Challenging the German Empire: Strategic nationalism in Alsace‐Lorraine in the First World War

Abstract

This article introduces the concept of ‘strategic nationalism’ to explain the shift of national allegiance of most Alsatians and Lorrainers from Germany to France during the First World War. Combining the historiographical concept of ‘national indifference’ with rational‐choice theories of nationalism, the article examines why a growing number of local citizens came to defy the authorities' relentless demand of national loyalty. Contrary to previous studies that emphasize the dictatorial character of the regime and the passivity of local citizens, the article argues that national attitudes were shaped by strategic interests and highly responsive to shifts in state policy, regional circumstances and the course of the war. From mid‐1918, it was less escalating state repression or dormant Francophile sympathies, but half‐hearted liberalization of policy, the authorities' unfaltering insistence on national loyalty and imminent military and economic collapse that prompted people to see France as an attractive alternative to German rule.

The Paris System in Western Europe: Minorities, Self-Determination, and the Management of Difference in the “Civilized West”

“…The First World War acted as a catalyst of these preexisting tensions, sidelining more liberal approaches to integrate the region in the German state. German military authorities' rigid policy of demanding unconditional loyaltywhile suspending most personal libertiestransformed economic hardship and political discontent into national antagonism and ubiquitous suspicion (Kramer 2002;Prott 2021a;Prott 2021b). Toward the end of the war, the German government began a policy of aggressive Germanization, which involved changing French names of places and persons, the expropriation of French-owned large properties, and the resettlement of Germans from eastern parts of the Empire to Alsace-Lorraine, right up to planning the partition of the region after the war (Preibusch 2006, 519-568).…”

“…Yet this policy of Germanization did not escalate into serious inter-ethnic conflict (O'Connell 2018, 35-36). Indeed, while Germanization did erode local support for the Reich, unlike in Alsace-Lorraine loyalty to Berlin was never seriously challenged in Eupen-Malmedy (Pabst 2014, 78-79;Prott 2021aPrott , 2021b. Overall, this persisting allegiance contributed to the absence of major tensions.…”

Unsettling Borderlands: The Population Exchange and the Polish Minority in Soviet Belarus, 1944–1947

“…However, in analyzing people's choices, the article adopts the framework of "strategic nationalism" which emphasizes the active instrumentalization of national identity by the people, rather than passive "indifference." 24…”