In the World of Stereotypes and Political Propaganda

The eminent British naturalist Charles Darwin was one of the first to prove that civilizational and cultural changes are determined not only by the ability of humans to adapt to certain conditions and cooperate with each other, but also by rivalry, the quest for dominance, and, as a result, violence. It occurs both at the level of individuals and entire collectivities, when it is often expressed through open armed conflict—war.1 The initiators and enforcers of aggressive actions are constantly looking for new "evidence" to gain recognition in the eyes of the public for the decisions they have made, or resort—for the same purpose—to old, often stereotypical, and negative perceptions of their adversaries. This type of practice can currently be observed on the European continent, among others, where the armed confrontation in Ukraine is ongoing. One of the propaganda efforts undertaken by the Russian government in preparation for the invasion on February 24, 2022, was an article by Vladimir Putin published a few months earlier—in July 2021.2 Known by his people for his all-around skills, the Moscow-based dictator (or, as some historians believe, a puppet of Russia's ruling security services) this time stepped into the role of a historian who carries out proof of the unity of the Russian and Ukrainian peoples, conditioned, in his view, by the commonality of history and close similarity of cultures. As part of his pseudo-scientific argument, devoid of much logical basis, the author tried to convince readers that Ukrainians are persecutors of the Russian minority in their state and therefore do not deserve their own independence. Besides, according to the Kremlin's chief occupant, they do not need to have their own state, as they do not constitute a separate nation. In the conclusion posted on the presidential page of the publication, an ominous forecast resounded that if even the gracious tsar would allow them to retain some kind of autonomy, it would be only under the rules and in the places determined by Moscow. The drastic, world-shocking practical implementation of such an argument became the invasion of a neighbor's sovereign territory by Russian troops and the annexation of large areas of eastern and southern Ukraine to Russia, sealed, in accordance with the old Stalinist practice of plundering the lands of neighboring states, by the supposed will of the local population, expressed in popular pseudo-referendums.In a broader historical perspective, Putin's anti-Ukrainian rhetoric in the field of historical journalism, by means of which the Moscow regime prepared the political-propaganda ground for armed, unprovoked aggression against a sovereign neighbor, is not an isolated attitude of this kind. On the contrary. The publication and dissemination of a pseudo-historical elaboration in the form of an essay signed by Putin is one of many examples of opinion-forming activities undertaken for centuries by various authors, which were and still are part of the pragmatics of so-called culture wars, which often pave the way for real wars, that is, military aggression. The term "culture wars" was used by the authors of the initiative to launch a series of scholarly publications, under the title Culture Wars against Poland, to be published by the Polish National Cultural Center (Narodowe Centrum Kultury, NCK). As understood by the members of the Program Council of this publishing series, namely Urszula Kosińska, Wojciech Roszkowski, and Zofia Zielińska, one of the essential elements of culture wars were texts published in different historical epochs, in which assaults on the culture of a given country, or a given community, were committed in order to defame it. The creation of a false image of the community under attack served to increase the effectiveness of the goals pursued by the authors themselves or their political principals, among which was usually some kind of subjugation or even total enslavement of the community and the country it inhabited. This type of attempt to discredit the Ukrainian people in the eyes of the public, made with the help of a whole range of various media, is currently being used by the Russian regime. The final goal of applying the principle of reversal of orders—presenting the victim as the aggressor (for the Moscow dictatorship, Ukrainians are Nazis threatening Russia's existence) is to justify, both in the eyes of world public opinion and among Russians themselves, the necessity of conquering a neighboring country. Thus, before the eyes of the world, which experienced the hecatomb of World War II and the Holocaust, another war is being played out, an integral part of which is a culture war, conducted at the level of various political discourses, journalism and propaganda, and diversionary actions, including in virtual space.As mentioned above, also in the history of the Polish state one can find, not at all singular, examples of waging cultural wars against its inhabitants. These were expressed, among other things, through the formulation of negative judgments about Poland and Poles by neighboring states. Such practices usually intensified under conditions of various neighboring disputes, political or military, in which the ultimate goal became the seizure of Polish territories or the justification of previous conquests. Sometimes, as part of culture warfare—motivated by ideological or even economic considerations—attempts were made, including