Diversity and Unity How Heritage Becomes The Narrative For Europe's Future

The Journal
of the Faculty of International and Political Studies

of the Jagiellonian University
52
2018
DIVERSITY AND UNITY

HOW HERITAGE BECOMES THE NARRATIVE
FOR EUROPE’S FUTURE
Supporting institutions:
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The Journal of the Faculty of International and
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POLITEJA
NO. 1 (52) KRAKÓW 2018
Diversity and Unity. How Heritage Becomes the Narrative for Europe’s Future
Edited by Krzysztof Kowalski, Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa
EDITORIAL BOARD
Prof. Jerzy Axer (University of Warsaw)
Prof. Andrea Ciampani (LUMSA, Roma)
Prof. Břetislav Dančak (Masaryk University, Brno)
Prof. Rahul Peter Das (Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg)
Prof. Taras Finikov (KROK University, Kyiv)
Prof. Saleh K. Hamarneh ( Jordan University)
Prof. Ferenc Hörcher (Pázmány Péter Catholic University, Budapest)
Prof. Alvydas Jokubaitis (Vilnius University)
iesław Kozub-Ciembroniewicz (Institute of Political Science and International
Prof. W
Relations JU)
Prof. Zdzisław Mach (Institute of European Studies JU)
Prof. Andrzej Mania (Institute of Political Science and International Relations JU)
Prof. Tadeusz Paleczny (Institute of Regional Studies JU)
Prof. Dorota Praszałowicz (Institute of American Studies and Polish Diaspora JU)
Prof. Anna Raźny (Institute of Russian and East European Studies JU)
Prof. John Robertson (Cambridge University)
Prof. Irena Stawowy-Kawka (Institute of Political Science and International Relations JU)
Prof. Noël O’Sullivan (University of Hull)
Prof. Adam Walaszek (Institute of American Studies and Polish Diaspora JU)
Prof. Andrey Yuriyevich Shutov (Lomonosov Moscow State University)
Prof. Andrzej Zięba (Institute of Political Science and International Relations JU)
CHIEF EDITOR
Prof. Bogdan Szlachta (Institute of Political Science and International Relations JU)
MANAGING EDITORS
Dr hab. Dorota Pietrzyk-Reeves
(Institute of Political Science and International Relations JU)
Dr Arkadiusz Górnisiewicz
(Institute of Political Science and International Relations JU)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
5 Krzysztof Kowalski, Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa,

Editors’ Preface
ARTICLES
MUSEUMS, HERITAGE AND MULTICULTURALITY
7 Łukasz Bukowiecki, What is Missing and Who Misses It? The Hidden Heritage
of Modernity at Open-Air Museums in Sweden and Poland
25 Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa, Europeanization

in Regional Museums? Examples from Sweden and Poland
57 Niklas Bernsand, Eleonora Narvselius, Cultural Heritage in Sweden

in the 2000s. Contexts, Debates, Paradoxes
MEMORIES OF WARS AND TOTALITARIAN SYSTEMS
95 Krzysztof Kowalski, The Europeanization of the Cemeteries of World War I

in West Galicia. In Search of Transnational Heroism and Sacrifice
125 Elisabeth Wassermann, The Polish Discourse about the Righteous Among
the Nations. Between Commemoration, Education and Justification?
145 Katarzyna Suszkiewicz, Museums in situ as Places of Reconciliation. Youth

Meetings and Educational Activities at Former Concentration and Death Camps
167 Adrian Velicu, Paratopic Recollections. Communism in Swedish Collective

Memory
CONCLUSION
189 Zdzisław Mach, Some Remarks on Memory and Heritage in Europe

DOI: https://doi.org/10.12797/Politeja.15.2018.52.01
EDITORS’ PREFACE
This volume of Politeja, entitled Diversity and Unity. How Heritage Becomes the Narra-
tive for Europe’s Future, deals with the question of how the diversity and unity of heri-
tage might become the narrative for Europe’s future. To tackle this broad area of reflec-
tion, the volume focuses on Poland and Sweden, countries situated at the geographical
periphery of the EU and which became EU-members relatively late (2004 and 1995 re-
spectively). We propose to analyse the use of the past in these two countries by looking
at how it has been narrated and represented in European symbolic resources, that is the
repository of images and ideas from which European collective identity is constructed.
The texts included show how the narratives and images of the past in the Polish and
Swedish contexts play a role in influencing the present of these two countries. We dis-
cuss the question of a European future built on the basis of a common European past
and especially one which stems from and exceeds its unification. We also enquire as to
whether the founding mythology of Europe applies to its periphery and pose the ques-
tion of how heritage is used to reinforce the cultural continuity of the Old Continent
to build a supranational community based on commonly held values.
Following these lines of investigation, the invited Polish and Swedish researchers
wrote about open-air museums (Łukasz Bukowiecki), museums (Łucja Piekarska-Du-
raj and Barbara Törnquist-Plewa), debates on cultural heritage (Niklas Bernsand and
Eleonora Narvselius), World War I cemeteries (Krzysztof Kowalski), Holocaust muse-
ums/memorials (Elisabeth Wassermann, Katarzyna Suszkiewicz), finally, communism
in Swedish collective memory (Adrian Velicu). All these topics serve as interesting ex-
amples of the pursuit of an enduring European community and challenges to this en-
deavour (Zdzisław Mach). These concrete studies permit the identification of the pro-
cesses underpinning the attempted construction of a common, European image of the
past. In this manner it is possible to consider the strength and role of unity and diver-
sity in the interpretation of the past and its utilization in particular situations in Poland
and Sweden.
6 POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
We would like to emphasize that the texts presented in this volume are the results
of research which has been supported by a number of institutions. Above all, we would
like to thank the National Science Centre (Poland), without which this publication
would not have been possible since they financed the entire (2013-18) research pro
ject “The Europeanization of realms of memory and the invention of a common Eu-
ropean heritage” (funding program Harmonia 4, research project no. 2013/08/M/
HS6/00041). The leader of the project is Prof. Zdzisław Mach (Institute of European
Studies, Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland), and the leading partner is Prof. Bar-
bara Törnquist-Plewa (Centre for European Studies, Lund University, Sweden). It is
crucial to stress that a key role was played by these two partner institutions – the Insti-
tute of European Studies at the Jagiellonian University and the Centre for European
Studies at Lund University – as their support was vital to the completion of the whole
research task.
Krzysztof Kowalski, Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa

ARTICLES MUSEUMS, HERITAGE AND MULTICULTURALITY
Łukasz BUKOWIECKI
University of Warsaw
l.m.bukowiecki@gmail.com
WHAT IS MISSING AND WHO MISSES IT?

THE HIDDEN HERITAGE OF MODERNITY
AT OPEN-AIR MUSEUMS IN SWEDEN AND POLAND
ABSTRACT The idea of a permanent public exhibition of translocated pieces of pre-modern

folk architecture with their equipment and surroundings emerged fully imple-
mented for the first time on 11 October 1891, when Arthur Hazelius’ Skansen
was opened to the public. In many aspects this bottom-up project, by using
a ‘translocative’ method of the conservation of monuments and introducing the
idea of a ‘living museum’, was ahead of its time, and, hence, very attractive for
its followers all over Europe. The origins of the Polish adoption of the Skansen
model are associated with the activity of the socially engaged intelligentsia even
before Poland regained its independence in 1918. However, a Polish skansen-
boom erupted only in the 1960s and 1970s under the rule of the Polish People’s
Republic. Nowadays, Sweden is becoming more and more a ‘late’ welfare state,
Poland is no longer a communist country, and post-modern Europe misses its
modernity perhaps even more strongly than modern Europe yearned for the
‘good old (pre-modern) days’. Nevertheless, the basic hidden modern determi-
nants composing the Skansen itself as well as the Skansen model are still in force
and matter.
Key words: heritage, modernity, nostalgia, open-air museum
As early as in the late 1980s, the growth of heritage in Europe has been perceived not
only as a favorably appreciated process of ‘saving the past for the future’, but also as a se-
rious and complex problem with the present. The professional critique of the so-called
‘heritage industry’ has been developing for about 40 years now and has resulted in the
8 Łukasz Bukowiecki POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
rich production of literature on – in short – cultural history for sale. Within this field
one could observe an increasing attention to the fetishism of (reconstructed, imagined,
or just invented) authenticity (of objects, practices, places, identities, etc.), to the aes-
theticization of spaces (especially by ‘theming’ and redesigning them for tourists’ plea-
sure and entertainment) and to the commodification of the past as a resource of arte-
facts, images and stories for the consumption of spectacle.
Thanks to David Lowenthal’s works the above-mentioned heritage critique has
been accompanied by repetitive expressions of a kind of a utopian wish for a pure (dis-
interested), true (objective) and third-person (neutral) history as an ‘enterprise’ op-
posite to heritage in an exclusive dichotomy of these two ‘routes to the past’ which are
animated by contrary aims and rely on antithetical modes of persuasion.1 As Lowenthal
argued in the preface of his famous book The Heritage Crusade and the Spoils of His-
tory: heritage is not history at all; while it borrows from and enlivens historical study, heri-
tage is not an inquiry into the past but a celebration of it, not an effort to know what actu-
ally happened but a profession of faith in a past tailored to present-day purposes.2
Regardless of whether one agrees with Lowenthal’s distinction between heritage and
history or not, there is no doubt that such scientific debates usually have only a slight
impact on the current cultural reality outside the academia. That is why long-noticed
and wide-discussed problems with growing production and consumption of heritage
(and/or history) may still be faced nowadays without any commonly accepted practical
solutions offered. The problem was not solved even by the fact that the critical approach
to heritage protection has been supported by numerous voices expressing self-reflection
of heritage managers. They were, and often still are, willing to share their Cassandrian
prophesies of ‘over-heritageization’ on a general and – at the same time – rather theo-
retical level, concerning all allegedly dire consequences of flattering nostalgia in popular
culture for contemporary, mostly European, societies. However, it is peculiar that they
are still usually not able (or not likely) to apply their own diagnosis. Hence, such delib-
eration does usually not cause any actual change in their own field of care, in terms of
both their primary affiliation and local environment.
One of the most commonly cited ironic predictions on heritage-in-danger which is
becoming more and more a danger itself, assigned to a former director of the Science
Museum in London Neil Cossons and quoted by a British cultural historian Robert
Hewison in his book The Heritage Industry in 1987, runs as follows: You can’t project
that sort of rate of growth [in heritage – Ł.B.] much further before the whole country be-
comes one big open air museum, and you just join it as you get off at Heathrow.3
The British sociologist John Urry, who cited the above-mentioned words in his
bestseller The Tourist Gaze (three editions and about ten reprints), commented on
1
All cited expressions come from: D. Lowenthal, The Heritage Crusade and the Spoils of History, Cam-
bridge 1998, pp. X-XI and 121.
2
Ibid., p. X.
3
R. Hewison, The Heritage Industry, London 1987, p. 24, cited after: J. Urry, J. Larsen, The Tourist
Gaze 3.0, London 2011, pp. 135-137.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 What is Missing and Who Misses It?… 9
them in the paragraph about the causes of the contemporary fascination with gazing upon
the historical or what is often seen as heritage4 by using a memorable maxim: The seven-
teenth-century disease of nostalgia seems to have become a contemporary epidemic.5
It needs to be highlighted that the British Isles were, of course, not the actual ori-
gin of this epidemic, nor the only site of its outbreak, hence no ‘sanitary cordon’ could
protect continental Europe from nostalgia-based heritage growth. Almost all Europe-
an powers and societies had become infected with this ‘contemporary epidemic’ for
many decades before the insular critique arose. As David Lowenthal claimed, We value
our heritage most when it seems at risk,6 and Europe was the very first place where such
a nostalgic attitude to the past, perceived as an ‘endangered’ common good, had – due
to many reasons – circumstances to be established and disseminated. That is why the
language of heritage that suffuses the world is [still – Ł.B.] mainly Western,7 even though
what is involved [in modern heritage concern – Ł.B.] is a cluster of trends whose prem-
ises, promises, and problems are truly global.8 Nobody had realized in time that Proustian
madeleine cake might be poisonous if overdosed.
What is more, this epidemic of nostalgia has been accompanied by another ‘lifestyle
disease’: a disease of looking away from the present. When Martin Selby reconstructed
materialist perspectives on urban tourism as the cultural logic of capitalism, he sum-
marized it as follows: It is argued, therefore, that the commodification of local history
and culture diverts attention from the present, as nostalgia is seen as a response to an un-
healthy present.9
However, it is only one side of the issue. Scholars, concerned with looking for hid-
den ideologies so as to discover it, often just skip the cover itself, neglecting it as a part
of a fake reality. After all, one can even propose just the opposite statement to the one
cited above: focusing on the present makes one look away from the history of forms of
the commodification of heritage.
There is no need to repeat all the argumentation against contemporary wide-spread
nostalgia nor to find possible ways of defending and appreciating it. Both ways, despite
being contradictory to each other, are based on the same assumption that one has the
right or even the obligation to assess social phenomenon by examining them in terms
of their ‘correctness’ or ‘wrongness’.
Instead of such a prescriptive approach to cultural practices, a more descriptive per-
spective based on the cultural history approach is to be proposed. There is no place
to recall a detailed history of nostalgia in Europe here. In brief, the production of the
imagined past, often commodified and used instrumentally, became an important and
4
Ibid., p. 135.
5
Ibid., p. 137.
6
D. Lowenthal, The Heritage Crusade…, p. 24.
7
Ibid., p. 5.
8
Ibid., p. 6.
9
See: M. Selby, Understanding Urban Tourism. Image, Culture and Experience, London–New York
2004, p. 48.
meaningful part of the present in European societies about two hundred years ago, as
a result of democratization of sentimentality. It may be regarded as one of the persistent
achievements of the European Enlightenment, when citizens emerged as new political
subjects, new actors of history and, finally, new consumers of the past.10 Thus, the re-
searchers’ duty is to reconstruct and interpret the genealogy of these processes for the
better and more balanced understanding of social and cultural practices concerning
longing for the past and protecting of what remains.
At approximately the same time as when a huge debate on the scale and limits of
heritage emerged among Western heritage professionals, Poland started to radically
and rapidly change under systemic transformation processes on its way from commu-
nism to capitalism and democracy. The cultural dimension of these processes was no-
ticed early by a Polish renowned theoretician and feminist critic of literature, Maria
Janion, who, in the early 1990s manifested, maybe even a bit too exaggeratedly, the end
of the romantic paradigm of Polish culture. According to Janion’s predictions at that
time, this traditional Polish type of common sense would be totally, or at least partially,
as her less radical colleagues claimed, replaced by a ‘free market of dreams’.11
In the 1990s it might have seemed that Poland had commenced a new era of on-
going modernization in which nostalgia or some sort of longing would become noth-
ing more than entertainment. In this intellectual climate, sort of reset in social rela-
tionship to heritage was expected and a debate on that topic emerged among Polish
scholars, too. For instance, the Polish anthropologist, ethnographer and art critic Alek-
sander Jackowski, known especially for his understanding approach to ‘the art called
naive’, raised the question of changing the role and meaning of ethnographic museums
in his essay “Czy wymyślilibyśmy dzisiaj muzea etnograficzne?” (Would we invent eth-
nographic museums today?), published in 1993. He wrote: museums, including ethno-
graphic museums, as institutions can be located somewhere between a cemetery and Dis-
neyland. Between a place that gives us a sense of connection with the past, a national or
cultural identity, and a place where we have fun learning and learn by having fun.12
This somewhat careful diagnosis, articulated when there was even no actual theme
park in Poland, may be developed into the thesis that the metaphors of ‘cemetery’ and
‘Disneyland’ define our ‘horizon of expectations’ for heritage nowadays, as well as its
abilities and opportunities. It also unconsciously corresponds to David Lowenthal’s
remarks on the ‘vernacular bents’ of heritage industry, which also come from 1990s
but were made from the Western perspective: Like its new clientele, the past doted on is
populist. Formerly about grand monuments, unique treasures, and great heroes, heritage
now also touts the typical and evokes the vernacular. The homes and haunts of Everyman
10
See: B. Anderson, Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Lon-
don 1983. See also: D. Lowenthal, The Heritage Crusade…, pp. 60-63 (section “From Community to
Nation”).
11
See: M. Janion, “Wolny rynek marzeń”, in eadem, Projekt krytyki fantazmatycznej. Szkice o egzysten-
cjach ludzi i duchów, Warszawa 1991, pp. 5-6.
12
A. Jackowski, “Czy wymyślilibyśmy dzisiaj muzea etnograficzne?”, Śląskie Prace Etnograficzne, vol. 2
(1993), p. 27 [transl. – Ł.B.].
and Everywoman have spread from Scandinavian open-air museums into historical theme
parks the world over.13
In light of both citations from the opposite sides of the former Iron Curtain, an
open-air museum may be used as one of crucial figures for understanding the condition
of heritage in unifying Europe at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, or to put it in
other words: a common European heritage in the making. To mention just four of the
most important dimensions of such heritage: its spatiality (in case of open-air museums
the suggested links to a cemetery or a theme park are more literal than in case of other
heritage institutions), its totalness (both in terms of the-whole-country-like preserva-
tion scope and diffusion of the idea over the world), its commodification (theming,
Disneyization14) and its vernacularity (ordinary people as the main protagonists of the
exhibitions as well as their target audience).
The proposed subject of study is the cultural history of open-air museums in two
countries: Sweden and Poland. The former is the place of origin of this ‘genre’ of muse-
ums where it was invented at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries and popularized in
the first half of the 20th century. The latter is where the model of open-air museums was
adopted in a very unobvious way in the mid-1900s and where, thanks to the European
Union funds, many such museums have increasingly become similar to the Swedish
pattern over a 10-15 year period.
The historical background presented in the paper is based on data collected in sub-
ject literature. For instance, the Scandinavian beginnings of the open-air museums and
their diffusion to other parts of the world was described in details by Sten Renzthog,
a retired director of one of the Swedish leading open-air museums – Jamtli in Öster-
sund, in his monograph Open Air Museums. The History and Future of a Visionary
Idea.15 The problems of the adoption of this idea in Poland were widely discussed in
1970s and 1980s by representatives of so-called skansen museology (or skansenology16)
who were usually at the same time theoreticians and teachers of monument protection
(rooted in art history and/or ethnography), museum practitioners (directors, curators,
researchers) and cultural policy makers. Among their publications is a collective vol-
ume Open-Air Museums in Poland17 from 1981, coedited i.a. by Franciszek Midura,
a ‘skansenologist’ from the then Polish ministry of culture, and a monograph Muzea
13
D. Lowenthal, The Heritage Crusade…, p. 14.
14
See: A. Bryman, “The Disneyization of Society”, The Sociological Review, vol. 47, no. 1 (1999), pp. 25-
47, at <http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-954X.00161>; idem, The Disneyization of Society, Thou-
sand Oaks 2004; Ł. Bukowiecki, “Between a Cemetery and Disneyland: A Cultural History of the
Sądecki Ethnographic Park”, in W. Szymański, M. Ujma (eds.), Pany chłopy chłopy pany. Masters peas-
ants peasants masters, transl. by E. Kowal, Nowy Sącz 2016, pp. 95-107.
15
S. Rentzhog, Open Air Museums. The History and Future of a Visionary Idea, transl. by S.V. Airey,
Östersund 2007.
16
See: ibid., pp. 194-203.
17
J. Czajkowski, M. Czajnik, F. Midura (eds.), Open-Air Museums in Poland, transl. by E. Goździak,
J. Rogalińska, Poznań 1981.
na wolnym powietrzu w Europie18 (Open-air museums in Europe) by Jerzy Czajkowski,

a director (1973-1999) of the biggest and most important Polish open-air museum
in Sanok.
Contrary to the above-mentioned existing literature of the subject, which has usu-
ally been produced by active or retired museum professionals and focused on local, re-
gional or national experiences, the perspective of conceptualizing open-air museums in
this article will be developed from the possibly external point of view, so as to see the big
picture of cultural contexts of the issue and to find its connections to social processes
on the supranational level, such as rapid and irreversible transformations of landscapes
and lifestyles in 19th- and 20th-century Europe.19
An argument to be defended in this paper is that open-air museums may be de-
scribed as markers of (mainly) European modernization as an ongoing, cumulative,
endless operation linking the past with the future. The process of modernization has
affected changes in daily life practices, social structure, cultural landscape and official
state ideologies for more than one hundred years in Europe. It was also responsible
for the institutionalization of new understanding of time, space, individual being and
collectiveness, which all together influenced the modern notion of heritage.20 Actions
aimed at ‘keeping the past’, such as collecting, preserving, exhibiting and describing ob-
jects, which are typical for institutions devoted to heritage protection and interpreta-
tion, including open-air museums, may be therefore recognized as an integral part of
the process of modernization.
The paper is especially focused on the process of translocation, which is character-
istic for open-air museums. The translocation will be understood in three ways: in its
literal meaning as a process of demolition, transfer (in pieces) and reconstruction (in
a new place) of historic buildings (mainly those of folk architecture), and additionally
in two metaphorical meanings: as a dissemination of the Swedish model of open-air
18
J. Czajkowski, Muzea na wolnym powietrzu w Europie. Historia – dzień dzisiejszy – perspektywy, Rze-
szów–Sanok 1984.
19
This article may be regarded as a continuation of my book devoted to the history and cultural analy-
sis of the Skansen in Stockholm and the Museum of Folk Architecture in Sanok. See: Ł. Bukowiecki,
Czas przeszły zatrzymany. Kulturowa historia skansenów w Szwecji i w Polsce, Warszawa 2015.
20
It is often suggested that the concept of heritage is just of modern nature and therefore cannot be ap-
plied to describe any pre-modern, or even pre-20th century phenomenon. Heritage meanings’ evolu-
tion, including the expansion of boundaries of the officially accepted definitions of heritage, is clearly
presented by Krzysztof Kowalski in his book O istocie dziedzictwa europejskiego – rozważania (Kra-
ków 2013, pp. 20-32). On the other hand, some scholars argue that heritage may be understood as
an ahistorical descriptive category of any products shaped from history and filtered with reference to the
present, whenever that ‘present’ actually is, because every society has had a relationship with its past, even
those that have chosen to ignore it – D.C. Harvey, “Heritage Pasts and Heritage Presents: Temporality,
Meaning and the Scope of Heritage Studies”, International Journal of Heritage Studies, vol. 7, no. 4
(2001), pp. 319-338, at <http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13581650120105534>. In this paper the mo-
dern transformation in scale, scope and access to heritage is respectfully acknowledged, but at the same
time ‘heritage’ is used as an analytical term for describing social relations with the past, even in cases for
which this usage may be perceived as sort of an anachronism. In this sense, the paper is also about the
heritage of heritage.
museums in Europe (translocation of Swedish invention abroad) and as an open-air

museums’ user-experience of the travel-in-time effect (the translocation of the audience
in time). All those three levels of translocation will be described and discussed, includ-
ing their European dimension.
The story begins about 125 years ago in Sweden.
THE SKANSEN AS A MODERN INVENTION
When Arthur Hazelius, the visionary Swedish ethnographer and pioneer of the world-
wide ethnographic-museum movement, decided to open his new invention, the Skan-
sen, to the public on Sunday, 11 October 1891, it was probably not a perfect day for
outdoor activities on Djurgården island on the outskirts of Stockholm. However, that
was the time and place when and where the idea of the open-air ethnographic museum
as a permanent public exhibition of translocated pieces of pre-modern folk architecture
with their equipment and surroundings emerged fully implemented for the first time
in history.21
It took about 5 years to create this first open-air museum in the former royal park
and hunting ground, before Hazelius’ dream of the Skansen came true. The first build-
ing acquired with the intention of translocation and exhibiting in the Skansen near
Stockholm, the so-called Mora cottage from the Swedish province of Dalarna, was
bought by Hazelius in 1885.
In many aspects the project was definitely ahead of its time. First of all, the Skansen
was probably the first ‘living museum’ in the world, where actors dressed in historical
costumes and performed components of ‘intangible heritage’, as one would say today,
are as important as exhibited material objects (artefacts). Living museums, still com-
monly opened and visited, serve as a background for performances of social practices
and traditional daily routines at home and at work, festive events and holiday customs,
performing arts and traditional craftsmanship, which are all united by one common
feature. They are perceived – by museum staff as well as by visitors – as being in danger
of extinction. The social process of the construction of heritage is similar to the one
concerning material objects, including entire buildings regarded as ‘relicts in danger’
which have to be rescued and preserved.
21
Just a first few years after the Skansen was created, thanks to other pioneers who took after Haze-
lius (or just competed with him), more open-air museums emerged in Northern Europe. To mention
only the most important examples: in 1892 Georg Karlin opened his Kulturen in Lund, an open-air
museum devoted to the Swedish region of Skåne; in 1894 Hans Aall transformed a collection of folk
architecture designed by Christian Holst (1884-1888) at the Royal Manor on Bygdø in Kristiania
(Oslo) into a first open-air museum in Norway (Norsk Folkemuseum, Bygdøy, opened to the public in
1902) and Anders Sandvig started collecting objects for his future Maihaugen in Lillehammer (inau-
gurated in 1904); in 1897 Bernard Olsen created the first Danish open-air museum in Kongens Have
in Copenhagen, which in 1901 was moved to its present location in Lyngby near Copenhagen (Fri-
landsmuseet); also in 1901, the first open-air museum in Finland was opened in Turku.
Moreover, Hazelius’ Skansen did mark the beginning of the open-air museums
movement which later became very popular in Scandinavia and spread all over Europe
together with a ‘translocative’ method of conservation of historic buildings. Dozens of
translocated pieces of folk architecture which were removed from their ‘natural’ envi-
ronment to the Skansen and many other open-air museums opened later all over the
world, tell the same, or at least similar, story. Certainly, the value of open-air museums,
compared to theme parks for example, is the fact that they preserve (and at the same
time re-use) the authentic materiality of historic (mostly wooden) buildings.
On the other hand, the process of the demolition, translocation and reconstruc-
tion of the object results in the situation that the exhibited building still has its origi-
nal provenience and form, but at the same time it definitely loses its original meaning,
taken out of its primary environment and deprived of its original functions. Thanks to
many scrupulous conservatory practices and accurate interior design, such a translocat-
ed form of house ‘looks like before’ (or even better: it looks like we think it should have
looked like in the past); however, it is no longer a literal home for anyone only because
it was taken from its primary context of private property, peripheral countryside and
productive, agricultural pre-modernity.
In other words, translocated forms are ‘destructed to be preserved’. Are they empty
then? Certainly not, because the translocation of forms is assisted by a translation of
meaning. This translation is done on a few levels: from the private property to the pub-
lic exhibition, from pre-modern production to modern consumption, from the periph-
eries to the local, regional or national centers (of powers, elites and common interests),
from folk culture to mass, urban and national culture.
Arthur Hazelius, with his unique balance of pragmatism and idealism, prepared
a new urban attraction using the countryside ‘bricks’ (or logs, to say it precisely) and
purely modern ‘glue’ between them. The Skansen, connected and adapted three im-
portant social phenomena, which started to gradually emerge in the second half of the
19th century in Europe: the building processes of modern nations, the cultural heritage
protection movement and – last but not least – the beginnings of the mass entertain-
ment industry.
By opening the Skansen, Hazelius wanted to show the Swedishness of Sweden to
the Swedes by – according to him – ‘living brush strokes’. The metaphor of creating the
exhibition in a form of impressive (and impressing) for its visitors image of something
as intangible and ideal as national community and its discovered (or invented) hidden
values with the tools of tangible pieces of folk architecture may be helpful to under-
stand how to perceive and assess the meaning of the museum. It could be regarded as
one of the oldest proto-narrative museums; however, with a very specific role of a nar-
rator, who was at the same time omniscient and silent. The voice of the museum was
naturalized in Michel de Certeau’s very carefully composed ‘spatial story’.22
Who was the narrator of this story? Probably the man, for sure – the teacher. More
precisely, it is possible to reconstruct three forms of the narrator which are (or at least
22
See: M. de Certeau, “Spatial Stories”, in idem, The Practice of Everyday Life, transl. by S. Rendall, Ber-
keley 1984, pp. 115-130.
used to be) present at the Skansen and at the same time were, among many others, very
important in the storytelling culture of the 19th century. They are the following: the
ethnographer/discoverer (who finds and descripts new aspects of culture), literary real-
ism writer (who is trusted to know and tell the truth) and the national revivalist (who
use the narration for a social mobilization, especially in nation building process).
The connection between the creation of open-air museums and nationalism is so
close and strong that even a century after the opening of the Skansen not only consum-
ers, but also the producers of heritage institutions of such kinds are taught to treat folk
culture as a part, or a dimension, of a particular national culture. As Sten Rentzhog
mentioned, in the wave of enthusiasm after the fall of Communism, a grandiose scheme
was put forward for a joint open air museum somewhere in Central Europe, with origi-
nal buildings from all European countries. But there was nobody to take charge of such
a proposal.23
Rentzhog comments upon this situation by adding rhetorical questions which lead
to an obvious conclusion: Why not develop thematic open air museums, on, for exam-
ple, herding or fishing communities from different countries? Why not [create – Ł.B.] one
showing the amazing similarities to be found in the vernacular architecture of mountain
districts? The strangest thing, actually, is the absence of this type of museum. Open air mu-
seums have remained a national affair.24
However, it seems that open-air museums respond to class-structured demands and
expectations as well as the ones connected to the national identity. Coming back to
the Skansen, its target audience was, from the beginning, supposed to be first of all
a Stockholm middle class, which was also an intended group of Hazelius’ previous eth-
nographic (indoor) exhibitions: the Scandinavian Ethnographic Collection (opened
in 1873 in the Stockholm city centre) and the Nordic Museum, the building of which
had started 3 years before the Skansen opened, and lasted almost 20 years up to 1907,
6 years after Hazelius’ death.
The Skansen, presenting reconstructed and reanimated wooden cottages and farms
from all parts of the country located in one place in the capital city, was successful
among mass audience as an attractive ‘time machine’ involved in production of com-
mon identity. But during the first few years of its history, the Skansen was mainly an
attraction only for Stockholm inhabitants.
The situation changed radically in 1897, when Djurgården island hosted the Uni-
versal Exhibition of Arts and Industry in Stockholm. The Expo was accompanied by
two important infrastructural facilities: a new functional, modern bridge connect-
ing the Stockholm district of Östermalm with the island, and a funicular railway be-
tween the exhibition site and the Skansen. An essence of Swedishness in miniature on
Djurgården island was no longer solely a destination for Sunday trips for Stockholm in-
habitants, looking for an oasis of countryside and nature. Since 1897, the Skansen has
23
S. Rentzhog, Open Air Museums…, p. 41.
24
Ibid.
become a tourist attraction for visitors from outside the city, and even from outside the
country – mainly: middle-class tourists.
If it is to be agreed that something what defines Europe is often a self-critique and
ideological pluralism that leads to many contradictions, the Skansen could be perceived
as a very European institution. It is the ambiguous site of the manifestation of contra-
dictory ideas. On the one hand, its goal was to show the image of Swedishness to new-
comers visiting the Expo, or, to put it in other words: to re-write folk culture using the
code of national culture. On the other hand, regardless of the place of origin, language
used and religion worshiped, everyone could find this rural idyll of the Skansen famil-
iar to some extent, and, hence, very attractive to follow.
Thanks to that, Hazelius should have not been worried about the future of his in-
vention. Indeed, when the founder of the Skansen died in 1901, it was not closed but
transformed into the public institution which was later developed many times, improv-
ing its collection by further translocations up to the 1970s. To say more, Hazelius was
buried with honors at the Skansen.
THE SKANSEN MODEL AND ITS POLISH ADOPTION
At the turn of the 19th and 20th century, when the Skansen became the symbolic and a real
tomb of his founder, this very Swedish late-19th century idea of creating open-air eth-
nographic museums spread all over Scandinavia and reached the southern shores of the
Baltic Sea, so as to be disseminated throughout Europe. Up to 1918, about 100 such mu-
seums were founded all over the continent and the popularity of the Skansen-like insti-
tutions was based on the attractive ways in which they legitimized the national claims to
the territory with its natural and cultural landscape. After the Great War, post-Versailles
Europe was divided into nation-states and there was a strong need for institutions sup-
porting (self )formation of nations, which resulted in the increase in popularity and rapid
development of an easy-adaptable and widely acceptable format of an open-air ethno-
graphic museum which in this paper is to be called the Skansen model.
That would be the second – metaphorical but still, say, ‘spatial’ – dimension of trans-
location. In this perspective, the translocated ‘object’ would be Hazelius’ original inven-
tion of the Skansen in Stockholm, and the translocation process of re-writing would af-
fect local embodiments of this idea, disseminated across the whole Europe, as well as in
the rest of the world. European dissemination of the Skansen model was done without
any top down management, thanks to local cultural elites on regional or national level,
who found the idea attractive. Open-air museums’ assumptions were always adapted to
local conditions and circumstances, but the essential architecture of the model (includ-
ing the fact that the architecture is essential!) is common. It may be therefore regarded
as a distributed or shared European ‘infrastructure’ for heritage protection.
Today there are more than 2,000 open-air museums in Europe, mainly located in
Nordic countries (more than 1,700). However, quite a lot of them can also be found
in Central Europe. In the former communist countries of that region, such institutions
were willingly opened after World War II as an answer to the rapid modernization af-
fecting radical social change, as well as a manifestation of the official state ideology of
that time, linking national identity with class consciousness of peasants and workers
who constituted the folk and/or ‘the people’.
The Skansen model was not implemented in Poland as an equal copy of its domes-
tic version from Sweden. By the way, there is a noteworthy peculiarity in Polish adop-
tion of the name of Skansen. Namely, a given name of Stockholm ethnographic park
was adopted in Poland as an unofficial but commonly used generic name for open-air
museums, which results in fact that each Polish open-air museum may be (informally)
called a skansen. At the same time lots of people do not know the origin of this name.
What is more, in Swedish the name Skansen has been always reserved exclusively only
for the open-air museum founded by Hazelius on Djurgården island. For each of the
other Swedish open-air museums – and there are more than one thousand of them at
the moment! – the term in Swedish is a friluftsmuseum, literally, an open-air museum.
It all together makes the word ‘skansen’ probably the most popular and at the same time
least consciously borrowed Swedish word in Polish language.
A brief overview of the development of open-air museums in Sweden and in Poland
is to be made, as well as a summary of the main differences in historical background
in Sweden and in Poland. Firstly, in Sweden there is a main, central open-air museum
in the capital (the Skansen) and about 1,000 local open-air museums which are most-
ly bottom-up locally-rooted and socially-driven initiatives, while in Poland there are
about 30 main regional open-air museums, established mainly in 1960s and 1970s as
a result of a rather top-down process initiated by heritage professionals (art historians,
ethnographers, monument conservators, museum managers, etc.) and supported by
state authorities, with no open-air museum in the capital and several dozen small, local
open-air museums which are non-public in terms of management.
Secondly, the exhibitions in Swedish open-air museums are generally focused on
both material artefacts and performances, which makes such a museum ‘a living history
site’, designed with attention to the quality of entertainment of the audience, while the
main objective of Polish open-air museum seems to be a care for the preservation of
material objects and their scientific documentation, thus they remain ‘shelters’ for en-
dangered architecture and other material artefacts. There was a very rare and very late
introduction to the ‘living history’ approach in Polish skansens after 1989, despite the
fact it was an important component of Hazelius’ original idea.
Thirdly, there are some crucial differences in the social and cultural contexts of
founding and functioning of open-air museums in Sweden and in Poland. The most
obvious difference is that of time, when the history of museums of such kind began as
a widely accepted and somehow politically supported movement in these two coun-
tries: the late 19th century versus the second half of the 20th century. However, there
are more serious distinctions of qualitative type in historical background. To list some
of the most important ones: (1) a land use in the countryside (the 19th century agrar-
ian reforms connected to the Great Commasation in Sweden versus the very late en-
franchisement of peasants on small allotments in Poland); (2) common beliefs about

