The History of Poland : M.B.B. Biskupski.

321 Pages·2019·2.168 MB·English

by  Mieczysław B. Biskupski

THE
HISTORY OF
POLAND
ADVISORY BOARD
John T. Alexander
Professor of History and Russian and European Studies,
University of Kansas
Robert A. Divine
George W. Littlefield Professor in American History Emeritus,
University of Texas at Austin
John V. Lombardi
Professor of History,
University of Florida
THE
HISTORY OF
POLAND
Second Edition
M. B. B. Biskupski
The Greenwood Histories of the Modern Nations
Frank W. Thackeray and John E. Findling, Series Editors
Copyright © 2018 by ABC-CLIO, LLC
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording, or otherwise, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review, without
prior permission in writing from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Biskupski, Mieczysław B., author.
Title: The History of Poland : M. B. B. Biskupski.
Description: Second edition. | Santa Barbara, California : Greenwood, 2018. |
Series: Greenwood histories of the modern nations | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifi ers: LCCN 2018023289 (print) | LCCN 2018024565 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781440862267 (ebook) | ISBN 9781440862250 (alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Poland—History.
Classifi cation: LCC DK4140 (ebook) | LCC DK4140 .B57 2018 (print) |
DDC 943.8—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018023289
ISBN: 978-1-4408-6225-0 (print)
978-1-4408-6226-7 (ebook)
22 21 20 19 18 1 2 3 4 5
This book is also available as an eBook.
Greenwood
An Imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC
ABC-CLIO, LLC
130 Cremona Drive, P.O. Box 1911
Santa Barbara, California 93116-1911
www.abc-clio.com
This book is printed on acid-free paper
Manufactured in the United States of America
KSIA˛Z˙KE˛ TE˛ DEDYKUJE˛ MOIM NAJMŁODSZYM DZIECIOM, MISI I STASIOWI.
BYC´ ICH OJCEM JEST DAREM BOZ˙YM.
This page intentionally left blank
Contents
Series Foreword ix
by Frank W. Thackeray and John E. Findling
Preface xiii
List of Abbreviations xvii
Timeline of Historical Events xxi
1 Poland Today 1
2 The Heritage of Old Poland 7
3 Poland’s Long Century, 1795–1914 21
4 War and Independence, 1914–1918 39
5 Wars, Experiments, and Frontiers, 1918–1921 57
6 The Second Republic, 1918–1939 79
7 World War II, 1939–1945 103
viii Contents
8 Communism in Poland: The Construction of
the PRL, 1945–1970 139
9 Collapse of the PRL, 1970–1989 165
10 The Third Republic: The Reemergence of
a Free Poland, 1989–2004 191
11 The Last Decade: Poland Confronts the
Twenty-First Century 209
12 Polonia: A Brief History of the Polish Diaspora 233
A Postscript 249
Notable People in the History of Poland 251
Glossary 261
Bibliographic Essay 265
Index 283
Series Foreword
The Greenwood Histories of the Modern Nations series is intended
to provide students and interested laypeople with up-to-date, con-
cise, and analytical histories of many of the nations of the contempo-
rary world. Not since the 1960s has there been a systematic attempt
to publish a series of national histories, and as series editors, we be-
lieve that this series will prove to be a valuable contribution to our
understanding of other countries in our increasingly interdependent
world. At the end of the 1960s, the Cold War was an accepted reality
of global politics. The process of decolonization was still in progress,
the idea of a unifi ed Europe with a single currency was unheard of, the
United States was mired in a war in Vietnam, and the economic boom
in Asia was still years in the future. Richard Nixon was president of
the United States, Mao Tse-tung (not yet Mao Zedong) ruled China,
Leonid Brezhnev guided the Soviet Union, and Harold Wilson was
prime minister of the United Kingdom. Authoritarian dictators still
controlled most of Latin America, the Middle East was reeling in the
wake of the Six-Day War, and Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was at
the height of his power in Iran.
Since then, the Cold War has ended, the Soviet Union has vanished,
leaving 15 independent republics in its wake, the advent of the com-
puter age has radically transformed global communications, the rising