European Political Order Research Articles

Tanzimat Reforms and the Ottoman Empire’s Reaction to Western Powers, 1839-1876

The Ottoman Empire entered the 19th century under pressure to preserve its existence against Western powers. Dismissing the illusions of past superiority, the Ottoman court acknowledged that reforms had to be instituted to end the Empire’s long-time stagnation and instability. The Tanzimat reform movement was the most significant reaction of the Ottoman Empire to the Western powers during the period between 1839 and 1876. During the Tanzimat period, all aspects of the empire were reshaped in a new way with certain success. Through Tanzimat, the Ottoman Empire continued to preserve its position as one of the major powers of the European political order, re-established its autonomy in domestic affairs, and successfully defended its sovereignty in many disputed regions with considerable might against a powerful emerging West.

EU Policy towards Ukraine: Entering Geopolitical Competition over European Order

ABSTRACT Since 2004, competition between the European Union (EU) and Russia over the European political, economic and security order intensified sporadically, with a focal point in Ukraine. The EU’s main mitigation tactic in response to this competition used to be denial, but in 2022, following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, this approach became untenable. As a result, the EU entered the competition as an emerging geopolitical actor in three important respects: engaging in a conflict over the European order; utilising its (still limited) hard power; and extending its geographical borders. Most importantly, the EU is actively trying to shape the future of the European order that was challenged by Russia’s war against Ukraine. While pursuing its goals predominantly through civilian means, the EU has also taken major steps to strengthen its hard power capabilities and contributed military assistance. Furthermore, by granting candidate country status to Ukraine, it took a clear stance on its future borders, while these were violently contested.

Zmierzch bogów. Przyczynek do poglądów i postaw arystokracji wobec upadku systemu dynastycznego w Europie Środkowo-Wschodniej pod koniec I wojny światowej

Twilight of the gods: The contribution to the views and attitudes of aristocracy towards the fall of the dynastic system in Central Eastern Europe at the end of the First World War The Great War 1914–1918, irretrievably destroyed the political order in Europe, which had been maintained unchanged after 1871 with the conviction of the long duration extended into the Belle Époque. It left many traces – among others – in the memoirs and contemporary reports revealing on a micro-historical scale, some of the opinions and attitudes of the aristocracy, which become invisible on the macro-historical scale and are represented by considerable numbers of sources, which allows a reconstruction of important political and military decisions. This article is a contribution presenting – on the basis of a few examples – the end of the political influence of aristocracy in Central and Eastern Europe that coincided with the departure of monarchs from its political scene.

War and politics. The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and refugee crisis on the eastern EU border from the perspective of border studies

Since February 24, 2022, we have been witnessing the next stage of what began in the 2014 Russo-Ukrainian War: a full-scale military invasion of Ukraine. For the first time in the history of the European Union, the intensive armed conflict is now approaching the border of the EU and Schengen Zone. The consequences of war: the refugee crisis, humanitarian aid, and economic problems have affected EU countries both immediately and directly. While keeping in mind the human tragedy and the tragedy of Ukraine, we would like to address a few important questions from the perspective of regional and border scholars. From this perspective, the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine is another stage of the new political order in Europe, preceded by the war in Ukraine that started in 2014, the 2015 migration crisis, 2021 Belarus-EU border crisis, which altogether – from the perspective of the border studies – could be described as re-bordering and securitization of borderlands.
 In this joint editorial, we address four main questions. Firstly, how we can interpret the Russian invasion in the wider, historical context, taking the frontier thesis as an explanatory category developed by Turner (1994). Secondly, the Ukrainian refugee crisis, in the context of the previous Belarusian-EU border crisis, is a multi-layered issue, where religion, gender, geopolitics, and rationales meet. Thirdly, apart from the military and political actions, war and refugee flux could be seen from the perspective of a grassroots movement of aid. Fourthly, the war in Ukraine brings uncertainty and questions about democracy and peace in Western Europe.