the nature of the national community and the cultural domination of social groups in
the society (urban middle-class in Sweden versus post-gentry intelligentsia in Poland);
(3) the traditional (self )recognition of peasants (inclusive in Sweden and strictly exclu-
sive in Poland).
The very origins of the Polish adoption of the Skansen idea are associated with the
activity of the Polish socially engaged intelligentsia even before Poland regained its in-
dependence in 1918 after more than 120 years of so-called Partitions (between Russia,
Prussia and Austria). By the beginning of World War II, despite several attempts and
numerous plans, only two small, family-driven, peripherally located open-air museums
had been opened. The first one was founded in 1906 in the small Kaszubian village of
Wdzydze Kiszewskie (approximately 75 km from Gdańsk) by a couple of local cultural
activists Teodora and Izydor Gulgowski. The second one was opened to the public af-
ter 8 years of preparations in 1927 in the small town of Nowogród Łomżyński in the
Kurpie region (about 150 km north-east of Warsaw) as a bottom-up initiative by the
ethnographer Adam Chętnik and his wife Zofia.
The political, economic, social and cultural background for open-air ethnographic
museums, as well as the circumstances of the adoption of a Skansen-like past master-
ing, spectacularly changed in Poland after World War II. On the one hand, the coun-
try was undergoing dynamic industrialization and urbanization. On the other, rural
areas were being modernized through agricultural reforms, electrification, illiteracy
campaigns and establishing new professional career opportunities for people coming
from the countryside to advance in the society. It all together allowed wider groups of
citizens to look at ‘the former countryside’ from a distance – either with pride from
the progress that was under way (in the authorities and their supporters’ view) or with
a growing sense of nostalgia for the lost pre-modernity that one would like to ‘go to the
countryside’ to see.
It was approximately in the mid-1960s, when the effects of modernization, that had
never been seen before on such a scale, became clearly visible. It is instructive to consid-
er the correlation between demographic processes and initiatives to protect the Polish
peasants’ culture, both proving radical social changes that were taking place in Poland
then. Namely, in 1966 for the first time in Polish history the number of city dwellers
exceeded the number of people living in the countryside25 and only two years later the
Folk Architecture Museum in Sanok, the largest and the most prominent open-air mu-
seum in Poland, was opened to the public.
The open-air museum in Sanok had been planned since the late 1950s and designed
as a model for other Polish museums of this kind. Indeed, its opening in 1968 was sort
of a breakthrough and, in the mid-1960s and 1970s, a Polish skansen-boom erupted.
Over the next two decades, more than 30 new ethnographic regional parks were estab-
25
See: G. Węcławowicz, M. Łotocka, A. Baucz (eds.), Rozwój miast w Polsce. Raport wprowadzający
Ministerstwa Rozwoju Regionalnego opracowany na potrzeby przygotowania przeglądu OECD krajowej
polityki miejskiej w Polsce, Ministerstwo Rozwoju Regionalnego, Warszawa 2010, p. 10, at <http://
eregion.wzp.pl/sites/default/files/rozwoj_miast_w_polsce_0.pdf>, 1 June 2016.
lished in Poland: four in 1950s, twelve in 1960s and eighteen in 1970s. Thus, it is not
surprising that in the late 1970s skansens were officially regarded as the most dynami-
cally developing type of museums in Poland.26
These new regional skansens (but without any main central Skansen-like museum!)
were expected to present – in a historical perspective – the development of standards
of living and working of ordinary people, so as to persuade citizens not to yearn for ‘the
good old days’ – which was of course full of paradoxes. On the one hand, any form of
bottom-up nostalgia was officially criticized and almost forbidden as communism was
considered the best and final form of political, economic and social regime. On the oth-
er hand, many experts and practitioners of, say, heritage protection were involved in the
preservation of the wooden folk architecture in skansens and many visitors to skansens
used it as a space for individual escapism.
What is more, despite the fact that the impetus of establishing open-air museums in
Poland started to decline in the 1980s, after 1989 the word ‘skansen’ made a surprising
career in the Polish public discourse in a metaphorical sense, as a synonym for everything
outdated, backward, old-fashioned and just bad.27 Consequently, as the general name
of the open-air type of museum and as a journalistic cliché, ‘skansen’ is probably used
more often in Polish than in Swedish at the moment.
THE SKANSEN AND THE SKANSENS IN LATE MODERNITY
While assessing the contemporary conditions of open-air museums, the social changes
and dynamics of cultural memory in the 20th and 21st century in Sweden and in Poland
(as well as in the whole Europe and in the world) should be taken into account. That
would be the third, ‘temporal’ dimension of translocation (after the literal one and
the dissemination of the Skansen model in Europe). Taking this perspective, the Skan-
sen itself as well as the Skansen model adopted elsewhere would be historical forms of
dealing with heritage translocated in time. In that sense, a given open-air museum still
carries its set of values, ideas, intentions, affects, and imaginaries accompanying its be-
ginnings; hence, it allows a contemporary audience to travel in time not only to the
period which is presented on the exhibition, but also to the times when the museum
was founded.
The imaginaries of traditional countryside Swedish daily-life presented in the Skan-
sen were based on the nostalgia of the late-19th and early-20th century middle class. The
initial impulse for creating the open-air exhibition on Djurgården island was the aim to
preserve and present folk culture as a national ‘treasure’ in danger.
26
See: F. Midura, “Wstęp”, in J. Czajkowski, M. Czajnik, F. Midura (eds.), Muzea skansenowskie w Polsce,
Poznań 1979, p. 9.
27
See: H.M. Łopatyńska, “Rola mediów w kreowaniu wizerunku muzeów jako instytucji przekazują-
cych dziedzictwo kulturowe”, Biuletyn Stowarzyszenia Muzeów na Wolnym Powietrzu w Polsce, no. 11
(2009), pp. 33-39.
Nowadays, those intentions could also be seen as a manifestation of historically con-

ditioned (or even determined) and culturally mediated class projections from the past.
In this term, an affection towards nature and the countryside, resulting in the interest
in folk culture protection, could be described as a form of obtaining and confirming
the dominant position of the middle class in the society. Such a statement seems to be
controversial at first glance, but two Swedish ethnologists, Jonas Frykman and Orvar
Löfgren, presented convincing arguments on this topic as early as the late 1970s, when
their book Den kultiverade människan was published in Sweden (the English version
was released in 1987, and the Polish one in 2007).28
To put it briefly (and perhaps even stronger than Frykman and Löfgren), the Skan-
sen in some sense anticipated the concept of folkhemmet – ‘the people’s home’, which
was the ideological background for the introduction of the welfare state system in Swe-
den in the 1930s. When the welfare state embodied the ideas of folkhemmet and was
put it into practice, for about 40 years the Skansen had reflected and made visible its
genealogy, but also had taken part in the creation of social reality which led to an al-
most revolutionary change.
At the moment folkhemmet seems to be a home after (or still under) renovation,29
as well as many other components of historical reality in which the Skansen model was
born and raised. Without going into the details of the tremendous intellectual debates
in Sweden and Poland, it may be argued that Sweden is becoming more and more of
a ‘late’ welfare state,30 Poland is no longer a post-communist state, and post-modern
(late-modern) Europe misses its modernity perhaps even stronger than modern Europe
yearned for the good old pre-modern days.
In Poland many things have changed since the skansen-boom. Nowadays, Polish
skansens are still often perceived as post-communist relics of old-style cultural policy
focused on the dissemination of state (mono)culture. At the same time, they are being
transformed into local tourist attractions and re-animated, or even animated for the
first time in their history, as during the Polish People’s Republic they were used most-
ly as museums of premodern architecture, not life. Introducing living-museum attrac-
tions, they are becoming more and more open to the nostalgic mood of their visitors
and they are gradually getting closer to the original model invented by Hazelius about
125 years ago.
The opening of several small town sectors in Polish open-air museums in the late
first and early second decade of the 21st century – such as the Galician Town in Nowy
28
See: J. Frykman, O. Löfgren, Den kultiverade människan, Lund 1979. English translation: Culture
Builders. A Historical Anthropology of Middle-class Life, transl. by A. Crozier, New Brunswick 1987.
Polish translation: Narodziny człowieka kulturalnego. Studium z antropologii historycznej szwedzkiej
klasy średniej, transl. by G. Sokół, Kęty 2007.
29
See: W. Anioł, “Dom Ludu po renowacji”, in idem, Szlak Norden. Modernizacja po skandynawsku,
Warszawa 2013, pp. 217-249.
30
Since the 1990s there have been some theories suggesting the end or collapse of the Nordic welfare
state model in the public discourse in Europe due to the evolution of the Scandinavian development
model after 1990, but the main principles of Swedish social policy have remained. See: ibid.
Sącz, the Galician Town Square in Sanok and the Provincial Central-European Town
in Lublin – may be a symptom of the next stage of the modernization process (this time
the global one), in which the role of great global cities is on the rise, while the impor-
tance of small and medium towns is declining, and people are beginning to miss their
character and atmosphere.
But the Skansen and the Polish skansens, as well as open-air museums in other coun-
tries, remain. Of course, they have often been subjected to lifting, changes and exten-
sions, which demands a detailed documentation elsewhere, but basic ‘modern’ determi-
nants of the Skansen model are still in force. It is still a mass-audience ‘time-machine’
dedicated to transforming national and regional claims as well as class projections into
a transparent and unquestionable nature. And at the same time, of course, it is still an
open, widely adaptable and inclusive media format.
What is more, revisiting the Skansen model, namely exploring its own historical dy-
namics, also has the potential to become a very useful tool to learn the European logic
of space making and dealing with the ambiguous concept of locality – as something at
the same time very universal (in the macroscale) and very specific (at the microscale).
The exhibitions of open-air museums in Sweden, Poland and other European coun-
tries, if re-written critically, may show not only historical or ethnographical regions,
but also ways of ‘bordering’ them. The translocation process, in its literal meaning, is
always, after all, based on ‘inventing’ regions and delimitation of their borders, which
all together defines the ‘range’ of the museum interest. It may include whole countries,
regions or other administrative units as well as subnational entities (e.g. Lesser Poland),
cross-border historical regions (e.g. Galicia) or multi-state areas (e.g. Central Europe or
Scandinavia). If we compare them and see them together, at the end of the day nothing
other than ‘Europe united in diversity’ may become a theme of the open-air museums.
At the same time, the Swedish Skansen and the Polish skansens, if explored carefully,
could tell the European story about modernity and modernization. As it has been al-
ready claimed, open-air museums may be recognized as institutional indicators of mod-
ernization. Where and when such museums appear is where and when modernization
is happening. Furthermore, the very process of ‘rescuing’ the remnants of a ‘disappear-
ing order’ (e.g. traditional wooden architecture or peasant culture) is a part of that
modernization. It always occurs according to the rules set by the ‘rescuers’ (monument
conservators, museum managers, ethnographers, art historians as well as their political
patrons and the public), and it confirms a relationship of dominance between them and
whatever they consider worthy of rescuing.
Taking the above-mentioned into consideration, it becomes clear that the connec-
tions between museums (not only of the open-air kind) and history calls for attention
and understanding. These relations may be examined at several, at least three, levels.
The first one is the historical aspect of the museum presentation itself, considered
both from the perspective of the collection and the audience. On the one hand, it is
a history of the institution’s foundation, development and maintenance (collecting, ex-
hibiting, organizing events and programmes, as well as staff and location changes, etc.).
On the other hand, it means the history of institutional effect on the visitors, as well as
the shaping of the culture of memory (especially when the museum narrative appears in
book format or if an exhibition becomes a film setting etc.).
The second level is the history of the subject of exhibition as a result of the objec-
tive dynamics in the presented world as well as the historical changeability of the ways
of its social perception. In this context, the selection of the moment and the mode of
‘arresting the time’ made by the museum for its exhibition is worth exploring because
this choice is always necessary, although it is not always consciously undertaken and ap-
plied consistently.
The last, third, level is the historicity of cultural policy environment, which is re-
flected in changing contexts of opening and functioning (and sometimes also closing)
of museums. To mention just a few crucial aspects here: models of local, regional, na-
tional and international cultural policy; social processes of constructing and valoriza-
tion of heritage; manifestations of ideological instrumentalization of cultural activity;
technologies of protection of the accumulated collection and of making it visible and
accessible for the public; the budget of free time for leisure in society and practices
of its use.
***
Let me finish by returning to the witty sentence about the heritage growth anti-utopia,
when the whole country becomes one big open air museum, and you just join it as you get
off at Heathrow, quoted in the introduction. I would like to pay attention to a rather un-
derestimated and perhaps even unconsciously used component of this phrase, namely
an airport terminal, which may be related to Marc Augé’s notion of the ‘non-place’ as
a (super)modern transitional space dedicated only (or mainly) for movement of peo-
ple and goods, and therefore vanished from any relations to the history, identity and
locality.31
The presence of an iconic example of an Augéan ‘non-place’, the Heathrow termi-
nal, in the vision of the transformation of Great Britain into a country-covering open-
air museum confirms, once again, the tight relationship between heritage protection
and (super)modernity. Moreover, it also reminds us who ‘misses’, or who is allowed to
‘experience’ heritage. Open-air museums, as well as other institutions protecting the re-
mains from the past, are nowadays dedicated mainly to ‘people from the outside’, rather
than inhabitants. As the main target group of open-air museums may be, thus, indicated
a very heterogeneous group of post-nostalgia tourists, who are able to yearn for some-
thing which they did not experience nor lose themselves, including both pre-industrial
and pre-nation-state premodernity and early-modern ways of their ‘heritageization’.
A travel through Augéan non-places is, of course, not the only way of separating
people from things, which favors contemporary nostalgia. This goal is also achieved by
many other means, such as literal translocation of objects, place marketing, inventing
‘destinations’ for tourists and – last but not least – professionalization of the gaze. The
31
See: M. Augé, Non-Places. Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity, transl. by J. Howe, Lon-
don–New York 1995.
point of view established by heritage professionals becomes the only one authorized
as ‘authentic’ one, and it has often almost nothing in common with traditional ‘local
knowledge’ of people who used to live immersed in ‘heritage’ before it actually became
heritage. That is why one day you could wake up in your own village or town just to re-
alize that you are living on a cemetery or in Disneyland. The only way out, then, will be
to pass through the closest airport terminal.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anderson B., Imagined Communities. Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Lon-
don 1983.
Anioł W., “Dom Ludu po renowacji”, in W. Anioł, Szlak Norden. Modernizacja po skandy-
nawsku, Warszawa 2013.
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London–New York 1995.
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<http://dx.doi.org/ 10.1111/1467-954X.00161>.
Bryman A., The Disneyization of Society, Thousand Oaks 2004.
Bukowiecki Ł., “Between a Cemetery and Disneyland: A Cultural History of the Sądecki Eth-
nographic Park”, in W. Szymański, M. Ujma (eds.), Pany chłopy chłopy pany. Masters peasants
peasants masters, transl. by E. Kowal, Nowy Sącz 2016.
Bukowiecki Ł., Czas przeszły zatrzymany. Kulturowa historia skansenów w Szwecji i w Polsce,
Warszawa 2015.
Certeau M. de, “Spatial Stories”, in M. de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life, transl. by
S. Rendall, Berkeley 1984.
Czajkowski J., Muzea na wolnym powietrzu w Europie. Historia – dzień dzisiejszy – perspektywy,
Rzeszów–Sanok 1984.
Czajkowski J., Czajnik M., Midura F. (eds.), Open-Air Museums in Poland, transl. by E. Goździak,
J. Rogalińska, Poznań 1981.
Frykman J., Löfgren O., Den kultiverade människan, Lund 1979 [Eng. Culture Builders. A His-
torical Anthropology of Middle-class Life, transl. by A. Crozier, New Brunswick 1987; Pl.
Narodziny człowieka kulturalnego. Studium z antropologii historycznej szwedzkiej klasy
średniej, transl. by G. Sokół, Kęty 2007].
Harvey D.C., “Heritage Pasts and Heritage Presents: Temporality, Meaning and the Scope of
Heritage Studies”, International Journal of Heritage Studies, vol. 7, no. 4 (2001), at <http://
dx.doi.org/10.1080/13581650120105534>.
Jackowski A., “Czy wymyślilibyśmy dzisiaj muzea etnograficzne?”, Śląskie Prace Etnograficzne,
vol. 2 (1993).
Janion M., Projekt krytyki fantazmatycznej. Szkice o egzystencjach ludzi i duchów, Warszawa 1991.
Kowalski K., O istocie dziedzictwa europejskiego – rozważania, Kraków 2013.
Łopatyńska H.M., “Rola mediów w kreowaniu wizerunku muzeów jako instytucji przekazu-
jących dziedzictwo kulturowe”, Biuletyn Stowarzyszenia Muzeów na Wolnym Powietrzu
w Polsce, no. 11 (2009).
Lowenthal D., The Heritage Crusade and the Spoils of History, Cambridge 1998.
Midura F., “Wstęp”, in J. Czajkowski, M. Czajnik, F. Midura (eds.), Muzea skansenowskie
w Polsce, Poznań 1979.
Rentzhog S., Open Air Museums. The History and Future of a Visionary Idea, transl. by S.V. Airey,
Östersund 2007.
Selby M., Understanding Urban Tourism. Image, Culture and Experience, London–New York
2004.
Urry J., Larsen J., The Tourist Gaze 3.0, London 2011.
Węcławowicz G., Łotocka M., Baucz A. (eds.), Rozwój miast w Polsce. Raport wprowadzający
Ministerstwa Rozwoju Regionalnego opracowany na potrzeby przygotowania przeglądu OECD
krajowej polityki miejskiej w Polsce, Ministerstwo Rozwoju Regionalnego, Warszawa 2010, at
<http://eregion.wzp.pl/sites/default/files/rozwoj_miast_w_polsce_0.pdf>.
Łukasz BUKOWIECKI is a PhD candidate, cultural studies researcher and cultural

historian affiliated with the Institute of Polish Culture at the University of Warsaw,
Poland. In 2015 he published a monograph devoted to the cultural history and social
function of open-air museums in Sweden and Poland (Czas przeszły zatrzymany. Kul-
turowa historia skansenów w Szwecji i w Polsce, Warszawa 2015). He has also contrib-
uted articles to the main Polish academic journals in the humanities, including Teksty
Drugie, Przegląd Humanistyczny and Kultura Współczesna. His main fields of interest
include: cultural heritage protection and history of its institutionalization, urban cul-
ture, ‘northern neighbourhood’ of Central Europe, Warsaw cultural history.
Łucja PIEKARSKA-DURAJ
Jagiellonian University in Kraków
lucja.piekarska-duraj@uj.edu.pl
Barbara TÖRNQUIST-PLEWA
Lund University
barbara.tornquist-plewa@slav.lu.se
EUROPEANIZATION IN REGIONAL MUSEUMS?

EXAMPLES FROM SWEDEN AND POLAND
ABSTRACT European museums have undergone major changes in recent decades, mirror-
ing many of the social and cultural processes taking place in Europe. Two of the
main issues that have shaped the public discourse concerning cultural heritage
are that of democratization and civil participation, both of which have not only
mobilized policies but also redefined musealized heritage. At the same time,
a ‘new museology’ approach, where heritage is understood as a dynamic con-
struct, shared and interpreted by communities rather than monopolized by ex-
ternal authorities, has inspired many museums to rethink their visions and pro-
grams. While heritage democratization processes may be found both in the
Lund and Tarnów museums, there are considerable differences between the two
of them. The article examines these with the use of several concepts from core
civilizational ideas such as: utility, progress, dignity, democratic governance and
inclusion. In both cases, heritage is used to support the present political legacy:
in the Swedish case, the emphasis is openly put on diversity and civil empower-
ment, whereas in Tarnów the narrative of past glory overwhelms other aspects
of the past. Nevertheless, it is the European concept of the ‘person’ which stands
behind both of them, however vague and complex its conceptualization may be.
Key words: regional museums, heritage, democratization, Europeanization

