On the 1st of August 1975 in Helsinki, 35 countries signed the Final Act of the CSCE. Running the Helsinki process was crucial for the institutionalization of the human rights movement in Central and Eastern Europe. For the first time the principle of respect for human rights, treated as a manifestation of European security, achieved a high status in the basic international document. Although at the beginning the conference did not have any means of direct impact on Member States, thanks to the adopted mechanisms (Review Conferences ) it became possible to international control over the observance of the principle of protection of human rights. As a result, already in 1976, the first non-governmental organizations, upholding the findings of Helsinki, were established in the USSR, Poland and Czechoslovakia,. In this way, the European communist states were subjected not only international but also internal pressure of societies. Social transformations in each of these countries have become the nucleus of the emerging civil society. The final result of, ongoing since 1973, the CSCE process in 1989, was a fall of the Iron Curtain in 1991 and end of the Yalta–Potsdam order, dividing Europe into the political sphere of influence for more than four decades.

Civil disobedience is the attitude which in the 20th century proved to be the only effective form of resistance to authoritarian regimes. So it was in the case of the events of August ’91 when the Soviet society objected to the activities of the State Committee on the State of Emergency. It would not have been possible without the reform programme known as perestroika initiated by the last USSR leader Mikhail Gorbachev. Thanks to perestroika and the accompanying glasnost transparency of socio­political life the previously apathetic and alienated Soviet society felt responsible for their own life and for the fate of the State. By opposing the rebels through passive resistance, the citizens proved to the leaders of their own country, to the world, and above all, to themselves that they were aware of their rights and responsibilities. The process of socio­political socialization stimulated the development of civil society in the Soviet Union.

W niniejszym artykule omówiono rosyjską narrację historyczną w rodzimym szkolnictwie. Poruszony temat polega na badaniu polityki historycznej Federacji Rosyjskiej i Związku Radzieckiego. Uwagę skupiono na zawartym w podręcznikach Federacji Rosyjskiej oraz Związku Radzieckiego opisie 17 września 1939 roku. Podstawą analizy stała się szeroko zakrojona kwerenda, w trakcie której zanalizowano teksty obowiązujących od 1954 roku podręczników szkolnych. Główne uzasadnienie podjętej tematyki stanowi cieszący się popularnością w polskiej publicystyce dyskurs nawiązujący do polityki historycznej Rosji. Zgodnie z założeniem artykułu historyczna wiedza przekazywana w szkołach Rosji cechuje się starannym pomijaniem wątków związanych z radziecką agresją na Polskę.

Onomastikon Polish surnames in documents of modern history of the Yaroslavl region

The article is devoted to the study of Polish and polonized surnames of the Yaroslavl region of Russia on the basis of a database formed from diverse documents of recent history, mostly modern authors. A range of sources of information about contemporary surname carriers is consecrated; an etymological analysis of the surnames is carried out, they are graded according to special features. The history of the repressiveness of the Soviet system in relation to the carriers of Polish surnames is traced. The conclusion is made about the strength of the essence and purpose of the foundations of Polish surnames as the most resistant element among the bearers of historical memory to the aggressive totalitarian environment.

Poland „towards Russia” in 1941. Unknown memorial of Ksawery Pruszyński as a press attaché of the Polish embassy in the Soviet Union)

Ksawery Pruszyński, one of the most talented Polish writers and publicists of the first half of the 20th century, underwent significant political evolution in his short life. His first articles unequivocally testified that he was an anti-communist, fiercely fighting all sympathy for Soviet policy, and at the same time an apologist of Józef Piłsudski and a spokesman for the Promethean concept. Pruszyński, a conservative, having respect for the Polish traditions of this movement, but seeking his new formula adequate to the requirements of modern times, and a spokesman for „superpower Poland” was at the same time a socially sensitive creator and reluctant to any dictatorship. This quarreled with his colleagues from the editorial staff of „Youth Rebellion” and led to the ranks of cautious apologists of the republican side fighting in the Spanish Civil War. However, he formulated the concept of the Polish-Soviet alliance against Germany, for which the price could be Polish eastern lands, and the prize - German eastern lands, only after the outbreak of the German-Soviet war. In 1941–1942 Pruszyński was a press attaché at the Polish embassy of the USSR. At that time he prepared the presented memorial, probably directed at the hands of Prime Minister General Sikorski, in which he wrote about the need to recognize the importance of the Russian factor in Polish politics. The text anticipated the article Towards Russia, published in 1942, in which the author has already ambiguously suggested the necessity of the assignment of Polish eastern territories in the name of correct relations. This caused a wave of criticism of the publicist, but he was more and more consistent in his views. This led him to return to Poland in 1945 and to accept the post-Yalta reality. He was not an ardent admirer, but he considered her the result of geopolitical realities. This, too, seems to have been the main reason for changing his views on the Soviet Union and communism – adopting hard policy rules as unchanging, perhaps colored by some social spell on Marxist radicalism. At the end of his life, Pruszyński held diplomatic functions. He died tragically in 1950 in a car accident, leaving unfinished texts and questions about the further fate of his views in the changing post-war conditions.

Polish journalism towards the independence transformations in Ukraine in 1988 – 1994

Ukraine, as a prominent republic of the Soviet Union, and – after disintegration of the USSR – a sovereign country playing a significant role in the geopolitics of the Central Eastern Europe, has been an important object of Polish journalists’ interest. The analysis of the texts and comments in the Polish press between 1988 and 1994 about emancipation transformations in Ukraine and social, political and economic issues of this country in the first period of its independence leads to conclusion that the public discussion participants have had positive and corroborative attitude towards the emancipation of the Ukrainians. Providing opportunities and threats in achieving the actual and solid independence of that republic the commentators express their opinions carefully. As the main obstacles they stress the imperialist ambitions of Russia, the problem of maintaining the territorial integrity of the state, the economic crisis related to the collapse of the Soviet economy and the consequences of exercising power by the post Soviet party apparatus representatives. The publicists claim, the first period of Ukrainian’s independence closed the conversion of Ukraine to the integration with Russia.

In 1951, the communist governments of Poland and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics concluded an agreement to exchange some territories. Poland transferred lands located in the Hrubieszów and Tomaszów counties in the Lublin Voivodeship in the upper Bug basin (the so-called Grzęda Sokalska). The USSR gave up the area in the Bieszczady Mountains east of the upper reaches of the San River, including the town of Ustrzyki Dolne. The mentioned areas were part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Areas of 480 km2 for each side were exchanged. Poland and the USRS had to evict their citizens from the ceded areas and take away their movable property. Soviet Ukraine resettled 32,066 people. Poland over 14 thousand its citizens. Both sides had to provide care and state assistance to the displaced population. However, the grief for the lost „small homelands” remained among Poles and Ukrainians. Only a few managed to return to their hometowns in the Bieszczady Mountains after 1957, including: to Łobozewo, Teleśnica Oszwarowa and Polana. The return involved a change of citizenship. The exchange of some territories is sometimes referred to as “Action H-T”, from the first letters of the names of the Hrubieszów and Tomaszów counties from which Polish citizens were expelled. In turn, the term “Action-51” appears in Ukrainian literature. The border change made in 1951 was the largest in the post-war history of Poland.