Audiencja publiczna nuncjusza apostolskiego Galeazza Marescottiego na sejmie elekcyjnym 1669 r. Znaczenie i ceremoniał

Paying attention to the ceremonial aspects of the early modern diplomatic practice is one of the main postulates of the historians of diplomacy. The presented article focuses on the political circumstances and ceremonial manifestations of the participation of the apostolic nuncio Galeazzo Marescotti in a public audience at the election sejm of 1669, as a result of which Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki was elected king. The Holy See’s informational policy regarding the political practice and ceremonial of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth during the interregnum and the election period is discussed, especially in the emergence of a new interregnum in 1668, as a result of the abdication of John II Casimir Vasa. The papacy’s diplomatic involvement towards the new election was at that time hampered by the cold relations between the nuncio and the ambitious primate of the Kingdom Mikołaj Prażmowski. The article also deals with the preparations for the nuncio’s audience at the election sejm that took place from the beginning of May 1669, demonstrating the secondary nature of this event for the political life of the Commonwealth. Then, the diplomat’s entry into the election field is presented, as is the detailed course of the audience, which culminated in the consigning of papal letters and the nuncio’s oration. The noble reception of Marescotti’s audience is also analysed. The article deals with the issues of political, diplomatic, and visual functions of the diplomatic audience. The hearing of the representative of the Holy See at the elective sejm is presented as an expression of the mutual belonging of the parties (the papacy and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) to the seventeenth-century European political order.

A disruptive moment? Parliaments, Brexit, and the future of European integration

ABSTRACT The withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union (EU) does not only challenge the idea of an ever-deeper integrated union; it also calls into question the very principles on which the European political order has been established. Against this backdrop, the contributions of this Special Issue set out to analyse how parliaments, that is political institutions at the core of democratic systems, have positioned themselves towards and reacted to Brexit. In this introductory article, I first discuss the meaning of Brexit as yet another major political crisis with serious consequences potentially affecting the role and functioning of representative institutions and actors across the EU. Having taken stock of the extant literature on the parliamentarisation and politicisation of the EU, I then detail the cross cutting issues that permeate this Special Issue, namely: How do parliamentarians assess the UK’s decision to withdraw from the EU and its consequences? Does Brexit exacerbate existing political divisions or does it generate new cleavages? To what extent have parliaments attempted to and succeeded in influencing Brexit negotiations and their outcome? Finally, the rest of the introductory article provides an overview of the articles constituting this Special Issue.

Nietzsche’s Praise of Master Morality: The Question of Fascism Revisited

One of the most disquieting facts about the totalitarian movements of communism and fascism which threatened the European political order in the interwar period is the support both these movements appear to derive from the writings of two of the most important European philosophers of the 19th century, Karl Marx and Friedrich Nietzsche. The destruction of Western civilization seems to have been engendered by Western civilization itself. It is commonplace to charge that Bolshevism represented a travesty of Marx’s ideas, just as Nazism represented a travesty of Nietzsche’s ideas. But while it is impossible to describe Nietzsche as a fascist avant la lettre, it is no less untenable to maintain that there is no connection whatsoever between his ideas and the ideological turmoil which brought Europe to the brink of destruction in the first half of the 20th century. My paper examines the locus classicus of proto-fascist elements in Nietzsche’s writings – his praise of “master morality” in the First Treatise of the Genealogy of Morality. I argue that when Nietzsche’s praise of master morality is approached with a proper appreciation of the distinction Nietzsche himself makes between “the exoteric and the esoteric,” the proto-fascist elements in his rhetoric reveal themselves to be playful, ironic and intentionally self-undermining, and subservient to Nietzsche’s goals of philosophical pedagogy. Yet, at the same time, this insight does not absolve Nietzsche of the charge of fatal irresponsibility in the rhetoric he chose to employ.

Granica Prus Wschodnich na odcinku z Polską w latach 1919–1922

Signed on 28 June 1919 in the Hall of Mirrors of the Palace of Versailles, this peace treaty established a new political order in Europe. Poland gained the Poznań lands, excluding Wschowa, Babimost, Międzyrzecz and Skwierzyna, and a larger part of the Royal Prussia (a total of 45 463 km2 and a little over three million inhabitants). Determining Polish borders was a process largely affected by the British Prime Minister, David Lloyd George, who was reluctant in his attitude towards Poland. He opposed any solution that would increase the role of France in Europe. The final shape of the borders was to be a task of the Allied and Associated Powers. After a heated debate, the Legislative Sejm of Poland ratified a peace treaty with Germany on 31 July 1919. It took effect on 10 January 1920. The peace treaty also arranged a plebiscite in parts of Eastern and Western Prussia, which was to determine the Polish or German affiliation of Warmia, Masuria and Powiśle. Only after that event the Boundary Commission began its delimitation works. The results of the plebiscite were unfavourable for Poland as it gained only small territories. The commission in the field focused on establishing the borders in the light of the peace treaty, so along the former German-Russian border until the Vistula river and then along it up to the Free City of Danzig.