26 Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
This article examines two regional museums, the Kulturen Museum in Lund in Swe-
den and the District Museum of Tarnów in Poland, in order to explore to what extent
their practices are related to the processes of Europeanization. The term Europeaniza-
tion denotes here a multidimensional process of the transformation of European soci-
eties under the influence of European integration. It includes, as has been argued by
many scholars,1 changes in the selection and interpretation of cultural heritage at the
local, regional and national levels. This process is multidirectional and encompasses
both the vertical and horizontal diffusion of ideas: the top-down actions of EU insti-
tutions, bottom-up initiatives of individuals and organisations, and the transnational,
horizontal exchanges of ideas resulting from the intensification of cooperation at all
levels of European society.2
Both Sweden and Poland are countries that became members of the EU relatively
late (Sweden 1995 and Poland 2004) whilst having been members long enough to par-
ticipate in the EU’s politics of heritage and memory.3 Thus, it seems justified to ask to
what extent the ideas of Europe and what is European heritage and memory, are to be
found on the regional and local level. In other words: how is Europe present and ar-
ticulated (or not) in such popular institutions as museums focused on the history and
culture of a specific place?
There are several reasons which warrant the exploration of museums in studies of
the Europeanization processes of heritage. First of all, they present a high level of the in-
stitutionalization of social memory while at the same time remaining dynamic lieux de
mémoire, as well as – in a number of cases – constituting significant public spaces where
diverse debates may be held. Secondly, museums frequently strive to support the myth-
ological aspect of collective identities by emphasizing continuity. As such, they give
a particular community (a locality, region, nation etc.) access to symbolic resources. Fi-
nally, museums themselves are much more than custodians of the past: they should also
be seen as interpreters who want to have their say when various identities are construct-
ed. Having said that, it should be emphasized that the museums of the 21st century in
Europe are – perhaps more so than ever before – experiencing significant transforma-
tions which, on the one hand, affirms their relevance but, on the other, makes research-
ing them a quite challenging task.
1
See, for example: M. Sassatelli, Becoming Europeans. Cultural Identity and Cultural Policies, New York
2009; or C. Shore, “Inventing Homo Europaeus: The Cultural Politics of European Integration”, Eth-
nologia Europaea. Journal of European Ethnology, vol. 29, no. 2 (1999), pp. 53-66.
2
For a general description of these processes see: K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa, “Heritage and Me-
mory in a Changing Europe. Introductory Remarks”, in iidem (eds.), The Europeanization of Heritage
and Memories in Poland and Sweden, Kraków 2016, pp. 15-32.
3
For more about this aspect see: ibid.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 Europeanization in Regional Museums?… 27
THE ‘NEW MUSEOLOGY’ AND EUROPEANIZATION
In order to examine and compare the complex practices of the two selected museums
from the point of view of Europeanization, we have developed an analytical framework
based on studies of the processes of heritage Europeanization and the propositions of
the so called ‘new museology’ that aims to transform museums from contemplation
and presentation spaces into living lieux de mémoire.4
As pointed out by several researchers,5 the EU’s politics of heritage and memory
since around 2007 has evolved from the emphasis on the common contents and events
in the European past to the foregrounding of common frames and modes for interpret-
ing the past. The idea behind this change of focus is to integrate the many national
perspectives that are frequently in conflict with each other into a common value frame-
work that would make it possible for the different views on the past to co-exist with-
out causing conflicts. Thus, in line with this politics, the past should be interpreted
through the prism of values seen as historically embedded in Europe. The most impor-
tant of them, such as freedom, democracy, tolerance, respect for humans, citizen and
minority rights, cultural pluralism, rule of law, and democracy have been articulated in
a number of the EU’s documents.6 This new way of looking at European heritage has
been reflected in the numerous programmes and, actions by the EU as well as in the
policy documents such as the European Commission’s document, Mapping of cultural
heritage actions in European Union policies, programmes and activities, issued in 2014.7 It
is noteworthy that as the first priority area this document mentions: cultural diversity,
intercultural dialogue and accessible and inclusive culture.8
An important point that we want to make here is that the views on cultural heri-
tage promoted within the EU, and pointed out above, are very much in tune with the
ideas of the new museology which calls for making a shift from the official narratives of
4
The movement of ‘new museology’ brought changes which eventually redefined museums as public
institutions in the 21st century. By highlighting the democratic aspect of heritage, not only the traditio-
nal authority of museums (as having monopoly on interpreting the past) was questioned, but new ways
of sharing collective identity were introduced, with eco-museums as models for community b ased, inc-
lusive lieux de mémoire. New museology is considered to have originated, among others, from the crisis
of the nation state which took place in the 1960s in Western Europe and can be symbolized by the fall
of de Gaulle’s rule in France. See: P. Vergo (ed.), The New Museology, London 1989.
5
For example: A. Sierp, History, Memory, and Trans-European Identity. Unifying Divisions, New York–
–London 2014; O. Calligaro, Negotiating Europe. EU Promotion of Europeanness since the 1950s, New
York 2013; K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa, “Heritage and Memory…”.
6
For example in the Lisbon Treaty. See: “A Europe of rights and values”, Treaty of Lisbon, at <http://
ec.europa.eu/archives/lisbon_treaty/glance/rights_values/index_en.htm>, 16 November 2016.
7
European Commission, Mapping of Cultural Heritage actions in European Union policies, program-
mes and activities, August 2017, at <http://ec.europa.eu/assets/eac/culture/library/reports/2014-
heritage-mapping_en.pdf>, 15 March 2017. For more examples see: K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Ple-
wa, “Heritage and Memory…”.
8
Ibid.
a sacralized past towards people, participation and the intangible.9 Moreover, the new
museology wants to place the person at the center of any museum’s narrative and fore-
ground the concepts such as human dignity, democratization and inclusion.10 In the
domain of heritage, where fragments and remains of the past are transformed into its
representations, the question of symbolic violence imposed by specific social classes is
fundamental. The distribution of symbolic resources is never totally equal and in muse-
ums not all voices can be made heard in the symphonies of the past. However, accord-
ing to the idea of new museology, museums can be a part of democratization processes
and even promote democracy in general by striving for multivocality, instead of con-
structing heritage by only recreating the official discourse of the past.
A large number of contemporary museums are aware of the fact that representing
the past requires the diversification of exhibits and interpretive perspectives. Yet, the
diversity of testimonies of the past is often very difficult to acquire, especially when it
comes to heritages of previously marginalized groups – it is much easier to illustrate the
past with official documents and objects of public significance. The new museology
postulates that in museums of the 21st century the question of diversity is important
and should be taken into account not only in exhibitions but also in terms of outreach
for various audiences and the effective inclusion of different groups into the interpre-
tation of musealized heritage. Thus, not only democracy, inclusion and participation,
but also diversity are key words in the new museology. Also noteworthy is the atten-
tion placed by the proponents of the new museology on the question of narrativity.
With the impossibility for museums to provide direct access to the past and with the
limitations of museum representation, there is always a need for interpretation which
comes in various forms of storytelling, as the exhibits are usually speechless on their
own. Generally speaking, narrativity in museums is a way of building new senses to the
exhibits and at the same time strengthening the linearity of a story, which, in turn, sup-
ports the continuity and construction of collective identity. The figure of continuity
can furthermore be reinforced by the idea of (and faith in) progress, firmly rooted in
European culture since the Enlightenment and narrated widely in European museums.
Progress, which can be seen as a linear story directed towards a better future, need not
be limited to civilizational optimism, but in fact gives meaning to all efforts of humans
when they keep improving their lives. Furthermore it should be added that many mu-
seums of the 21st century often aspire to be recognized in terms of their utility: be it
civil or educational utility. They are prepared to teach, inspire and contribute to the
development of a number of practical skills. Unlike in classical museums, the heritage
on display in many 21st century museums is no longer self-explanatory, being valuable
only for the fact it belongs to the sacralized past which cannot be recreated. There has
been a significant shift from museums as the ‘temples of muses’ towards more open
9
For more discussion about the ideas of the new museology see: G. Anderson (ed.), Reinventing the
Museum. Historical and Contemporary Perspectives on the Paradigm Shift, New York 2004; as well
P. Vergo (ed.), The New Museology.
10
See: Ł. Piekarska-Duraj, “Democratization as an Aspect of Heritage Europeanization. The Museum
Triangle”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization…, pp. 33-58.
and inclusive institutions, with an emphasis on the profane rather than the sacred. As
argued by Jean Clair, in terms of a culture without a cult, the positioning of museums
has proven to be very complex.11 It could even be said that the museums of today strive
to justify their raisons d’être by pointing more or less directly to their usefulness and
informing their clients and sponsors about their missions and visions. This utilitarian
aspect is also very much in line with the European Union’s policies regarding heritage.12
Noteworthy in this context is a correspondence between the ideas of utility in the mod-
ern museums and education. As shown above, it is one of the many ideational connec-
tions between the two.
Therefore, the juxtaposing of the main directions in the European politics of heri-
tage, and the main ideas of the new museology, demonstrates that they are closely relat-
ed.13 They display many ideational connections and overlap in regard to the values and
qualities they want to foreground in heritage work. This insight has led us to identify
a set of seven value-based elements which are common for the discourses of the new
museology and the EU’s ideas on heritage. We propose regarding them as core qualities
to be used as an analytical tool, a yardstick to investigate the Europeanization of heri-
tage in museums. These seven qualities, which we see as the bearers of certain European
values and regard as indicators of Europeanization, are: progress, utility, dignity, diver-
sity, inclusion, narrativity and democratic governance.
Thus, we suggest that scholars investigating the Europeanization of heritage in mu-
seums could consider the seven core qualities and operationalize them in the form of
questions put to their material. After placing them in a specific order, one obtains the
acronym of pudding which makes it easy to use in the research field, as all the ele-
ments can easily be re-conceptualized and also memorized by researchers during the
analytical process.
PUDDING: WHAT DOES IT STAND FOR?
There is a set of issues to raise with each letter and the concept which it stands for in
the acronym.14 When analyzing progress in museums, a general story line should be
looked at.15 This is not to say – in terms of Europeanization – that only linear stories
11
J. Clair, Malaise dans les musées, Paris 2007.
12
See: European Commission, Mapping of Cultural Heritage actions…
13
Indeed, it should be noted that the new museology is not exclusively European, but largely a global
development in heritage management. However, this just supports the argument by Gerard Delanty
that Europeanization should be seen in relation to globalization. See: G. Delanty, The Cosmopolitan
Imagination. The Renewal of Critical Social Theory, Cambridge 2009.
14
The concept of European pudding is introduced and developed in: Ł. Piekarska-Duraj, The Invisible
Hand of Europe (manuscript in progress).
15
See Tony Benett’s idea of museums’ ‘vision’ as a way of conceptualizing museums for analysis in:
T. Bennett, “Civic Seeing: Museums and the Organisation of Vision”, in S. MacDonald (ed.), A Com-
panion to Museum Studies, Hoboken 2011, pp. 236-281.
can be considered European: other models of storytelling are also present in European
museums, with multivocality perhaps the most democratic one. Yet in museum narra-
tives, progress could be found in most general attitude of the present to the past and
especially in their particular abilities to grasp social change.
In terms of the utility of museums’ visions, missions and activities should be fo-
cused on, with special attention given to what they teach (in terms of competences,
skills), but also if they involve some kind of public mission (for example, in promot-
ing tolerance and appreciating differences) or are active local players. With museums’
analysis, the point of utility is to be useful, not only to prove the symbolic significance
in conserving the past.16
The third element of the framework is dignity, with the concept of the person,
human rights and free will at its heart. Research concerning this idea should comprise
a closer look at the ways individuals are presented in a museum, but also if any sensitive
heritage is dealt with care. With sensitive heritage, the question is actually more signifi-
cant than ‘paying respect to ancestors’, because – as strengthened by the complimentary
rules of progress and of continuity – the museums’ audiences should also feel respected
in their private and individual approaches. Dignity can be most evidently traced when
any remains of human bodies are musealized and the question of the necessity of such
public burial arises.
To comply with the logic of individual value, another indicator of Europeanization
should be examined and that is the value of diversity – clearly present in the EU’s
programmatic motto ‘Unity in Diversity’. Diversity17 can be first of all operationalized
in museums when referring to: objects and exhibits; narrative strategies and storytell-
ing; audiences and other client groups – especially in terms of their participation in
museum’s activities. Since the diversity of the presented past can be defined as the op-
posite of monolithic and univocal, when one addresses this issue in museum research,18
the main point would be to look at the complexity of the presentation of the past: in
terms of class and gender representations as well as other minority narratives.19 The
latter is also an indicator of inclusion, the next element of the analytical framework
presented here. Inclusion could be regarded in its relation to the unique value of an in-
dividual and his/her abilities to comprehend the heritage on display, but at the same
time an inclusive exhibition would be one where unofficial and marginalized heritages
are present and audiences are encouraged to participate in interpreting the museum’s
messages.20 As mentioned already, museums operate within certain limits of represen-
16
On the influence of the Enlightenment ideas on heritage in museums see: M. O’Neill, “Enlightenment
Museums: Universal or Merely Global?”, Museum and Society, vol. 2, no. 3 (2004).
17
The issue of diversity in relation to exhibiting particularities and cultural systems was thoroughly dis
cussed by Tony Benett in: T. Bennett, “Exhibition, Difference, and the Logic of Culture”, in I. Karp,
C. Kratz, L. Szwaja (eds.), Museum Frictions. Public Cultures/Global Transformations, Durham 2006,
pp. 46-69.
18
See: D.J. Sherman, Museums and Difference, Bloomington 2008.
19
See: T.W. Luke, Museum Politics. Power Plays at the Exhibition, Minneapolis 2002.
20
See: R. Sandell (ed.), Museums, Society, Inequality, London 2002.
tation. Therefore, interpretation (of objects and intangible heritages) is a crucial factor
when it comes to giving access to the resources of the past by museums. Museums not
only store and produce numerous stories but also take part in creating heritage and thus
public discourse in general.
Narrativity, which is another element in the pudding framework, should be
researched in relation to all of a museum’s discursive practices, with storytelling as the
most obvious one. The main questions would be: whose stories are told, what is the
narrative perspective of the museum (is it striving to be transparent or rather subjec-
tive) and – last but not least – how successful museums are in helping to set relations
between the visitors and heritage. Narrativity,21 as the potential to interpret objects by
telling stories, compliments the value of progress and the general time model struc-
tured for representation purposes in museums, as well as revealing if visitors are actually
able to create their own stories by identifying with some aspects of heritage on display.
Another perspective to discuss narrativity can be found in mission statements, where
museums often aim to present themselves as either interpreters or neutral transmitters
of the past.
What can be seen as the cherry on top of the pudding model is the question of
democratic governance, understood both as a way of influencing the contempo-
rary political scene and reflecting a museum’s way of narrating the power relations of
the past exhibited.22 This element of analysis is also directly connected to the prob-
lem of utility, as it shows how museums answer the needs of providing their visitors
and communities with opportunities to develop civil competencies. Another aspect
of governance which can be analyzed is the museum’s involvement in local affairs, be
it by creating unique outreach programs for local communities or catalyzing local ini-
tiatives. This is also an effective way of interpreting museums’ political programs and
ideologies, both performed publicly and on the backstage. The question of democracy
is essential in this case, finalizing the whole set of research issues by examining from an
ideological perspective the problems of: inclusion of audiences and minority narratives,
opportunities for participation, equality in representation and – again – the notion of
integrity of a person, as a key concept to the logic of democracy.
In the following we will use the proposed analytical model of pudding to investi-
gate two regional museums, the Museum of Cultural History and Open-Air Museum
in Lund called Kulturen in Sweden and the Main Building, located at the Town Hall,
a branch of the District Museum in Tarnów in Poland. In our view, such a comparison
can broaden the horizon of reflection on the processes of heritage Europeanization in
museums and, at the same time, give us the opportunity to test the new analytical tool,
described above.
21
The discursive practice in relation to history creation was presented among others in: D.J. Sherman,
I. Rogoff (eds.), Museum Culture. Histories, Discourses, Spectacles, Minneapolis 1994.
22
It is very useful in this context to use Michel Foucault’s theory where the notions of inclusion and in-
clusions are revealed in their relation to the power systems. See: B. Lord, “Foucault’s Museum: Diffe-
rence, Representation and Genealogy”, Museum and Society, vol. 4, no. 1 (2006).
THE KULTUREN MUSEUM IN LUND
Kulturen is the second oldest open-air museum in Sweden and probably in the world.
It was opened in 1882, just one year after Skansen in Stockholm, the model for other
open-air museums in Europe.23 The founder of Kulturen and the managing director un-
til 1933 was, Georg Karlin. Like Arthur Hazelius, the founder of Skansen, Karlin was
influenced by the ideals of national romanticism. He observed the gradual disappear-
ance of the old farming society in Southern Sweden and wanted to preserve its traces
for posterity and also wished to rescue objects from the medieval period in Lund.24
Therefore, the museum he created was destined from the beginning to function both
as a regional museum and the local museum for the city of Lund.
The main part of Kulturen is located near the historic Lund cathedral in central
Lund. The museum consists of a number of exhibitions mounted in several buildings
and an open-air museum which was built according to the pavilion system, inspired by
the international exhibitions of the 19th century. It includes over 30 different buildings,
most of them moved from the different parts of the city and the countryside, originat-
ing from different epochs, from the Middle Ages to the 1930s. Around the houses there
are street settings and gardens.25 Kulturen has a large and unique collection of more
than two million items. The visitor can choose from among twenty exhibitions – from
folk art to modern design, from medieval history to the present day, from local culture
to world culture.
With the proposed analytical framework of pudding, we approached Kulturen
in order to trace the signs of the Europeanization of heritage in the museum’s activities
and exhibition. We analyzed a number of documents where the vision and mission of
the museum is formulated, the exhibitions and, last but not least, Kulturen’s work with
visitors and outreach in general. The methods applied were: content analysis, close
reading of the museum’s policy documents, visual analysis of exhibitions, participant
observation and interviews with some of the employees (director, former director and
communicator – responsible for PR).
23
For more about Skansen see the contribution by Ł. Bukowiecki in this volume.
24
In the 1890s, when the city dug its first sewers, he began to collect the finds from the excavations. At
several places in the open-air museum the visitor can see fragments of medieval buildings, chiefly from
demolished medieval churches in Lund. There is a large concentration of these in the Lapidarium.
25
In the 1920s, thanks to a generous donation, Karlin was also able to acquire a farm in Östarp, east of
Lund, where he created a museum in the middle of the existing cultural landscape. Besides this, the vi-
sitor can experience other places, included in the museum: Hökeriet, which is the oldest grocery s tore
in Lund, the Museum of Life (Livets museum), which is about the human body functions, and the
Museum of Medical History in Helsingborg.
THE MISSION AND VISION OF KULTUREN
Kulturen was founded under the auspices of the nonprofit organization called the Cul-
tural-Historical Association for Southern Sweden (Kulturhistoriska föreningen för sö-
dra Sverige) which until today is the museum’s main administrator. The association,
the regional government of Scania and the Lund municipality share the costs of the
museum (one third each). The main mission for Kulturen is expressed in the statutes
of the association which state that its goal is to collect and preserve the tangible cultural
heritage with special focus on southern Swedish cultural history and in connection there-
with promote research and education as well conduct activities related to these tasks.26 The
other two principals of the museum, the regional authorities and municipality, add to
this main mission some more specific duties formulated in special documents. Thus,
the regional authorities want the museum to develop international contacts but, first
and foremost, to work actively with ‘accessibility’,27 with a particular focus on children,
youth and national minorities. The idea of accessibility as a part of a policy of inclu-
sion is also emphasized in the documents formulating the tasks assigned to Kulturen
by the Lund municipality. In connection to the concept of inclusion the city encour-
ages the museum to promote ‘hospitality’.28 Additionally, as an important undertak-
ing for Kulturen, the city highlights the need to work with ‘sustainable development’,
including economic development and tourism. It points to the utilitarian aspects in
heritage work.
Values such as democracy and inclusion have been vitally important for Kulturen’s
work for many years, which is evidenced in the museum’s annual reports.29 However, in
2016, the museum found it necessary to adopt a special policy document called Kul-
turen’s Värdegrund (Kulturen’s Principal Values in our translation). This was due to the
museum’s controversies with non-liberal actors such as the Embassy of Iran and the
nationalist party Swedish Democrats that were denied the opportunity to rent the mu-
seum’s conference facilities. In this context, the museum wished to make its ideological
position clear.
Consequently, the document Kulturen’s Principal Values declares that Kulturen is
firmly grounded in such values as democracy, equality, diversity, accessibility and equal
value of each person and that it wants to contribute to open and democratic society which
affirms diversity. Additionally, the museum wants to contribute to social cohesion and
26
See the statutes: Föreningens stadgar, Kulturen, at <https://www.kulturen.com/om-kulturen/
vardegrund-vision-och-uppdrag/foreningens-stadgar/>, 21 February 2017. Translation from Swedish
made by the authors.
27
See Kulturen’s official document Principal Values, Mission and Vision: Regionalt uppdrag, Kulturen,
at <https://www.kulturen.com/om-kulturen/vardegrund-vision-och-uppdrag/regionalt-uppdrag/>,
21 February 2017. Translation from Swedish made by the authors.
28
Ibid.
29
For the annual reports see: Kulturens verksamhetsberättelse 2015 (Kulturen’s annual report from 2015),
at <http://online.pubhtml5.com/lbgr/etzh/#p=4>, 1 March 2017. This was also stated by the mu-
seum’s communicator Johan Hofvdahl in the interview conducted 16 March 2016.
creation of a society where everyone feels included and welcome. It is even stated that we
have courage and dare take a position on issues relating to human equality and further:
In the matter of cooperation and business relations Kulturen should not have any connec-
tion with the parties or representatives of the parties whose values conflict with the values of
Kulturen. This does not prevent us to initiate or contribute to activities that include or may
include dialogue with such parties.30
This policy document discloses that Kulturen is involved in the ideological strug-
gles at play in Sweden and elsewhere in Europe and that it wishes to take a stand in
terms of the values emphasized by the EU. In light of that, it can be argued that on the
level of discourse present in the museum’s policy documents, Kulturen implements val-
ues, declared as ‘European’ in the EU’s documents. The question is how it is translated
to the museum’s activities, its exhibition and work with outreach.
EXHIBITIONS
At the time of conducting our field study at Kulturen (February-March 2017), the mu-
seum had fifteen so-called ‘base exhibitions’ (more or less permanent) and five tempo-
rary ones. The permanent exhibitions as a whole tell a story about how people of all
social layers lived in villages and towns in southern Sweden, especially Scania, from the
early medieval period until around the middle of the 20th century. Everyday life and
work is emphasized and some focus is put on Lund’s history as a dynamic center of ec-
clesiastic, scientific and artistic life in this part of Europe. Thus, it is first and foremost
regional and local heritage, and not the national one, that is foregrounded and the ac-
cent is on the region’s and city’s contacts with neighboring European countries, espe-
cially Denmark (to which the region belonged until 1658) and Germany.
In its promotional materials, the museum promises to take the visitor on a journey
through time.31 For this purpose, the exhibition narratives are structured in linear way,
irrespective of the topic: glass or ceramics, toys, textiles, weapons, foods or agricultural
tools. The visitor follows the development of different objects or phenomena in chron-
ological order. In this linear narrative the idea of progress as an unquestionable value
comes forward. This is especially striking in the exhibition on the history of the book,
starting with papyrus and ending with e-books as well in the exhibition on the history
of Lund University. The exhibitions express a pride in human progress and the local
contribution to it in the form of scientific inventions, for example a dialysis machine. It
is also noteworthy that the museum educators emphasize the contrast during the guid-
ed tours between then and now to the disadvantage of the past. The past often stands
for poverty, dirt, diseases, hunger, injustice and very hard work while the modern time
30
See: Kulturens värdegrund (Kulturen’s Principal Values), Kulturen, at <http://www.kulturen.com/
wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Kulturens-v%C3%A4rdegrund.pdf>, 1 March 2017.
31
This is stated in the majority of Kulturen’s information booklets.
brings the promise of welfare, a high level of hygiene and health care, medical inven-
tions and democratic society.32
The stories about life in the past are often told from the perspective of the individu-
als that lived in the buildings preserved at the open-air museum, which appeals to the
visitor’s imagination and enables their identification with people from the past. How-
ever, the specific persons or families described are not important in themselves as real
figures that existed, but as representatives of groups and examples of the way of life. In
some cases even stories about fictitious figures are created for the same purpose. There
are no heroes in the presented narratives. Thus, groups and collectives seemed to be
more important than individuals. The value of dignity is mostly connected to groups
and their work. The exhibition presenting how folk crafts have inspired modern profes-
sional artists can serve as an example in this respect. In this exhibition it is the folk artist
that is acclaimed, not any famous professional designer. Special attention is paid to the
need of the folk craftsmen to put their name, initials or special marks on their work. The
folk artist is compared here with the professional artist and recognized as equal in its
creativity, skills and human desire to leave a trace behind and be remembered. This kind
of representation: dignifying a folk artist and equating her or him with the professional
one, seems to be in line with the egalitarian ideas firmly rooted in Swedish society,33 and
reminds one about equality as an important value stated in museum policy documents.
Furthermore, it should be pointed out that Kulturen cherishes diversity. The muse-
um offers a great diversity of objects and milieus on display: archeological findings, ag-
ricultural and fishery tools from different epochs, all kind of textiles, folk craft, kitchen
utensils, glass, ceramics, books, printing machines, toys etc. Moreover, temporary exhi-
bitions can contain paintings, photographs, video recordings and other art objects. The
museum also presents a great variety of buildings and interiors: farm buildings from
different parts of Southern Sweden, a vicarage, church and city houses. However, it is
more important to highlight the fact that from its very inception Kulturen had ambi-
tions to show the lives of different social groups and classes. In 1882 it was mostly about
settings from the four estates – the nobility, the clergy, the burghers, and the peasants –
into which the Swedish Parliament was divided before 1866. Later on, the representa-
tions of the living conditions of other social groups were added: Professor Thoman-
der’s house (representing intellectuals/middle class) and a worker’s family house from
the 1930s.
Besides showing social and economic diversity, the museum cares for paying atten-
tion to the gender aspects of narratives in its exhibits. Thus, for example, the exhibition
about peasant life in Scania from the 17th to the 19th century makes the work of women
on the farm salient and tells in details about women’s life, their health problems, child
care, role in the economy etc. Furthermore the exhibition on Lund University’s history
points out how late the women were allowed to study at the university level and how
32
Observations done during such a tour on 16 March 2016, confirmed in the interview with Björn Ma-
gnusson Staaf former manager at Kulturen, conducted 24 March 2017.
33
As pointed out by J. Frykman, O. Löfgren, Den kultiverade människan, Lund 1979.
much the life of female students differed from their male peers. Also, female folk craft
is especially celebrated at Kulturen in the form of displays of beautiful woven rugs, em-
broideries and hand sewn cloths.
Diversity as a value is also expressed in the exhibitions that show how the culture of
this part of Sweden was influenced by impulses coming from diverse cultures. Danish
culture is obvious in this context since the region of South Sweden belonged to Den-
mark for centuries. Yet, the exhibitions also demonstrate other influences such as Ital-
ian (glass production), Chinese (ceramics) and first and foremost German (production
of glass and ceramics, weapons, influence in science, higher education and arts). Ad-
ditionally, the exhibition about Modernity underscores the fact that the artists from
Lund got their inspiration from Berlin, Paris and Vienna and that they themselves in-
fluenced European trends in design and architecture at the end of the 19th and begin-
ning of the 20th century.
However, in regard to representations of minorities, not much is to be found in
Kulturen’s permanent exhibitions. Indeed, in the newest permanent exhibition, the
one about Modernity, the existence of sexual minorities is made visible to some extent
in the connection to the interpretation of few paintings by the famous Swedish artist
Gösta Adrian Nilsson (called GAN), who lived as a homosexual. Nevertheless, the rep-
resentations of national or ethnic minorities are conspicuous in their absence. On the
one hand, it may be not surprising since Sweden until the World War II was relatively
homogeneous in terms of ethnicity, with the exception of the Sami people living in the
north, small groups of Roma spread over the country and small groups of mainly Jewish
immigrants (who were allowed to settle in Sweden as late as at the end of the 18th cen-
tury). On the other hand, over the last 70 years or so, the migrants continued to come
to Sweden in smaller and larger waves and changed Swedish society, including that of
southern Sweden and thus one may wonder why the narratives about them are missing.
The exception from this silence about minorities and migrants constitutes the exhi-
bition To Survive – Voices from Ravensbrück which is based on witness stories and small
objects submitted by a group of Polish and Jewish women who came to Sweden 1945
from the German concentration camp in Ravensbrück thanks to the rescue action con-
ducted by the Swedish Red Cross. Many of them chose to stay in Sweden after the end
of the war. The exhibition was opened 27 January 200534 and should be seen as a part
of the interest in the history of Holocaust that awoke in Sweden shortly after the coun-
try became member of the EU.35 Sweden joined (and even became a leader of ) the EU’s
politics of memory in regard to Holocaust remembrance, seen by the EU as a tool to
promote democratic values and prevent racism and nationalism.36 These educational
34
The exhibition can also be seen on the web: To Survive – Voices from Ravensbrück, Kulturen, at
<http://ravensbruck.kulturen.com/English/r1.htm#>, 3 March 2017.
35
See: B. Magnusson Staaf, “The White Buses Creating Remembrance of the Second World War in Swe-
den”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization…, pp. 163-188.
36
See: B. Törnquist-Plewa, “The Europeanization of the Memory and Heritage of the Second World
War and the Holocaust in Sweden”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization…,
pp. 133-162.
and ideological goals of the European politics of memory correspond well to Kulturen’s
own motivation for opening the exhibition, as expressed in the following statement:
Among the millions of items in our vast collection of cultural history, we have now chosen
to bring forth these artifacts. We do so, because it is needed. Presently, in Sweden racism
has been on the rise. Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, homophobia are increasing. Have we
not learned anything from history? We see what developed then! Don’t we see what is hap-
pening now?37
It is noteworthy that the museum uses the local connection to the history of the
Holocaust for educational purposes, but omits at the same time sensitive questions
concerning the local society’s all too often positive attitudes to German Nazism in the
1930s as well anti-Semitism in this period.38 It seems that the museum avoids being too
provocative in their choice of topics.39
Nevertheless, it can be argued that the exhibition To Survive – Voices from Ravens-
brück was groundbreaking since it was the first time Kulturen dealt with the narratives
reflecting the experiences of non-ethnic Swedes living in the region. Later on, other at-
tempts were made to fill this gap and thus, in 2015, the temporary exhibition Cultural
history of Roma people in Sweden was set up40 and in 2016 the temporary, photography
exhibition called Voices of Roma people. It consisted of a series of large photographs of
individuals from different Roma groups living in Sweden. Each photograph was fol-
lowed by a short, personally told life story of the person depicted. In this way, the digni-
ty of the presented persons was emphasized and at the same time the visitors were given
an opportunity to come closer to the Roma people as individuals, not just frequently
stereotyped group members. This focus on Roma should be seen, in our view, in the
context of the EU member states special commitment towards promoting Roma inclu-
sion since 2011. In May 2011, the European Commission adopted an EU Framework
for National Roma Integration Strategies,41 that has been followed up by recommenda-
tion for member states and a number of measures with the goal of improving the situa-
tion of Roma in Europe.
According to the information acquired in the interviews with the museum staff, the
question of the representation of minorities first emerged as being very important in re-
37
See: the introduction by Margareta Alin, the director of Kulturen in the guide book for teachers, pro-
duced specially for this exhibition in 2006: Att överleva. Röster från Ravensbrück. En lärarhandled-
ning, Kulturen 2006, at <http://www.kulturen.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/Ravensbruck_
Lararhandledning.pdf>, 3 March 2017.
38
There is research made about the topic which could be used for that purpose. See: S. Oredsson, Lunds
universitet under andra världskriget – motsättningar, debatter och hjälpinsatser, Lund 1996.
39
Interview with Johan Hovfdahl.
40
Världen på Kulturen, Kulturen, at <http://www.kulturen.com/utstallningar/kommande-utstallningar/
varlden-pa-kulturen/>, 10 May 2015.
41
See the document: European Commission, Communication from the Commission to the European
Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Re-
gions “An EU Framework for National Roma Integration Strategies up to 2020”, Brussels, 5 April 2011,
COM(2011) 173 final, at <http://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regdoc/rep/1/2011/EN/1-2011-173-
EN-F1-1.Pdf>, 10 March 2017.
cent years. In the view of our informants, it can be interpreted as a kind of Europeaniza-
tion, but not in terms of following some policies, recommended by the EU. They rath-
er interpret this new direction as a reaction to several processes including: an increased
number of foreign visitors due to the radically increased mobility in Europe (including
Roma people), the large waves of migrations that reached Sweden first after the EU-en-
largement to the East and later in the wake of the latest wars in the Middle East and, last
but not least, the need to counteract the nationalist forces that grown in strength in the
Swedish society. Europeanization means to our informants42 being more influenced by
what happens in European countries, to be involved in the problems of Europe and at-
tempts to handle them by following values seen as European.
In recent years many museums in Europe have begun to focus on the need to repre-
sent migration and to contribute to the integration of newcomers.43 Kulturen took the
first steps in this direction in 2015 by joining a major action in southern Sweden that
aims at gathering testimonies by refugees who have come to Sweden since World War II
to the present, and who are willing to be recorded and tell their stories of flight and ex-
ile. The idea is to collect a large database in order to preserve these refugee memories
for posterity. At the end of 2016, Kulturen presented a selection of these recorded tes-
timonies as part of the temporary exhibition entitled The World on Fire.
OUTREACH
The question of diversity is very much connected to the question of inclusion. As stat-
ed above, minority narratives are represented rather marginally in today’s exhibitions
in Kulturen, although the museum is taking steps to remedy this. More could also be
done to encourage members of migrant communities as well foreign visitors in general
to come to Kulturen. The museum staff intensified its work with this task recently and
it is now even inscribed in the policy documents. According to the staff members the
focus on minorities and migrants may be interpreted as a form of Europeanization.44
However, they are at the same time eager to point out that inclusion has always been
important for their work. Kulturen states on its website: Our vision is to become the most
vibrant and engaging museum – a role model when it comes to participation.45
In line with this vision, no costs were spared to increase accessibility for handi-
capped persons. Lifts were installed, wherever possible, and special appliances and fa-
cilities were created for persons with impaired hearing and vision. Special efforts are be-
42
Interview with Johan Hovfdahl, and interview with Anki Dahlin (director) conducted 5 April 2017.
43
See: “New Publication: Museums, Migrations and Cultural Diversity”, NEMO, 30 May 2016, at
<http://www.ne-mo.org/news/article/nc/1/nemo/new-publication-museums-migrants-and-
cultural-diversity>, 10 March 2017.
44
Interview with Johan Hovfdahl, as well with Björn Magnusson Staaf.
45
Official site of Kulturen: Föreningens stadgar, Kulturen, at <https://www.kulturen.com/om-kulturen/
vardegrund-vision-och-uppdrag/foreningens-stadgar/>, 21 February 2017.
ing made as well to attract children and youth to come to the museum. Each year, a new
temporary exhibition is created especially for children designed to encourage them to
play and learn at the same time. Furthermore, the museum has a well-developed co-
operation with schools that are offered special programs every year. Teachers can at-
tend short courses which are given regularly, (called a ‘driving license’ at Kulturen) and
which enables them to use the museum exhibitions in their teaching. Thus, both chil-
dren from preschools as well school classes are frequent visitors. Other groups targeted
by the museum are researchers and university students, particularly those who study
ethnology, archeology, history and art as well foreign students taking courses about
Swedish culture and society. The visits to Kulturen are included in their curriculum
and such visits are also a part of Swedish language courses for migrants, who come to
Kulturen with their language teachers. All of the groups mentioned above are high-
lighted as core audiences and main targets for Kulturen.46 However, according to the
visitor studies conducted regularly by the museum, a typical visitor to the museum is
a well-educated woman between 50 and 70 – a figure termed in the Swedish cultural
debates as a ‘Culture Auntie’, since she has been statistically identified as a primary con-
sumer of so called ‘high culture’. Kulturen wishes to change this pattern.47
To promote participation also means to invite audiences to influence the activities
of the museum and to relate to the contents of the exhibitions. During the preparation
of the exhibitions, the staff makes efforts to invite stakeholders to discuss the content.
For example, in connection to Voices from Ravensbrück a focus group was created con-
sisting of, among others, of the few still living survivors as well representatives of both
Jewish and Polish associations.48 The stakeholders have their say but the final decision
about the exhibition design belongs to the museum staff.49 The only exception from
this rule is the exhibition presenting the history of Lund University which was wholly
created by the Society for the Studies of History of Lund University (Universitetshisto-
riska Sällskapet). Nevertheless, museum visitors can get insights into how the staff work
with selection and interpretation, since these matters are presented on the regularly
written blog on the museum webpage, as well in the Yearbook published by Kulturen.
When the exhibition is in place, visitors are invited to comment. For example, at the
temporary exhibition The World on Fire (Världen brinner) the visitors have been en-
couraged to record their comments using the equipment which is available there. At an-
other (about different building techniques through time), they can write their remarks
on small pieces of paper. Furthermore, Kulturen works actively with social media, en-
couraging visitors to comment on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. The visitors are also
asked to complete short questionnaires prepared by the staff about their impressions
46
Interview with Anki Dahlin.
47
Interview with Johan Hovfdahl.
48
For more about this, as well about the exhibition in general, see: K. Tinning, “To Survive Ravens-
brück: Considerations on Museum Pedagogy and the Passing on of Holocaust Remembrance”, Mu-
seum & Society, vol. 14, no. 2 (2016), pp. 338-353, at <https://www2.le.ac.uk/departments/museum-
studies/museumsociety/documents/volumes/tinning>, 15 August 2017.
49
Interview with Björn Magnusson Staaf.
from the visits. However, the general result of these efforts is far lower than the museum
staff would hope for50 as it seems that the visitors are not so keen to give feedback. Does
it mean that they are just consumers and not ‘prosumers’ (producers and consumers at
the same time)? We should not jump to such conclusions since it has been noticed that
the visitors actually share their interpretations and impressions from the visit at Kul-
turen with others on social media, but not so much with the museum staff.51
Also taking into account the profile of Kulturen’s visitors it seems that Kulturen’s
primarily function is to teach and deliver knowledge about the regional and local past.
This is also emphasized in the previously mentioned policy documents stating that the
museum’s goal is to preserve and take care of the local and regional heritage and to
make it accessible for research, education and to a broader public. However, our inter-
views with the employees showed that the staff members do not want to limit them-
selves to the role of educators. They also wish to deliver pleasant experiences and even
some form of entertainment (or rather infotainment) to the public. The work with
intangible heritage provides opportunities in this direction and thus Kulturen regu-
larly organizes celebrations of traditions connected to Advent, Santa Lucia, Christmas,
Epiphany, Easter and Midsummer festivities that attract many people, especially fami-
lies. During the summer season, the museum also invites musicians to give concerts or
to play live traditional folk music for dancing. The entrance to the museum is free at
these occasions and the events are really well-attended. On specially agreed dates some
of the museum buildings can also be used for weddings, attracting people that do not
usually come to Kulturen.
Additionally, it appears from the interviews that the museum staff wants Kulturen
to be more engaged in public matters and work actively for an open, democratic soci-
ety. The museum has conference facilities which can be rented by different organiza-
tions and institutions and the museum also uses it from time to time to organize small
symposia or discussion panels on the urgent social questions in cooperation with other
stakeholders. Another, interesting initiative in this context is Kulturen’s promotion of
ecumenism and religious tolerance by opening every summer the old church (one of
the objects in the building collection) for the celebration of masses and prayers for all
kind of Christian communities in the town. Every Sunday during the summer, one of
the churches invites people to pray according to its rules and uses the opportunity to
present itself.
THE TARNÓW MUSEUM
Tarnów is a medium sized town in the Małopolska region of southern Poland. It has
a historical city center, with some Renaissance buildings, an interesting cathedral and
the spectacular remains of the local synagogue, where nowadays artistic events are some-
50
Interview with Johan Hofvendahl.
51
Interview with Björn Magnusson Staaf.
times held. For visitors, the monuments are surprisingly beautiful (although scarce) and
the atmosphere seems relaxed. The District Museum of Tarnów could be seen as the
guardian of the city’s symbolic resources, supporting the construction of local identity
and striving to define the regional one, too. For the one-day visitor, Tarnów is a charm-
ing place, but unpromising in case of a longer stay, with the museum as a must see. Feel-
ing like a museum visit, the tourist would be naturally led to the main branch of the
museum as it is situated in the town hall, a landmark of the city located in the middle of
the main market square. But he or she would in fact have more options as far as muse-
ums go – there is a choice between the Archdiocesan Museum or other branches of the
District Museum, for instance the Ethnographic Branch which devotes its permanent
exhibition to the Roma.
The history of the Tarnów Museum proves its strong links with the history of the
city of Tarnów and the region, which – influenced by political changes – might be seen
as a lens for identity changes in Poland. Founded in 1927, not long after Poland re-
gained its independence (1918), it originated from the spirit of safeguarding valuable
representatives of the past that otherwise might have been lost. Tarnów, together with
its museum, felt a strong mission to be a leading provincial museum and an example
to other institutions of the kind nationwide.52 In the two inter war decades the city of
Tarnów developed, largely due to the decision to establish important industrial plants
there (Azoty). Following its economic development, Tarnów’s museums grew in splen-
dor and the Town Hall was designed to be the main branch housing the marvels of the
collection. The choice was backed up by museologists, who appreciated the collection
of the city and formally suggested the town hall should change its primary function.53
After the horrors of World War II, the new era of Tarnów Museum began. Guards were
provided to keep the exhibits safe already in 1945 and, during the overwhelming post-
war chaos, a new challenge of gathering art objects which had been kept at manors and
in the villages, began. In this way the museum can be seen as carrying traces of the many
historical changes that Poland has gone through, including the reforms introduced un-
der communism (up to 1989) and the re-organization which followed the reforms of
1989. While today the museum may not be seen as the most relevant identity frame-
work by the citizens of Tarnów, it certainly sees its mission in connecting them with the
local past. Yet, as it will be discussed below, the gap between the past and the present
is not very efficiently bridged, so the heritage on display in the Tarnów Museum is not
very representative for the city itself.
In the Town Hall, the main building of the District Museum, whose exhibition will
be the main focus of this analysis, the story of the past is told mostly with a strong em-
phasis on its splendor, significance and glory while at the same time neglecting the
class diversity of heritage by focusing primarily on the legacy of noble families. In gen-
52
As noted by the delegates of the Association for Polish Museums in 1925. See: M. Piotrowski (ed.),
Pamiętnik V Zjazdu Delegatów Związku Muzeów w Polsce odbytego w Tarnowie w dn. 12-13 czerwca
1930, Kraków 1930.
53
Ibid.
eral, Tarnów is presented as a ‘private city’, a concept rather vaguely explained as a ‘city
owned by the Tarnowski family’, and then ruled by the Sanguszkos.54 From the begin-
ning of the museum, which was first opened as a town museum in 1927, the institution
may be regarded as primarily safeguarding what is seen as historically valuable. The
value – as it will be proved later on – could be seen as corresponding to the official dis-
course and strengthening the political legacy of the town – establishing its foundation
myth within an aristocratic family genealogy.
While at present the museum consists of ten branches dispersed all over Tarnów, it
is the municipal perspective of a provincial town that sets the main perspective for the
interpretation of all of them. It is also the museum main building – the Town Hall –
that has the most recognizable and significant collection, originally mainly owned by
the Sanguszko family. While in this analysis the narrative as well as the activities of
the Town Hall exhibition will be covered, it should be noticed that the museum itself
has nine other branches, and they cover a large scope of the region’s heritage includ-
ing topics such as history of the peasant movement or the town’s history. Yet, most of
them are strictly connected with monuments they are located in. A good example of
a topical collection can be found in the medieval castle of Dębno, the painted village of
Zalipie (a village with a tradition of painting house exteriors in floral patterns) or the
manor of Dołęga (especially significant for 19th century events, such as the uprisings).
Considering the exhibitions of all the branches, it could be noted that the diversity of
themes, topics and periods represented in the collections is vast, yet this richness can
only be appreciated when the whole organization of the museum considered. When
taken all together, the ten branches speak a lot about the diverse aspects of the region’s
history. It is very unlikely, however, that they would all be visited by one visitor, so the
usual viewpoint of the visitors would be based on sightseeing having taken place in just
one building. The fact that all the branches are part of one regional museum, run by
regional Marshal’s Office of Małopolska, was mainly an effect of the political decisions
taken after 1989, when Poland entered the post-communist era and not for any content
related reasons.55
THE TOWN HALL EXHIBITION IN TARNÓW
The Town Hall exhibition is chosen to be presented here for several reasons. First of all
it is, as we will argue, a good example of heritage constructed as a class attribute, relating
to noble classes, although the seat of the collection may be seen as surprisingly set in the
most civil of public spaces – the town hall. Secondly, the narrative of the foundational
54
The notion of the ‘private city’ was developed in an interview conducted with Janusz Kozioł, the pro-
gramme director of the Tarnów Museum, during the research project “The Europeanization of realms
of memory and the invention of a common European heritage”.
55
M. Kołodziej et al., “Historia Muzeum Okręgowego w Tarnowie. History of Tarnów Museum”, in 80
lat Muzeum w Tarnowie. 80 Years of Museum in Tarnów, Tarnów 2007.
myth of Tarnów is told in the most straightforward way here establishing the story in
the gentry driven glory of the past times. Finally, as will be pointed out, individualism
and human dignity are present in the exhibition in a very significant way reflecting the
general vision of the past as shaped by the museum.
In general the foundational myth of Tarnów may be seen as the overwhelming nar-
rative, although it is not revealed as the main theme of the Town Hall exhibition, yet
the more thorough analysis reveals the narrative tells in fact more about the nation than
Tarnów or the region. The narrative is constructed as a provincial town’s input to the
grand historical narrative, mainly the one of the nation, but – as we will argue – the ref-
erence framework of Europe is present, too. Such a construct may be explained as an at-
tempt to valorize Tarnów and make its role significant while at the same time adding to
the relevancy of the museum’s message. This is not to say the heritage of Tarnów should
be seen as inferior, but rather as the museum’s way of coping with the prestige and glory
represented by the exhibits of the 17th and 18th centuries, which at some points seems to
overwhelm the other possible aspects of the museum’s storytelling.
In order to set the perspective for the analysis, a short tour of the exhibition of the
Town Hall is proposed. This is the usual way of getting to know the museum’s collec-
tion and it allows us to sketch a fragmented and experience driven way of sightseeing.
It is an important, but surprisingly often overlooked fact, that visitors are not very in-
terested in the museum itself, but rather in the heritages presented (and interpreted)
by them. Considering this, a visit oriented museum analyses (as opposed to collection
analyses) could be seen as reflecting the majority of visitors’ experiences influenced by
the exhibitions. At the same time, it should be said that the museum’s activities may
influence many actors, as the museum’s authority of safeguarding the past of the town
and the region is very strong indeed and the museum’s staff act as experts in a number of
public and private bodies. Nevertheless, it is the exhibitions (and the sites themselves)
which remain the most important elements of the museums’ impact and visiting them
in person provides the opportunity to learn the most about the region and the district
of Tarnów.
It may be worthwhile to start the visit in the last (and extra) point of a regular sight-
seeing, that is to climb the tower where a magnificent panorama of the town can be ad-
mired, as well as the tower clock mechanism which is presented to all who walk up the
stairs. The clock is still operationall, making it unique, but also significantly confirms
the spirit of continuity: this is the same clock that gave rhythms to the city life centuries
ago and the bell has constantly kept Tarnów citizens tuned to the passing of time. The
rigid monotony of the tower clock gives a good background to the main narrative of the
exhibition: people lived and passed away, and those who want to remember them in-
scribe themselves in the same long duration history told as a composition of individual
biographies, as well as the social movements and political shifts both presented in the
exhibition as somehow unavoidable and external to individual lives.
Next to the clock tower mechanism and protected by glass is a small archeologi-
cal exhibition which immerses the town’s history in a narrative more ancient than the
historical one: there is a mammoth tusk, excavated locally and there to signify the pre-
history of the town. Its presentation, next to the clock mechanism, makes the tempo-
ral context even more profound, although it must be mentioned that the presentation
of mammoth’s teeth and tusks is not unusual for smaller and larger museums. It is not
really clearly explained whether presenting mammoth’s remains should symbolize the
times before human memory can grasp it or rather it is used to testify to the skills of the
archeologists, at the same time adding to the image of the museum as shelter for every-
thing that may have value because it is very old.56 Nevertheless, establishing such a tem-
poral context makes the city’s foundational myth more significant: it makes it clear that
the story is very long.
Coming back to the regular sightseeing program, before visitors set off to see the
main collections of the Town Hall (the art and crafts of 17th century Poland) they are
shown some photographs in the lobby of the Gumniska property of the Sanguszko
family, who – as the guide says – ruled and owned most of the city. The collection of
images comprises conventional noble class possessions such as stables, parks or parts
of manors and mansions. The legacy of the Sanguszko in Tarnów has somehow been
retained to the present (2017): a photograph of the prince and princess visiting the
museum in the present day can be seen on the upper floor, next to the china and sil-
verware collection which in fact mostly belonged to the family as well and had been
rescued right after World War II from their palace. The decision to secure the objects
was a consequence of the nationalization act which acquired valuable objects and items
that would be the property of the state from then on. It is rather hard, however, to con-
nect them so that they form a convincing message about the origins of the collection.
On the contrary, the photos represent the fact that some unknown property creates
a form of postmemory57 to be freely decoded by visitors but one which is not very well
explained to them.
The main room of the Town Hall and the museum itself is the former audience
room. It is the largest and its former function is barely noticeable due to the concept
of the design: a large collection of portraits is exhibited on the walls in such a way that
they dominate the whole of the interior, leaving its original function mostly to the
imagination of the visitors, while the figures and faces of people in the portraits tend to
command their attention. The discrepancy between the original function of the space
and decorating it with aristocratic images is significant, especially as this seems to be the
most civil space in the whole of Tarnów. On the walls there are dozens of portraits but
there are not many explanations as to who the portrayed people were. However, such
a silence has interesting consequences: visitors are urged to interpret the portraits for
themselves and, despite not knowing much (or anything at all) about the individuals
presented in the pictures, they somehow ‘face’ them and look into their eyes, trying to
56
In fact, the Tarnów Museum records its efforts to construct meaningful collection from the start, for
example a collection of butterflies, offered as a gift to the museum, was decided to be irrelevant and did
not enter the collection. Ibid., p. 8.
57
The term was introduced by Marianne Hirsch who examined meaning making processes in relation to
photographs connected with pre-Holocaust and Holocaust era. M. Hirsch, Family. Photography, Nar-
rative and Postmemory, Cambridge–London 1997.
anchor their attention to any detail which might be recognized without expert knowl-
edge. Visitors notice women, children and men, all dressed elegantly and looking at the
viewers from some remote estate that they used to live in. Exhibiting the whole collec-
tion of portraits raises a number of questions concerning their origin, artistic quality
or merely who they present, still the main impression visitors may get is very general,
although the collection can be also read as an introduction to other parts of the exhi-
bition. Many of the portraits are classified as ‘Sarmatian’, recalling the concept of the
Sarmatian tradition which was believed by the Polish gentry to have provided the roots
of their own families (and the Polish nation) and certainly inspired the costumes of
wealthy Poles in the 17th and 18th centuries. The clothes of the portrayed people are
very richly ornamented and bear witness to the wealth on display.
The portrait collection compliments the narrative of the magnificent weaponry
collection, which is presented on the ground floor of the town hall, next to the photos
in the lobby. For non-expert audiences, the exhibits are difficult to interpret, as first of
all the labels do not provide support in that matter, being ‘museologically’ structured
while the textual descriptions to be read on the walls are far too long and unattractively
presented in small fonts on a grey background. It is mostly the guide’s personal skills,
attitude and knowledge that can awake the meanings locked in the exhibits. The most
crucial fact about the weaponry, as well as most of the silverware collection, is that it
was bought by the Sanguszko family already as a collection of antiques, to be later en-
riched by further purchases. This means that what the objects illustrate is in fact not the
everyday life of Tarnów (or the region) at all but rather a concept for the antiques col-
lection of Polish gentry. This reveals another aspect as well: the objects were not only
already old when they were acquired but also represent symbolic (non-practical) value,
adding to the prestige of family estate which they had decorated.
Quite surprisingly, as it has been already stated, the whole storytelling of the Town
Hall exhibition could be read as exemplifying the glorious past of Tarnów, as more
than ‘just a provincial town’, when it is perhaps truer that the exhibition relates in fact
more to the lifestyle of the gentry, presented here as representative of the whole of the
city’s past. The weapons, for instance, are interpreted first of all as elements of lifestyle,
as some of them had been used for hunting. The diversity of the exhibited objects may
reflect the ways of spending free time as much as the skills of craftsmen, but probably
should not be presented as representative for (any) period.
The interesting part of the collection, and at the same time of the story told in the
museum, is connected with the siege of Vienna (1683). It is recalled with exhibits such
as a mobile tent to be set in the battlefield or a shoe attributed to Queen Marysieńka,
wife to Jan III Sobieski, the heroic king who is presented as defending Europe from
an Islamic invasion. His achievement, as visitors learn from the guide, would not have
been possible without the bravery and sacrifice of Polish soldiers, many of whom origi-
nated from the region around Tarnów. The victory of Vienna is described as a civili-
zational act of domination, a historical moment of Poland’s significance in European
history. This plot is developed later on in the exhibition, when an interpretation of the
portraits is offered by the guide. Visitors may learn about one of the favorite and most
popular Polish myths of origin, namely the Sarmatian, and the myth is not deconstruct-
ed in the guide’s narrative but rather emphasized as still having a profound impact on
Polish national identity. Poles (and not only Tarnów inhabitants) are presented as the
brave defenders of Christian civilization and Europe. Again, the bravery, rich imagina-
tion and effectiveness of Poles, for whom the local representation is given with the por-
traits, are highlighted. The feeling of pride due to belonging to a community of brave
men of honor is promoted in the guide’s storytelling and, by setting the context of the
glorious past together with the weaving together of the story of continuity, visitors may
feel invited to share in the legacy presented therein. Through this story, Europe is pre-
sented as an integral entity which needs to be defended from invaders and Poles are en-
titled to do it, especially as the inheritors of the Sarmatians.
Striving to build correspondences between Europe, Poland and the city of Tarnów,
it is presented as a good example of community where both local and national patrio-
tism have been effectively cultivated. Most unfortunately the narrative is exclusively in
terms of one class: history is presented as a construct shaped by noble families and so-
cial diversity of the past is hardly ever mentioned. This drawback may be justified by
the fact that in other branches of the museum, other versions of story are told, but the
fact remains that the narrative of the Town Hall exhibition promotes the aristocratic
legacy of the past.
As to the collection itself, the impression that visitors may get is the complexity
of objects and probable codes of behavior which can be deduced from the objects. It
is in fact very significant that the image of the past created on the exhibition is based
on weaponry, silverware and china, portraits of noblemen and some pieces of armor
and related objects of war. Hunting, battles, parties and romance seem to make up the
content of the past, all spanning the period from the times of the mammoths until the
symbolic collapse of Tarnów, an incident presented as having been caused mainly by
external conditions of a historical, social and political nature. But Tarnów reclaims its
golden age in its museum’s presentation, where inferiority complexes may be healed and
the civilizational narrative can be effectively spread.
The pudding model proposed in the first part of this article stipulates several qual-
ities that by means of their relation to European values can function as indicators of
Europeanization in museums. In the following section we would like to examine to
what extent these qualities are to be detected in the museum in Tarnów. Progress is the
first one on the list, and the Town Hall exhibition, which certainly follows the linear
time model in most of its storytelling, seems to escape the simple story of progress and
to instead provide visitors with a kind of niche view of the passing of time, not leading
anywhere in terms of civilizational progress, but rather establishing important symbolic
resources for the identities: local, regional and national. There are some elements of
weaponry presented, however, which may be interpreted as very elaborate and highly
complicated, and thus technical progress can be somehow read in them yet it is the
spirit of past glory that feeds the dominant narrative much more than the linearity of
civilizational progress. Visitors may actually get the impression that the golden age of
Tarnów and the region should be preserved in the museum, but since no literary recre-
ation of the past is possible, the museum can be regarded as constituting a shelter for it,
a symbolic treasury that can be used for meaning-making purposes. In other words, the
linearity of the story is woven here to set a strong mythological setting for the myth of
origin, but there may be a feeling of discontinuity too because visitors don’t learn much
about Tarnów in the years after the end of the private city era.
The interpretation of utility may also be interesting since the objects on display
relate most of all to their symbolic meaning, as they stand for the wealth of the noble
classes. In other branches of the museum, however, many everyday objects used by the
poorer people (significantly in the Roma exhibition) are explained as having very prac-
tical uses. This supports the notion of non-technical objects of prestige, such as the sil-
verware collection, strengthening the image of those who did not possess many objects,
but those that were in their possession had to be practical. In this perspective, establish-
ing the interpretive framework for heritage as such seems to define it as a class driven
phenomenon belonging to the rich. This is also why it is extremely important to have
a look at other branches of the museum, where various heritages are presented, leaving
the one of prestige and gentry as one of many. Still, this is the one that sets the scene and
this is the one presented as most significant for identity formation today. A museum,
with all its heritage on display, seems to have vague correspondences to local identity
construction, as the content of it is representative for one family, but in fact it may be
very useful because the storytelling adds up to the national mythology with the mes-
sage of Tarnów as relevant. The only problem with this may be that the symbolic capital
gathered and presented here is hard to transform into social capital.
The issue of dignity may also be interpreted given the portraits and objects of the
gentry: as ancestors are presented with an outlook of grace and honor, provided mostly
by the distance between the past and the present. The museum follows a traditional,
semi-feudal way of representing the past, with the emphasis on luxury and which itself
adds to the prestigious and symbolic potential of the exhibition, at the same time keep-
ing it far from the hybrid and diverse ‘reality’ of the past.
Diversity, another aspect of the pudding framework, is limited by the representa-
tion of only one class in the exhibition, but it should be pointed out that in terms of
reaching out to new audiences, the museum can boast some successes such as coopera-
tion with the local prison and schools. Programs tailored to suit the needs of prisoners
do not reflect the content of the Town Hall exhibition, but are much more focused on
World War II and the history of Jews in the region. There have been, however, some
‘museum meetings’ held at the museum, where various stories from 17th century Poland
were mentioned, with special regard to weaponry and wars.58 Schools and other edu-
cational institutions are offered a special, discounted museum visit (Pl. bon kultury)
which is subsidized by the Małopolska Marshal’s Office as a result of an open competi-
tion. The workshops and museum classes are well received, providing a light introduc-
tion to history, narrated in a semi theatrical way, creating a good form of ‘edutainment’.
It is hard to admit that the past is presented in its diversity, as the presentation is limited
58
As recalled by Janusz Kozioł in the interview.
to the collection related to one social class and not many interpretative perspectives are
included, either.
One could see, however, that narrativity – the next framework element – is a real
component of the exhibition. The story of the past is told with vivid images and many
narrative strategies are used by the guides, including demonstrations of objects or bio-
graphical stories. The main characteristics of the storytelling, however, may be defined
by its mythological function, which in this case might be seen as safeguarding the im-
ages and the values of the past. In their narratives, guides would rather stress the dif-
ferences between contemporaneity and the past, without clearly stated similarities. Eu-
rope from these stories appears to be a different domain than the one of today, with no
links to the political situation of today.
There is one more aspect of narrativity which should be revealed here and it may
be interpreted as a form of utility, too. The setting of the Town Hall tower has some
reputation as the most romantic site of Tarnów and is known as a perfect place for pro-
posals. It is hard to say whether the dramatic scenery overlooking the town, the history
of the building or the treasure it shelters support this choice of place, but the museum
supports this romantic use of its site with some public consequences.59
In terms of governance, the last part of the pudding model, the striking absence
of civil history in the Town Hall may be read as reducing heritage to nobility, a rather
non-democratic way of storytelling about the past. It needs to be added, however, that
in the guide’s comments there is some irony about the old time heroes, too, still due to
the limited time of a museum visit, the complex and critical part of the story gets domi-
nated by the more direct, mythical like one. It is challenging for visitors to fully appreci-
ate the richness of what can be told in the museum, as the visit is hardly ever participa-
tive, although there are some opportunities for the visitors to try the old cloths, armor
or weapon (only available with the guided visit).
In general terms, the democratization of heritage is not an easily recognizable asset
of Tarnów Town Hall, although it is quite unfair to judge the whole museum solely on
the basis of the highlights presented there. Yet, as has been already said, many visitors
would choose this branch as the most representative one, so it should be given spe-
cial attention even if it is not representative of the other museum branches. As already
stated, the exhibition highlights the presented objects as symbolic resources and they
should be treated as important in constructing reference frameworks for identity, and
finding the concept of Europe is not difficult at all: being juxtaposed to Islam, Europe
is told in accordance with the Polish national tradition, where romanticism often takes
over historiography. Because the collection comprises objects from the late 16th and
18th centuries, the main story illustrated with exhibits is the Sarmatian one, with the
figure of Poles as a noble nation of proud heroes, who appreciate life but sometimes can
be misguided by their fantasy. Establishing such a mythical reference was apparently re-
garded as being fake from the outset but the fiction that Poles had originated from an
59
As demonstrated in several interviews, the actual lack of proper marketing and public relations staff in
the museum is critical for the potential impact of the museum.
ancient tribe was widely accepted amongst the gentry. The game of the popularization
of the myth, both real (in social terms) and false (historically) is still being played to-
day by the institution involved in the interpretation of both Polish and local tradition.
Throughout the whole narrative the construct of Sarmatians as ancestors to con-
temporary Poles is ubiquitous. Their story is told with a sense of dignity: as politically
and economically important, they not only influence but in fact co-author history. The
main theme for the exhibition might be formulated as ‘the old times of the civilization
we live in today’, and the Sarmatians are shown as significant citizens of Europe. Yet the
dignity and individualism strongly narrated in the exhibition are presented without any
social perspective of those groups and people who could not have benefited from their
wealth. This makes the exhibition far from the accepted standards of democracy and
inclusion, but strengthens its mythical symbolic potential. A silver sugar box exhibited
behind glass is a good illustration of this: the exhibit is made of silver and has a key hole
which is explained by the guide as protecting the sugar from being stolen by servants.
COMPARATIVE REMARKS AND CONCLUSIONS
The use of the pudding framework allows us to draw some comparative conclusions
regarding the Europeanization of heritage in the two museums scrutinized here. The
seven qualities serving as indicators of this process and summarized in the acronym are
present in our cases to considerably varying degrees.
As demonstrated in the analysis, the idea of progress is clearly visible and even ac-
claimed in Kulturen in Lund, where the linearly structured narratives emphasize con-
tinuity in civilizational advancement and express the pride of the local society of being
part of this development. This cannot be said about the Tarnów exhibition, in which
progress is just indicated in the linearity of the narrative which more or less ends in the
time of the Polish Noble Republic (16th-17th century), which is presented as a golden
age and source of local and national pride.
As to the second element of the pudding model – utility – the contrast is even
greater. While the museum in Tarnów seems to have as its only goal the preservation of
heritage objects and presenting them to the public so they can be admired and enjoyed,
the museum in Lund aims primarily to pit its collections in the service of education and
research. Additionally, Kulturen works purposefully with its public mission by opening
its doors for social, cultural and scientific events. In other words, Kulturen fully em-
braces utility as a quality for modern European heritage.
The next quality – dignity – can be traced in both museums, but it is articulated
in very different ways. The exhibition in Tarnów has its focus on noble individuals and
families. Dignity emanates from them while, at the same time through the metonymic
operation in the presented narrative, they give dignity to the town of Tarnów and the
whole Polish nation. In Kulturen, the nobility is marginally present and there is also
much less emphasis on concrete individuals. Dignity mainly comes forward in repre-
sentations of the hard and creative work of people representing different social classes.
It is also visible in efforts to dignify the previously or currently marginalized and social-
ly stigmatized groups such as Roma.
In terms of diversity and inclusion, the exhibition in Tarnów, as shown above,
is extremely limited, while Kulturen is very keen to display social diversity, include dif-
ferent interpretative perspectives and work to increase participation and accessibility
for people with different social and ethnic backgrounds, ages and even handicaps. In
recent years the Swedish museum has even begun to work with the legacy of migration
which was previously absent in the museum’s exhibitions.
The sixth quality in the pudding model – narrativity – is central for the
Tarnów Museum while less prominent in the museum in Lund. The main reason is
probably that Tarnów presents a visitor with one, impressive, vivid and detailed grand
narrative about the past of the Polish nobility and the Polish nation, while Lund of-
fers a multitude of small, local and regional narratives that compete with each other
for the attention of the visitor. Moreover, the narrative in Tarnów is embedded in the
aura of an old Saramatian myth which has the potential to kindle fantasy and playful-
ness, while the narratives in Lund are rather down-to-earth and educationally oriented.
It is also noteworthy that the narrative presented in Tarnów supports local identity as
much as the national one, while regional belonging is almost invisible. This is in con-
trast to Kulturen, which focuses very much on stories supporting regional and local
identities, leaving the national dimension almost totally aside. Another important dif-
ference between the two museums’ approach to narrativity is their different temporal
dimensions. The narrative in Tarnów’s Town Hall is wholly oriented to the past and
it indulges almost nostalgically in the lost national glory of the past. The narratives in
Lund, on the contrary, are very much oriented towards the present and even to the fu-
ture. They are often constructed in response to the societal challenges of the present,
such as, for example, the growth in racism and xenophobia or the challenges of mass
migration to Europe.
These narrative features characteristic of the respective museum can explain to
some extent the difference between them in regard to the last element in our acro-
nym – governance. The Tarnów Museum seems to lack relevancy in terms of mod-
ern governance and democracy. In the exhibition, the distance between the past, which
remains a powerful symbolic resource, and the present, is so immense that it is challeng-
ing for the visitors to refer to it and use it in their life for other ways than just pure plea-
sure. Kulturen, on the other hand, works very methodically in promoting such demo-
cratic values as participation, inclusion, tolerance and equality, both in its exhibitions
as well in other activities: outreach, contact with stakeholders and the organization of
social and cultural events. The museum shows considerable engagement in social and
political life.
To conclude, our analysis of Kulturen and the Town Hall Museum in Tarnów with
the help of the pudding model allows us to draw some conclusions as to the scope of
the Europeanization of heritage in the two museums. It can be stated that the heritage
work conducted at Kulturen in Lund is very much in accordance with the policies and
visions of heritage promoted by the EU and supported by the ideas of new museology.
In its exhibits and activities, the museum displays all seven qualities identified by us as
crucial for current European heritage work. This cannot be said about the museum in
Tarnów, where such elements as progress and utility are visible but far from obvious.
Diversity and inclusion, not to mention governance including participation and de-
mocracy, are practically wholly absent.
However, in comparing the two museums we can notice an interesting paradox.
While the Swedish museum, unlike the Polish one, works very much in accordance
with current European models, it is seldom explicit in its references to Europe and nev-
er to the EU. Europe remains largely invisible, despite the international connections of
the locality being featured in the exhibitions. Moreover, as it transpired in the inter-
views, the museum staff at Kulturen does not perceive their work as being affected by
the EU’s policies in any way. At best they agree that if this is the case, then the influence
is imperceptible, perhaps because it is channeled via regional and municipal institu-
tions. It is the local authorities that urge the museum to fulfill some tasks which may
reflect the goals of the EU’s policies and the values promoted by the Union, such as de-
mocracy or respect for minority rights and human rights. However, according to our
informants at Kulturen, these goals and values have been important for the museum
for many years, even before the Swedish accession to the EU. The only clearly later ad-
ditions are the interest in memorializing the Holocaust and the victims of Nazism that
found refuge in Sweden, and the attention paid to ethnic diversity, especially that re-
sulting from migration. These two elements are recognized by our informants as a pos-
sible outcome of Europeanization. However, it is noteworthy, that the Europeanization
process in this context is apprehended by them not primarily as a vertical top-down
movement, a result of the EU-directives, but rather as a horizontal movement, an out-
come of intensified transnational exchange of ideas and mutual influences coming in
the wake of increased mobility, migrations and closer cooperation.
In contrast to Lund, Europe as a concept is visible and referred to in the Tarnów
Museum. Yet it is not articulated by the implementation of certain qualities referring to
the specific values described above, but by giving Europe a substantial place in the nar-
rative. In that narrative Europe as such is mainly a mythical domain of the past which is
referred to because it has been safeguarded by the Poles. In turn, they are presented as
always having been loyal to both their own nation and Christianity and thus, by exten-
sion, to Christian Europe. Locality is constructed in a very significant way, too, being
an important component of the larger community of nation and then, in the next step,
of Europe. Thus, Europe is present and seems to be highly valued (worth fighting for),
but as a myth and arena where Polish bravery and other virtues can be displayed, not
as a currently existing entity with concrete politics and visions. In our view, this inter-
pretation of Europe does not offer museum visitors any tools for a better understand-
ing of the current world and for making meaningful correspondences with the knowl-
edge they already have. Consequently, it could be argued that the heritage presented in
Tarnów’s Town Hall is European, in the traditional and literal sense of the word, but
not Europeanized in terms of the adoption of ideas of modern European museology