through the manipulation of public opinion, to force Poles to renounce their own values, even those based on centuries-old traditions, and to adopt new, culturally alien norms and customs instead, thus paving the way for the consolidation of foreign influence. Awareness of this type of unfriendly or hostile discourse, which is analyzed by, among others, the authors of the books published as part of the cited publishing series, is extremely important, given that the cited phenomenon is not only historical, but also occurs today and not only in relation to Poland—as the ongoing debates on the war in Ukraine clearly demonstrate. What's more, it is much easier for contemporary adversaries of a given community than in previous eras to reach potential addressees and influence their opinions. Through digital media, widely distributed, sometimes out of control, in the reality of the global information network, any public discourse conducted is available at one's fingertips. In the modern and industrial eras, waging culture wars was certainly more difficult in this regard, but still possible. Despite these technological barriers, even before the advent of image and then sound recording capabilities, many aggressors or their propagandists succeeded in convincing the public of their reasons with the help of other tools of persuasion available at the time, at the forefront of which were various types of opinion-forming printed media. Books, articles in the press, and many other printed forms of communication were sometimes particularly popular, especially when they contained statements by representatives of political or intellectual elites. The positive reception by readers of the content defaming the community under attack was determined by the authority of its author.There should be no doubt that the study of culture wars is extremely important from the point of view of historical and cultural studies and a reflection on the essence of the processes to which civilizations and cultures are subjected to in the context of mutual perception by given ethnic and national communities, especially those that are directly adjacent to each other, although in modern times of globalization this is not the only premise. In the eighteenth century, any effort to discredit Poland internationally, bearing the hallmarks of culture wars, used to be particularly welcome by the political elite of Russia, Prussia, and Austria, i.e., the countries bordering the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Their rulers partitioned its territory by 1795, thus depriving Poland-Lithuania of its independence until 1918. The future invaders of the Polish-Lithuanian kingdom, even before their armies entered their neighbor's sovereign territory, had long before prepared the ground to justify their actions with the help of anti-Polish propaganda, taking advantage of the image of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth disseminated in European public opinion for this purpose as a failed country, mired in anarchy, and therefore undeserving of independent existence.Jack Kordel's Królestwo anarchii: W poszukiwaniu nowożytnych wyobrażeń o Rzeczypospolitej i jej mieszkańcach The kingdom of anarchy: In search of modern notions about the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and its inhabitants is the first book published in the Culture Wars against Poland series, which is entirely devoted to the topic of culture wars.3 Kordel analyzes the mainly negative, often stigmatizing views about Poland and Poles that were expressed and disseminated in the eighteenth century by some of the leading figures from the world of politics or science of the time—personalities mainly associated with the European Enlightenment, both as its precursors and leading representatives. Given the great authority enjoyed, at least in the circles of the European elite, by almost all of the authors cited in the book, it is not surprising to see the great influence of their writings not only on the public opinion of their contemporaries, but also on subsequent generations of readers. A picture of a certain regularity emerges from reading Kordel's book on the subject. The reader learns how, as a result of the practice of formulating and reproducing certain judgments, as well as making usually unauthorized generalizations on their basis, negative stereotypes were born,4 which were then used in propaganda actions directed against the Polish nation. In the case of the defamatory opinions and actions against Poland described in the book under discussion, which were undertaken by its future partitioners over the course of the eighteenth century, the stakes were very high: Polish independence.The author of the monograph cited here undertook the very important and at the same time ambitious task of delving into this slightly more than century-long slice of the Commonwealth's history, considering it in the context of the culture wars against the Commonwealth, whose main and most tragic, though not the only, consequence was its partition. In his book, Kordel tried to find answers to questions about the directors, causes, and circumstances under which negative perceptions of Poles and their state were created. In this way, the reader received an engaging, in-depth study about the mechanisms of birth, functioning, and dissemination of content created, often deliberately, for specific propaganda needs.Jacek Kordel's book consists of nine chapters, forming a clear framework within