During the decade between 1939 and 1948, Poland, Ukraine and the Baltic States constituted a borderland invaded by war and occupation, with Soviet, Nazi and again Soviet power succeeding each other at short intervals. During the same period, these societies fell prey to internal violence, opposing its Polish, Ukrainian, German and Jewish population. As such the region constitutes not only an extreme laboratory of some of the most brutal conflicts of Europe’s twentieth century, but it stands also at the crossroads of different historiographical traditions. Nazi occupation policies in Eastern Europe, the Nazi genocide of European Jewry, the sovietisation of Poland and Ukraine and the ethnic cleansing of polish and Ukrainian inhabitants on both sides of the changing frontiers of the mid-century, have each been the object of a highly innovating historiography since 1989, benefitting of access to new sources but even more so of new approaches and interpretations. The most challenging conclusion of these evolutions seems to be the degree of inextricable overlapping of previously seperate fields of study : sovietology, the study of nazism and the Holocaust and the history of polish and Ukrainian society. The sheer complexity and the multiple linguistical hurdles this implies are effective deterrents for the integration of the history of this region during this crucial decade in lager interpretations of European history. However, precisely during this period, these “borderlands” seems to constitute the heartland of the dramatic transformation of Europe during the twentieth century. This workshop intends to encourage an exchange between different historiographical traditions who share a common object of study and by doing so, it will demonstrate its pivotal place for historians of the contemporary period.

9H – 13H Président de séance : Henry Rousso (IHTP)

Omer Bartov (Brown University) : Introduction
Long-Term, Small Scale, Multi-Voice: Interethnic Relations on the Local Level in Buczacz, Ukraine
Longue durée, échelle réduite, pluralité des voix : les relations interethniques au niveau local à Buczacz en Ukraine

Jan Thomas Gross (NYU)
Blinded by social distance
Aveuglé par la distance sociale

Timothy Snyder (Yale University)
Toleration, Espionnage, Genocide: The Volhynia Experiment and the Polish-Soviet Contest for Ukraine, 1926-1938
Tolérance, espionnage, génocide : l’expérience de Volhynie et l’épreuve de force polono-soviétique pour l’Ukraine, 1926-1938

Nicolas Werth (CNRS-Institut d’Histoire du Temps Présent)
Soviet repression (arrests, deportations, executions) in occupied Western Ukraine and Western Bielorussia, sept. 1939- june 1941
La répression soviétique (arrestations, déportations, exécutions) dans la partie occidentale occupée de l’Ukraine et de la Biélorussie, septembre 1939-juin 1941

15H – 19H.

Dieter Pohl (Institut für Zeitgeschichte, Munich)
Occupation, ethnic conflicts and Mass murder in the East of the General Gouvernement 1941-1944<
Occupation, conflits ethniques et meurtre de masse dans l’Est du Gouvernement général, 1941-1944

Jeffrey Burds (Northeastern University)
"War within the War". Ethnicity and Occupations in the German-Occupied East (The Case of Western Ukraine)
"La guerre dans la guerre". Ethnicité et occupations dans les régions de l’Est occupées par les Allemands (Le cas de l’Ukraine occidentale)

Catherine Gousseff (CNRS-CMR-EHESS)
The “return” in Poland of deported Populations from the annexed territories (1945-1947)
Le "retour" en Pologne des populations déportées des territoires annexés (1945-1947)

Pieter Lagrou (IHTP) Conclusion