and ideas about the heritage promoted by the EU.
***
The framework of pudding applied above was developed in order to support research
carried out in museums, with a special emphasis on the Europeanization of heritage.
The main idea was to help in structuring the analysis of the otherwise very complex
matter of museums’ exhibitions, activities, programs, outreach and all practices that
could be considered in their analysis. The pudding framework does not include all
aspects of a museums’ functioning, but our analysis above proves, in our view, that it is
effective in tracing Europeanization processes in museums, which are otherwise rather
abstract, complex and not easy to capture. It should also be noted that as a tool it need
not be applied in every fragment, although it is useful to bear in mind the interconnec-
tions between all seven elements. We hope that it will be useful for further research.
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“New Publication: Museums, Migrations and Cultural Diversity”, NEMO, 30 May 2016, at
<http://www.ne-mo.org/news/article/nc/1/nemo/new-publication-museums-migrants-
and-cultural-diversity>.
O’Neill M., “Enlightenment Museums: Universal or Merely Global?”, Museum and Society,
vol. 2, no. 3 (2004).
Oredsson S., Lunds universitet under andra världskriget – motsättningar, debatter och hjälpin-
satser, Lund 1996.
Piekarska-Duraj Ł., “Democratization as an Aspect of Heritage Europeanization. The Museum
Triangle”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization of Heritage and
Piotrowski M. (ed.), Pamiętnik V Zjazdu Delegatów Związku Muzeów w Polsce odbytego w Tar-
nowie w dn. 12-13 czerwca 1930, Kraków 1930.
Regionalt uppdrag, Kulturen, at <https://www.kulturen.com/om-kulturen/vardegrund-vision-

och-uppdrag/regionalt-uppdrag/>.
Sandell R. (ed.), Museums, Society, Inequality, London 2002.
Sassatelli M., Becoming Europeans. Cultural Identity and Cultural Policies, New York 2009.
Schuman R., Pour l’Europe, Paris 2000.
Sherman D.J., Museums and Difference, Bloomington 2008.
Sherman D.J., Rogoff I. (eds.), Museum Culture. Histories, Discourses, Spectacles, Minneapolis
1994.
Shore C., “Inventing Homo Europaeus: The Cultural Politics of European Integration”, Ethno-
logia Europaea. Journal of European Ethnology, vol. 29, no. 2 (1999).
Sierp A., History, Memory, and Trans-European Identity. Unifying Divisions, New York–Lon-
don 2014.
Simon N., The Participatory Museum, Santa Cruz 2010.
Tilden F., Interpreting our Heritage, Chapel Hill 2008 (1947).
Tinning K., “To Survive Ravensbrück: Considerations on Museum Pedagogy and the Passing on
of Holocaust Remembrance”, Museum & Society, vol. 14, no. 2 (2016), at <https://www2.
le.ac.uk/departments/museumstudies/museumsociety/documents/volumes/tinning>.
Törnquist-Plewa B., “The Europeanization of the Memory and Heritage of the Second World
War and the Holocaust in Sweden”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europe-
anization of Heritage and Memories in Poland and Sweden, Kraków 2016.
To Survive – Voices from Ravensbrück, Kulturen, at <http://ravensbruck.kulturen.com/English/
r1.htm#>.
Värdegrund, vision och uppdrag (Statues for Cultural-Historical Association for Southern Swe-
den (Kulturhistoriska föreningen för södra Sverige)), Kulturen, at <https://www.kulturen.
com/om-kulturen/vardegrund-vision-och-uppdrag/>.
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utstallningar/varlden-pa-kulturen/>.
Vergo P. (ed.), The New Museology, London 1989.
Interviews with
Anki Dahlin, director at Kulturen, 5 April 2017.
Johan Hovfdahl, museum communicator at Kulturen, 15 March 2017.
Janusz Kozioł, deputy director at the Tarnów Museum, 3 June 2017.
Björn Magnusson Staaf, former manager at Kulturen, 24 March 2017.
Anonymous content analysis questionnaire conducted during “Local Museum in a Glob-

al World” action research project, conducted in October 2013 at the Tarnów Museum
( J. Hajduk et al., Lokalne muzeum w globalnym świecie. Poradnik praktyczny, Kraków 2013).
Łucja PIEKARSKA-DURAJ holds an MA in European Studies (2002) and a PhD in

sociology (2013) both received from the Jagiellonian University. She is currently affili-
ated with the Institute of European Studies at the Jagiellonian University. She is a so-
cial anthropologist, interpretive heritage trainer and cultural manager. As a researcher,
she is mainly interested in relations between social memory, heritage and identity, es-
pecially in the domain of museums. As a heritage consultant she promotes interpretive
and democratic museology. She specialises in storytelling for museums and the support
for brand management strategies. She has co-authored a manual for interpretive muse-
ology Lokalne muzeum w globalnym świecie. Poradnik praktyczny [Local museum in
a global world] (written with Joanna Hajduk, Sebastian Wacięga, Piotr Idziak, Kraków
2013) as well as a number of museum exhibitions and projects (e.g. dzieło-działka, Kra-
ków Ethnografical Museum, 2010; “Wirtualne muzea Małopolski”, 2009-2014; “Mu-
zeobranie”, 2004-2006). After a decade of museum activism, she joined the UNESCO
Chair for Holocaust Education at the Jagiellonian University (2016).
Barbara TÖRNQUIST-PLEWA is a professor of Eastern and Central European Stud-

ies at Lund University in Sweden. In the years 2005-2017 she was the head of the Cen-
tre for European Studies in Lund. Her main research interests are nationalism, identity
and collective memories in Eastern and Central Europe, but she has also published
on Polish-Swedish cultural relations. She has participated in many international re-
search projects and, most recently, she was the leader of the European research network
“In Search for Transcultural Memory in Europe” (financed by the EU’s COST-pro-
gramme 2012-2016). Currently she is co-leader of the International Research Training
Group “Baltic – Borderlands”, run by the universities in Greifswald, Tartu and Lund
since 2009. Her international experience also includes visiting fellowships at universi-
ties in Warsaw (2001), Berkeley (2003) and Stanford (2013) and lecturing visits at the
National University of Malaysia (2014) and the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
(2016). She is the author and editor of a number of books and articles in English, Swed-
ish and Polish. The latest are: The Twentieth Century in European Memory (ed. with
Tea Sindbaek Andersen, Amsterdam 2017), Disputed Memory. Emotions and Memory
Politics in Central, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe (ed. with Tea Sindbaek Andersen,
Berlin–Boston 2016), Whose Memory? Which Future? Remembering Ethnic Cleansing
Beyond and Lost Cultural Diversity in Eastern, Central and Southeastern Europe (New
York–London 2016) and The Europeanization of Heritage and Memories in Poland and
Sweden (ed. with Krzyszof Kowalski, Kraków 2016).
Niklas BERNSAND
Lund University
niklas.bernsand@sol.lu.se
Eleonora NARVSELIUS
Lund University
eleonora.narvselius@slav.lu.se
CULTURAL HERITAGE IN SWEDEN

IN THE 2000s
CONTEXTS, DEBATES, PARADOXES
ABSTRACT The article analyses the contexts, arguments and paradoxes of thinking about
cultural heritage in Sweden of the 2000s when the topic achieved broad societal
relevance in traditional media, internet fora, political communication and aca-
demic research. The discussion focuses on four themes: the normative criticism
paradigm that has been increasingly influential in the heritage sector in recent
years and the tensions and conflicts it provokes, recent heritage work on and
with the until the last two decades silent ethnic minority Romani Travellers, the
continuing media polemic around the Sweden Democrats and its heritage poli-
cies, and the heritage debate initiated by journalist and China expert Ola Wong
in 2016. The analysis builds on projects and publications featuring heritage pro-
fessionals, academics, NGO people and professionals with other kinds of cul-
tural capital working in the heritage sector, as well as on illustrative debates and
interviews in the mass media. The debates are often heavily polarized, interwo-
ven with positions in other politically loaded issues such as globalization, migra-
tion and integration, and laden with questions of the legitimacy and authority of
political and institutional actors.
Key words: Sweden, cultural heritage, debates, Sweden Democrats, Romani

Travellers
58 Niklas Bernsand, Eleonora Narvselius POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
INTRODUCTION
Viewed from an outsider’s perspective, the ways of dealing with heritage in contempo-
rary Sweden differ significantly from what can be observed in other European coun-
tries, especially in Central European ones. The geographical distance between Poland
and Sweden is not that big, both countries are EU members and participants in nu-
merous international heritage bodies, but the logic, priorities and products of heritage
work in Sweden in many cases appears unconventional and needs to be explained in
more detail.
Consider three very recent examples. In April 2017, the Swedish government de-
cided to refrain from the nomination of the presented suggestions of Swedish immate-
rial cultural heritage for UNESCO’s heritage lists. A dignitary from the Department
of Culture commented upon the decision in the following manner: Quite often, it is
difficult to argue that a particular heritage or a particular tradition would be more im-
portant or more significant than some other. We think that, at present, there is no reason
to do to order them in this kind of value hierarchy.1 Another example concerns prepara-
tions before the inauguration of the Viking Museum in Stockholm’s downtown. De-
spite the fact that Vikings have been a trademark of Sweden for almost a century, the
establishment of a modern museum that would attract numerous foreign tourists and
domestic visitors to the Swedish capital has not been a priority until now. A journalist
who was allowed to see some exhibits before the official opening reported about a mas-
terly done wax figure of a Viking whose physical features correspond to a reconstructed
DNA-profile. He writes: The Viking happened to be male. With reddish thick wavy hair
brushed back and goatee, he looks like […] well, like a quite stereotypical Viking. ‘I can al-
ready see the criticism waiting for me’, says […] one of the museum’s creators. ‘It is a cliché
image of the Viking.’ But he is not a representation of the Vikings, not a type, he represents
only himself ’.2 Yet another example is about plans to install “Stolpersteine”3 in memory
of the Holocaust victims in Stockholm. This project was put on ice in 2007 and 2010,
but in 2017 the “Stolpersteine” were finally approved by the Stockholm municipality.
The decision to mark several places in Stockholm as sites of the Holocaust commemo-
ration, despite the well-known fact that Sweden was not a site of the genocide, brought
much criticism. Some Swedish debaters, among them representatives of Jewish organi-
zations, were scandalized by what they perceived as the effort to create ‘fake’ memories
1
C. Gustafsson, “Inga svenska traditioner på Unescos listor över kulturarv”, Sveriges Radio, 11 April
2017, at <http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=478&artikel=6669759&utm_source=
dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter>, 20 June 2017.
2
C. Daun, “Vikingens rätta ansikte: ‘Alla var inte vedervärdiga’”, Svenska Dagbladet, 18 April 2017, at
<https://www.svd.se/vikingens-ratta-ansikte--alla-var-inte-vedervardiga>, 20 June 2017.
3
“Stolpersteine”, literally ‘stumbling stones’, is an art project by the German artist Gunter Demnig. This
is a cobblestone-size mini-monument mounted in pavement and bearing an inscription with names
and life dates of victims of Nazi extermination policies. Since 1992, over 56,000 “Stolpersteine” have
been installed in 22 European countries.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 Cultural Heritage in Sweden in the 2000s… 59
and capitalize on the tragedy of European Jewry for city-branding purposes.4 In a nut-
shell, these cases exemplify the different problems the heritage sector faces in Sweden.
However, what makes them comparable is a noticeable uncertainty about who are the
targeted audiences and, consequently, what the suggested heritage product should epit-
omize. A corresponding problem concerns the diverse stakeholders and custodians of
heritage, a problem that eventually affects the quality of the heritage product. These
difficulties may be a side-effect of the transitional period accompanying the creation of
new visions of heritage, but may also turn out to be a new normality.
Without trying to paint an all-encompassing picture of the recent public debate on
heritage, this article will focus on broader contexts, main lines of argument and some
paradoxes of thinking about heritage in contemporary Sweden. The period in focus
is the dynamic 2000s, when against the background of epochal global events (the war
on terrorism, the growing political polarity of the post-Cold War world, the global
economic crisis, rise of radical right-wing movements, mass migration etc.), heritage
emerged as a topic of broad societal relevance in the traditional media, internet fora,
political communication and academic research. In Sweden, the intensity of the recent
heritage-related debates might indicate a growing concern about the impact of global-
ization on the Swedish welfare model, its national specificity and democratic institu-
tions. It may also give clues as to the transformation of the country’s cultural field, and
help to estimate its current constellations of power.
In a similar vein, the recent vivid media polemic not only says quite a deal about the
internal logic of heritage-making in the Swedish context, but also reveals the general
sensitivity of the heritage domain to international contexts and changing trends of na-
tional politics. We can get a clue about the gamut of conceptualizations of heritage as
a broadly defined cultural practice about cultural practice5 in a particular national case.
Besides, we will be able to distinguish more specific political-ideological currents and
detect struggles in the field of power that craft specific visions of heritage. With some
exceptions,6 the latter aspect has been under investigated, as academic literature usu-
ally brings to the fore policies, institutional backgrounds and internal motivations of
heritage claims, without explaining the more complex ideational contexts of change or
stability. Hence, this study intends to fill this gap to some extent by sketching a broader
picture of the recent developments in the domain of heritage in Sweden.
Our ambition to make sense of the contemporary discussion on heritage in Sweden
inevitably leads us to the issue of the actors participating in the debate as well as the
contexts and rationale of their statements. For this purpose, we suggest extracting use-
ful arguments concerning institutional logics and fields of power. Against the backdrop
4
D. Korn, “Skammens stenar”, Focus. Sveriges Nyhetsmagasin, 3 March 2017, at <https://www.fokus.
se/2017/03/449082/>, 20 June 2017.
5
P. Aronsson, L. Gradén (eds.), Performing Nordic Heritage. Everyday Practices and Institutional Cul
ture, Farnham 2013, p. 4.
6
E.g. J. Lundberg, Det sista museet. Reflektioner om identitetspolitik, kultur & integration, Stockholm
2016.
of these theoretical suggestions, we will proceed with an analysis of several resonant de-
bates that have brought the issue of heritage into the limelight.
FIELDS OF POWER AND THE INSTITUTIONAL LOGICS