The normative threat of subtle subversion: the return of ‘Eastern Europe’ as an ontological insecurity trope

A combination of undemocratic developments in Hungary and Poland as well as Eastern Europe’s reluctance to engage in solidary burden-sharing at the height of the refugee crisis in Europe has brought back familiar allusions of Eastern Europeans as troublemakers for European unity and peace. This article offers a discursive dissection of ‘Eastern Europe’ as a subtly subversive challenge to Europe’s security of ‘self’, entailing a fear of being overrun by an ‘other’ perceived as endangering one’s normative and cultural order. Proceeding from Ingrid Creppell’s (2011) notion of normative threat, this article argues that the reappearance of ‘Eastern Europe’ as an ontological insecurity trope is indicative of deeper anxieties within Europe, some of which are systemic (such as doubts about the efficacy of integration and the legitimacy of the European Union) and some of which are contingent (such as concerns about defending the European political order from populist upsurges amidst ‘resurgent nationalism’).

Expressions of Relational Power in Nato Discourse: Cooperation with Former Adversaries

Abstract The dissolution of the Soviet Empire in 1991 has challenged the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to grapple with an issue that had been avoided and postponed during the Cold War - how to give specific and practical content to the Alliance’s long-standing vision of a peaceful political order in Europe. This paper examines the galvanizing role of language in forging a solid discourse aimed at initiating and consolidating cooperation between the Alliance and its former adversaries in the aftermath of the Soviet Union’s collapse. Drawing on discourse analysis as a method of qualitative investigation, the present linguistic exploration of military discourse focuses on a number of NATO official documents that reify the Alliance’s determination to contribute to the construction of a more secure transatlantic environment

On the Global Impact of the Russian October Revolution of 1917

The 1917 Russian October Revolution upset the political order in Europe, causing a significant geopolitical change on two continents and exerting various degrees of influence on the politics on six continents for several decades. However, the Revolution failed in its primary declared strategic objective – to destroy and abolish world capitalism. Moreover, it became discredited in its own country of origin and in most of Europe – much more than in many non-European countries, particularly Asia.

Not seven, but eleven? European crises or “new normal”?

Not seven, but eleven? European crises or “new normal”?

Democratic accountability and the changing European political order

AbstractThis article is about democratic accountability and a Europe struggling to find viable answers to the questions of who and what shall constitute “Europe” and how to develop legitimate political institutions for governing it. The article is, nevertheless, first and foremost about political order and change, rules for living together, the role of democratic politics in society and the relations between political organization and civilized coexistence, and the study of the political. Modern democracies live with unresolved conflict, and accountability regimes are part of an institutional arrangement for preserving order and continuity and also for creating dynamics and change. Accountability processes take place within settled and unsettled orders, and they affect and are affected by existing orders. Without denying the importance of contending interests, power struggles, strategic behaviour, non‐cooperative games, and (re)distributional battles, attention is directed towards the search for unity, political cohesion and solidarity based upon the informed voluntary consent of the people through reflection and reasoned deliberation among individuals with different values, interests, understandings and resources.

Islam im westeuropäischen Gesellschafts- und Politiksystem

Abstract Peter Antes sets straight the popular belief that Islam, which in Western Europe displays an immense plurality regarding its schools of thought and ethnic back-ground, and Western European political and social order constitute homogenous monolithic entities, with each being representative of positions that stand in marked contrast to each other. Taking a closer look at the present-day social and political systems prevailing in Western Europe as well as outlining their historical developments, Antes demonstrates that modern secular Western European democracies did not emerge, in a linear fashion, from the turmoil of religious wars raging in Western Europe in the Early Modern Age in the wake of the Reformation. Owing to this development, even today, it is still possible to dis-cern the influence national church(es) once exerted on the predecessors of mod-ern European democracies. Turning the focus to the current situation of Reli-gious Education at state schools, Antes reveals that even here numero...

The Ukraine Syndrome and Europe: Between Norms and Space

It is no accident that the Euromaidan revolution from November 2013 was triggered by President Viktor Yanukovych’s decision to postpone signing the Association Agreement with the European Union. This paper traces the connection between a certain type of Ukrainian state building, here labelled as monist, and the larger context of European institution building based on the eu, which from the pan-European perspective is also monist. These two monist projects, which fail systemically to allow for alternatives and pluralistic diversity, feed off and mutually reinforce each other. Neither in structural terms can imagine alternatives existing outside of themselves. Both are deeply plural internally, but claim certain hegemonic privileges. By contrast, projects for the constitutional incorporation of pluralistic diversity in Ukraine offer the perspective of national reconciliation, and this would be facilitated by the advancement of some sort of greater European pluralism that would obviate the need to choose between alternative integration projects. The Ukraine syndrome is part of the broader failure in the post-Cold War years to create an inclusive European political order.

