Maďarsko

For many Hungarian soldiers in Italy, 3 and 4 November 1918 meant not the armistice and a return home, but the beginning of a prolonged stay in one of the Italian prison camps. It is widely known why these soldiers fell into captivity, but their prospects of returning home are still somewhat unclear. The topic is particularly interesting since some of the Hungarian soldiers were to return to a different country from the one they left given that from 1918–1919 onward, their native land now belonged to one of the successor states of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.

The appreciation of the year 1945 began almost immediately after the war, and lasts until today, while generating strong tensions in both public life and historiography in Hungary. Debates concerning the politics of memory were crystalized especially about the question if 1945 represented a liberation (of the German yoke) or an occupation (by the Soviets). Recent research, of which this contribution summarizes the results, has considerably enriched the literature with new points of view on the intermediate period of 1944 – 1945.

The central axis of the essay represents the tricky relationship between the politically promoted and ideologically driven concept of ‘socialist patriotism' and the Marxist historical studies of nation-building in East- Central Europe. It starts with a short overview of the ambiguous relationship of radical socialist movements and communist parties in the region to national or nationality question until the end of WWII that foreshadowed the even more complicated development during the communist parties‘ dictatorial rule.

This article aims to tell the 'pre-history' of the environmental movements in East-Central Europe with a special regard to Hungary and its primary industrial region, the Borsodi Basin in the Sajó river valley.