After losing the austrian legacy wars and losing a crucial part of economically advanced Silesia to Prussia, the Austrian state initiated economic modernization of the rest of the country through financial incentives as well as its own investments. In addition to traditional agriculture and forestry, states’ support activities focused primarily on the development of the textile industry and the resumption of ore mining, and later also on stone coal. While textiles became the domain of members of the old craftfamilies, and above all of the representatives of the fledgling bourgeoisie recruited from the ranks of merchants and final treatments of fabrics and textile goods, it was the land nobility who played a decisive role in the heavy and extractive industries. While these industries developed more slowly than textiles after the country was divided, they gradually strengthened their role within the country's economy from the end of the 18th century until, in the second half of the 19th century, it became a crucial and dominant segment of industrial production in the region under review, despite the dynamic development of textile production that continued throughout the habsburg monarchy. Collapse

The aim of this article is, based on the situation in Poland (according to the borders of 1945), Czechoslovakia (according to the borders of 1938), Austria-Hungary (within the borders from 1867 to 1918 and their immediate successors), i.e. the 19th century parts of Prussia (later Germany), Russia and Austria, to indicate (using selected examples) the method, circumstances, factors of planning the railway network and similarly the circumstances of their implementation. Therefore, an indirect aim will be also to present the differences and similarities between these countries in order to ultimately show the areas of the relationship between railways and modernity. The ‘hopes’ accompanying these plans and the ‘emotions’ absolutely present during implementation are also subject to analysis. All applicants for further railway investments expressed hopes of a ‘miraculous’ impact of the railways on economic and social life (in that order). However, this impact also varied depending on the time when the investment was made. Certainly, the existence of this phenomenon (and the associated danger of overinvestment) was recognised as early as the seventh and eighth decades of the 19th century, and it was pointed out in the analyses of the projects submitted that they would not provide a return of the sums invested. Nevertheless, such projects were not always abandoned. There was no similar consideration in many cases in interwar Poland. After 1918, Czechoslovakia basically pursued only politically-driven projects (as it had faced earlier overinvestment and invested in modern motorisation) – including those aimed at integrating the two parts of the country. Polish decision-makers (and communities), on the other hand, were still at this time largely pinning their hopes on the beneficial impact of the railways on economic development.
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The aim of the paper is an overview of urban planning ideas and factors affecting development of towns and cities in the western part of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Greater Poland, part of Pomerania, Kingdom of Poland, Galicia) that had a real impact on the quality of life of city dwellers in the period between the demise of the Polish-Lithuanian state (1795) and the World War One (1914). In the paper I deal mainly with the restructuring of the urban fabric in the towns and cities in question in the first half of the nineteenth century, which had a decisive impact on urban development before 1914. I analyse also the main selected urban planning elements that had the closest ties with the developmental factors: the process of creating tree-lined alleys, roads and boulevards, the creation of railway districts, the impact of the military factors on urban forms and the expansion of urban greenery. It is completed by conclusions, which also discuss the urban planning regulations. Some significant elements are not mentioned: the idea of garden cities or urban land incorporations, which pertained to peripheral areas and started to change the urban landscape often only in the last years of the period. The paper is based on the existing scholarly literature and the previous research of the author, and has a review-oriented and interpretational character. It results in a new attempt at a partial, though stretching beyond the partition borders, synthesis of the urban development in the Central Europe, or – as this region is often called in the Polish literature – the East-Central Europe. Collapse

Szczecin, Gdańsk and Królewiec (Königsberg) in the 19th century were the most important Prussian ports on the Baltic Sea. However, due to the general trends of the global economy, their role as trade centers has been marginalised. Under the influence of top-down modernization tendencies (agrarian reforms, liberalization of the economy, democratization of political processes, stability of the administrative system) they became modern economic, political and cultural centres. They confirmed their position as regional centres, but were outclassed by other centers in Germany and Europe. Collapse

