The Politics of Self-Determination examines the territorial restructuring of Europe between 1917 and 1923, when a radically new and highly fragile peace order was established. It opens with an exploration of the peace planning efforts of Great Britain, France, and the United States in the final phase of the First World War. It then provides an in-depth view on the practice of Allied border drawing at the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, focussing on a new factor in foreign policymaking-academic experts employed by the three Allied states to aid in peace planning and border drawing. This examination of the international level is juxtaposed with two case studies of disputed regions where the newly drawn borders caused ethnic violence, albeit with different results: the return of Alsace-Lorraine to France in 1918-19, and the Greek-Turkish War between 1919 and 1922. A final chapter investigates the approach of the League of Nations to territorial revisionism and minority rights, thereby assessing the chances and dangers of the Paris peace order over the course of the 1920s and 1930s. Volker Prott argues that at both the international and the local levels, the 'temptation of violence' drove key actors to simplify the acclaimed principle of national self-determination and use ethnic definitions of national identity. While the Allies thus hoped to avoid uncomfortable decisions and painstaking efforts to establish an elusive popular will, local elites, administrations, and paramilitary leaders soon used ethnic notions of identity to mobilise popular support under the guise of international legitimacy. Henceforth, national self-determination ceased to be a tool of peace-making and instead became an ideology of violent resistance.

About the Author
Volker Prott is lecturer in modern European history at the University of Melbourne. His research interests include Franco-German history, the history of the First World War, and the Interwar Period, as well as Cold War history. In particular, his work explores the historical dynamics of nationalism, ethnic violence, expertise, and political decision-making. His research is driven by comparative and transnational approaches and draws on social science theories. He obtained his PhD from the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, and was post-doctoral research and teaching fellow at the University of Tubingen in Germany.

Reviews
Prott's work has the great merit of theorizing Wilsonian ideology and its application in First World War Europe, combining social and international perspectives and underlining the distance between the original idealism and its pragmatic application. It is undoubtedly based on an enormous amount of archival research. The book represents a sincere attempt at understanding the consequences that national self determination had in Europe, and has great value for all those scholars interested in the historical process that led to the remaking of territories and, though indirectly, of national identities. * Giuseppe Motta, Sapienza University of Rome, European History Quarterly *
insightful ... a wide-ranging and multidimensional study of the politics of self-determination in the years following the First World War ... Volker Prott has offered us an absorbing and enlightening addition to the literature on the First World War and its aftermath, which supplements the existing literature very nicely indeed. * Conan Fischer, H-Nationalism *
Recommended. * CHOICE *



Book Information
ISBN 9780198777847
Author Volker Prott
Format Hardback
Page Count 278
Imprint Oxford University Press
Publisher Oxford University Press
Weight(grams) 550g
Dimensions(mm) 240mm * 164mm * 20mm