Dmowski – Father of Independence, but besides a multidimensional man, unjustly blamed not only for what he did not support ("anti-Semitism", "rusophilia"), but besides reduced to invocation from "The Thoughts of a Modern Pole". Unlockable in drawers, proclaiming praise for activism and modern nation, while complying with its requirements. A man with views that distort even those who want to invoke them. A man who preaches what those who would condemn him have on the banners – democratisation and modernization. Let's just say he truly meant it. The man whose postulates contributed more to the realization of any of what socialists and liberals wanted than the actions of the second – the component of the empowerment of peasants was not only giving them land, but besides the sense of belonging, but besides the "civil society" created Dmowski fighting for the activation of the masses.
A bit of approximation, a bit of a lie – about the attitude towards democracy and modernization, about the approach to Jews, anti-Semitism and its various kinds, about the approach to religion, about Polishness and national self-consciousness, but besides about the causes of the fall of the First Republic and the inability to gain independence, about the realism and view of relations with Russia, about Darwinism and romanticism.
1. In the full propensity to simplify history, “realists” and “romantics” are frequently opposed. Romana Dmowski categorizes in this first group – despite its distance to conservative environments, the most clearly accentuating realism, despite his tremendous respect for the romanticist tradition. Almost as frequently as the words in the first paragraphs of “Thinkings...” are referred to by Dmowski's message that in relations between nations it is not good and evil, but strength and weakness.
Dmowski actually criticized the insurrectional tradition and at the same time viewed the contemporary Polish society as orbiting between extremes. On the 1 hand, the nation went to the impossible, with tremendous losses not only during the uprisings, but besides after it (the increase in the force of the possessor), on the another hand, it was in passiveness and indifference, without forming self-consciousness, remaining a "female nation" (this word from "Thinkings..."). Poles were able to attribute certain qualities to another nations, most frequently seeing them as a group standing on a lower than their own ethical level – at the same time in categories specified as others did not learn to think about themselves. At the same time, Dmowski recited Adam Mickiewicz's poems, noted the affirmative influence of Romanticism on the spiritual strength of the nation. What is different, however, is the strengthening of hearts, what is different is reasoning about strategy – both building a modern nation and the kind of relations with the invaders. Talking about a “moral advantage” was rationalizing your inactivity.
2. “Everything Polish is mine, I cannot quit anything,” Roman Dmowski wrote in an invocation to “The Thoughts of a Modern Pole”.
Yes, Dmowski was very critical of Poles, frequently reaching for mockery – in no case was it an attitude of an uprooted nihilist, distanced to his own people. Dmowski's words were to stimulate reasoning – the way he wrote was conducive to this function. Dmowski criticized for love, felt for Polishness with all its flaws, not reasoning about rejection, but about change.
The increase in national self-awareness was considered a fundamental challenge – Dmowski, as 1 of the causes of the fall of the First Republic indicated an excessive geographical expansion of the state, not connected with the Polishization of the population surviving in Poland. independency alone is not adequate if the nations do not live in a self-conscious nation.
3. Dmowski's attitude towards Catholicism evolved – from designation as imperatives of "national egoism" gradually to the demands of reconciliation of religion, an immanent part of Polishness with national interest. As a result, the book “Church, Nation, State” was published in early 1927, but besides the increased religiousness of Dmowski himself.
He never admired Italian fascism, as many nationalists of interwar times – precisely due to his totalizm, which reconciles with Christian values. Nor did anyone accuse him of instrumentalizing religion – and with specified a charge even an ideologically related Dmowski French nationalist (or monarch) Charles Mauras met.
Dmowski here had different views than, for example, another creator of the National Democracy Zygmunt Balicki, developing the concept of "national egoism", but besides "citizen-soldier".
4. Liberal intelligent usually Dmowski did not read at all, and what he knows about him is that Dmowski was a "antisemite". So he preached the views that led to the Holocaust.
Such a look at Dmowski is so caricatural and at the same time unfair that it is not known from which side to start a polemic with him. People recalling specified views match these immoral moralists, unwise wise men, described by Dmowski himself in “Thinkings...”
Let us not forget that the judaic subject does not appear in Dmowski's writing often, and the only longer publication is devoted to them "Separatism of Jews and its source". Let us not forget that the description of the reality made by the author of the intention was in harmony with what Hannah Arendt wrote (large passages on the subject are found in the roots of totalitarianism) or with what Karl Marx felt (and what led to his dream of building a planet without nations) – just Jews were isolated from society group and formed their own aggregates.
"Anti-Semitisms" can be distinguished at least a few, whether it is simply a mistake or a manipulation to identify conspiracy theories about Jews gathering and plotting in the cemetery in Prague, from the "Protocols of Zion's sages", racist anti-Semitism from Alfred Rosenberg's writings with the socio-economic "anti-Semitism" of Dmowski.
Well, Dmowski felt that the division into nobles and peasants, which prevented the emergence of a modern nation, was, due to their own interests, sustained by this first group. It prevents the formation of a bourgeois class – and the function of townspeople is fulfilled by Jews, not assimilated to society. This was the origin of his “anti-Semitism”.
He did not confess the cultural concept of the nation, he felt that the relation with the Polish people could feel anyone, regardless of origin. It has nothing to do with racism, in any of its varieties.
5. Roman Dmowski was not a “rusophile”, and he was not a “rusophobe” – and not due to the fact that he had specified a alternatively different attitude towards relations with Russia, but due to the fact that he rejected sympathy and antipathy as direction indicators of politics.
We will find a lot about this in the book “Germany, Russia and the Polish issue”.
He felt that ruthless, organized, supported by racist concepts Germanization posed a greater threat to Poles, hence it was easier to communicate with the Russian invaders. At the same time, to those who crossed the boundaries of specified an agreement, he devoted at least a fragment of the text "Półpolacy":
“This position has been seen in all 3 occupations and in different, far from each another in another aspects of the standing parties, starting with socialists from Kraków Na front, and ending with supporters of Russia from the Persian Country,” he besides looks at a crucial part of the intelligence, politically colourless. And there was most likely no alien assault that could not find a sympathetic echo in our society."
The second reason for seeking an agreement with Russia is that she was an ally of large Britain, in which Dmowski saw an ally of the Polish cause. The geopolitical agreement created during planet War I had to be skillfully played, for the benefit of Poles.
What should be emphasized is that the relation to Russia was for the creator of the National Democracy a function of relation to the UK, and the relation to the UK was a function of relation to Poland.
Like everything at Roman Dmowski's.
Jacek Tomczak