OF HERITAGE-MAKING
Any definition of heritage is a difficult (and some even say vain) enterprise. Some ana-
lysts conclude that neat academic definitions of heritage inevitably straightjacket and
undermine its ability to function as a ‘convenient shorthand’.7 While theoretical de-
bates about the role, scope and characteristics of heritage pervade the international
academy and international heritage bodies, on the national level systematic thinking
about heritage is congruent with national cultural politics, memory politics and dem-
ocratic participation. A resonant public polemic triggered simultaneously by several
opinion-makers may be highly instrumental in clarifying the reasons, dynamics and
mechanisms of strong collective preoccupation with heritage in certain periods. More-
over, the outcomes of public discussions in this matter may have long-lasting effects on
the legitimacy and positioning of various institutional and individual actors engaged in
heritage work.
It would be an oversimplification to state that the opinions about heritage circu-
lating in a contemporary society are a direct outcome of political directives and party
politics. While refracted through the lens of national cultural policies, popular ideas
on heritage are also indicative of the logics generated by supranational actors and trans-
national institutions. Nevertheless, visions of heritage relate to national political dis-
courses in plenty of ways. Much points to the fact that heritage in Sweden grew into
a significant public issue as its mobilizing potential became re-discovered in the new
political circumstances of the 2000s, about which we will return to in subsequent pag-
es. To frame the following discussion theoretically, it should be stipulated from the
very outset that, similarly to the notion of culture, heritage is a stake of competition in
several fields, primarily the artistic and intellectual fields. However, heritage brings to
the fore what may be conveyed to the future generations in the shape of institutionally
selected, approved and curtailed versions of culture. Without necessarily being inten-
tionally politicized, heritage thus becomes instrumental in struggles over the definition
of social classifications (included/excluded, modern/outdated, native Swede/migrant)
and attains a political significance as a node structuring symbolic hierarchies. Heritage
thereby functions as an instrument of (dis)empowering groups and organizations with
various ideological outlooks.
In our opinion, it makes sense to focus on the empowering qualities of heritage re-
sulting primarily from its normative quality, flexibility and engagement with diversity.
Laurajane Smith emphasizes all these aspects when she writes that Heritage can be un-
7
M.L. Sörensen Stig, J. Carman, “Introduction: Making the Means Transparent: Reasons and Reflec-
tions”, in iidem (eds.), Heritage Studies. Methods and Approaches, London–New York 2009, p. 12.
derstood as one of a range of specific resources of power that is drawn on to validate or in-
validate claims for recognition of diversity or to maintain misrecognition and indifference
to diversity and thus help maintain political marginalization and injustice. In this render-
ing of the politics of recognition, claims to identity are contextualized within historical and
contemporary acknowledgements of inequity to make claims for parity in policy negotia-
tions over the distribution of material resources. The assertion of moral worth and self-es-
teem is also fundamental in this process. […] In applying these concepts to heritage, I suggest
that self-recognition by individuals and collectives as either the inheritor of privilege or of
marginalization might be understood as a first step in the playing out of either the seeking
of recognition for yourself or of the granting of recognition to others.8
This argument supports the view of heritage as a valuable asset in the struggle for
symbolic dominance that takes place in the field of power. Pierre Bourdieu describes
fields as metaphorical arenas of engagement and struggle, arenas where various actors
with diverse resources confront each other to win the right to define institutional logic
and stakes in certain domains, in particular in the domain of culture and cultural poli-
tics. The success or failure of their performances depend on types and proportions of
particular resources (more specifically, cultural capital, social capital, economic capital
and, eventually, symbolic capital) they can mobilize. According to Bourdieu, field of
power [is …] the system of positions occupied by the holders of diverse forms of capital which
circulate in the relatively autonomous fields which make up an advanced society.9 The di-
versity of capital mobilized in the symbolic struggles correlates with eventual plurality
of principles of hierarchization10 or, in Thornton’s terminology,11 institutional logics
operating in the field of power. In translation to the heritage problematic, this means
that heritage work engages with various aspects of democratic pluralism, cultural diver-
sity and claims on cultural custodianship. Quite expectedly, issues of plurality, diversity
and power are also constantly present in the public debates addressing heritage.
In the 2000s, the nexus of institutional and normative plurality, cultural diversity
and empowerment became the heart of the heritage debate in Sweden. Unlike in Po-
land, where cultural domination has for a long time been a prerogative of the intelligen-
tsia, and cultural capital transmitted by intelligentsia families became a universal demo-
8
L. Smith, “‘We Are... We Are Everything’: The Politics of Recognition and Misrecognition at Immi-
gration Museums”, Museum & Society, vol. 15, no. 1 (2017), p. 71.
9
L.J.D. Wacquant, “From Ruling Class to Field of Power: An Interview with Pierre Bourdieu on La No-
blesse d’État”, Theory, Culture & Society, vol. 10, no. 3 (1993), p. 20, at <https://doi.org/10.1177/02
6327693010003002>.
10
Ibid., p. 20.
11
P.H. Thornton, Markets from Culture. Institutional Logics and Organizational Decisions in Higher
Education Publishing, Stanford 2004; P.H. Thornton, W. Ocasio, M. Lounsbury, The Institutional
Logics Perspective. A New Approach to Culture, Structure and Process, Oxford 2012; P.H. Thornton,
C. Jones, K. Kury, “Institutional Logics and Institutional Change in Organizations: Transformation in
Accounting, Architecture, and Publishing”, Research in the Sociology of Organizations, vol. 23 (2005),
pp. 125-170, at <http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0733-558X(05)23004-5>.
cratic resource,12 in Sweden the custodianship and legitimation of heritage has always
been a more ambivalent issue. Historically, several types of institutional logics defined
cultural politics and the subordinated sector of heritage in different constellations over
different periods. Until recently, a relative stability of heritage discourses and practices
in Sweden was ensured by a prevalence of cultural-professional, bureaucratic and demo-
cratic logics.13 Despite path-dependence and a general consensus on the importance of
these logics for the heritage domain, their combination is far from unproblematic, as
each of them has its own objectives and legitimation strategies that often conflict with
each other. Cultural-professional logic that stresses the importance of cultural prod-
ucts of high quality and gives the upper hand to expert (professional, artistic and aca-
demic) judgement is often on a collision course with a democratic logic that stipulates
the equal participation of citizens and encourages public co-creation of cultural assets.
Each of these logics, in their turn, may come into conflict with bureaucratic logic that
focuses on implementation of political decisions, obedience to rules and maintenance
of hierarchies.
CULTURAL POLITICS AND HERITAGE WORK IN SWEDEN:

CONTEXTS AND GENERAL TENDENCIES
Since the end of the 1990s, the dominant position of cultural-professional and bureau-
cratic logics has been seriously challenged. While the left-leaning cultural politics in
the 1970s and 1980s rested on principles of the centralized distribution of funding and
protection of culture against commercialization, with Sweden’s membership in the EU
(1995) and periods of center-right rule, the idea of culture as a factor of regional devel-
opment and economic growth won the day.14 This, in turn, implied the activation of
management and market logics in defining the rationale of cultural politics and heri-
tage work. Such a shift was a result of several factors that disturbed the relative balance
in the field of cultural politics. Some of these factors were connected to socio-political
developments in Sweden, while others pertained to ideational trends of transnational,
pan-European or global character.
A global-wide development reverberating in the heritage debates on national and
regional levels is the changing status and quality of elites coming up with claims to
12
T. Zarycki, R. Smoczyński, T. Warczok, “The Roots of the Polish Culture-Centered Politics:
Towards a Non-Purely-Cultural Model of Cultural Domination in Central and Eastern Eu-
rope”, East European Politics and Societies, vol. 31, no. 2 (2017), pp. 360-381, at <https://doi.
org/10.1177/0888325417692036>.
13
J. Svensson, K. Tomson, “Institutionell förändring på det kulturpolitiska fältet”, in eaedem (eds.),
Kampen om kulturen. Idéer och förändring på det kulturpolitiska fältet, Lund 2016, p. 295; B. Jacobs-
son, “Stabilitet och förändring: om kulturpolitkens kringelikrokar under fyra decennier”, in J. Svens-
son, K. Tomson (eds.), Kampen om kulturen…, pp. 49-70.
14
B. Jacobsson, “Stabilitet och förändring…”, pp. 49-70; T. Möller, Svensk politisk historia. Strid och sa-
mverkan under tvåhundra år, Lund 2015.
cultural authority and thus altering the existing status quo in the field of power (com-
pare, for instance, the problematic concerning ‘escape of elites’,15 or ‘anywheres vs some-
wheres’16). The traditional role of cultural experts originating from bureaucratic and ac-
ademic sectors is increasingly being challenged both from above (i.e., by economic and
political powers) and from below (by heritage activists and opinion-makers from all
walks of life). However, viewed from the global perspective, the most significant con-
ceptual/ideological trends detectable in the heritage discourse and practices of present-
day Sweden are neoliberalism, normative criticism and multiculturalism in conjunc-
tion with universal discourses of human rights and recognition. In the 2000s, these
developments gained momentum in the West, and most obviously in the EU where
they correlate with principles of the European normative conditionality.
The Stockholm International Forum on the Holocaust and foundation of the Inter-
national Holocaust Remembrance Alliance in 2000 were pivotal events signaling the
ambitions of the Swedish state to obtain a position of influence in the ongoing Euro-
peanization of historical narratives and create useful symbolic-political alliances. The
realization of this initiative was especially important for Sweden, a country that did not
experience either the German occupation or the Holocaust. The symbolic significance
of the Holocaust was not only conveyed through a range of educational initiatives (like
the Living History Forum) and exhibitions, but also by efforts to make it a tangible and
permanent part of the Swedish public space.17 The recent initiative to install several
‘stumbling stones’ in memory of the Holocaust victims (“Stolpersteine”) in Stockholm
points in this direction. In the 2000s, the increased interest in the Jewish legacy was also
reflected in the establishment of the Jewish Museum in Stockholm and granting Yid-
dish the juridical status of official minority language in Sweden.
The Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities and the Eu-
ropean Charter of Regional or Minority languages ratified in 2000, were another step
on the path of Europeanization of the Swedish politics. It was followed by the Swed-
ish Law on minorities and minority languages adopted in 2000 and extended in 2010.
Despite the support of these symbolic-political initiatives, by and large, much indicates
that in the ‘reluctantly European’ latecomer Sweden18 Europeanization continues to be
conceived primarily in terms of economic, administrative and partially political adjust-
ment to the EU regulations.19 Europe is accepted, but not prioritized20 in many impor-
tant societal domains, and cultural politics and heritage work is one of them. Although
Sweden is a diligent implementer of European policies and regulations, a deeper alle-
15
C. Lasch, The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy, New York 1995.
16
D. Goodhart, Road to Somewhere. The Populist Revolt and the Future of Politics, London 2017.
17
See: B. Törnquist-Plewa, “The Europeanization of the Memory and Heritage of the Second World
War and the Holocaust in Sweden”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization of
Heritage and Memories in Poland and Sweden, Kraków 2016.
18
T. Möller, Svensk politisk historia…, p. 260.
19
Ibid.; SOU 2016:10 “EU på hemmaplan”; J. Tallberg, N. Aylott, C. Bergström, Europeiseringen av Sve-
rige, Stockholm 2010.
20
J. Tallberg, N. Aylott, C. Bergström, Europeiseringen..., p. 137.
giance to European identity in the sphere of culture and education is practically non-
existent.21 One of the clear indicators of such a state of affairs is, for example, the non-
participation of Sweden in the European Heritage Label. Instead of Europe as a focal
point of transnational identity, the broader public as well as cultural elites in Sweden
traditionally refer to the Nordic countries (Norden) and to some extent to Scandinavia
as a supra-national identity-generating discourse.22 This tendency may become more
pronounced under the influence of two major pan-European developments affecting
the country: the massive immigration of the 2000s that reached its culmination in
2015, and the accompanying growth of restorative nationalism. The ideological profile
of the Sweden Democrats (SD), an anti-migration and Eurosceptic party, is interesting
in many respects. In particular, in the 2000s, SD took a lead in the discussion on a na-
tional cultural canon and heritage, partly due to the negligence of this problematic by
other parliamentary parties. We will come back to this detail later.
The necessity of the better integration of previous migrant populations and accom-
modation of newcomers, a growing concern with the declining quality of secondary
education and a keener focus on national identity against the background of global cul-
tural developments resulted in a zooming of interest on cultural politics and heritage
work. A milestone event that defined Swedish cultural politics of the 2000s was the In-
vestigation of Cultural Politics (Kulturutredningen) that was presented by the center-
right Alliance government in 2009. Compared with the similar investigation presented
by the Social Democratic government in 1974, several novelties were introduced and
became the focus of a heated public debate. Three ideas were especially elevated: the
role of culture as a factor of economic growth which is foregrounded in the EU cul-
tural policy documents, the idea of culture management, and decentralization of deci-
sion-making in the sphere of cultural politics.23 The articulation of these relatively new
viewpoints in the Swedish context can be regarded not only as an adjustment to global
cultural trends, but also as a spill-over effect of the EU’s promotion of the so-called cul-
tural and creative industries in the wake of Lisbon Strategy in 2000.24 The next step on
the way to adjustment of cultural-political visions is the recent Proposition about Cul-
tural Politics (2017) that includes a Museum Law and changes in the Cultural Environ-
ment Law. This important initiative is driven by the Ministry of Culture where leading
positions were presently embraced by the members of the Green Party (Miljöpartiet).25
One of the most notable changes in the text of the proposition that was accepted by the
21
SOU 2016:10...
22
P. Aronsson, L. Gradén (eds.), Performing Nordic Heritage…
23
J. Svensson, K. Tomson, “Institutionell förändring…”, p. 12.
24
E. Rindzeviciute, “Les liaisons dangereuses? Kultur och ekonomisk tillväxt i EU”, in J. Svensson,
K. Tomson (eds.), Kampen om kulturen…, p. 82.
25
Miljöpartiet (the Green Party) has been a partner to the Swedish Social Democratic Party in the mino-
rity coalition government of Sweden since 2014. The party was founded in 1981 and presently focuses
on environmental policies and climate change. In their party platform, Miljöpartiet elevates ideas of
participatory democracy, ecological wisdom, social justice, children’s rights, environment-friendly eco-
nomy, nonviolence, equality and feminism, animal rights, self-reliance, freedom, and sustainability.
Parliament on May 31st 2017 is the systematic deletion of the word ‘national’ from the
earlier phrase ‘national cultural heritage’.
Before we proceed to the analysis of the Swedish debates on heritage that brought
to the fore ethno-cultural diversity, the changing power balance in the domain of cul-
tural work and a plurality of institutional logics, two important details should be stipu-
lated. One is a surprising unanimity of views on cultural heritage that have been recent-
ly expressed by mouthpieces of the parliament parties in Sweden. When asked in 2014
by journalists of the Swedish Radio26 about priorities in the field of heritage, practically
all the established political parties, with the exception of the Greens and the parvenu
SD, took up the issues of financing (more money to cultural activities, free entrance to
museums) and accessibility of heritage through digitalization. Hence, the approach to
heritage prevailing among the Swedish political establishment is developing along the
intersection of two types of organizational logics: the democratic and the management
ones. This is well in tune with visions of the leftist Swedish intellectuals who have dom-
inated cultural debate in Sweden since the 1960s.27 The Greens and the SD diverged
from this general tendency by focusing on the content of heritage. While the former
emphasized the democratization of cultural heritage by means of creative activities at
heritage institutions and a focus on the cultural environment, the latter used the oppor-
tunity to stress the necessity of a national heritage foundation, a national cultural canon
and increased support of organizations protecting Swedish national traditions. In the
struggle for the definition of priorities in the field of heritage, the Greens presently have
an obvious advantage as a party governing in coalition with the Social Democrats and
supported by the Left Party, while the self-designated nationalist SD is not regarded
by the political and cultural establishment as ideologically ‘decent’ and therefore meets
obstacles in their cultural activities. Nevertheless, some reputed opinion-makers who
represent the mainstream gamut of political opinions and who use to denounce SD
for xenophobia, anti-migration propaganda and an exclusive view of the nation, have
increasingly turned their criticism against what is claimed to be short-sighted heritage
policies promoted by the Green Party. As one of them pointed out, the right extremists’
best friend is the Ministry of Culture led by the Greens.28
Another important detail that helps to shed light on the contradictions and ambi-
guity of the recent approach to heritage in Sweden is the institutional structure of heri-
tage work. The official formulation presented on the website of the Swedish Heritage
Board refers rather to ‘cultural environmental work’ (kulturmiljöarbete) that comprises
all environments affected by human activities – buildings, industrial complexes, forest
or mountain landscapes – as well as intangible components related to them, such as tra-
26
“Partiernas förslag för kulturarvet”, Sveriges Radio, 20 August 2014, at <http://sverigesradio.se/sida/
artikel.aspx?programid=478&artikel=5942868>, 20 June 2017.
27
J. Ljunggren, Inget land för intellektuella. 68-rörelsen och svenska vänsterintellektuella, Lund 2009.
28
“Patrik Oksanen: MP:s kulturella beröringsskräck spelar högerextremisterna i händerna”, Dalarnas
Tidningar, 12 April 2017, at <http://www.dt.se/opinion/ledare/patrik-oksanen-mp-s-kulturella-
beroringsskrack-spelar-hogerextremisterna-i-handerna>, 20 June 2017.
ditions and folklore.29 This reflects a broad conceptualization of heritage correspond-

ing with the UNESCO- and EU-promoted approaches that acknowledge the role of
heritage as a resource for achieving sustainable development.30 The interpenetration of
the cultural problematics and environmental issues is also well in line with the visions of
the Green Party, which has taken the lead in formulating the agenda for heritage work
in Sweden in recent years. Thus, according to the Swedish Heritage Board, the range
of actors in charge of the cultural environment work is extremely broad. It comprises
all principal institutions such as regional and local governments, the churches, indus-
tries, universities, museums, various NGOs as well as authorities responsible for for-
estry, water supply, agriculture and traffic (see fig.1). Within such a broad institutional
framework, cultural-professional logic risks losing its consolidating power, as expert
knowledge of heritage professionals is expected to be dispersed in a broad institutional
landscape. The thinness of the cultural-professional and bureaucratic arguments may
be compensated, on the one hand, by opening the field of heritage to non-professionals
and the wider public and, on the other hand, by leaving the ground to professionals
without cultural credentials and specific cultural capital (managers, educators, consul-
tants, investors, developers, communicators). The predominance of democratic, mana-
gerial and market logics in the field of heritage implies a different vector of the heritage
work. The appeal, usability and openness of heritage for the broader public may be
framed as a necessity for whole-sale solutions that it is expected will cater for the vari-
ous societal groups and, besides, will be acceptable for every individual. This opens the
field of heritage up for ‘popular’ ideological agendas that rely on democratic rhetoric
and herald the emancipation of individuals and marginalized groups, but, as we will
show further, in tandem with this it will disenfranchise significant categories of citizens
and resurrect essentialist thinking about identities, communities and belonging. One of
them is the so-called normative criticism.
In what follows we examine normative criticism in the heritage sector and identify
who might be empowered and disempowered by the projects and publications referring
to this normative-epistemological paradigm. We focus on some inconsistencies and
paradoxes highlighted or being provoked by this paradigm, in particular, the tension
between cultural diversity and the diversity of perspectives, views on what constitutes
politics, and a discursive strategy we call the ‘essentialist boomerang’. We also scrutinize
whether some of the declared aims of normative criticism, most importantly the inclu-
sion of previously invisible or silenced groups and perspectives, could be achieved with-
in other, less divisive frameworks. The discussion then continues with a review of the
legacy of Romani Travellers, the continuing media polemic around SD, and the analysis
of the heritage debate initiated by journalist and China expert Ola Wong in 2016. The
29
Riksantikvarieämbetet (Swedish National Heritage Board), Kulturarv, 2015.
30
“The Hangzhou Declaration: Heralding the Next Era of Human Development”, 2013, at <http://
www.unaavictoria.org.au/news-resources/the-hangzhou-declaration-heralding-the-next-era-of-
human-development-see-mo/>, 20 June 2017; Council of Europe, “Council of Europe Framework
Convention on the Value of Cultural Heritage for Society”, 2005, at <http://www.coe.int/en/web/
conventions/full-list/-/conventions/treaty/199>, 20 June 2017.
analysis builds on projects and publications featuring heritage professionals, academ-

ics, NGO people and professionals with other kinds of cultural capital working in the
heritage sector, as well as on some illustrative debates or interviews in the mass media.
Fig.1. “Roadmap for actors involved in working on the cultural environment”. The picture
illustrates the all-embracing and reciprocal character of thinking about institutional
responsibility for heritage in Sweden
Source: <http://www.raa.se/app/uploads/2016/05/Broschyr_Vision-för-kulturmiljoarbetet-till-2030_
webb.pdf>, 20 June 2017.
NORMATIVE CRITICISM AND THE LOGIC OF

(DIS)EMPOWERMENT IN THE HERITAGE SECTOR OF SWEDEN
In a report from 2016 on the role of cultural heritage work for social development, the
Swedish National Heritage Board states that throughout the 2000s cultural heritage
has increasingly focused on identity, social cohesion and inclusion and, consequently, on
social hierarchies, ownership of heritages and the right to access such heritages.31 The
report concludes that the emphasis on the heterogeneity of the past has come to focus
even more on identity and on questions about how people in the past saw their identities
or which identity its traces represent. This sometimes might mean that legitimacy is being
sought in the past for identities that are being manifested in society today.32
These arguments are well in line with normative criticism (normkritik), a specific
theoretical and empirical framework stemming from the US academy that became en-
demic in the larger sector of cultural heritage in Sweden. Normative criticism promotes
awareness of social norms that allegedly guide important social practices, and questions
the production of normality and deviance with the ensuing social inequality. Norma-
tive criticism is therefore often discussed alongside such notions as intersectionality
and identity politics. It places the focus not on individuals and groups perceived to
be deviant from the norm, but rather on the hierarchies and the privileges of those
upholding the norm. In the field of cultural heritage in Sweden, normative criticism
therefore seeks to highlight the norms underpinning previously dominant conceptions
of heritage and redirect attention to experiences of individuals and groups that were
previously excluded or whose stories were earlier not distilled into cultural heritage.
Among the perspectives most frequently included in the heritage politics of normative
criticism are ethnic and sexual minorities, gender, contemporary migrants and refugees,
the disabled etc. The rhetoric is thus about democracy, emancipation and participa-
tion. Hence, normative criticism provides a set of easily understood but also potentially
divisive catchphrases for communication with NGOs and the wider public.
Normative criticism can be said to be fairly thin in terms of ideational content. Nev-
ertheless, as it props up intersectionalist projects, including nexuses of state or regional
bureaucracies, academia and the heritage institutions, it turns instrumental in produc-
ing the whole-sale solutions in the heritage sector. Here normative criticism enables
emancipation and representation of previously silenced and invisible perspectives and
identities. However, as we will argue, it risks leading to the sorting out and disempow-
erment of other ones. As will be demonstrated below, it introduces normatively loaded
rhetoric to heritage work, often in form of binary oppositions of inclusion-exclusion,
open-closed, tolerant-intolerant, and even good-evil. Consequently, many proponents
of normative criticism tend to envision positions and participants of the debate in ac-
cordance with such binaries.
31
Kulturarvsarbetet i samhällsutvecklingen. Redovisning av regeringsuppdrag om omvärldsanalys och kun-
skapsöversikt avseende kulturarvsområdet. Rapport från Riksantikvarieämbetet, Stockholm 2016, p. 41.
32
Ibid., p. 43.
An article from 2016 on a website for museum professionals celebrating the ad-
vent of the new inclusive heritage paradigm and applauding the coming government
proposition on cultural politics, refers to the two most important projects that have
contributed to the spin-up of normative criticism in the heritage sector in recent years.
It also exemplifies the rhetoric of well-positioned heritage professionals on the outlook
of museums within the framework of normative criticism. While several contributors
applauded the increased independence of museums promised in the proposition, one
museum director expressed her doubts about the effect a renewed notion of cultural
heritage might have on SD and other nationalist forces.33 Although, as will be shown lat-
er, the Minister of Culture Alice Bah Kuhnke rejects allegations that she is trying to im-
pose normative criticism from above, the article states explicitly that the museum pro-
fessionals were enthused by the minister’s earlier speech where she argued that it was
time to include the dark pages, not only the bright ones, in the stories about Sweden.
This idea echoes key notions associated with the Europeanization of memory empha-
sizing the need to tone down self-aggrandizing histories and confront difficult national
pasts instead.34 It was supported by the director of the Regional Museum in Kristians-
tad in the following terms: The museums have focused on nostalgia and have therefore
been exclusionary. But now there is a spirit where other groups insist on being making
themselves heard and visible, groups whose history has not been written, e.g. the Roma,
LGBT-persons and the disabled.35 In a similar vein, another museum director made it
clear that Swedish museums need to showcase the stories they were earlier reluctant to
address, although they should not substitute, but rather complement the ones already
exhibited: It is easy to pinpoint as cultural heritage (kulturmärka) a nice old house, but
harder to tell the difficult parts of our Swedish history. The institutions really need to wid-
en their scope of selection for what is highlighted. As a complement to the canonized image
other aspects have to be showcased.36
In conclusion, the article quoted above elevates both key arguments of normative
criticism and props up the political logic according to which the heritage institutions in
Sweden are responsible for protecting heritage from being hijacked by SD: Today more
than 70 museums and organizations are forming a popular movement that shows that
monocultural society has never existed. In reality, Sweden has always been heterogeneous,
but what did not fit in the dominant historiography was silenced. Sweden Democrats’ ef-
forts to annex the notion of cultural heritage with rhetoric and threats, and claim a mono-
cultural truth has been the immediate reason for many people to bring up a more realistic
view of society.37
33
F. Söderling, “Nu är kulturarvet en het fråga”, Utställningsestetiskt Forum, 3 June 2016, at <http://
ueforum.se/16/163/163synpunkt.html>, 8 June 2017.
34
K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa, “Heritage and Memory in a Changing Europe. Introductory Re-
marks”, in iidem (eds.), The Europeanization…, pp. 15-32.
35
F. Söderling, “Nu är kulturarvet…”.
36
Ibid.
37
Ibid.
The first emphatic and well-argued effort to question normative criticism and con-
temporary identity politics in the heritage sector was made by the literary scholar, writ-
er and conservative public intellectual Johan Lundberg. In his book The Last Museum
(2016)38 he argues that the programmatic preoccupation with cultural diversity risks
to undermine the diversity of perspectives, ideas and outlooks in the heritage sector.
In his view, the different geographical, thematic and temporal foci of various museums
have historically guaranteed a diversity of perspectives. Museums enabled the visitor to
step out of his contemporary role and meet an abundance of perspectives that differ from
the contemporary’s own.39 If all museums instead were champions of cultural or, rather,
demographic, diversity as filtered through the prism of normative criticism it would
amount to a reduced ideological diversity reflecting a restricted contemporary vision
imposed on all exhibitions regardless of their focus. Lundberg doubts whether such
a perspective would serve the task of inclusion and integration, which is advocated by
the paradigm he criticises.40 Although Lundberg’s effort to oppose normative criticism
and identity politics to would-be universalist aestethics and ideals of high-quality art
and literature is not necessarily convincing, his distinction between cultural diversity
and diversity of perspectives is valuable.41
In Sweden of the 2000s, a striking feature of institutional discourse that supports
and propagates normative criticism are the ubiquitous references to the role of the heri-
tage sector in fighting forces accused of working for exclusion, in particular the policies
of SD. This task is awarded a prominent place in the justifications for several recent
heritage projects working in this paradigm, as well as in other prominent theoretical
contributions to the paradigm.42 To some extent, we witness a situation where both SD
and the adherents of normative criticism claim that the other side started politicizing
heritage first. More often, as will be shown below with reference to the media polem-
ics on the cultural politics of SD, heritage professionals and heritage activists critical of
SD maintained that heritage is by definition political, and that it is the specific content
of heritage politics that is at stake. Most explicitly this point was underlined in the in-
tersectional projects “Disturbing Homogeneity” and “Norm, Nation and Culture”. In
several publications, Anna Furumark, the leader of the projects, concludes that heritage
is always political, and thus can be used both to create communities, to include and over-
come differences and to exclude, shut out and create an us and them and draw boundar-
38
J. Lundberg, Det sista museet…
39
Ibid., p. 87.
40
Ibid., p. 88.
41
Ibid., p. 13. A similar argument is also sometimes made in heated Swedish discussions on immigra-
tion – those claiming to favour cultural diversity are often criticised for not respecting the diversity
of opinions, e.g. the right to oppose or highlight problems with immigration. See e.g.: A. Johansson
Heinö, Gillar vi olika? Hur den svenska likhetsnormen hindrar integrationen, Stockholm 2012.
42
See e.g.: A. Furumark (ed.), Att störa homogenitet, Lund 2013; A. Furumark , M. Eivergård (eds.), När
det stör, Lund 2016; C. Hyltén-Cavallius, F. Svanberg (eds.), Älskade museum. Svenska kulturhistoriska
museer som kulturproducenter och samhällsbyggare, Lund 2015.
ies between people.43 “Disturbing Homogeneity” thus sought to convince heritage pro-
fessionals that no neutral position exists, that their sector is inherently political, and
that there is a distinction between party politics, i.e. the struggle for political power of
formal political parties, and ‘general politics’.44 In the final project report, published as
a book in 2016, she envisions a heritage politics that is inclusive, seeks to change exist-
ing societal norms and fights exclusionary nationalism.45 However, eventually she re-
peats the binary opposition between good and bad heritage policies leading either to
a victory for the inclusionary side or to the landslide of nationalists who would then
proceed to use the heritage sector to further their exclusionary, essentialist, and anach-
ronistic politics. The vision of the heritage field is here almost Tolkienesque, as it is pre-
sented as the scene of a fierce struggle between the good forces of openness and inclu-
sion and the evil forces of rigid boundaries and exclusion.
A further indication of this binary thinking is the construction of the heritage field
and the choice of opponents in key norm criticist publications as they exhibit examples
of strongly negative reactions to their own or their colleagues’ previous work. As will
be discussed below, resistance to normative criticism in the heritage sector is not lim-
ited to SD or other nationalist actors, and the reasons for taking such critical positions
is hardly only a matter of intolerance and downplaying of diversity. However, practi-
cally all the negative reactions to “Disturbing Homogeneity” showcased by Furumark
and Eivergård, stem from SD politicians and activists, intolerant and nationalist envi-
ronments on the web46 and populist, radical right and neo-Nazi internet publications.47
Hyltén-Cavallius and Svanberg48 analyze very vaguely defined ‘ultranationalist’ views on
cultural heritage found on web forums, and not the least the reactions on such forums
to various heritage initiatives advocating normative criticism. Despite the alarm about
the prevalence of nationalism and exclusionary visions of heritage, very little reflection
is given as to why this might be the case, and especially absent are considerations about
whether some expressions of normative criticism could provoke such reactions. The spe-
cific discursive regimentation seeks legitimacy by focusing on the most radical oppo-
nents. Since publications supporting normative criticism are actually known and read in
web forums such as Flashback, this choice might sometimes contribute to a polarization
of debates on cultural heritage, and even in the long run help to foster a future backlash
against the inclusion of minorities and previously silenced groups supported by norma-
tive criticism.
43
C. Hyltén-Cavallius, F. Svanberg (eds.), Älskade museum…, p. 8.
44
A. Furumark (ed.), Att störa…, p. 60. It is difficult not to notice here that this book itself, as well as
other similar publications, is replete with calls to fight the heritage policies of Sweden Democrats.
45
Ibid., p. 46.
46
Ibid., p. 96.
47
A. Furumark, M. Eivergård (eds.), När det stör, pp. 86-103. The exception is a reference to journalist
Marika Formgren’s critique in the liberal-conservative magazine Axess.
48
C. Hyltén-Cavallius, F. Svanberg (eds.), Älskade museum…, ch. 2.
ESSENTIALISM STRIKES BACK: THE UNINTENDED

