Love of Wide Open Waters. The Polish Maritime Programme according to the Baltic and Western Institutes in the Aftermath of the Second World War (1945–ca. 1950)

• Authors: Marta Grzechnik
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

PL

This article analyses the Polish maritime programme after the Second World War, as expressed in scholarship of two main Polish research institutions: the Baltic Institute and the Western Institute. Given the considerable border changes at the end of the war, which incorporated a long coastline and three major ports on the Baltic Sea (Danzig/Gdańsk, Stettin/Szczecin and Gdynia) into post-war Poland, the maritime programmes gained a new basis for operations in comparison to the interwar period, and thus had to be adapted accordingly. They contained both continuities and modifications: in ideological terms they were based on the prewar premises of Poland’s origins as a Baltic Sea country, and had a strong anti-German dimension. On the other hand, they were more pragmatic and concentrated on the organization of the maritime economy and education. Similarly as in the interwar period, they were also seen as a modernizing project: the maritime economy and education were supposed to connect the Polish nation with the whole world, and thus assure its equal status as part of the Western world.

Keywords

PL

Baltic Sea; Poland; post-Second World War; maritime policy; maritime education; Baltic Institute; Western Institute

• Publisher: Polska Akademia Nauk. Instytut Historii im. Tadeusza Manteuffla PAN w Warszawie
• Journal: Acta Poloniae Historica
• Year: 2018
• Volume: 117

Dates

published

2018

online

2018-10-10

Contributors

author

Marta Grzechnik

Identifiers

DOI

10.12775/APH.2018.117.07