which the monographic discussion is presented chronologically and thematically. It begins with an analysis of the evolution of views on Poland and Poles contained in the writings of the German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716), to which the German philosopher paid attention in the context of the political turmoil during the interregnum after the abdication of King John Casimir (1668–1669) and in the following years, while it ends with a discussion of views on Poland of the Stanislaus era left by foreigners (Germans, French, English) who visited the country at that time. Using the example of Polish themes in Leibniz's writing, Kordel convincingly shows how ideas about Poland evolved in the face of changing geopolitical trends, but also in the face of personal experience. In the case of Leibniz, who at first posited Poland as a bastion of Christian civilization, Tsar Peter I's rise to power in Russia and his hopes for the modernization of Russian society, as well as the German thinker's expectations of a career at the side of King Augustus II (which ended in disappointment) dramatically changed his views on the Commonwealth, which he began to perceive negatively, in a philo-Russian spirit.In the next chapter of the book under review, the reader has the opportunity to familiarize himself with a number of opinions about Poles contained in seventeenth-century accounts of travels to the Commonwealth by representatives of various foreign nations, which he confronted with the so-called Styrian table of nations, an oil painting from 1725, containing in tabular form the characteristics of European national communities. What emerges from this analysis is a rather content-rich, mostly negative (though not exclusively so) picture of Polish society. One has to agree with Kordel's opinion that at least some of the cited opinions of those traveling in seventeenth-century Poland, repeated, modified, and over time distorted and disseminated in subsequent generations, assumed the hallmarks of stereotypes that were used in subsequent centuries. One may doubt, however, whether the origins of ideas about the national characteristics of Poles should be sought in the seventeenth century, as the title of this chapter of the book suggests, but probably erroneously. Research carried out in this regard with reference to the medieval era proves that many stereotypical perceptions of the Polish community have a very old pedigree.5In the next two chapters of the book (3 and 4), Kordel focuses the reader's attention on the territory of eighteenth-century France. In them, the author examines the views on Poland of the famous Montesquieu (1689–1755), followed by representatives of the slightly younger generation of authors of the Great French Encyclopedia. The former thinker referred to Poland in the margins of his philosophical reflections on legal and political systems, contained, among others, in the works On the Spirit of Laws, Persian Letters and others, pointing to the country on the Vistula as an example of civilizational backwardness, including in the sphere of laws and customs. Kordel noted that this father of the French Enlightenment had never been to Poland, which may have influenced the fact that his knowledge of it and, consequently, his views on the country were simplistic and superficial. Despite this, the Frenchman's popularity meant that his opinions were considered a reliable source of information for readers. In a similar tone to that of Montesquieu, encyclopedists spoke about Poland, devoting a lot of space to the country on the Vistula River. The predominant conviction in these descriptions was that there were numerous defects in the system of the Polish-Lithuanian state, the barbarism of the inhabitants, and the poor character or total lack of infrastructure. Opinions were given, among others, on the basis of numerous accounts of trips to Poland, however, making uncritical generalizations and relying on stereotypical judgments. Kordel sees in his analysis of the Encyclopedia's excerpts on Poles also complimentary remarks, such as their ability to learn foreign languages and their long tradition of religious tolerance (pp. 128–130). Such mentions, however, remained in the minority, while the overall picture of the Commonwealth that an educated Frenchman could reach on the basis of this valued source of knowledge remained overwhelmingly negative.In the remainder of the monograph, starting with chapter five, Jacek Kordel reaches for examples of perceptions operating in public opinion, which should be interpreted as part of a propaganda offensive against Poland and its people. In the eighteenth century, in order to discredit the Polish-Lithuanian state, its enemies made instrumental use of the issue of religious dissidents. An opportunity to do so came in the form of the riots that took place between Protestants and Catholics in Torun in July 1724 (referred to as the "Torun bloodbath"), leading to harsh sentences against some of the Evangelicals involved in the incidents (including the death penalty for the city's Protestant mayor). These events reverberated in various corners of Europe (including public commentary in England and the United Provinces). Above all, however, the memory of them was used by the Prussian and Russian authorities as a pretext to accuse the people of the Commonwealth of religious fanaticism and intolerance, gradually reinforcing this type of narrative to justify interference in the sovereignty