The subject matter of the article is inscribed in a broad current of research on the economic history and civilisational changes in the Prussian Partition in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The aim of the study is to analyse the economic situation and the level and characteristics of industrialisation in six towns with poviat (districts) rights located within the Prussian Partition: Bydgoszcz, Elbląg, Gdańsk, Grudziądz, Poznań, Toruń. This analysis is based on the exploration of two Prussian censuses of 12 June 1907: the Berufszählungen occupational census and the Betriebszählungen industrial/business census. Selected census data are presented in the form of tables and a graph. Employment in non-agricultural divisions and branches of the national economy is presented, including the 5 most numerous in terms of the number of employed workers. The structure of the working population in the main occupation is also presented, including for the 5 occupations with the highest employment. For the six urban poviats (districts), the importance of crafts and the small-scale nature of industry was observed. The cities most significant in terms of industrialisation processes were Gdańsk and Poznań, but also Elbląg. Each city had its own characteristics in terms of economic conditions and development. It can be concluded that industrialisation was one of the most important, though not the only, factor for the cities in question (economic factor). Despite the fact that the authorities of the Second Reich took good care of the civilisational progress of the Prussian Partition, the backwardness of this area in terms of development processes was still visible. Collapse

This article aims to examine the historical significance of church building in the Kingdom of Poland during the second half of the nineteenth century, with a particular focus on its role in the processes of colonisation, Russification, and modernisation of the region. The article analyzes the utilization of the Russian Orthodox Church as an instrument in Russian nationalist politics, shedding light on its involvement in shaping the political and religious landscape. The Uniate question and the issue of the separation of Chelm region are also explored in the context of this policy. The authors provide insights into how the Russian Empire viewed the Kingdom of Poland, dividing it into two key regions and highlighting the consequences of this policy from the perspective of the local population. Additionally, the article examines the priorities of the Russian administration in the Kingdom of Poland, taking a closer look at their impact on the modernisation processes that took place in the Congress Kingdom. By analyzing the historical interaction between religion and politics, this article offers a comprehensive understanding of the role of the Orthodox Church in shaping the internal situation of the Kingdom of Poland at the end of the 19th century. Collapse

In the interwar period which started in 1918 after the Great War, the dominant politics was that of the economic liberalism which, along with the changes taking place on the political scene, shifted towards interventionism or economic nationalism. This path was also taken by three countries of Central Europe, i.e. Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary. However, each one of them implemented its own economic policy, initially largely dependent on the heritage of the previous era. After the post-war economy (war economy in Poland), the time has come for the economic prosperity, and afterwards, the Great Depression which reevaluated politicians’ thinking about the economy. At the beginning of the 1930s, the Central European countries started to move away from the liberal concepts in favour of interventionism and statism. Each of them tried to implement this ‘common’ concept in its own way. None of the countries achieved their intended goals. The fall of Czechoslovakia and Poland in 1939 and Hungary’s dependence on Germany was by no means the result of adopting the erroneous economic policy by any of the countries of Central Europe. It was a consequence of the German policy of Drang nach Osten, which they could not oppose together (for political reasons), much less on their own. The aim of the article is to present mechanisms of the economic policy of the Second Republic of Poland in comparison to countries of Central Europe, which is understood, to follow Piotr Wandycz, as a tight territorial, cultural, economic region including the Republic of Poland, the Republic of Czechoslovakia, and the Kingdom of Hungary. The discussion also addresses modernization. Collapse

After 1864 the cities of the Kingdom of Poland went through a lot of changes which can be defined with the word ‘modernization’. It refers to various spheres of reality, from economic, through social, and, finally, to cultural processes; it also concerns everyday life, which can be understood as material surroundings of an individual, communication, infrastructure and urban space, entertainment and free time. Using the press from that time, it is possible to trace some of the aspects of the modernization processes, the speed with which it occurred, and the relationship with the centre. The example of Lublin presents some characteristic trends of the provincial cities: following in the footsteps of Warsaw with a few-year delay, but also the problems (e.g. financial ones in the case of infrastructure or the required entertainments), which became common in the provinces; it is a fact that the material things spread faster than attitudes and some top-down activities associated with introduction of standardization, norms, and regulations in various spheres of life. Collapse