CONSEQUENCES OF THE HERITAGE RHETORIC
OF INCLUSION, PLURALITY AND UNIVERSALISM
A paradox that emanates from the application of the norm criticist framework in the
heritage field is that its professed anti-essentialism sometimes runs full circle and re-
turns as essentialism. Notably, both inside and outside the heritage sector, normative
criticism goes in tandem with mainstream academic methods aiming to deconstruct
notions of naturalized ethnic, cultural and historical continuities and bounded com-
munities. One such community is the nation, a frequent target of norm criticist decon-
structions. As was noticed earlier, the Proposition on Cultural Politics of 2017 works in
a post-national direction and systematically obliterates references to a national cultural
heritage. Nevertheless, a sizeable number of the proponents of normative criticism tend
to recognize the importance of the nation as a phenomenon that is here to stay […] for
the foreseeable future.49 The task is thus not to abandon national ramifications, but to
build a pluralistic and inclusive Swedish nation.
Exhibiting such pluralistic and inclusive narratives on the national past would per-
haps provoke less controversy if heritage workers accepted the possibility of a pluralist
present unfolding from a past that was less pluralist, at least in ethnic terms and within
current state borders. However, the problem is that, as Swedish historian Peter Arons-
son assumes, contemporary Swedes have been encouraged to perceive their continu-
ity with historical populations of the country primarily through the anti-essentialist
spectacles highlighting universal and existential identifications. Aronsson points out an
interesting tendency: while exhibitions of the Danish National Museum unabashedly
display an ethnic Danish narrative spanning thousands of years, the National Historical
Museum in Stockholm, where much norm criticist work has been conducted, explicitly
challenges the idea of a continuity between the ancestors and the descendants. He as-
sumes that: In Sweden the memory is oriented towards seeing others, putting ethnic Swedes
in a similar position to new Swedes. We are not related with but curious about the others
that lived here before us. Hence memory is instead universalized and thought to be able to
talk to all visitors on an alleged existential level without ethnic qualification.50 In Arons-
son’s interpretation, exhibiting a reflexive, gendered, multicultural class-conscious sto-
ry of the territory of contemporary Sweden and explicitly stating that Sweden of course
did not exist at the time thus means confronting the visitor as an individual meeting
equal but distant strangers in a universal conversation about death, power, family life etc.51
The abovementioned example of the rhetoric of curators at the new Viking Museum in
Stockholm aptly illustrates this sort of argument.
49
Svanberg in: A. Furumark (ed.), Att störa…, p. 29.
50
P. Aronsson, “Writing the Museum”, in J. Hegardt (ed.), The Museum Beyond the Nation, The Natio-
nal Historical Museum, Stockholm 2012, pp. 33-34.
51
Ibid., p. 33.
The described vision of historical continuity or rather lack of it, in the heritage
sector echoes the approach evident in the first book based on the “Disturbing Homo
geneity” project. Here, the universalist focus on openness, mixing, movement and
change replaces previous visions of identification with real or imagined ancestors. As
we will see, essentialism is lurking in some of the assumptions of normative criticism,
especially in the idea that people with roots in other countries cannot identify with
Swedish displays of the past that underline continuities with people from historical pe-
riods during which they and their ancestors did not live in the country. Paradoxically,
insisting that such an identification is possible would draw on notions of the territorial,
the universal and the existential, but would perhaps be less normative critical since it
would focus on newcomers as much as on the beneficiaries of the established norms.
Instead, one prefers the rhetoric of inclusion that displays a detached and for many visi-
tors undoubtedly insipid identification with people from the past. Considering Arons-
son’s observation that the national master narrative is after all still present in the Stock-
holm exhibition, but in a very Freudian way, which must confuse the visitor,52 the merits
of a post-national mnemonic approach to pluralist nation-building can be questioned.
It seems that essentialist notions creep back into the language of museums by draw-
ing on normative criticism through the loophole of ideas about representations. The
idea that normative criticism and the identity politics stemming from it might strength-
en essentialist notions of identity was highlighted by Johan Lundberg. His book criti-
cizes oftentimes very detailed representation of various identities and experiences, as
brought forward for example in a report on museums and diversity by the Swedish Ex-
hibition Agency rhetorically asking when we will see museum directors that are both
disabled and transsexual. Lundberg then poses the question why it is assumed that
a transsexual disabled museum director would necessarily support the agency’s view on
traditional museums as institutions furthering oppression.53 In other words, normative
criticism seems to carry a risk of essentializing the views of individuals as reflecting one
or some of their presumed identities.
A brief polemic exchange in the Gothenburg daily Göteborgs-Posten between a lib-
eral public intellectual and a PR strategist at a Swedish heritage institution exemplifies
the clash between competing perspectives on cultural heritage in contemporary Swe-
den. Adam Cwejman, a liberal opinion-maker and politician of Polish-Jewish-Ukrai-
nian origin, criticized both the central Swedish Exhibition Agency and one of the re-
gional Swedish museums for their statements that Swedish museums are exclusionary
just by depicting Swedish history and that new stories of the past are needed because of
the demographic changes in the wake of the recent immigration.54 Cwejman quoted
the director of Västerbottens museum who said that maybe we have to let go of the 19th
52
Ibid.
53
J. Lundberg, Det sista museet…, p. 18.
54
A. Cwejman, “Rör inte mitt kulturarv”, Göteborgs-Posten, 9 March 2016, at <http://www.gp.se/ledare/
adam-cwejman-r%C3%B6r-inte-mitt-kulturarv-1.3923>, 8 June 2017.
century farm and think whether we can use the houses and tell other stories.55 Cwejman
claimed that this attitude is problematic both because it does not reflect an accurate
view of history, and since it implies that foreign-born Swedes would feel alienated by
taking part of Swedish history, an assumption he regarded as directly condescending as
it views those of us with foreign background as over-sensitive children. Instead, Cwejman
proposed another, slower path to inclusion into the local and national Swedish cultural
heritage that challenges the normative critical ramification advocated by some heritage
professionals and politicians: That Gothenburg has been populated by people who didn’t
look like me, who didn’t share my ethnicity, name or customs and language of my forefa-
thers does not make the place any less interesting or important to me. This will be my his-
tory as I live my life here. And with time my descendants will speak self-evidently about
their Gothenburg roots. I don’t want their and my history to be told through an ideological
and diversity-marinated filter.56
A communication strategist from the Swedish Exhibition Agency took terms with
Cwejman’s idea about historical accuracy. She argued that the best way to create true
historical accuracy, which has been distorted by the previously dominant homogeneous
frameworks at the museums, was to include silenced voices and invisible perspectives
of, for instance, women as well as ethnic and sexual minorities.57 Cwejman replied by
pointing out that he had never denied the importance of including forgotten groups
and perspectives or the fact that those groups previously were excluded. He recounted
in more explicitly liberal terms his critique of collectivist notions on identity and di-
versity resulting in ‘paternalistic’ attitudes towards migrants and minorities: There is
nothing in a truthful and wide account of Swedish history that excludes those with foreign
background. We who have foreign background are mature enough to realize that although
Sweden today is an ethnically diverse country this has not always been the case.58
This polemic exemplifies how a new vision of heritage projected by some politi-
cians, civil servants, academics and heritage professionals runs the risk of being per-
ceived as disempowering not only by nationalist political parties and web activists, but
also by mainstream public figures. Resistance to the alleged disempowerment is often
expressed through quite contentious notions of historical accuracy and historical con-
tinuity. However, what is considered as threatening by commentators like Cwejman, is
not the inclusion of new perspectives and a new focus on minorities, but the perceived
negligence of historical continuity and ‘accurate’ depictions of the past coming in the
wake of normative critical agendas inculcated by official institutions.
It is instructive that the Swedish National Agency official assumed that Cwejman’s
reference to the epistemologically contentious notion of historical accuracy implies
55
The quote was taken from a reportage on Swedish Public Service Radio: P. Öberg, “Landets mu-
seer ändrar kurs”, Sveriges Radio, 7 March 2016, at <http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?
programid=478&artikel=6382680>, 8 June 2017.
56
A. Cwejman, “Rör inte…”.
57
Idem, “Kulturarvet är alltid i rörelse”, Göteborgs-Posten. Ledarbloggen, 16 March 2016, at <http://
blogg.gp.se/ledarbloggen/2016/03/16/riksutstallningar-svarar-adam-cwejman/>, 8 June 2017.
58
Ibid.
that he might question the very idea of including historically excluded minorities and
neglected perspectives. This might on the one hand simply have been an example of
discursive foul play. On the other, this could also exemplify the binary thinking noted
above, which presupposed that an individual or an institution is believed to be either
for or against inclusion, either for openness or for the sealing off of cultures from each
other. If this is the case, then we witness an envisioning of the field of heritage in terms
of a Ricoeurian hermeneutics of suspicion, which is often a characteristic of radically
polarized debates. The presented discussion serves as an example of how parts of the
heritage sector sometimes generate unnecessary tensions by antagonizing those who in
fact do not oppose inclusionary heritage policies.59
When essentialism does not strike back, one may instead sense a fine line between
deconstruction and attacking straw men, i.e. refuting views that an opponent did not
express. The above-mentioned debate, where opponents of normative criticism were
presented as opponents of the inclusion of minority heritages, exemplifies this develop-
ment. There also was much controversy around Ingrid Lomfors, the Head of the Living
History Forum, who was accused of having denied the existence of a specific Swedish
culture during a public event organized by the government to stimulate support and ac-
ceptance for refugees in October 2015. In a recent polemic exchange, she argued that
her words had been distorted by ‘the Internet trolls’ and that what she had meant was
that the notion of the existence of a unitary native culture that goes back to ancient times is
not built on fact. We have always been influenced from outside. Her opponent, the con-
servative journalist Lars Anders Johansson, made the obvious point that she was debat-
ing a straw man, since no one would claim that Swedish culture is unchangeable and
free from outside influences.60 In a similar case, which can also be seen as an example
of selective constructivism, the chairman of the Swedish National Heritage Federation
in a public debate with a representative of SD denied the possibility of speaking about
a specific Swedish culture because of the multiple origins of its various expressions,
while simultaneously taking the existence of a seemingly holistic immigrant Kurdish
culture for granted.61
59
It should be noted, however, that when Cwejman made the same point in a conversation with two
heritage professionals during a public event arranged by the Swedish National Heritage Board the re-
actions of the latter were much more self-reflective and accommodating than in the example from the
newspaper debate. See: “Att engagera sig i kulturarvet”, UR Samtiden. Kulturarvet och samhällsutvec-
klingen, 2016, at <https://urskola.se/Produkter/199636-UR-Samtiden-Kulturarvet-och-samhallsut
vecklingen-Att-engagera-sig-i-kulturarvet>, 8 June 2017.
60
“Replik: Johansson borde sluta lyssna till nättrollen”, Jönköpings-Posten, 18 April 2017, at <http://
www.jp.se/article/replik-johansson-borde-sluta-lyssna-till-nattrollen/>, 8 June 2017.
61
“Kritik mot SD:s kulturpolitik”, Sveriges Radio, 27 September 2010, at <http://sverigesradio.se/sida/
artikel.aspx?programid=1650&artikel=4047229>, 8 June 2017.
REPRESENTING ROMANI TRAVELLERS: WHOSE LOGIC WINS?
In this section, we briefly look at how recent trends highlighting cultural diversity in
the heritage sector have affected representations of Romani Travellers,62 arguably the
most exposed and simultaneously least visible ethnic minority in modern Swedish his-
tory. It is not possible here to provide more than a brief introduction to the complex
background and identities of Romani Travellers or to the dark legacies of state policies
towards the group in the 20th century that affected many individuals and seriously dis-
rupted inter-generational cultural transmission. The heritage sector began to include
stories and experiences of Romani Travellers in the 2000s, following a cultural and so-
cial revival in the group in the 1990s.
Romani Travellers, who together with other groups such as Kelderash, Lovara, Arli,
Finnish Kalé etc. have officially constituted the Roma national minority since 1999, are
the Roma community with the longest historical presence in Sweden. Also after the ar-
rival of the Kelderash Roma in the late 19th century, Romani Travellers were by far the
largest of the Roma groups in Sweden, and probably continue to be so today, although
the contemporary Roma group is much more diverse due to recurrent waves of immi-
gration starting in the 1950s.63 In terms of identification, many Romani Travellers see
themselves as a specific group among the Roma with their own Romani language and
a specific culture, while others consider themselves an ethnic group outside the Roma
framework.
The historian Ludvig Wiklander identifies three main phases in Swedish minority
politics towards the Romani Travellers in the 20th century.64 Firstly, in the first half of
the century the group was framed in racial terms as a socially undesirable mix of Swedes
and Roma constituting a serious social problem, a view that had the potential to in-
form very harsh measures from the local authorities against individuals and families.65
Although there was no coherent state policy officially targeting Romani Travellers, the
group was very significantly overrepresented as both victims of enforced sterilizations
62
In Swedish, the group is most often referred to as resandefolket or resande, while romanifolket is prefer-
red by some Romani Travellers. Internally terms such as dinglare and tavring are also frequent. Until
the 1990s the most frequent term both in official documents and popular use was tattare, which is
considered derogatory by the group.
63
There are no official ethnic statistics in Sweden, and estimations of the size of group vary strongly. Jo-
urnalist Bo Hazell, a leading Swedish expert on the history and culture of Romani Travellers estimates
the number to be 20,000-25,000. See: B. Hazell, Resandefolket. Från tattare till Traveller, Stockholm
2011, p. 7. Romani Traveller activists, depending on their definition of who should be regarded as
a member of the group, provide different numbers, e.g. 6,000-8,000 (Ralf Novak-Rosengren, Romani
Traveller musician and activist, personal communication with Niklas Bernsand), or 30,000-50,000
( Jon Petterson, Romani Traveller activist, chairman of the Franzwagner Society, personal communi-
cation with Niklas Bernsand). The second estimation focuses on the number of persons with two Tra-
veller parents, regardless of the extent of personal identification with the group.
64
L. Wiklander, “Resandefolket och svensk minoritetspolitik. 1990-talets paradigmskifte”, Historisk
Tidskrift, vol. 135, no. 4 (2015).
65
M. Ericsson, Exkludering, assimilering eller utrotning? ‘Tattarfrågan’ i svensk politik 1880-1955, Lund
2015.
in the period 1935-1975, enforced adoptions and abuse in social care. An estimation by
the Swedish government report based on a limited selection of applications for steril-
ization found that victims might have been found in as many as one out of four Romani
Traveller families.66 Secondly, in the post-war years Romani Travellers were re-concep-
tualized as a socioeconomic group with a Swedish background, or a social isolate as one
of the academic legitimisers of this discourse, sociologist Adam Heymowski termed
it.67 The view of Romani Travellers as a socially distinct rather than an ethnic group
was in part a rejection of the stigmatizing racist paradigm, but can also be seen as a re-
flection of the self-image of a forward-looking post-war society where old prejudices
could be made irrelevant by social engineering facilitating equality and progress. This
meant that Romani Travellers became viewed as a remnant of past inequality that could
be overcome by social reforms, making any cultural distinction of the group irrelevant.
While this view opened up for assimilation into the majority society, local authorities
in many cases continued to differentiate Romani Travellers families in social policy.
From the 1940s the group therefore virtually ‘went underground’ for many decades, as
many Travellers hid their identities in public to avoid persecution.68 This discourse was
dominant well into the 1990s, and was not overcome until the beginning of the third
phase, when Romani Travellers were recognized as part of the Roma national minority
in Sweden in the law of national minorities in 1999. As late as 1992 Romani Travellers
in a programmatically diversity-friendly handbook on the history of immigration in
Sweden were categorized as a socio-cultural isolate originally stemming from the majority
population, which are usually attributed a ‘secret language’ and have now through sociopo-
litical measures become assimilated.69 The view of the group as merely a social formation
consisting of outcasts from the majority society is deeply insulting to many Romani
Travellers, and is seen as one of the root causes to their suffering in the post-war years.
Countering such images has therefore been an important part in the emancipation
struggles since the 1990s. In an interesting case of heritage from below, Romani Trav-
ellers drew on both emerging DNA techniques and genealogical research as tools for
empowerment in their effort to refute the (until recently) hegemonic view of them
as a Swedish social isolate that can be made to disappear by social engineering. Many
Travellers often use digitalized archives to research their family origins, participate in
genealogical forums and cooperate with genealogical experts. Drawing on a wide va-
66
See: SOU 2000:20 “Steriliseringsfrågan i Sverige 1935-1975. Historisk belysning – Kartläggning – In-
tervjuer”, p. 240. See also: B. Hazell, Resandefolket…, pp. 132-133. The oft-quoted 1:4 ratio is based
on the approximated share of applications in relation to the number of ‘tattare’ found in the official
inventory of 1944. The investigation of serious abuse of children in social care also pointed to a strong
overrepresentation of victims from the group. See: SOU 2009:99 “Vanvård i social barnavård under
1900-talet”, p. 149.
67
A. Heymowski, Om ‘tattare’ och ‘resande’, Uppsala 1955; idem, Swedish ‘Travellers’ and their Ancestry.
A Social Isolate or an Ethnic Minority?, Uppsala 1969.
68
See life stories of Romani Travellers in: B.-I. Hedström Lundqvist, A. Hellman, “Sveriges historia – ett
resandeperspektiv”, in eaedem (eds.), Dinglarens väg. Vorsnos Drom. De ofrivilligt åsidosatta, Uppsala
2015, e.g. pp. 30-31.
69
I. Svanberg, M. Tydén, Tusen år av invandring. En svensk kulturhistoria, Värnamo 1992, p. 350.
riety of sources, genealogists have recently demonstrated the complex origins of the
group. Most importantly, genealogist Bo Lindwall shows after many years of study that
Romani Travellers can trace their ancestors both to Roma ancestors, to the Swedish ma-
jority population, and sometimes also to families with various ethnic and cultural back-
ground that had specific professions such as knackers and executioners.70 Simultane-
ously, as is shown in journalist Karin Bojs’ and genealogist Peter Sjölund’s recent book,
many Romani Travellers draw on the increased accessibility of DNA tests to find out
more about their origins.71 Tests made so far show that the origins of all tested Romani
Travellers can partly be traced back to the Indian subcontinent, while they all also have
strong roots in Scandinavia and Finland, and some also in Turkey and Eastern Europe,
namely the areas they passed on the way to Scandinavia.72 According to our Romani
Traveller informants, this endeavor has grown even more popular since the publication
of Bojs’ and Sjölund’s book in 2016. Genealogy and DNA technique here thus come
forward as important tools for empowerment of a hitherto stigmatized and unrecog-
nized ethnic minority.
The cultural and social revival beginning in the 1990s as heritage from below also
encompassed efforts to revitalize Traveller Romani, to safeguard and popularize the
musical tradition, and to express the historical experiences of the group.73 Some of these
efforts were made in cooperation with professional linguists, folk musicians etc. Of key
importance for popularizing knowledge of this group in the larger society was a large
and encompassing book by journalist Bo Hazell, which included a focus on language,
music and other aspects of cultural heritage, as well as radio and TV programs made by
Hazell in the late 1990s.74
The heritage institutions’ work on and with Romani Travellers began slowly in the
2000s. Projects have developed in close cooperation between heritage professionals,
academics and ethnic activists. Some of the most notable heritage initiatives in this re-
gard involve Bohusläns Museum in Uddevalla. To date, the only permanent exhibition
in Sweden devoted to the group, Meet the Romani Travellers, is located here,75 and the
museum is one of the partners in the transnational project “Resandekartan” mapping
sites important to the group’s history in the Swedish-Norwegian borderland region and
70
B. Lindwall, Anor från landsvägen. Hur jag finner mina förfäder bland resandefolket, Solna 2014,
pp. 117-130.
71
K. Bojs, P. Sjölund, Svenskarna och deras fäder. De senaste 11000 åren, Stockholm 2016, pp. 170-180.
72
Ibid., p. 178.
73
See. e.g. the Swedish-Romani dictionary: L. Lindell, K. Thorbjörnsson-Djerf, G. Carling, Ordbok över
svensk romani. Resandefolkets språk och sånger, Stockholm 2008, and the song book: R. Novak-Rosen-
gren, M. Länne Persson, Resandefolkets visor. 500 år i Norden. Muntlig sång- och vistradition, Göteborg
2012, and the collection of oral history in: B.-I. Hedström Lundqvist, A. Hellman, “Sveriges histo-
ria…”.
74
B. Hazell, Resandefolket…
75
“Möt resandefolket!”, Bohusläns Museum, at <http://www.bohuslansmuseum.se/utstallningar/mot-
resandefolket/>, 8 June 2017.
publishing them on an ambitious web site.76 The museum also led the excavations of
the abandoned Traveller village Snarsmon close to the Swedish-Norwegian border.77
In 2014, the Örebro County Museum led excavations of another former Traveller vil-
lage, Krämarstan outside the town Finnerödja as a part of the normative critical flag-
ship project “Disturbing Homogeneity”.78 In southern Sweden, the art museum in Ys-
tad hosted the exhibition Romani Travellers and Brolin about a prominent Romani
musician family from the Skåne region. Less attention has so far been paid to the urban
heritage of this group, which has neither been systematically studied nor presented de-
spite its long and compact historical presence in specific neighborhoods of cities like
Malmö and Helsingborg. However, some researchers have conducted historical studies
on the pogrom against Romani Travellers living in a central urban district of Jönköping
in 1948.79 The exhibitions and projects focus partly on the difficult past and persecu-
tions against the group, e.g. the cottages in Snarsmon were likely torn down,80 and Ro-
mani Travellers were forced out of Krämarstan by the local population.81 This is not al-
ways the case, though, as e.g. many of the places marked as heritage sites by the project
“Resandekartan” are places of interaction between Romani Travellers and the majority
population, and in 2013 this category of sites was more frequent in the project than
those indicating the heritage of conflicts.82
While heritage projects with a focus on and in cooperation with Romani Travel-
lers tend to be positively received by the group,83 exhibitions claiming to represent the
Roma group in general can be more problematic. A recent study analyzing heritage
work on Roma at Malmö Museums in the early 2000s indicates that conflicts over rep-
resentations arose not the least between Travellers and other Roma working on the
exhibitions.84 It is also reported that Romani Travellers were worried about the partici-
pation of other Roma whom they considered to be potential hijackers of the heritage
76
Resandekartan/Reisendekartet, at <http://reisendekartet.no/sv/>, 8 June 2017.
77
See the book emanating from the project: B. Andersson (ed.), Snarsmon – resandebyn där vägarna
möts, Bohusläns museums förlag, Uddevalla 2008.
78
A. Furumark, M. Eivergård (eds.), När det stör, p. 124. In Swedish, the name of the project, “Att störa
homogenitet”, refers to the idea that homogeneity can or should be disturbed, and does not carry the
potential second meaning of the English translation of homogeneity itself being disturbing.
79
See e.g.: M. Ericsson, Exkludering, assimilering..., and J. Selling, Svensk antiziganism. Fördomens kon-
tinuitet och förändringens förutsättningar, Limhamn 2013. The pogrom, which was virtually unknown
to the Swedish public until well into the 2000s, has in recent years often been used as an example of
the dangers of racism and xenophobia and the presence of such illnesses in modern Swedish history.
A monument to the victims of the pogrom was erected in Jönköping in 2014.
80
B. Andersson, “Möte med Snarsmon”, in idem (ed.), Snarsmon..., p. 60.
81
B. Hazell, Resandefolket…, pp. 232-248.
82
I. Martins Holmberg, K. Jonsson, “Kulturarvsprojektet Resandekartan – nationsöverskridande plats
historia”, in I. Martins Holmberg (ed.), Vägskälens kulturarv – kulturarv vid vägskäl. Om att skapa plats
för romer och resande i kulturarvet, Göteborg 2014, p. 205.
83
E.g. ibid., p. 211.
84
C. Johansson, “The Museum in a Multicultural Setting. The Case of Malmö Museums”, in L. Gouri-
évidis (ed.), Museums and Migration. History, Memory and Politics, Abingdon 2014, pp. 130-131. In
excavated in the Snarsmon village.85 One factor underlying such sentiments is the Trav-
ellers’ perception that other Roma might be more recognizable as ‘archetypical Roma’
according to the expectations of the Swedish majority society. Among the factors feed-
ing such moods was the clear underrepresentation of Romani Travellers in relation to
other Roma in many events accompanying the 500-year anniversary of Roma presence
in Sweden in 2012, despite the fact that only this group can claim such a long histori-
cal presence.86
A consequence of lesser visibility in the larger Roma framework is that specific ex-
periences of other groups in exhibitions, books or the media often are presented as per-
taining to all Roma, including the Travellers. An example here are the Kelderash Roma
civil rights struggles of the 1960s, when representatives of the then approximately 740
members87 of this group together with supporters from majority society fought for rec-
ognition, while the much larger group of Romani Travellers was completely voiceless
in the public debate and faced strong assimilatory pressure. In representations of this
struggle, the perspective of the silenced and under- or misrecognized Romani Travellers
is rarely brought to the fore. Furthermore, the strong focus on the lack of modern hous-
ing and schooling in the struggle for Kelderash emancipation can be portrayed in a way
that looks similar to the experiences of all Roma.88 A knowledgeable Romani Traveller
activist who challenged the frequently held assumption that Roma did not live in hous-
es or had access to schooling until the 1960s, recalled the fact that his story bewildered
the Swedish parliament.89
A further example concerns old toponyms, mostly in the Swedish countryside, that
indicate historical local presence by Romani Travellers. Those place names often refer
to the old popular denominations of the group that are no longer in use or are consid-
ered to be offensive, such as Tattarkullen, Skojareberget etc., but are preserved as top-
onyms for hills, forest paths, or places for old homesteads or camps. In recent years,
such place names have occasionally been challenged as part of efforts to combat traces
of old intolerance and racism on the Swedish map. Interestingly, those efforts have met
strong resistance from Romani Traveller activists and organisations who see the place
connection with one of the exhibitions the curator stressed the need to distinguish between Romani
Travellers and other Roma, on request from both groups.
85
J. Hjort, Utvärdering av Bohusläns museums verksamhet om och med resandefolket. Utvärdering av verk-
samheten 2004-2013, Uddevalla 2015 (Bohusläns Museum Rapport, 2015:7), pp. 49-50.
86
E.g. during an event specifically devoted to Romani Travellers organized by The Centre for European
Studies in Lund in 2012 representatives of the group noted wryly that ‘the cousins’ were more visible in
the celebrations. Among the reasons for this is the longer established public voice of e.g. the Keldarash
group, since the civil rights struggles in the 1960s.
87
N. Montesino, I. Ohlsson Al Fakir, “The Prolonged Inclusion of Roma Groups in Swedish Society”,
Social Inclusion, vol. 3, no. 5 (2015), at <http://dx.doi.org/10.17645/si.v3i5.247>.
88
This impression emanates e.g. from the exhibition We are Roma. Meet the people behind the myth,
produced by Gothenburg City Museum in cooperation with the Living History Forum and Roma ac-
tivists, shown since 2014 in several Swedish museums, e.g. Malmö Museer.
89
J. Pettersson, “Vad är romsk historia i Sverige?”, É Romani Glinda. Den romska spegeln, no. 4 (2016),
p. 4.
names as testimonies of the historical presence and as traces of their ancestors and rela-
tives. In 2016, a Swedish government report on measures to combat racism towards
Roma claimed that some Roma are offended by such toponyms and proposed that the
government should further investigate how to relate to these place names.90 In their re-
sponse, the Romani Traveller organisation Franzwagner Society wrote that such names
do not express anti-ziganism in the first hand. Rather, they testify to our historical pres-
ence in the country as these places are part of the Swedish-Roma history and of the imma-
terial cultural heritage. The Society argued instead that name changes would be anti-
ziganist, since they would make invisible Roma’s historical participation in the Swedish
society.91 The text further pointed out conflicts over representation with other Roma
groups, as it wondered who should have the final say in such questions, emphasising
that such places are a historical heritage belonging to Roma with a long historical presence
in the country. Another Romani Traveller organisation, Kulturgruppen för Resande-
folket, responded in similar terms that the names are a reminder of the overall presence
of Romani Travellers in Swedish nation-building.92 In the larger framework of minority
politics such conflicts over representation are paralleled in the debates over apology
and compensation for state persecutions in the 20th century. Here, efforts of the author-
ities to frame the issue as pertinent to the whole Roma community are challenged by
Traveller activists, who point out that exactly their group was overrepresented among
victims of the state abuse and their language and culture were under attack, while many
other Roma were not present in Sweden at the time of abuse.93
By and large, Romani Travellers in the 2000s benefited from the emphasis of the
heritage sector on cultural diversity and the inclusion of previously silenced perspec-
tives. In some cases, Romani Traveller activists also employed an explicitly normative
criticist approach in their work.94 Considering the focus of the preceding section on
normative criticism that stresses the importance for heritage work for questioning ma-
jority norms, it is notable that the field work conducted on Romani Traveller heritage
sites did not seem to antagonize the local non-Romani population. The project “Re-
sandekartan” reported that on some occasions the local population exposed prejudices
and feelings of discomfort caused by shame over past wrongdoings. Nevertheless, no
one openly criticized marking some locations as heritage sites of Romani Travellers, and
90
SOU 2016:44 “Kraftsamling mot antiziganism. Slutbetänkande av Kommissionen motantiziganism”.
91
Yttrande över SOU 2016:44 “Krafttag mot antiziganism”. Remissvar Franzwagner Sällskapet, 14 De-
cember 2016, at <http://www.regeringen.se/4af67d/contentassets/c2b7817bfc9444f8a578ceadf14
38e87/frantzwagner.pdf>, 20 June 2017.
92
Svar på remiss SOU 2016:44 “Krafttag mot antiziganism. Kulturgruppen för resandefolket”, at <http://
www.regeringen.se/4af262/contentassets/c2b7817bfc9444f8a578ceadf1438e87/kulturgruppen-
for-resandefolket.pdf>, 20 June 2017. The complexity of such heritage conflicts is shown by a case
when in the town of Varberg the name of neighbourhood Tattarkullen, was questioned by another
traveller organisation, while Kulturgruppen manage to defend the old name.
93
See e.g.: Yttrande över SOU 2016:44...
94
E.g. B.-I. Hedström Lundqvist, A. Hellman (eds.), Dinglarens väg…
many people responded with interest.95 It strikes us as perfectly possible to empower

a historically harassed ethnic minority such as Romani Travellers in terms of cultural
heritage without creating feelings of disempowerment among the majority population.
However, as will be demonstrated in the following chapter, the polemic around heri-
tage issues in the Swedish media challenges this assumption in several respects.
TWO WAVES OF MEDIA DEBATES ON HERITAGE IN THE 2000s:

WHOM DOES HERITAGE EMPOWER IN SWEDEN?
Since the beginning of the millennium, quite an intense debate focusing on heritage
issues has taken place in the Swedish media. Two waves of this polemic, with almost
six years between them, addressed different topics and confronted different political
stakeholders, but they also had principal similarities, as in both cases democratic partic-
ipation, ideological instrumentalization and multicultural contexts of heritage-making
were brought to the fore.
Until the beginning of the 2000s, heritage had seldom been a subject of major pub-
lic discussion with political implications. Previously, the sporadic exchange of opin-
ions and critical commentaries among museum professionals, cultural workers and
representatives of the state bureaucracy were eclipsed by other concerns. The situation
changed radically in 2010 when SD entered the parliament. As a relatively new party
that channeled popular dissatisfaction with the slow integration of the migrants and
permissive migration policies of the Swedish state, they saw their chance in taking over
and animating the lukewarm concept of heritage. Against the background of the rela-
tive disinterest of the more established Swedish parties in creating strong cultural-polit-
ical profiles, the tactics of drawing attention to heritage issues proved to be successful.
However, turning heritage from a peripheral issue of other parties to SD’s own calling
card did not come as a surprise, as the analogous move had already been successfully
tested by the sister party of SD, the Danish People’s Party. The motion about the intro-
duction of the Swedish cultural canon that SD presented in October 2010 was inspired
by the Danish example. Eventually, this idea, that in Sweden was earlier formulated but
then abandoned by the Liberal Party (then known as Folkpartiet), did not find support
in the parliament. Nevertheless, this proposition struck a chord with the Swedish pub-
lic as it problematized the ideological conventions that had long gone unquestioned in
the Swedish mainstream cultural discourse.
The principal target of SD’s cultural-political initiatives was Swedish anti-national-
ist nationalism of the 1990s. As Peter Aronsson further explains, In fact, Sweden is […]
an example of an almost paralyzing paradox between a new rhetorical content pointing
to a civil, non-historical, non-cultural citizen identity and a silent ethnically understood
‘we’ that is Swedish, national and needs to handle the whole topic of diversity to stabilize
95
I. Martins Holmberg, K. Jonsson, “Kulturarvsprojektet Resandekartan…”, pp. 212-213.
the ethnically and historically transmitted nation.96 SD chose to underscore the latter
aspect of Swedishness that was allegedly endangered by the cultural imperialism and
cultural relativism inculcated from above. Well in line with this argument and unlike
other parliamentary parties, SD proposed to regard culture from an anthropological
perspective,97 i.e. not as high culture and arts, but as traditions and daily practices. Con-
sequently, in the party documents heritage is linked not to institutionalized practices
curated by professional elites in the first turn, but rather to heritage from below, as it
unpacks common norms and values, collective memories, common myths, common festi-
vals and traditions, common customs and practices to be able to keep together in the long
run.98 Nevertheless, the praiseworthy intention to underscore solidarity aspects and the
democratic value of heritage in practice often took the form of encouraging a conser-
vative cultural canon and folksy culture that supposedly all genuine Swedes identify
themselves with. As SD’s cultural-political manifesto states, this type of heritage has
not only Swedish but also Nordic outreach. It focuses on the conservation of church
antiquities and the work of the Heritage Board, the state historical museums and the
Nordic Museum, among others.99 It is also associated with local history societies (hem-
bygdsföreningar) stemming from the popular education movement of the early 1900s.
As a way to promote this conceptualization of heritage and ‘common identity’, SD sug-
gested to radically reduce the financing of activities that boost the multicultural societal
experiment.100 In particular, SD condemned the ambitious governmental initiative to
merge several famous cultural museums into one Museum of World Culture. In the
party ideologists’ view, this restructuring was a clear example of the top-down imposi-
tion of multicultural agenda at the expense of Swedish heritage. In the same vein, SD
also argued that state funding of the modern arts and music should be reduced, espe-
cially those that do not have a constructive aim and broad popular anchoring.101
Quite expectedly, these and similar propositions triggered a storm of protests and
indignant comments in the Swedish media.102 Among the staunch critics of the SD cul-
96
P. Aronsson, “Demokratiskt kulturarv – nationella institutioner, universella värden, lokala praktiker”,
in A. Alzén, P. Aronsson (eds.), Demokratiskt kulturarv? Nationella institutioner, universella värden,
lokala praktiker, Linköping 2006, p. 11.
97
“Hotet mot en fri kultur”, Dagens Nyheter, 22 October 2014, at <http://www.dn.se/kultur-noje/
kulturdebatt/hotet-mot-en-fri-kultur/>, 20 June 2017.
98
“Partiet för kulturarvet”, Sverigedemokraterna, at <https://sd.se/var-politik/kulturpolitik/>, 20 June
2017.
99
Sverigedemokraterna (SD), 99 förslag för ett bättre Sverige. Sverigedemokraternas kontrakt med väljarna
2010-2014, Stockholm, 2 September 2010, Svensk Nationell Datatjänst, at <https://snd.gu.se/sv/
vivill/party/sd/manifesto/2010>, 20 June 2017.
100
“Censur och mångkultur heta i riksdagens kulturdebatt”, Sveriges Radio, 16 December 2010, at
<http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=478&artikel=4243660>, 20 June 2017.
101
“SD vill avveckla kultur som provocerar”, Svenska Dagbladet, 23 September 2010, at <https://www.
svd.se/sd-vill-avveckla-kultur-som-provocerar>, 20 June 2017.
102
Ibid.; Å.M. Larsson, “Kulturarvsfrågan ägs inte av de främlingsfientliga”, Ting och Tankar, 3 Octo-
ber 2010, at <http://tingotankar.blogspot.se/2010/10/kulturarvsfragan-ags-inte-av-de.html>,
20 June 2017; “Hotet mot…”; P. Wirtén, “Kulturarvet och Sverigedemokraterna”, Arena, 10 October
tural agenda one could see first and foremost heritage professionals, academic research-
ers and opinion-makers belonging to the non-nationalist mainstream. Many journal-
ists and cultural professionals strongly opposed SD’s propositions and asked whether
increased state financing of church antiquities, open air activities and traditional dance
and music will not create a homogeneous ‘harmonious’ Swedishness that would put a lid
on less consensual cultural phenomena.103 Another argument voiced in this connection
was that the politicization of the cultural heritage by SD would, on the contrary, lead
to an even stronger polarization of society. Some other discussants pointed out that SD
simply capitalizes on the taken-for-granted ideas rooted in the Swedish cultural-polit-
ical tradition: The critique raised against Sweden Democrats mixes symptom and illness.
Critique had to be directed against the current cultural politics that created the very idea of
‘our cultural heritage’ and thereby laid the ground for thinking that changed the premises
of the preservation work, namely thinking about culture as separateness.104
As many alarmed commentators assumed, by bringing to the fore the ethnic Swed-
ish majority and its allegedly homogeneous view of heritage, SD exposed its xenopho-
bic, fascist and racist nature. However, a sober academic approach to the SD’s think-
ing about heritage exposes more obvious similarities of SD’s arguments with national
romanticism rather than with extremist right ideologies.105 Popular national romanti-
cism, with its contempt for ‘elitist intellectual tastes’, its hailing of ‘people keeping both
feet on the ground’ (verklighetens folk), suspicion of those ‘who are not like us’ and
search of ontological security in ‘our own’ culture seems to strike a chord not with some
extremist minority, but with broader groups of voters in present-day Sweden. When
the established political parties chose not to talk about heritage and when the discus-
sion about the cultural content of Swedishness as distinguished from other cultural
affiliations was banned as ‘promotion of xenophobic views’, the vacuum was filled by
a new party that could mobilize their voters exactly around these questions.
As Björn Magnusson Staaf emphatically points out: The one who controls the cul-
tural heritage has an important tool for defining who ‘we’ are. [...] It is a gross intellectual
error to think that supporting cultural heritage promotes xenophobia. Cultural heritage
work is not about reproducing a static story of how something once was. It largely consists of
running a discussion about how we understand ourselves in the present time. At the end of
the day, as the scholar concludes: Discussion about how we presently understand ourselves
2010, at <http://www.magasinetarena.se/2010/11/10/kulturarvet_och_sverigedemokraterna/>,
20 June 2017; J. Nordwall, B. Svanström, “SD:s hembygd är inte vår hembygd”, Aftonbladet, 2 Octo-
ber 2010; A. Gill, “Vårt kulturarv – Sverigedemokraterna, främlingsfientlighet och bevarandearbete”,
Fornvännen. Journal of Swedish Antiquarian Research, vol. 107, no. 2 (2012), pp. 112-115, at <http://
samla.raa.se/xmlui/bitstream/handle/raa/3301/2012_112.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y>,
20 June 2017.
103
J. Lindahl, S. Schwarzenberger, “Sä vill SD rasera kulturen”, Aftonbladet, 9 September 2016, at <http://
www.aftonbladet.se/kultur/article23484494.ab>, 20 June 2017.
104
A. Gill, “Vårt kulturarv…”, pp. 112-115.
105
“DN Debatt. Kontroll över kulturarvet SD:s medel för att nå makt”, Dagens Nyheter, 3 October 2010,
at <http://www.dn.se/debatt/kontroll-over-kulturarvet-sds-medel-for-att-na-makt/>, 20 June 2017.
should continue. The work on these issues is our responsibility, as it addresses key issues of
democracy. [...] To guarantee this, it is of the utmost importance that all parties in the par-
liament take the cultural heritage seriously and support it.106
It is not difficult to notice that during the first wave of the debate around 2010,
the main target of criticism was the obvious political instrumentalization of heritage
issues by one nationalist party, rather than effects of politicization of heritage field per
se. Some debaters admitted that political use of cultural heritage is unavoidable, but the
question is which kind of politics should be given a priority.107 As an example of already
existing tacit politicization of the field, Gustafsson and Karlsson mention practices of
research support to the humanities and social sciences in Sweden that took conservative
direction […] instead of a broader view of cultural heritage and the relationship between
archaeology, politics and contemporary society.108 As a remedy these authors suggest to ac-
cept the challenge and take a standpoint for a democratic, solidaristic and multicultural
policy and to use cultural heritage for these purposes.109
To summarize, despite its entrenched, retrospective and restrictive agenda in the
field of heritage, SD willy-nilly catalyzed a debate about the side-effects of normative
criticism, multiculturalist ideology and political uses of heritage in Sweden. The debate
exposed quite a broad consensus about the nature of heritage as a democratic resource,
but also demonstrated a rift between nationalist circles referring to majority democra-
cy, and their opponents who rather envision consensus democracy or liberal democracy
with its emphasis of human rights and individual freedoms. It also highlighted the ex-
istence of polarized opinions about how heritage and heritage politics should empower
and disempower. While SD mouthpieces made it clear that the Swedish majority is
disenfranchised by heritage institutions failing to suggest a feasible vision of identity
and community, their opponents assumed that nation-oriented heritage politics risks
to disempower migrants, minorities and ‘anti-nationalist’ cultural producers.
The second wave of the heritage debate that culminated in autumn 2016 addressed
similar issues, but from a different perspective. This time the war of words was trig-
gered by the publications of Ola Wong, an expert on China and journalist affiliated
with the Swedish liberal-conservative newspaper Svenska Dagbladet. The main focus
of his polemic was the continuing controversy around the merging and re-location of
four important cultural museums (the Museum of Ethnography, the Museum of Far
Eastern Antiquities, the Museum of Mediterranean and Near-Eastern Antiquities all in
Stockholm and the Museum of World Culture in Gothenburg). What was conceived
as a large-scale project aiming to support integration and present the heritage treasures
of Sweden in a global framework, proved to be, in Wong’s words, a microcosm of cul-
106
Ibid.
107
A. Gustafsson, H. Karlsson, “A Spectre is Haunting Swedish Archaeology – the Spectre of Politics.
Archaeology, Cultural Heritage and the Present Political Situation in Sweden”, Current Swedish Ar-
chaeology, vol. 19 (2011), pp. 30-31.
108
Ibid., p. 25.
109
Ibid., p. 31.
tural politics that went astray in post-colonial thinking and the suffocating norm of nor-
mative criticism.110 In line with his argument, an especially alarming development was
the planned merger of the museums within the framework of the Museum of World
Culture. Referring to the tough economic situation and administrative difficulties, the
management reduced the museum staff with expert knowledge in ethnography and an-
tiquities, and opened the door to ‘generalists’ schooled in gender and diversity issues.
Thus, Wong’s argument runs, instead of promoting knowledge, the new museum orga-
nization fosters the ‘correct’ ideological outlooks. As a source of such skewed develop-
ment the journalist pointed out not only the politically indoctrinated museum leader-
ship, but also the political establishment, especially the Ministry of Culture dominated
by representatives of the Green Party. He put it bluntly that The government wants to
use the museums as an ideological instrument against SD. However, the ongoing politiciza-
tion of the Museums of World Culture risks oiling the wheels of the right-wing populism.111
While normative criticism and post-colonial theories may serve as a useful explanatory
framework, it is wrong to turn them into an indisputable guide for museum practice.112
The targeted museum chefs and politicians were quick to reply. Most importantly,
the incumbent Minister of Culture Alice Bah Kuhnke (Miljöpartiet) took part in the
discussion to counter Wong’s argument. Her main message was that the ministry had
nothing to do with the ideological top-down steering. Instead, every cultural organiza-
tion has the right to decide about the direction of its activities, provided that they are
in line with the existing official directives. Neither did the minister admit that certain
ideological narratives had been given a priority: It should be repeated that some assign-
ment to promote normative criticism at our museums has not been given by me. It is totally
strange to me to control our state museums in this way, but the cultural policy, on the con-
trary, is about increasing the distance between the politics and the profession.113 Neverthe-
less, many representatives of authoritative academic institutions and cultural organiza-
tions supported Wong’s position in the debate and saw the imposition of norm critical
models and the negligence of cultural expertise on different levels.114 The leitmotif of
many publications siding with Wong was the necessity to respect knowledge and cul-
tural expertise, and at the same time to safeguard heritage and culture as a democratic
resource beyond party political influences.
The second wave of the heritage debate encompasses around 75 publications. Its
initiator Ola Wong was recently rewarded with a prestigious prize of the Swedish Acad-
emy. This acknowledgement signals a symbolic victory of Wong and his supporters.
110
“Bah Kuhnkes kulturpolitik hotar kulturarvet”, Svenska Dagbladet, 28 September 2016, at <https://
www.svd.se/bah-kuhnkes-kulturpolitik-hotar-kulturarvet/om/museidebatten>, 17 June 2017.
111
Ibid.
112
“Vem är det som har kolonial blick egentligen”, Svenska Dagbladet, 7 October 2016, at <https://www.
svd.se/vem-ar-det-som-har-kolonial-blick-egentligen>, 17 June 2017.
113
“Det gör ont när teser brister”, Svenska Dagbladet, 27 September 2016, at <https://www.svd.se/det-
gor-ont-nar-teser-brister>, 17 June 2017.
114
“Museidebatten handlar om respekt för kunskap”, Svenska Dagbladet, 11 November 2016, at <https://
www.svd.se/museidebatten-handlar-om-respekt-for-kunskap>, 17 June 2017.
However, to say that the group who was empowered by this debate were solely liber-
ally-minded experts and museum workers, would be an oversimplification. Notably,
Wong himself is not a cultural professional in the narrow sense of the term. Rather, he
assumed a position of a well-educated commentator and responsible citizen concerned
with quality and reputation of the cultural product crafted in contemporary Sweden.
In one of his polemical letters Wong defined his audience and closest allies as the edu-
cated middle class. The debate has shown that this category ‘proved to be much alive’
and is ready to support the cultural-professional and democratic logic of the heritage
field. However, an alarming finding of the debate was that the educated political class
met the fate of the [extinct] Tasmanian wolf.115 Indeed, with some rare exceptions, the
second wave of heritage debate did not strike a chord among the high-positioned poli-
ticians. This may imply that the established practices of ideological inculcation and use
of heritage for getting political advantage will not undergo some radical changes in the
nearest time. It seems that in Sweden, economic reasons, effective management and
transmission of the ‘correct’ ideological messages to the broader public will continue to
provide leverage for the political actors in the field of culture.
CONCLUSIONS
This article focuses on the transformations of heritage-related discourses and practices

in Sweden since the beginning of the 2000s. As has been argued, the enhanced public
interest in heritage is stimulated partly by a pan-European process of ‘the return of the
national’ but also by globally spread insecurity about the future in terms of the wel-
fare state, democracy and technological development. Another contributing factor is
the internal dynamic of the heritage field where constellations of democratic, manage-
rial and market logics grew strong and now successfully compete with cultural-expert
and bureaucratic logics. In the 2000s, a combination of these background factors and
the domestic political developments created a specific cultural climate in which the
concept of heritage all of a sudden attained a considerable political clout. While some
opinion-makers and professionals pleaded for the field of heritage to be left outside
party politics, the majority of commentators took the political nature of heritage for
granted. Depending on its specific content and implementation, heritage may serve
as an instrument of empowerment or disempowerment, marginalization or support of
cultural-political demands of various population groups. Thus, the recurring question
of the recent heritage polemic is what kind of politics should or need to be catered by
heritage in the changing socio-cultural circumstances.
As has been demonstrated, a cultural-political paradigm that over the past two de-
cades has exerted much influence in the heritage sector of Sweden and, consequent-
ly, became either enthusiastically accepted or fiercely criticized, is normative criticism.
115
O. Wong, “Den bildade politikerklassen på utdöende”, Svenska Dagbladet, 3 November 2016, at
<https://www.svd.se/tecknet-pa-att-den-bildade-medelklassen-lever>, 17 June 2017.
The main attraction of this heritage discourse is its transformative potential, as it prom-
ises representation and emancipation of certain previously marginalized perspectives
and identities. Nevertheless, it stands out with its insistence on normatively loaded
rhetoric, often in form of binary oppositions such as inclusion-exclusion, open-closed,
tolerant-intolerant, and good-evil. It does ‘disturb homogeneity’, as it challenges deeply
entrenched mono-cultural structures of cultural representations and destabilizes com-
peting elite discourses on heritage. However, it also deliberately excludes a range of ac-
tors and perspectives and, consequently, disturbs the knowledge-promoting tasks of
heritage institutions. No wonder that normative criticism became the principal hall-
mark of mainstream heritage practices in Sweden, but also one of their most criticized
aspects. As this article argues, the reasons behind the ubiquity and strengths of norma-
tive criticism in the heritage sector may be sought in the specificity of elite thinking
about Swedish national identity that balances between ‘anti-national nationalism’, non-
historical future-oriented citizenship, individual rights, universalist allegiances and
vainly prides of being at the forefront of linear historical development.116 This is also
one of the reasons for the resistance to this paradigm, as many Swedes, including the
political and ideological mainstream, rather subscribe to notions of Swedish national
identity as something rooted and continuous. As our examples show, many actors op-
pose not inclusion or minorities, but what is perceived as the disruptive zeal of a nor-
mative paradigm that often does not seem to be satisfied with inclusion and making
minorities visible but rather undermines the very idea of bounded continuity.
The intensity of the recent heritage-related polemics once again demonstrates that
heritage is a power resource that can make a difference in the field of politics and serve
as a catalyzer of identity processes. In this context, it is important to know whom heri-
tage caters to, who is empowered by it in the first turn and who is expected to have
a decisive word in forming its visions. As the analysis of the Romani Travellers’ case
demonstrates, heritage work guided by the ideas of inclusion and recognition, and thus
evoking basic principles of normative criticism, may empower unprivileged minori-
ties in their struggle for cultural acceptance. At the same time, in some other contexts,
norm critical assumptions destabilize the legitimate conceptualizations of the nation
shared by the majority and elevating identifications with certain historical origins, ter-
ritory and cultural characteristics.
The waves of polemic around the SD heritage propositions as well as the introduc-
tory examples (the discussion about Swedish intangible heritage, the Viking Museum
in Stockholm and the “Stolpersteine” in the same city) indicated that skillful balanc-
ing between the array of demands and interests of various heritage actors presupposes
the constant (self )interrogation about custodianship of heritage. Context-sensitive an-
swers to this question may help to avoid the dead ends and extremes often stemming
from either a too broad and all-encompassing or, on the contrary, a too narrow and spe-
cific view of heritage and its custodians. However, this is easier said than done as the de-
116
A. Nelvin, “Svensken – den sista människan? Hoppet att alla till slut ska bli som en själv är det sista
som överger oss”, Kvartal, vol. 2 (2016), at <http://kvartal.se/artiklar/svensken-den-sista-mnniskan>,
20 June 2017.
bates are heavily polarized, interwoven with positions taken on other politically loaded
issues such as globalization, migration and integration, and laden with questions of the
legitimacy and authority of political and institutional actors. In this regard, the case of
the Romani Travellers shows a mostly positive example of how heritage professionals
are able to include new perspectives while downplaying belligerent and antagonistic
rhetoric, and without turning heritage into a zero-sum game.
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Niklas BERNSAND is a PhD student at the Centre for Languages and Literature at
Lund University. His research interests include discourses of cultural diversity and the
politics of memory. Among his most recent publications are: Cultural and Political
Imaginaries in Putin’s Russia (ed. with Barbara Törnquist-Plewa, forthcoming 2018);
Against All Odds. Ukraine and Ukrainian Studies a Decade after Yuriy Shevelov (ed. with
Roman Horbyk, forthcoming 2018); “Memories of Ethnic Diversity in Local Newspa-
pers: The 600th Anniversary of Chernivtsi” (in B. Törnquist-Plewa (ed.), Whose Mem-
ory? Which Future? Remembering Ethnic Cleansing and Lost Cultural Diversity in East-
ern European Cities, Oxford 2016); and “Lviv and Chernivtsi: Two Memory Cultures
at the Western Ukrainian Borderland” (East/West: Journal of Ukrainian Studies, vol. 1,
no. 1 (2014); with Eleonora Narvselius).
Eleonora NARVSELIUS is an ethnologist affiliated with the Centre for Language and
Literature and Center for European Studies at Lund University. She defended a PhD in
ethnology at Kyiv University (Ukraine) and holds a PhD in Ethnic Studies and Nation-
alism from Linköping University (Sweden). Her recent research is at the intersection
of memory, heritage and urban studies, together with aspects of ethnicity and national-
ism. In the course of her research career she has participated in two large international
research projects focusing on the urban environment, memory and heritage manage-
ment: “Life Forms in the Suburbs of Large Cities in the Baltic Sea Region” (funded by
the Swedish Research Council, project leader Prof. Karl-Olof Arnstberg, 1999-2001)
and “Memory of Vanished Population Groups and Societies in Today’s East- and Cen-
tral European Urban Environments. Memory Treatment and Urban Planning in Lviv,
Chernivci, Chisinau and Wrocław” (funded by the Swedish research foundation Riks-
bankens Jubileumsfond, project coordinator Dr. Bo Larsson, 2011-2014). Within
the latter project, Dr. Narvselius was in charge of the development of methodological
guidelines and coordination of qualitative sociological and oral history work in the
four cities.
ARTICLES MEMORIES OF WARS AND TOTALITARIAN SYSTEMS
Krzysztof KOWALSKI
krzysztof.1.kowalski@uj.edu.pl
THE EUROPEANIZATION
OF THE CEMETERIES OF WORLD WAR I
IN WEST GALICIA
IN SEARCH OF TRANSNATIONAL HEROISM
AND SACRIFICE
ABSTRACT Focusing primarily on the Łużna-Pustki military cemetery constructed by the

Austro-Hungarian army on the Eastern Front after the Battle of Gorlice, also
known as the ‘Little Verdun’ (2-5 May 1915), the article deals with the memory
of World War I and its use in local, national (Polish) and European contexts. The
text shows the history of this lieu de mémoire: its creation, cultural and artistic
contexts, and ultimate slide into oblivion during the interwar period and after
World War II, before a resurrection in interest in Poland at the turn of the 21st
century. Taking into consideration Europeanization processes, the author shows
how tangible remnants of World War I are brought into the limelight within
European frames of reference and discusses the consequences of this discursive
reinterpretation of the Łużna-Pustki military cemetery, awarded a European
Heritage Label in 2016.
Key words: World War I, cemeteries, lieux de mémoire, discourse, Europeani-

zation
World War I enjoys a particular significance for Poles since, after 123 years of the
Partitions,1 the conflict restored the independence which had been lost in 1795. The
1
Three Partitions saw the division of the territory of the Polish Republic, in which the following neigh-
bouring countries took part: Russia, Prussia and Austria (1772); Russia and Prussia (1793) and, final-
ly, Russia, Prussia and Austria (1795). From 1795 to 1918, Poland ceased to exist as an independent
state.
96 Krzysztof Kowalski POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
war which had broken out in 1914 placed the armies of the Partitions on opposing sides
and finally provided Poland with the means to regain its independence (1918). In striv-
ing to do so, Poles often fought in the uniforms of the Partition powers and their graves
may be found in war cemeteries on the fronts of all sides of the conflict, often on oppos-
ing sides in the same battle. Apart from the heroic, national and independence threads
of the conflict, the heritage of World War I has largely been forgotten in Poland and
sometimes even intentionally discarded, especially when and where it was seen as be-
longing to the empires which, happily for Poles, ceased to exist as a result of the conflict.
In this context, the cemeteries of West Galicia which were built by the Austro-Hun-
garian army on the Eastern Front are remarkable in many respects.2 They are intrigu-
ing spaces as they comprise a group of 401 cemeteries of varying sizes scattered across
the south-eastern provinces of Poland. In addition, they are remarkable for the sym-
bolic openness of their creators since they were built not only for ‘our’ heroes (the sol-
diers of the Austro-Hungarian and German armies), but also the fallen of the defeated
Russian army.
This article, making reference to the literature on the subject, illustrates the context
of the creation of war cemeteries in West Galicia and particularly the case of no. 123
in Łużna-Pustki. It takes into account the shifting nature of the armies on the Eastern
Front of World War I, the Battle of Gorlice3 and the creation of the IXth War Graves
Division at the War Ministry in Vienna4 which was responsible for the building of all
of the military necropolises in West Galicia between 1915-1918. However, the panora-
ma of historical events is not the essence of this text, merely its basis. There is a much
broader discussion of the transformation that the symbolic dimension of these wartime
necropolises (especially no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki) underwent as a result of the political
alliance of this lieu de mémoire with successive national ideologies and their European
successors.
Following the end of World War I and the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Em-
pire, this planned imperial landscape of victory, heroism and praise5 found itself in the
territory of the newly reborn Poland which understandably approached the remem-
brance of the fallen soldiers of the partition armies with considerable reserve. They
were forgotten and the cemeteries began to fall into ruins. The tremendous sacrifice of
World War II contributed further to the obscurity of the fallen heroes of the Great War
2
I would like to stress that this article refers to war cemeteries located in West Galicia (a former province
of the Austro-Hungarian Empire) which is now to be found in southeastern Poland.
3
The name of this battle is sometimes framed differently in English – the Battle of Dunajetz.
4
The translation of the term ‘the IXth War Graves Division’ is taken from: J. Schubert, “Organizacja
grobownictwa wojennego w Monarchii Austro-Węgierskiej. Dziewiąty Wydział Grobów Wojennych
(Kriegsgräber-Abteilung) przy Ministerstwie Wojny – powstanie i działalność w latach 1915-1918. Or-
ganization and Structure of Wartime Cemeteries in Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The IX War Graves
Division (Kriegsgräber-Abteilung) at the War Ministry in Vienna in the Years 1915-1918”, Architektu-
ra. Czasopismo Techniczne. Architecture. Technical Transactions, no. 13 (2009), pp. 169-200.
5
Comp.: R. Frodyma, Cmentarze wojskowe z okresu I wojny światowej w rejonie Beskidu Niskiego i Pogó-
rza, Warszawa 1989, pp. 9-10.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 The Europeanization of the Cemeteries… 97
and Polish historical policy after 1945 was not interested in cemeteries which held ‘for-
eign’ heroes. Without the necessary protection, they fell victim to vandalism and the
passing of time. Necropolises fell into ruin and were devoured by forests. The inhabit-
ants of nearby villages frequently regarded them as free sources building material and
degradation set in.
The situation began to change in the 1970s and 80s with the increased interest in
the war cemeteries of World War I and they began to be noticed by interested locals and
tourists alike. An expression of the growing interest in them and their exploitation was
the preparation of the application by the local authority of Łużna and the Małopolska
Provincial Office (2015)6 for a European Heritage Label for war cemetery no. 123 in
Łużna-Pustki in 2016 (the unveiling of the EHL took place on 21 April 2017). This is
the last stage in the turbulent history of this necropolis and began the construction of
this transnational complex of cemeteries as a lieu de mémoire héroique of the Austro-
Hungarian Empire. It ended with a prestigious European award, received by those who
are not ‘the direct heirs’ of this legacy. In this context one may justifiably ask how and
in what sense this ‘foreign’, adopted heritage helps to construct European heritage and,
furthermore, what happens when this discovered and adopted ‘foreign’ heritage is in-
terpreted by ‘us’ in the context of European values. In a general sense of reflections on
European heritage one may say that all of the transformations and changes that this
local site underwent belong to the imaginarium of the supranational European com-
munity. This, in turn, raises another question: which historical narrative of the past of
the cemetery will become the official one and which will become subsumed? From the
considerations of Glen Jordan and Chris Weedon, one may ask the further question of
which historical narrative concerning this place will be told/displayed and which will
be silence/hidden? What will be remembered in the future and what will be forgotten?
What and who will be used and what will be rejected?7
6
See: the application made to the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and by the Department of
the Conservation of Monuments of Kraków and National Heritage, Małopolska Provincial Office in
Kraków and the local authority of Łużna. Comp.: interview with Joanna Florkiewicz-Kamieniarczyk,
director, Department of the Conservation of Monuments of Kraków and National Heritage, Mało-
polska Provincial Office in Kraków, 4 April 2016; and the interview with Kazimierz Krok, head of the
Łużna local authority, 7 April 2017.
7
G. Jordan, C. Weedon, Cultural Politics. Class, Gender, Race and the Postmodern World, Oxford 1995,
p. 4.
Fig.1. Cover of the brochure prepared by the Local Authority of Łużna to mark the award of
the European Heritage Label
© photo: A. Ziobrowski, T. Machowski, D. Bugno, P. Sekuła; graphic design: T. Machowski, D. Bugno

© Łużna Commune Office
In other words, the article portrays the symbolic changes which cemetery no. 123
underwent, beginning as an Austro-Hungarian place of remembrance, through its Pol-
ish rejection in the interwar years and its disappearance after World War II. The pres-
ent, final stage in its semiotic transformation is the alliance of the Łużna-Pustki place of
remembrance with European values, a result of which is its potential exploitation of this
lieu de mémoire to help build a supranational and European imaginarium. The process-
es of Europeanization at play here utilise the ecumenical character of this place but the
resulting continuity between national interpretations and their European counterpart
is marked by the silencing of certain interpretations and the strengthening of others.
THE SITUATION ON THE EASTERN FRONT (1914-1915)
Following the outbreak of World War I (28 July 1914), four fronts emerged in Eu-
rope – the Western, the Southern, the Eastern and the Balkan. Aligned along them
were the powers of the Entente against the Central Powers.
The opening of the Eastern Front began on the territory of East Prussia with the
Battle of Stallupönen (17 August 1914), where the German army triumphed over the
forces of the Russian Empire. However, just 3 days later at the Battle of Gumbinnen,
the scales shifted in favour of the Russians (20 August 1914). This victory, however,
did not prevent the armies of the Tsar from suffering a crushing defeat at the Battle of
Tannenberg (17 August – 2 September 1914).8 As a result of this spectacular defeat, the
Russian army fell apart and its offensive ground to a halt. The situation was different on
the central and southern parts of the Eastern Front.
In what is now southern Poland – then West Galicia, a part of the Austro-Hun-
garian Empire – the fight continued and increasingly favoured the armies of Nicholas
II. Aside from the first few victories of the Austro-Hungarian Empire over the Rus-
sians (Kraśnik, 23-25 August 1914; Komorów, 26 August – 2 October 1914), the
Russians captured Lviv, the capital of Galicia (3 October 1914).9 Such was the fear of
the total defeat of the Austro-Hungarian army at the time that it led the commanding
general, Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf, to give the order to retreat to a line along the
Carpathian Mountains. As a result, the armies of the Tsar swiftly advanced across the
whole of Galicia, shifting the front considerably to the west. The Russians laid siege
to the Fortress of Przemyśl (5 November 1914), which finally fell to Russian forces on
23 March 1915.10 The Russians then began to attack the Fortress of Kraków11 and the
Russian forces in the central part of the front began to threaten Berlin and Budapest.12
Following the Łapanów-Limanowa operation (2-12 December 1914) the front sta-
bilised and a considerable swathe of Galicia was recovered from the Russians. From this
point until May 1915, there were no major changes on either side, with a war of attri-
tion setting in. It was only after the Battle of Gorlice (2-5 May 1915) that the charac-
ter of the front changed again. A massed Austrian artillery attack on the Russian posi-
tions around Gorlice began on 2 May 1915. Particularly fierce fighting was around the
8
More information on the Galician campaign in 1914-1915 may be found in the following works:
T.A. Olszański (ed.), Pierwsza wojna światowa w Karpatach, Warszawa 1985; M. Klimecki, Gorli-
ce 1915, Warszawa 1991; D. Jordan, M.S. Neiberg, Front Wschodni 1914-1920. Od Tannenbergu do
wojny polsko-bolszewickiej, transl. by J. Kozłowski, Poznań 2010; R.L. DiNardo, Przełom. Bitwa pod
Gorlicami-Tarnowem 1915, transl. by J. Szkudliński, Poznań 2012. Comp.: J. Pajewski, Pierwsza woj-
na światowa 1914-1918, Warszawa 2004, p. 328; D. Jordan, Bałkany, Włochy i Afryka 1914-1918.
Od Sarajewa do Piawy i Jeziora Tanganika, transl. by J. Szkudliński, Poznań 2011, pp. 113-114. See
also: D.E. Showalter, Tannenberg 1914. Zderzenie imperiów, transl. by R. Dymek, Białystok 2005;
E.D. Erickson, Gallipoli i Bliski Wschód 1914-1918. Od Dardaneli do Mezopotamii, transl. by J. Ko-
złowski, Poznań 2011, p. 25.
9
The first movements on the Eastern and Western Fronts are described in: J. Łaptos, J. Solarz, M. Zgór-
niak, Wielkie wojny XX wieku (1914-1945), Warszawa 2006, especially the chapter entitled: “Pierwsze
miesiące 1915 r. na frontach zachodnim i wschodnim”.
10
The Austro-Hungarian and German forces recovered the fortress on 3 June 1915.
11
On the World War I cemeteries in the Fortress of Kraków, see: B. Nykiel, “Cmentarze wojenne Twier-
dzy Kraków z okresu I wojny światowej”, in W. Frazik et al. (eds.), Przez dwa stulecia XIX i XX w. Stu-
dia historyczne ofiarowane prof. Wacławowi Felczakowi, Kraków 1993.
12
J. Schubert, Austriackie cmentarze wojenne w Galicji z lat 1914-1918, Kraków 1992, pp. 8-9.
Pustki heights, which had considerable strategic significance and were regarded as the
key to the Russian positions. Particularly fierce fighting took place around the Prustki
heights which enjoyed considerable strategic significance. They were described as ‘the key
to the Russian positions’. They were defended by the 31st Russian Infantry Division who
fortified the position, putting up wire and digging lines of trenches. The summit was seized
after fierce fighting by the 12th ‘Kraków’ Infantry Division which was made up of Galician
privates […] the assault on the lines came at great cost but it was taken nonetheless. After
hostilities ceased, it became one of the largest Galician cemeteries, containing the bodies of
1,200 soldiers of all armies.13 Ultimately, the Battle of Gorlice was a prelude to many
weeks of Austro-Hungarian and German advances to the east, with the Russians giving
up all of the territory that it had gained just a few months earlier.14
AN OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY, ORGANIZATION