of a neighbor in the future. The theme of propaganda use of faith-based animosity found discussion in chapter six, where the author examines Russia's involvement in Polish affairs in order to allegedly protect the rights of religious minorities. Kordel points out that at the time Russian propaganda exploited the fame of one of the greatest authorities of French Enlightenment thought, Voltaire (1694–1778), using his skilled pen and progressive mind in its intrigues against the Commonwealth. The author of the monograph in a comprehensive analysis reveals to the reader the backstage of Voltaire's journalistic activities. Fascinated by the "enlightened" rule of Catherine II, the philosopher became one of the main advocates of the "persecuted" dissenters in Poland, publishing extensively in their defense, while accusing Russia's Catholic neighbor of confessional fanaticism and supporting Russian intervention in the case. Kordel concludes that while defending religious tolerance, of course in accordance with noble Enlightenment principles, the French philosopher at the same time presented a one-sided and highly simplified point of view on Polish problems. At the same time, he seemed to overlook for a long time that he was deftly manipulated in this regard by Russian diplomacy and succumbed to its aggressive propaganda, while he probably could have prevented this if only by entering into a reliable dialogue about religious problems in Poland with thinkers from the entourage of King Stanislaw August Poniatowski.In chapters 7 and 8, we get an interesting insight into the details of the political discourse conducted at the peaks of power of the countries that initiated the process of plundering Polish and Lithuanian lands in 1772. Both in the courts of Prussia and Russia efforts were made to justify the partitions by resorting to legal and historical arguments, while—as Kordel demonstrably presents in his book—a number of manipulations were committed to this end. They consisted of selective use of historical facts and legal documents and omission of inconvenient content. In this way a false picture was created, which was carefully disseminated to the European public. In the final chapter of the book, the author again (as in chapter 2) reached in his analysis to the views of foreigners about the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, who for various reasons found themselves in this country in the declining period of its existence. From a review of published statements by, among others, Prussian scholar Georg Forster, French writer Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint Pierre, and Englishman Nathaniel William Wraxall, who was associated with the East India Company, a complex picture emerges, which was based on a number of circumstances. The accounts of the travelers quoted in the book lead to the conclusion that the declining Polish-Lithuanian state aroused in them a series of contradictory feelings: from individual admiration resulting from aesthetic sensations, and warm words about the people, to comments full of criticism, frustration, or even disbelief. Kordel finds each of these reflections valuable to the historian, and at the same time rightly recognizes in the conclusion of this chapter that the texts quoted in the book, seemingly simple in their message, may seem easy to interpret, but often are not so. In addition to the literary convention in which a given account was written, numerous other factors contributed to its content: the author's views, his personal experiences at the time the account was written, and finally, the socio-cultural realities of the era in which the writer lived. There is also the danger of selectively citing excerpts from these texts, which was indeed done to reinforce negative stereotypes about Poles in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.The research thread developed by Kordel in his book is not new. It is not surprising, given its importance for historical and cultural studies, which researchers have long recognized. The issue of foreigners' opinions (including positive ones) about Poles in various historical periods has been explored by several generations of historians, and excellent new works are still being written on the subject,6 an example of which is the book under discussion here. Thus, to some extent, Kordel's monograph is a continuation of the scholarly discussion,7 which the author significantly enriches by using the latest research results of his own, as well as those of Polish and foreign (mainly German and French) historians. Reading this work makes it clear that Kordel's personal contribution to the ongoing discourse is that he has successfully exploited new interpretive possibilities inherent in long-known sources and applied various methods of historical research, including critical, comparative textual analysis. The result is a book that is not only a reminder of how relatively easy it is to succumb to the temptation to use simplifications in depictions of communities other than the one in which we ourselves live, especially when using messages that are deliberately misleading. Using the historical example of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Kordel provokes questions about the difficult present in the context of current culture wars against individuals and entire communities, indirectly pointing to the anticipatory role of reliable historical knowledge as an efficient means of self-defense and sane judgment.