The aim of the article is to present, based on the results of the latest research, the basic phenomena in the field of economic and social modernization taking place in Poland in the interwar period. An introduction to the analysis is the opening balance, which discusses the conditions present in Poland in 1918. The following sections present the processes of economic and social modernization taking place in it. Within the framework of economic modernization, the basic limitations were the negative impact of the legacy of the partitions, war damage and the Great Depression. The currency reform of Władysław Grabski, the period of prosperity in the second half of the 1920s, and the modernization policy of Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski in the second half of the 1930s were favorable phenomena. In the case of social modernization, the state played an important role, introducing important institutional solutions from the very beginning, including equality of citizens before the law, compulsory schooling, women's suffrage. A special role was played by the social policy of the state, thanks to which hundreds of thousands of citizens entered modernity, who could take advantage of social security, modern labor legislation, employment policy, and health care. At the same time, there were visible processes of disseminating the achievements of modernity, including mass and popular culture. The conclusions of the analysis indicate that, despite many examples, modernization in interwar Poland had an island character. The processes related to it have only just begun, and the implementation of many projects undertaken in the second half of the 1930s, such as the construction of the Central Industrial District or the public health service, was interrupted by the outbreak of World War II. Collapse

The article presents the development of the idea of building fast roads in Central and Eastern Europe in the first half of the 20th century. In Europe, until 1945, highways were built in: Germany, the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, the Netherlands and Italy. In other countries, including Poland, the construction of this type of roads in the interwar period remained only in the planning and project phase. The concept of building highways was implemented by fascist countries, including: Italy (474 km of routes opened) in 1922-1942, Germany (3,896 km) in 1933-1943, and the dependent Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia in 1939-1942 (188 km under construction), mainly to achieve a propaganda effect the agency of the totalitarian system in counteracting unemployment and the planned increase in motorization, which proves the wealth of workers. Collapse

The article concerns one of the most important elements of the railway transport system, which is the rolling stock, i.e. traction vehicles and wagons. The aim of the article is to determine what the modernization activities undertaken in the period of the Second Polish Republic in the field of rolling stock manifested themselves, what was their scope and how they affected the satisfaction of communication needs. For this purpose, the existing, quite dispersed literature on the subject was reviewed and its most important findings were summarized. Particular attention was paid to the electrification and motorization of railways. At the same time, areas that still require the determination of the most basic facts were indicated, as well as those that require verification and clarification of the findings made. This text also indicates the possibility of including the modernization activities discussed or only signaled in it in research in the field of numerous areas of economic or social history, for which the functioning of rail transport was important. It also ends with the postulate to analyze and evaluate modernization activities in longer time perspectives, due to their extended implementation and the emergence of their effects. Collapse

The article characterises selected aspects of Poland’s housing situation during the interwar period, particularly in the Pomeranian Voivodeship, which was actually annexed to Poland in 1920. The largest urban centres were Toruń and Grudziądz for the first decade, with Gdynia coming to the fore in the 1930s. In 1938, the area of the voivodeship was significantly enlarged and its borders included, among others, Toruń. Bydgoszcz, as the largest city in the region, was added to the voivodeship, and the article made limited mention of the housing situation in this city. Most attention was devoted to the analysis of statistical data from from the two Polish censuses, including the housing situation, which were conducted in September 1921 and December 1931. For Pomerania, reference was also made to data from the German census of May 1918. Full data from the Polish censuses, including those for the area of Pomeranian Voivodeship, were published between 1927 and 1938. They made it possible to indicate that, against the national background, the situation of Pomeranian Voivodeship was one of the best in the whole of Poland. This was evidenced by a small group of the tightest single-room flats, as well as a very high index of good technical equipment of flats. Most had gas, electricity, sewerage and water supply. In the former Russian and Austrian occupied territories it was exactly the opposite. The towns there were much tighter and their technical equipment extremely modest. Despite the relatively good housing situation in the Pomeranian Voivodeship, social tensions also occurred in this area. There were social tensions over the housing situation. Above all, this concerned the lack of housing. In quantitative terms, this was not as acute as in Warsaw, Łódź or Lwów, for example, but it was also perceptible. The problem affected mainly cities, even not very large ones such as Chełmno or Chojnice. However, it was most acute in large centres such as Toruń or Grudziądz, and from 1938 Bydgoszcz, where the number of people without housing, nestling in makeshift conditions reached up to several thousand. The most difficult situation arose in Gdynia, as the extremely dynamic port city, with its increasingly strong industrial base and with a large number of jobs, could not keep up with the construction of housing infrastructure. The number of genuinely homeless people condemned to live in slums was reaching even over 20,000. Collapse