Staging the State in Calderón’s “Argenis y Poliarco”

Calderon adapted Barclay’s best-selling political romance Argenis (Paris, 1621) with the title Argenis y Poliarco sometime between 1626 and 1636, the date of its first recorded performance. It was first printed in 1637, in the Segunda Parte of his plays. In comparison with other works from that collection, such as El medico de su honra or the two comedias palaciegas , El mayor encanto amor and El galan fantasma , Argenis y Poliarco is virtually unknown, with only a few critical studies and one recent edition by Alicia Vara Lopez (2015). This edition, coupled with the renewed interest in Barclay’s neo-Latin romance, should inspire critical reconsideration of a play that appeared in a transformative moment in Calderon’s career. After reviewing the scholarship on how Calderon transformed the romance into his distinctive theatrical idiom, I investigate the play’s political meaning and challenge the view that Argenis y Poliarco is above all a palatine play about love. While it is true that Calderon simplifies the plot, by eliminating or pushing offstage the overtly political action and by cutting Barclay’s disquisitions on good government, I argue that the political element is not suppressed. It is, rather, recast in theatrical terms. Calderon’s skillful stagecraft constitutes a dramatic representation of a European political order marked by ambiguity, plurality and contingency, where the destiny of a state is determined in large measure by what happens beyond its borders.

Defending the European political order

This article theorizes the European-level political response to the radical right by suggesting a focus on the conceptions of politics, society and of the European Union itself that inform this response. Analyses of the ways in which the political mainstream relates to such movements remain under-theorized and often fall back on understandings of political action in narrow instrumental terms. Instead, this article proposes an approach to this response which emphasizes the process through which shared understanding of the European political project surface. It engages with these issues by turning to ideas that emerged in relation to the rise of European fascism in the 1930s on how to mount an effective defence of democracy. The underlying social analysis that fed into such strategies, the article argues, serves as a useful framework for analysis of the contemporary European response to the radical right.

To nie my przekroczyliśmy granicę, to ona przecięła nas. Biopolityka europejskiego reżimu migracyjnego

This article reconceptualizes analytical tools suitable to theorizing the European migration regime by employing concepts developed by philosophers of biopolitics. By referring to border and migration studies, it diagnoses both the crisis of the traditional conceptualization of the border and the crisis of the post-Westphalian political order in Europe. Identifying the end of bordering practices as a result of the intertwining of sovereignty, territory, and population in the context of a neoliberal regime of capital accumulation, the article proposes to treat borders as productive apparatuses (dispositifs). While they support the desirable flows of people, they block the undesirable forms of circulation. In conclusion, the article argues that the co-existence of borderless spaces within the European Union with the arbitrary mechanisms of mobility control applied to non-EU migrants is impossible to maintain in the long run. Keeping the current status quo will result in the obliteration of the inside/outside division and a rupture in the strong link between borders and territory. In effect, the same apparatuses which aimed to make free mobility possible are becoming its main source of danger.

Imported memories: the Italian audience and the reception of American movies about the Second World War

Memories of the Second World War played a central role in shaping the European imaginary and in founding the European political order after 1945. Nevertheless, while the Second World War was a global event, its memories have been mainly studied from a national point of view, thus underestimating the conspicuous phenomena of transmission of narratives and representations of the conflict from one country to another. This article analyzes the Italian reception of American movies about the Second World War, as a way to overcome the preponderance of a nation-centered perspective and to open up to a transnational analysis mainly based on the concepts of communication, diffusion and exportation of cultural products. After a theoretical introduction, the article analyzes an original source of great use for the study of the reception of American movies: the evaluation forms produced by the audience of an Italian cineforum about five American war movies in the 1960s. The importance of the source lies in its rarity: direct testimonies of the opinion of a non-specialist public about a movie are very rare, and thus extremely precious for a bottom-up approach to such issues.

Which European Union?: Europe after the Euro crisis

Preface: how many Unions? Part I. Institutionalisation of Multiple Unions: 1. From Rome to the Lisbon Treaty 2. The Lisbon Treaty and the Euro Crisis 3. Institutionalisation and constitutional divisions Part II. Main Perspectives on the European Union: 4. The perspective of the economic community 5. The perspective of intergovernmental union 6. The perspective of parliamentary union Part III. Towards the Compound Union Perspective: 7. Comparing democratic models 8. Compound unions and the EU 9. A new political order in Europe.