Between 1919 and 1920, the eastern territories of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were temporarily administered by the Civic Management of Eastern Territories, established by Józef Piłsudski. The residents of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania were to determine their future governance. Piłsudski placed the Civic Management outside the structures of the Polish government, while his opponents from the Polish nationalist wing wanted to suborn it to the government in Warsaw. Based on hitherto unknown archival documents, the author describes the reasons for the failure of Piłsudski’s federation idea, both on the Polish side, as well as errors by Belarusian leaders and the policy of the Lithuanian state.

Modernism and pessimism seem to go hand in hand. What are the sources of the historical pessimism we see in the legions of writers and thinkers over the past three centuries who saw modern civilization as degenerate and despicable, happily marching to its own doom? Why did so many educated and intelligent people despise the innovations that were the work of their contemporaries? This book focuses on English and Polish thought during the 19th and early 20th centuries, a time of relative political stability and great success in science and industry, when many nevertheless voiced concern that Europe is moving in the wrong direction, to its own destruction. After WWI, these warnings became even more dire and have left their mark on the European culture of our times.