The Exile History Review, 2023, No. 2
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- ItemExiles on Main Street: The Centrality of Exile in Transatlantic Relations(KUL Publishing House, 2023) Scott-Smith, GilesThis article explores the meaning of exile in political theory and its importance within our understanding of political organization and more specifically transatlantic relations. Attention for the political ramifications of the movement of people across borders is divided among the study of diasporas, forced migration, and cultural transfer, as well as exile. The article covers the definition of the term and its use in the Western political tradition, focusing on its meaning and its relevance for conceptions of political progress under modernity. By examining the use of “exile” in relation to Latin American politics, the article puts forward a contrasting critical sketch of exile in transatlantic relations through the 20th century.
- ItemIn Search of “Good Russians”: Ukrainian-Russian Encounters in the United States During the First Cold War(KUL Publishing House, 2023) Kravchenko, VolodymyrThe article is devoted to the topic of Ukrainian-Russian intellectual encounters in exile during the Cold War. The author focuses on Ukraine’s and Russia’s mutual representations in historical narratives in connection with their respective discourses of national identity. The article also describes sporadic attempts at establishing Ukrainian-Russian public dialogue in exile starting in the early 1960s. All of them were initiated and conducted by Ukrainian public activists and intellectuals. The author concludes that participants on both sides ascribed opposing meanings to historical terms. Russian authors, on the one hand, consistently used the modern designation “Ukrainian” as a synonym for “Little Russian,” which automatically situated Ukraine within the “pan-Russian” historical framework. Ukrainian historians, on the other hand, tried to reinterpret “Russian” as a modern national designation rather than an imperial one. Hence the Ukrainian-Russian dialogue had no chance of succeeding unless Russian participants agreed to rethink their discourse of national identity. It is no wonder that many American observers remained confused about the nature of Ukrainian-Russian debates: to them, they looked like a dead-end situation. Thus, rather than trying to find alternative interpretations of Ukrainian and Russian history, most Western specialists followed either one or the other respective national narrative.
- ItemMercenaries of a Phantom War The “Hostile Emigration” in Yugoslavia’s Globalized Ideology of Insecurity(KUL Publishing House, 2023) Robionek, BerndYugoslav state security services became infamous for organizing dozens of targeted killings against hostile emigrants abroad. What can be regarded as an interlinked chain of violence and counter-violence has more to it. First, there is the experience of external threats (not only) common to Communist leaders. But in the Yugoslav case, the global non-aligned position of the country strengthened the insecurity felt by the leadership. This was caused by a close identification with Third World countries affected by Cold War interventions. Officials and politicians concerned with security matters interpreted the continuing aggression of the “hostile emigration” as part and proof of a subliminal “Special War” against the socialist self-administration system. As a response, the state security stepped up the lethal operations in the host countries of the “hostile emigration”. The study starts with the development of anti-Communist and pro-Soviet exile activism in the post-war period. It traces the reinforcement of the danger posed by hostile émigrés back to the early 1960s, when Yugoslavia became a prominent member of the Non-Aligned Movement. Also, it analyses the roots of the “Special War” and shows how this idea of external intervention was transferred to the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). The consequences of the adaptation to the Yugoslav conditions are addressed as well as the outcome for the treatment of the “hostile emigration”. A critical assessment of émigré terrorism is followed by the presentation of exemplified cases. This essay seeks for a better comprehension of the mental disposition behind the drastic measures applied by Yugoslav secret services. Therefore, it is focused on the importance of the antagonistic emigration for the concept of the “Special War”.
- ItemFrom “Exile” to “Diaspora”: The Shift in Self-Identification among Refugee Latvians, 1944-2023(KUL Publishing House, 2023) Plakans, AndrejsThe 175,000- Latvians who fled their northeastern European homeland in the final year of World War II (1944-45) eventually resettled in some four continents and twenty different host societies. Their tasks were many, ranging from “freeing” Latvia among the politically minded to building a new life in their host societies. For some ten years after the war, their official status remained uncertain, as did the terms they used to describe themselves. Eventually, the agreed upon frame of reference became trimda (Eng. exile). It was the rare social, cultural, and political activity that was not discussed within the exile framework, and an impressive cultural superstructure was built upon it from the 1950s to the 1980s. This framework, however, became anachronistic after 1991 and the collapse of the USSR. Western Latvians could no longer claim to be in exile, but relatively few of them showed a willingness to return to the old homeland. Two decades of discussion about identity eventually led the new Latvian government and social-science researchers in Latvia to propose the term diaspora for all Latvians living outside the country’s borders. This term has been generally accepted, even by the still living World War II refugees and their descendants, who now refer to themselves as the vecā trimda (Eng. old exile) component of the diaspora.
- ItemNew Tools against the Soviet Union in the Political Work of the Latvian Diaspora in the 1970s-1980s: The Case of Human Rights Violations in the Soviet Union(KUL Publishing House, 2023) Bekere, KristineStarting with, and initiated by, the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe in the first half of 1970s, the topic of human rights violations in the Soviet Union, and specifically in the Baltic states, became part of the Latvian diaspora’s political argumentation when lobbying against the Soviet Union in host countries. Almost unknown before, this topic was very prominent in the political activities of the 1970s and 1980s up until the disintegration of the Soviet Union. The issue of human rights violations in the political argumentation of the Latvian and Baltic diasporas as a whole has always been inextricably linked to the main political goal of these diasporas – the restoration of the right to political self-determination for the Baltic states. Without self-determination, human rights cannot be realized – this is how the basic principle of the diaspora’s position could be summarized. The diaspora’s rapid focus on human rights violations in particular demonstrates its ability to react quickly to current trends in society and to use issues of current public concern to shape its communication and advance its political cause.