ideological traditions. The article shows, furthermore, that studies of democratic transition have displayed some interest in the rhetorical aspect of politics, although this potential has not been fully played out. The article points out the difficulty of doing comparative research on the language of democracy, but nevertheless calls for a rhetorical perspective to the study of democracy.

WHOSE DEMOCRACY? HISTORIES OF BRITISH POLITICAL CULTURE BETWEEN THE WARS

ABSTRACTThis article reviews the current state of historical writing on British political culture in the interwar period, with a particular focus on the character of the democratic society which emerged from the franchise extensions of 1918 and 1928. It takes as its starting point the influential interpretation advanced by Ross McKibbin in his two most recent books,Classes and cultures(1998) andParties and people(2010). This holds that Britain's interwar democracy came to be shaped in the image of the anti-socialist middle class, buoyed by the centrist appeal of Baldwinite constitutional Conservatism. Anti-socialism's interwar hegemony, McKibbin further argues, had serious consequences for the progress of social democracy after the Second World War. Whilst this narrative is, in many respects, highly compelling, this review suggests that much recent literature on the period points to a range of alternative interpretative possibilities which offer different answers to McKibbin's core question: what kind of a democracy was Britain between the wars? Drawing on these studies, the review argues that Britain's political culture was rather more ‘democratized’ during these years than McKibbin allows, before finally identifying some directions for future research.

Rakousko-Uhersko, Rakousko, Němci a Německo v Peroutkově Přítomnosti I. (do příchodu nacistů k moci v Německu roku 1933)

Editor-in-chief Ferdinand Peroutka´s independent weekly Přítomnost is rightly considered at present on of the signs of Czechoslovak inter-war democracy. This article analyses Přítomnost from the viewpoint of the relation of this democracy to the old and new Austria, Czech Germans, relation to the crucial neighbouring state - Germany - and "Reichsdeutsche" (Germans from Germany) at the time of consolidation of political and economic situation (1924-1929) and after the first repercussions of global economic recession on domestic situation (after 1929). The text stresses Peroutka's functional cultivation of contemporary national and civic principles, the contemporary social discussion as the substance of democracy in Masaryk's spirlt as well as European horizons of Peroutka's thought which made it possible for hlm to understand historical continuity of the old continent. Peroutka's weekly developed lhe journalistic profession of mediating information. It created condltlons for self-examination of the Czech nation which assumed responsibility for the new stale, Czechoslovakia. Peroutka was critical of the young country as critical approach is always a sign of natural existence oť object of one's interest. According to Peroutka, real being implied respect for others' views, to open oneself deliberately to inter-ethnic dialogue, to try to draw lessons from shortcomings and losses, but also from the achievements of others. Peroutka's Přítomnost was certainly nationalist. Peroutka, who was thinking realistically, refused to deny national principle at the time when conflicting interests, arising from national ground, really existed. Peroutka's Přítomnost and its ethnic-images reflected calm maturity of the inter-war national elite or maturity based on nationally-motivated effort to discuss with others and at the same time critically re-examine oneself. The article does not criticise Peroutka for his national determination as it is based on the principle that every democracy is born in the time which determines it. Understandably, this, as Peroutka said, faithfulness to the time extended into his ideas about Austria-Hungarian Empire, Austria, Germany, Czech Germans and those living in Germany. As a rule, it was not at the detriment of a sharp examination, often corresponding with findings of present-day historiography.