In the aftermath of World War Two, approximately three million Sudeten-Germans were expelled from their homes in the former Czechoslovakia because of their part in the dismemberment of the Czechoslovak Republic by Nazi Germany in 1938-39. For many years their representatives, the Sudeten-German Association, attempted in vain to redress the wrong done to their people. However, the end of the Cold War has given a new impetus to their campaign. Currently they attempt to block Czech entry into the EU unless there is restitution of confiscated properties. Jürgen Tampke tells the story of the Sudeten-Germans from the beginning of their settlement seven hundred years ago in what is now the Czech Republic to current times.

This innovative volume analyzes historical, strategic and domestic political influences on the character and dynamics of the European Union's eastern enlargement. Its main focus is on interactions between Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary, in political-diplomatic, commercial-economic and socio-cultural fields. The book also examines the wider European and international contexts to show that as enlargement advanced, we also witnessed an increase in the potential for conflict among EU members, old and new. Steve Wood provides an eclectic and topical appraisal, which identifies the German state as the crucial actor in both the enlargement venture and parallel processes of bilateral reconciliation. The book is recommended to those with interests in contemporary Germany, Central and Eastern Europe, and European integration.

Challenging conventional wisdom about German dominance in the new Europe, this study presents a new approach to the question of power and influence after the Cold War. Inspired by the debate over German hegemony and drawing on intensive fieldwork, Ann L. Phillips develops two original cases of German relations with East-Central Europe to test competing arguments. As she convincingly demonstrates, the politics of reconciliation and the activities of German party-affiliated foundations illustrate German engagement in the region in its dual faces: restraint and projection. The author uses the less-developed literature on reciprocal influences of domestic politics and the international environment to frame her analysis. These two cases provide evidence not only of the intersection of domestic politics and international relations but of when and how one trumps the other. Contributing to the theoretical debate, Phillips argues that this interplay explains the divergent trajectories bilateral relations have taken since 1990 in ways that more traditional neo-realist or liberal approaches could not. The author's fresh perspective and new evidence demonstrate that East-Central European states play a much greater role in the influence equation than they did in the past.

Presenting a thorough examination of critical aspects of twentieth century history this book explores how the events of the twentieth century still cast a shadow over relations between Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic.

The book focuses on the description and analysis of the historical formation of the Czechoslovak and Czech positions in the international system during the course of the 20th century. The first part of the book presents a brief outline of the history of Czechoslovak foreign policy between the First World War and the end of the Cold War. The authors focus on the key periods and turning points in the role of the small Central European state in the international system as well as on the significant actors formulating Czechoslovak foreign policy from the inside and influencing it from the outside. The second, analytical part of the book focuses on the key issues connected to the change of the position of Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic after 1993 in world politics, and on the formulation of Czech foreign policy priorities and strategies in the globalized world after the end of bipolar confrontation. The authors analytically investigate the activities of the Czech Republic in (Central) European regional integration processes and the integration of the state in the global system of development cooperation. A great deal of attention is paid to the key political actors of the Czech foreign policy discussion and their impact on the formulation of foreign policy goals. Special attention is paid to the dilemmas of Czech foreign policy: the hesitation between the role of a small state and a medium power and also the span of Czech foreign policy between Atlanticism, anti-Americanism and Europeanization.

Established in the belief that imperialism as a cultural phenomenon had as significant an effect on the dominant as it did on the subordinate societies, the "Studies in Imperialism" series seeks to develop the new socio-cultural approach which has emerged through cross-disciplinary work on popular culture, media studies, art history, the study of education and religion, sports history and children's literature. The cultural emphasis embraces studies of migration and race, while the older political, and constitutional, economic and military concerns are never far away. It incorporates comparative work on European and American empire-building, with the chronological focus primarily, though not exclusively, on the 19th and 20th centuries, when these cultural exchanges were most powerfully at work. This work explores the sexual attitudes and activities of those who ran the British Empire. The study explains the pervasive importance of sexuality in the Victorian Empire, both for individuals and as a general dynamic in the working of the system. Among the topics included in the book are prostitution, the manners and mores of missionaries and aspects of race in sexual behaviour.