AND ACTIVITY OF THE IXTH WAR GRAVES DIVISION
The victory of the Central Powers on the Eastern Front came at great cost to both sides.
Before the Battle of Gorlice, the landscape of the Beskid Mountains was riven by lines
of trenches and the offensive destroyed whole villages and left towns in ruins. After the
passing of the front through West Galicia, the decaying bodies of the fallen soldiers of
all the armies lay on the fields. A few months after the Battle of Gorlice, it became nec-
essary to rearrange battlefields, to exhume bodies from temporary graves, to build final
graves, to prevent the outbreaks of epidemics, and to give the peasants a land to return
to and grow crops on.15
The IXth War Graves Division was created on 3 November 1915 by the Ministry of
War in Vienna (Germ. Kriegsgräber-Abteilung, KGA), with a task which would have
been difficult to perform even in times of peace. It had to coordinate all of the exhu-
mation, identification and designing, building and care of cemeteries used as symbols of
war.16 This titanic task encompassed an area of 100,000 km2 of West Galicia. It was
done by our less able soldiers and a large number of POWs,17 including Italians famed for
their stonework (sent from the southern front) and Russians who were known to be
13
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci. Cmentarze wojenne z lat 1914-1918 w Małopolsce, Kraków
2005, pp. 26-27. Oktawian Duda gives an alternative date for its establishment namely the 3rd of De-
cember 1915. O. Duda, Cmentarze w Galicji Zachodniej 1914-1918, Warszawa 1995, p. 31.
14
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, ch. “Galicja Zachodnia w latach 1914-1918”, pp. 14-29.
15
R. Broch, H. Hauptmann, Zachodniogalicyjskie groby bohaterów z lat wojny światowej 1914-1915,
transl. by H. Sznytka, ed. by J.J.P. Dragomir, Tarnów 1994 [Die Westgalizischen Heldengräber aus den
Jahren des Weltkrieges 1914-1915, Wien 1918], p. 2.
16
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, p. 34. It should be noted that from April 1916 KGA was affi-
liated with the German War Graves Division (Deutsche Kriegsgräber-Abteilung). As Oktawian Duda
has stated, no documents detailing the form of their cooperation has survived. O. Duda, Cmentarze
w Galicji Zachodniej…, p. 40. Comp.: J. Schubert, Autriackie cmentarze wojenne…, p. 13.
17
R. Broch, H. Hauptmann, Zachodniogalicyjskie groby bohaterów…, p. 2.
skilled carpenters.18 In addition, the soldiers were aided in their efforts by civilian em-
ployees of the KGA and locals.19
Rudolf Broch was made the commander of the KGA and Hans Hauptmann the
chief designer.20 A joint publication about the West Galicia cemeteries published in
1918, they both wrote about the venture that above all we were grateful for their service
to the Fatherland, to Justice, the Conscience of the World and, finally, each of us. In their
work, Broch and Hauptmann further wrote that they were overwhelmed by the glori-
ous deaths of the soldiers and it was this awareness and feeling of gratitude which found
its best expression in the cemeteries where we had prepared a final resting place for our
fallen heroes.21 They gave their work a more universal character with the claim that […]
the Fatherland has striven to create, on the scale of the modern world, an appropriate and
dignified resting place for its Sons who have fallen on the field of battle and honour […]
the love of the whole of Austro-Hungary created this cemetery, the respect of the whole of
Austro-Hungary will hold a sword and shield over it for all time.22
Thanks to the tremendous expenditure of both resources and human effort, as Ag-
nieszka Partridge notes, in the space of two years, from 1916 to 1918, and at a record
breaking speed, over 400 cemeteries and memorials were created. The last work in the 11th
cemetery region was done in November 1918, when it was already clear that the Empire
lay in ruins.23 The cemeteries were finished when the fall of the Central Powers was al-
ready predestined and unavoidable. The desire to perpetuate the memory of the fallen
soldiers of the Empire was meant to triumph over the result of the conflict.
The area covered by the IXth War Graves Division was tremendous as it encom-
passed the matter of wart graves across the whole [Austro-Hungarian] Kingdom and its
occupied territories.24 Three military zones were created in Galicia, with headquarters in
Kraków (the ‘West Galicia’ zone), Przemyśl (the ‘Central Galicia’ zone) and Lviv (the
‘East Galicia’ zone).25 Each of them had one particularly important and representative
cemetery and in the Kraków zone, that was no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki.
The KGA sought out temporary cemeteries and burials, exhuming and identifying
the bodies. Together with the identifying group, architects, sculptors, photographers and
artistic directors moved across the battlefields. They assessed the location and arrangement
18
J. Schubert, Austriackie cmentarze wojenne…, p. 17.
19
Frodyma wrote – alluding to the works of Broch and Hauptmann – that the KGA received more than
4,000 workers, of whom nearly 3,000 were prisoners of war, mainly Italians and Russians. J. Schubert,
Autriackie cmentarze wojenne…, p. 17.
20
J.J.P. Drogomir, “Wstęp do wydania polskiego”, in R. Broch, H. Hauptmann, Zachodniogalicyjskie gro-
by bohaterów…, pp. VII-VIII.
21
22
Ibid., p. 8. Comp.: J. Winter, Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning. The Great War in European Cultural
History, Cambridge 2008.
23
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, p. 28.
24
J. Schubert, Austriackie cmentarze wojenne…, p. 13.
25
O. Duda, Cmentarze w Galicji Zachodniej…, p. 32. See: R. Frodyma, Cmentarze wojskowe…, p. 9.
of the temporary graves and sought out places for new cemeteries […] the photographers
took a huge number of documentary and landscape photographs. Subsequently, prelimi-
nary projects were prepared. […] Then came the time to implement them. A team of army
engineers went to work, laying out the area of the future cemetery and the road leading to
it. Work was done in quarries and lumber camps to collect the necessary material, foundry
work took place.26
During World War I, a new form of cemetery art arose.27 This was the military cem-
etery, symbolically appealing to the ethos of the soldier-hero and the holiness attained
by their sacrifice on the battlefield.28 It is best expressed by the line of Horace, Dulce et
decorum est pro patria mori.29 In this spirit, the cemeteries built in World War I on both
the Western and Eastern fronts did not abound in details but rather emphasised the
military severity and gravity of the sacrifice made.30
The solutions applied in Galicia had a unique character and the analogical approach
applied in the cemeteries of the Western Front was somewhat different. It must be em-
phasised that what distinguishes cemetery no. 123 in the European context is that in
the Galician cemetery were interred not only the soldiers of the Central Powers but
also those of Russia joined them in their eternal rest. The heroes were not divided into
‘ours’ and ‘theirs’, they were all treated with the same due respect.31 What is more, it also
transpired (e.g. at the dedication of the cemetery in Gorlice) that an ‘official’ delegation of
Russian regiments took part, from among the ranks of POWs and who had earlier worked
in building the cemetery.32
This was a phenomenon that one did not encounter on the Western Front. There
one could find just a handful of common cemeteries containing the fallen of the French
and British armies, the Allies. Never, however, were the dead of the opposing armies
laid to rest together. It is hard to find an example in history of the treatment of yesterday’s
26
J. Schubert, Austriackie cmentarze wojenne…, p. 16. Some of the graves of the Austro-Hungarian and
German soldiers have nameplates thanks to the so-called ‘tags’ that allowed for the accurate identifica-
tion of the buried. The Russian army did exactly the opposite. Not only did the soldiers not have such
identifiers, but most of the graves being built were of a mass character, and the corpses were deprived of
all signs of identification. The following registers were introduced: a) alphabetical order by surname,
b) by the place of the cemetery, and c) by unit.
27
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, p. 35. Comp. the chapter: “Projektowanie i budowa cmentarzy,
organizacja robót i transport materiałów”, in O. Duda, Cmentarze w Galicji Zachodniej…, pp. 44-48.
28
See: J. Winter, Sites of Memory… Comp.: E. Kantorowicz, Mourir pour la patrie et autres textes, Paris
1984; S. Czarnowski, Kult bohaterów i jego społeczne podłoże. Święty Patryk – bohater narodowy Irlan-
dii, transl. by A. Glinczanka, Warszawa 1956; M. Ossowska, Ethos rycerski i jego odmiany, Warszawa
1986, pp. 7-20.
29
Horace, Odes III, 2.
30
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, p. 35. Comp. with the chapter: “Projektowanie i budowa
cmentarzy…”, pp. 44-48.
31
The ecumenical dimension was stressed very strongly in the application for the European Heritage
Label.
32
O. Duda, Cmentarze w Galicji Zachodniej…, p. 40.
enemies with a similar degree of humanism, raising monuments to them, protecting their
graves from being forgotten together with those of their own fallen.33
The supranational, multicultural and multi-religious character of the Galician ne-
cropolises is underscored by the fact that in the majority of the cemeteries (95%) the fall-
en of all three fighting armies are found together, those of different nationalities and faiths
(with the exception of Jews), with just 12 cemeteries for only the soldiers of the Russian
army and 14 separate ones for fallen Jews.34 The army, regimental, and national affilia-
tions were distinguished, and the design of the grave crosses determined whether the
soldier was Christian, Muslim, or Jewish. For even greater precision, a Latin cross was
used for both Catholics and Protestants, with an Orthodox cross (with an extra arm)
for Orthodox Christians. Muslims were given headstones, and Jews – in accordance
with religious observance – in their own cemeteries, often built especially for them.35
THE SLAVIC ARTISTIC DIMENSION AND OTHER STYLISTIC

ELEMENTS PRESENT IN THE CEMETERIES
The artistic aspect of the cemeteries was intended to reinforce their moral, suprana-
tional, multicultural and multi-religious character. They used motifs taken from Antiq-
uity, the Renaissance, Romanticism and Classicism, motifs which allowed the creation of
a cemetery complex in Małopolska which it would be impossible to find elsewhere.36
Each of the artists working for KGA had their own style. Thus whilst in the work of
one might find the symbols of war (swords, soldiers caps), others chose a monumental
style or appealed to folk, local or non-Slavic traditions.37 As a result, the architecture
of the cemetery is full of borrowings and more or less evident connections. In the proj-
ects there appeared elements of individual style: visible in the references to former architec-
33
J.J.P. Drogomir, “Wstęp…”, p. IV.
34
O. Duda, Cmentarze w Galicji Zachodniej…, p. 42.
35
Judaism prohibits the burial of Jews in a Christian cemetery. As a result, 15 Jewish cemeteries were
created (the largest and located alone is Zakliczyn no. 283). It sometimes transpired, however, that in
spite of the prohibition, some Jewish soldiers were interred in Christian cemeteries. Comp.: M. Ło-
pata, “Groby żydowskich żołnierzy Wielkiej Wojny w Galicji”, in M. Dziedziak (ed.), Znaki pamięci.
Materiały z konferencji naukowej, Gorlice 27.10.2007, Gorlice 2007, pp. 5-27. Jews were buried toge-
ther, in common graves, with the fallen Jewish soldiers of both sides laid to rest next to one another;
ibid., p. 16. Apart from the work of the War Graves Division in West Galicia, well maintained Jewish
military cemeteries can be found in Nowy Targ, Wadowice, Bielsko-Biala, Cieszyn, Frysztak (Karwin)
and Ostrava. Ibid., p. 19.
36
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, p. 28. Agnieszka Partridge writes about many of the formal
elements utilised by the creators of the cemeteries: urns, sarcophagi, dedication elements (e.g. charms),
tablets with the names of the fallen soldiers, crosses etc.
37
On the subject of the different styles, elements and symbolism applied in the cemeteries of West Gali-
cia, see: ibid., ch. “Symbolika galicyjskich cmentarzy wojennych”, pp. 70-215.
ture – mainly Romanesque, Renaissance and Baroque – created in the spirit of modernism
and from the flowing lines of Secessionism.38
Particularly well known builders of Galician cemeteries were Dušan Jurkovič and
Jan Szczepkowski, but in differing ways Wojciech Kossak, Hans Mayr, Henryk Uziębło
many others cooperated with the KGA.39
The most beautiful wooden chapels and cemetery elements were designed by Dušan
Jurkovič, known as the ‘poet in wood’. Chapels and Slavic gontynas40 became his calling
card. They were connected to Slavic elements and in a clear manner utilised the Car-
pathian architectural style which can be seen in many Carpathian churches, Catho-
lic and Orthodox alike.41 In the ‘gontynas’, ‘kącinas’ and ‘stołpas’, he found a national
symbolism, an old Slavic impulse which allowed him to freely express this existential
content.42 What is more, some of his projects were regarded as being too Slavic in their
character and were amended or even did not make it past the tender stage judged by the
artistic commission of the KGA in Kraków.43
Jan Szczepkowski was also considered to be old and proto-Slavic,44 and who, like
Jurkovič, sought inspiration in folk traditions, including their buildings. The influence
of the emerging Zakopane style on his cemeteries is unmistakable. His style was consid-
ered homely, close to tradition, folk art, nature.45
The attitude of Poles – especially the Kraków elite – to the cemeteries was negative,
rejected for both ideological and artistic reasons. They were criticised for the alien, Prus-
38
K. Chrudzimska-Uhera, “O dylematach Polaka, artysty, żołnierza. Jan Szczepkowski jako projektant
cmentarzy I wojny światowej”, in M. Łopata, K. Ruszała (eds.), Znaki pamięci IV – w 95. rocznicę bitwy
gorlickiej. Materiały z konferencji, Gorlice 2011, p. 52.
39
O. Duda, Cmentarze w Galicji Zachodniej…, ch. “Twórcy cmentarzy”, pp. 52-58.
40
The gontyna (also known as a kontyna or kącina) was a form of pagan temple found in areas that pre-
viously been occupied by the Old Prussians, Slavs and Lithuanians. See: “gontyna”, in Słownik języka
polskiego, at <https://sjp.pl/gontyna>, 8 April 2017.
41
Orthodox elements may be found in Jurkovič himself, whose opinion of the cemetery no. 51 is de
scribed by A. Kroh, “Dušan Jurkovič a styl zakopiański”, in Cmentarze z I wojny światowej na Podkar-
paciu. Materiały z sesji krajoznawczej, Wysowa 23-25 października 1987, Warszawa 1989, p. 13.
42
A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, p. 149. Sometimes, the cemeteries of this creator have even
been compared to human figures. To date, some of the unrealized cemetery designs of this artist have
been preserved, preserving their stylistic references. See: M. Dziedziak, “Niezrealizowane projekty
cmentarzy wojennych Dušana Jurkoviča w Beskidzie Niskim”, in idem (ed.), Znaki pamięci…, pp. 27-40.
43
On the alterations to projects deemed to be too Slavic or religous, see: K. Ruszała, “Zachodniogalicyj-
skie cmentarze na pocztówkach wydanych przez Oddział Grobownictwa Wojennego. Projekty i ich
realizacja”, in M. Dziedziak (ed.), Znaki pamięci…, p. 49.
44
K. Chrudzimska-Uhera, “O dylematach…”, p. 53.
45
Ibid., p. 49. Katarzyna Chrudzimska-Uhera writes that at the time of the construction of the Galician
cemeteries at the beginning of the 20th century, the search for a distinct, Polish national style was stron-
gly being sought and which was reflected in art, crafts and architecture. This synergy, embodied in the
national framework, was meant to express and at the same time strengthen Poland’s national identity.
Polishness, expressed in native and local tradition, was also sought in medieval and Romantic patterns.
In addition, folk art – especially from the Podhale region – became the basis for the national style. And
it is Podhale and its folk borrowings which are visible in the cemeteries built by Szczepkowski.
sian style of the necropolises, of polluting the landscape, of having nothing to do with Polish
culture and art. The completed cemeteries were accused of a lack of taste, being termed and
charged with being: stone-faced terrors, freaks of concrete and twisted iron and that their
‘banality and ugliness’ was a scar on the Polish landscape. Even their removal was mooted.46
Furthermore, the plans were considered to be alien to the Slavic soul, and they were
called Teutonic, as if they were aesthetically brutal and political enemies.47 The Polish
artists involved in the construction of the cemeteries were stigmatized and rejected.48
An atmosphere arose in which the destruction of the cemeteries became distinctly pos-
sible. As Agnieszka Partridge wrote, the first acts of vandalism on graves and cemeteries
occurred two years after the war, already in 1920. Later, there were cases of destruction
even in those cemeteries where legionaries were buried.49
Consequently, in the interwar period and after World War II, the cooperation of
Polish artists with the Austrian authorities in the construction of cemeteries in West
Galicia was not necessarily a cause for personal pride. Katarzyna Chrudzimska-Uhera
points out that the subject of Szczepkowski’s involvement in KGA works was, as
one might suspect, initially silent in two biographies of the artist, the first of which
appeared in the interwar period and the second in the Polish People’s Republic. The
cemetery-building aspect did not match the image of the co-creator of the Polish na-
tional style.50
PILGRIMAGES IN THE INTERWAR PERIOD
In Western Europe, the construction of large military necropolises led to the growth in
pilgrimages to soldiers’ graves. Individuals, families and associations were involved.51 An
analogous – albeit much more limited – phenomenon was observed in Poland, where
the cemeteries were well marked and easily accessible. They were visited by Czechs,
46
Ibid., p. 49. Chrudzimska-Uhera refers to particualr opinions expressed in publications of the period:
Nagrobki, Kraków 1916, pp. 3, 55; T. Szydłowski, Ruiny Polski, Kraków 1919, pp. 187-190, R. Feliń-
ski, “Pomniki wojny i zmartwychwstania Polski”, Rzeczy Piękne, no. 1 (1919), p. 4; G. Kowalski, “O na-
szą kulturę. Uwagi o odbudowie i ratowaniu zniszczonych zabytków”, in Sprawozdanie i wydawnictwo
Wydziału Towarzystwa Opieki nad Polskimi Zabytkami Sztuki i Kultury za rok 1914 i 1915, Kraków
1916, pp. 26-27.
47
W. Kosiński, “Wstęp”, in A. Partridge, Otwórzcie bramy pamięci…, p. 9.
48
Ibid.
49
50
K. Chrudzimska-Uhera, “O dylematach…”, p. 50. Broch and Hauptmann (iidem, Zachodniogalicyjskie
groby bohaterów…, p. 150) show the stylistic differences of Szczepkowski in comparison to other artists
working for KGA. In their view, he appeals to folk culture, underscores the role of nature in cemetery
projects and their place in the landscape and their natural context. There also appears – perhaps even
as a criticism – that the cemeteries designed by him appeal to a ‘naïve form of folk art’ (ibid., p. 150).
51
J. Winter, Sites of Memory…, particularly the chapter entitled “Communities in Mourning”.
Hungarians and Slovakians but also by Austrians and Germans.52 This had been the de-
sired effect which the designers of the cemeteries had in mind when they created them.
In order to make the cemeteries more attractive, KGA artists used the potential of
the surrounding landscape and nature. Broch and Hauptmann believed that in the most
picturesque areas of the Western Carpathians of Galicia, which were discovered by foreign-
ers during the war, may join the ranks of Europe’s most popular tourist destinations. The
most notable attraction in this mountainous landscape will certainly be the many cemeter-
ies of fallen soldiers.53
In addition, Broch and Hauptmann were driven by the conviction that the soldiers’
necropolis was not only an expression of respect for the sacrifice made by the fallen, but
also of the goal of patriotic pilgrimages exploring the attributes of the Beskid Niski and
Pogórze region. As they recall, the work of building cemeteries was accompanied by the
following thought: Take the sandals from your feet, for the land on which you stand is holy
ground.54 In this way, the landscape was sacralised together with the soldiers’ graves.
Around them, as they were planning them, a pilgrimage movement was developing,
and most of the cemeteries were built to serve as patriotic ceremonies. It had already been
the case on All Souls Day in 1915 and 1916 […] It was anticipated that after the war these
cemeteries would be visited by families and fellow pilgrims, and also become a place of pride
and reflection for subsequent generations. This postulate was related to the positivistic idea
of the cemetery as a historical record.55
The paradox of history is that these necropolises, which were planned and built
with such dedication, forethought and a wealth of symbolic references, began to be for-
gotten soon after the end of the Great War. The Austro-Hungarian Empire not only
lost World War I but it also fell apart. The heroes lost their Fatherland/homelands for
which they sacrificed their lives. Their sacrifice turned out to be futile.
THE AFTER WAR PERIOD AND THE MAŁOPOLSKA HERITAGE

LIST
After World War II, the complete lack of interest on the part of the state authorities sen-
tenced the Łużna cemetery – as well as the other cemeteries built between 1915-1918 –
to ruin.56 From the 1970s and 80s, an image remains in the memory of the inhabitants
of Łużna of the gontyna as a place where May blessings and Rosary services were per-
formed by priests from the local parish. At that time, the cemetery was overgrown with
forest to which the necropolis owed its romantic character. Zofia Żmijowska mentions
52
53
R. Broch, H. Hauptmann, Zachodniogalicyjskie groby bohaterów…, p. 23, in A. Partridge, Otwórzcie
bramy pamięci…, p. 52.
54
55
56
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “Description of the site”, p. 9.
that the sun light shone through him, illuminating the individual graves. This romanti-
cism is gone today. Then [before the trees were cut] the cemetery was charming.57
From the end of World War II until the 1980s, the cemetery gradually lost the char-
acter of a soldier’s necropolis, and became an ‘overgrown park’ where families walked
on Sundays and where young people went to play truant. The role of the soldier’s ne-
cropolis was clearly suspended, although – and this should not be overlooked – it was
still present. The heroic fate of particular soldiers ceased to be the central element in
this space. It became instead the backdrop to everyday life. Without descendants to
care for it, the cemetery became a non-place – non-lieu – losing its original, funeral
character.58 Society ceased to be tied to this place and its extreme liminality was rein-
forced by the fact that – as current inhabitants of the village maintain59 – the wooden
chapel at the top had been taken over by the homeless as their abode. They also ascribed
to them the fire which completely destroyed the gontyna on 29 June 1985.60
Yet paradoxically the fire which destroyed the gontyna saw the beginning of a phase
in which interest arose in the cemeteries built in World War I period in West Galicia.
This steady growth in interest led in 2006 (two years after Poland had joined the EU)
to placing cemetery no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki on the list of objects which were the focus
of the 8th edition of the Małopolska Heritage Days (20-21 May) which are organised
by the Małopolska Institute of Culture based in Kraków (MIC, Pl. Małopolski Insty-
tut Kultury).61 A brief description of the cemetery placed in a guidebook prepared for
the event claims that during the Gorlice operation, thousands of soldiers from both sides
perished, amongst them many Poles. We can also read that: It is the largest Hungarian
cemetery complex outside the borders of Hungary.62
The Polish aspect in the guide to cemetery no. 123 is stressed by the figure of Gen-
eral Tadeusz Rozadowski who prepared the artillery barrage which preceded the at-
tack on the positions by two Polish regiments: the 56th Wadowice Infantry Regiment
and the 100th Cieszyn Infantry Regiment. The victory [of the Austro-Hungarian army]
was bought at tremendous [Polish] cost.63 John Paul II also appears in the guide, not as
a central figure but his sacralising presence to the site is noted. We learn that Sergeant
Karol Wojtyła, the father of the Pope, took part in the assault on Pustki. This is a clear-
ly Polish, national and Catholic element. Furthermore, the contemporary touristic at-
57
Conversation conducted with Zofia Żmijowska (20 April 2017), a Polish teacher at the school in Łuż-
na and amateur photographer. As evidence of the romantic character of the place, Zofia Żmijowska
showed her collection of photographs of the place from the 1980s.
58
M. Augé, Non-lieux, introduction à une anthropologie de la surmodernité, Paris 1992.
59
This view was also ventured by Kazimierz Krok (interview 7 April 2017).
60
“Kaplica cmentarna (gontyna), Wzgórze Pustki w Łużnej. Dzieje historyczne – czasy I Wojny Świato-
wej”, Cmentarz wojenny Nr 123 Łużna-Pustki (official website devoted to cemetery no. 123 in Łużna-
-Pustki), at <http://www.pustki.luzna.pl/gontyna.html>, 8 April 2017.
61
The cemetery in Łużna was placed on the list of places for the Małopolska Heritage Days in 2013.
62
B. Sanocka, VIII Małopolskie Dni Dziedzictwa Kulturowego, Kraków 2006, text without page num-
bers.
63
Ibid.
tractiveness of the site is emphasised by the laconic description of it: the composition of
the necropolis is particularly picturesque: the graves are marked by simple, wooden crosses
placed amongst the trees […] just below the summit is located an amphitheatre. Winding
between the crosses and the trees are paths […] they bring to mind a landscaped garden.64
For tourists visiting the cemetery during the Cultural Heritage Days, the Małpolska
Institute of Culture prepared a plan of the cemetery in 2006 (see fig.2). This route,
which tourists can complete in stages, leads from the entrance to the summit where
a wooden chapel stood until 1985.65 The accompanying description is important, in
which we learn that the construction follows the lines of existing trenches and the ‘fight-
ing of the fallen heroes’. The character of the place, which retains the memory of the
tragic events of 90 years before, is emphasised by the additional information that the
cemetery also shows the symbolic relation between the fallen (soldiers) with the earth upon
which they fell in battle. In addition, the cemetery was designed as a ‘grove for heroes’.66
This is also linked to the classical idea of ‘Pro Patria Mori’ by the statement that a sol-
dier’s death is not an anonymous and private matter: it is a heroic sacrifice given for the
homeland. This idea is expanded upon by the claim that the cemetery was funded by
the citizens of Austro-Hungary to be a monument to victory in war and the defence of
the Fatherland. This formulation is linked to the inscription from the gontyna which
one may find on the map: To the eternal memory of fallen heroes who met their deaths in
striving to win this summit for the glory of the Fatherland.67
The map proposes a visit in the manner of one’s own ahistorical participation in
the events of 2 May 1915. This is akin to reliving mythical events – a mythical battle –
which is all the more powerful when it is done in situ.68 On the plan of the cemetery, the
route is enriched by a clearly biblical reference which was also referred to by Broch and
Hauptmann: Take the sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.69
So, the modern tourist/pilgrim enters a quasi-sacral space, into the ‘heroic space’. The
steps of the tourist/pilgrim imitate those of the fallen heroes, and their heroic effort be-
comes that of the tourist. In this context, the plan states that the stages have been made
in such a way that their conquest should not be a ‘light’ one.70
The identity of the place is a fact and brooks no argument (the place of the battle
is also the cemetery which the tourist/pilgrim visits). As a result, the tourist/pilgrim
climbs up, conquering the different phases of the battle which are marked by successive
64
Ibid.
65
In 2006, the gontyna was yet to be restored.
66
Map prepared by MIC for use in the war cemetery no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki during the 8th edition of
the Małopolska Heritage Days.
67
Ibid.
68
A similar effect was achieved during the ceremony to mark the unveiling of the European Heritage La-
bel on 21 April 2017, during which a film showing the fighting on the Eastern Front on 2 May 1915
was shown.
69
Exodus 3,5.
70
Map prepared by MIC… Here should be mentioned the numerous re-enactment groups who recreate
the events of the World War I period.
Fig.2. Map prepared by the Małopolska Institute of Culture for the 8th edition of the
Małopolska Heritage Days (20-21 May 2006)
© Małopolska Institute of Culture
graves. In this manner they ‘repeat’ the assault of 2 May 1915. During the visit, histori-
cal time becomes suspended and is replaced by mythical time, by the time of heritage.
This patrimonial illud tempus allows the tourist/pilgrim to touch, feel and see the past.
In other words, the memory materialized in the heritage here is used as a social tool to
transgress time and return to a mythical time of before, a time belonging to the fallen
heroes. Following in their footsteps allows us to ‘open’ up a way to this patrimonial illud
tempus from which it all began and in which the law that clearly distinguish good from
evil have been established.71 It is not, however, a law which diminishes the vanquished
at the hands of the victors but rather one which unites them and removes the barrier
between the ‘enemies’ and the ‘heroes’.
On the field of battle, the honour of a heroic death erases any army, national, cultur-
al, religious or other affiliation. By becoming fallen heroes on the summit of Pustki, the
soldiers joined a pantheon of fame which exceeds the purely national frame. As soldiers
71
This type of mythical thinking is expressed by the idea of the European Heritage Label. It is Europe
starts here.
they had names, surnames and ranks,72 but as heroes they lose their individual identity.
Their individual biographies ‘disappear’ (Fr. disparaître), as Roland Barthes put it.73 In
their place stands their collective heroism and reconciliation which – as Barthes’ theory
has it – overwhelms them intrusively, contextually and intentionally. History evapo-
rates, stolen by the myth.
PREPARATIONS FOR THE CENTENARY OF THE BATTLE

OF GORLICE
On 28 June 2014, almost 30 years after fire had levelled the gontyna, a ceremony was
held to mark the interment of a lump of coal in the foundations to mark the rebuild-
ing of this soldier’s chapel and the whole of cemetery no. 123 on Pustki in Łużna. Work
proceeded at great speed and the reconstructed building was opened on 18 October
2014.74 A new chapter in the history of the Łużna-Pustki necropolis and its presence in
the historical consciousness of the inhabitants of the whole region began.
After the restoration of the cemetery chapel and before the hundredth anniversary
of the Battle of Gorlice (1-2 May 2015), the local school in Łużna organised a compe-
tition devoted to historical knowledge under the slogan They passed away. They left
traces. Although Poland had not been a distinct party in World War I, it was the Polish
‘national’ and ‘patriotic’ elements which were clearly expressed and historically justified
in the first stages of this competition. This was also emphasised both in the competi-
tion regulations and in the questions asked to young people.75 The first stage of the
competition overlooked questions on the cemetery itself in Pustki and other necropo-
lises from World War I in the region while the second stage redressed this omission and
such questions appeared. What was interesting was that the Polish, ‘patriotic’ and in-
dependence elements were emphasised by questions related directly to the famous song
We are the First Brigade76 sung by the Polish Legion led by Józef Piłsudski.77
72
For a more precise identification see: R. Broch, H. Hauptmann, Zachodniogalicyjskie groby bohate-
rów… See: J.J.P. Drogomir, Polegli w Galicji Zachodniej 1914-1915 (1918). Wykaz poległych i zmarłych
pochowanych na 400 cmentarzach wojskowych Galicji Zachodniej, vol. 1, Tarnów 1999.
73
R. Barthes, Mythologies, Paris 1957.
74
Informator Gminny. Łużna, no. 2 (2015), p. 11, and interview with Kazimierz Krok.
75
The first two regulations of the competition were the following: 1. Shaping the awareness and patriotic
attitudes of the younger generation through the diversification and deepening of knowledge on the subject
of the history of Poland and the region. 2. Strengthening the sense of national identity. From: Regulations
of the Historical Knowledge Competition. 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Gorlice, material made
available by the director of the school in Łużna, author’s own collection. See also: set of competititon
questions (stage I), author’s own collection.
76
Regulations of the Historical Knowledge Competition. 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Gorlice…
See also: set of competition questions (stage II), author’s own collection.
77
Józef Piłsudski – national hero and creator of the independent Polish state (1918).
A considerably different stress was to be found in the school photography competition

(spring 2015) which was intended to shape the patriotism of the younger generation but
also awaken interest in the history and culture of their own region. The subject of the pic-
tures were to be places commemorating the events of World War I e.g. cemeteries, monu-
ments, obelisks, grave figures, chapels and cemetery chapels.78 As a result of these condi-
tions, works flowed into the competition from cemeteries in the III and IV zone of the
war graves. One of the most photographed objects was, of course, cemetery no. 123 in
Łużna-Pustki.79
In the choice of topics and in the descriptions of the submitted pictures, one could
clearly see two notions. The first clearly appealed to the national frame of reference,
according to which particular graves and cemeteries were identified. In this respect, Aus-
trian, German, Russian, Polish and Hungarian graves were to be seen. The second ap-
proach dealt with the more universal theme of the death of soldiers on the field of hon-
our. Here, the national element is not present and the fallen heroes are an eternal guard 80
to use the title of the work by Magdalena Tatko. In other words, the pantheon to which
both ‘common’ sets of heroes is not an effect of national selection but refers to a much
broader frame of reference. They are not European, however, but universal.
CENTENARY CELEBRATIONS FOR THE BATTLE OF GORLICE
During the celebrations of the centenary of the Battle of Gorlice (1-2 May 2015), a cer-
tain tension between the national (Polish) and European and even universal manner of
the interpretation of these events and cemetery no. 123 became manifest. The Infor-
mator Gminny. Łużna (Eng. Local Newspaper. Łużna) came to the conclusion that the
events were of a patriotic nature, to learn about the tragic period of events during World
War I and to pay respects to the fallen soldiers.81 Furthermore, an expression of love to
the Fatherland was the communal singing by the public of symbolic, Polish songs from
the period.82 The aim of the event was to bring participants closer to the atmosphere expe-
78
Regulations of the Regional Photographic Competition. 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Gorlice
(version for primary and junior high schools), material made available by the director of the school in
Łużna, author’s own collection.
79
A separate question is the stylistics of these works and the translations of their titles. Apart from the
photography competition, an arts and crafts competition for primary school children was organised
in which the gontyna was one of the most popular subjects chosen by the children.
80
Na wiecznej warcie, photographic work by Magdalena Tatko, class IIa, Junior High School no. 6. See
also: the documentation for the photographic competition entitled “Międzygminny Konkurs Foto-
graficzny”. 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Gorlice (version for primary and junior high schools),
material made available by the director of the school in Łużna, author’s own collection. The results
of the competition are taken from the Informator Gminny. Łużna, no. 2 (2015), p. 11, also interview
with Kazimierz Krok.
81
Informator Gminny. Łużna, no. 3 (2015), p. 2.
82
Ibid., mentioned are the songs: Warszawianka, Marsz Pierwszej Brygady, Przybyli ułani pod okienko
and Pierwsza kadrowa.
rienced by the soldiers as these songs had considerable significance for them. They not only
helped them to fight for their Fatherland but also supported the soldiers during battle. By
singing the hymns and songs of the soldiers, in our hearts and thoughts we could recall all
of those who had given their lives for the Fatherland.83
Those laid to rest in the cemetery did not have – however – one Fatherland. They
had a number of them and none of them survived World War I in an unchanged form.
What is more, it was from the ashes of those countries/empires that Poland emerged.
And it was Poland which was praised and honoured by those Polish patriotic songs
during the centennial celebrations. This paradox of history is expressed by the fact that
the celebrations were held to mark the centenary of the battle in a cemetery designed to
commemorate an Austro-Hungarian victory which had been expected in Vienna by the
descendants of those who had won their independence at the expense of the fall of the
Habsburg monarchy. As the head of the Łużna local authority, Kazimierz Krok, put it:
Poles took part in this battle. Many of them fell on the battlefield. This battle contributed to
the weakening of the Russian army which it never recovered from until the end of the war.
It was the first step towards Polish freedom.84 The semantic content of this wartime lieu
de mémoire – as can be seen – is tremendous.
The presence of a Polish, national significance during the centennial celebrations
was alongside a supranational frame of reference. Furthermore, during the evening
commemorations at the gontyna (1 May 2015), candles were placed on all of the graves.
No grave was distinguished and none were omitted. The “Appeal for Freedom, the Ap-
peal of the Fallen, and the prayers for the dead” were read and they were heard by young
people from the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Germany, France and Italy.85
In this part of the ceremony, the national aspect was clearly weakened or even dis-
appeared. It was dominated by the transnational character of the battle itself. The de-
parture from the national canons was reflected in the ecumenical prayer for the soldiers
who were buried in the cemetery. Their surnames, ranks, nationalities or affiliation were
not mentioned and, as a result, there was no absence of reflective words and questions as
to the sense of millions of victims and the warning for the present and future generations.86
The warning stemming from this event did not have a national character and, what is
more, it went beyond national lines and took on a universal significance and meaning.
83
Ibid., p. 3.
84
Interview with Kazimierz Krok.
85
Informator Gminny. Łużna, no. 3 (2015), p. 3. Łużna maintains contact with foreign partners. Look
ing after visitors from overseas schools to the cemetery is one form of this cooperation. The examples
given refer to just such a visit.
86
Ibid., p. 4.
EUROPEAN HERITAGE LABEL – THE APPLICATION
The commencement of work on the application for a European Heritage Label for cem-
etery no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki introduced this lieu de mémoire into new interpretative
contexts, reflecting the political need for the implementation of Polish historical policy
within the European Union. The local administration joined in with the preparations,
but the provincial and government administrations played a crucial role.87 Finally, the
Łużna application was supported by Polish experts and the Ministry of Culture and
National Heritage. As a result, the symbolic formatting of this place of memory began
which was to not only show the honour and victory of the multicultural and multi-
religious Austro-Hungarian Empire (which would have been in accordance with the
intentions of its builders during World War I) or the Polish road to freedom but rather
to connect itself to the values which are recognised as being important for European his-
tory and identity.88
To connect cemetery no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki with European values, one may in-
dicate a particular part of the application where one can read that the values which
formed the basis for the whole cemetery in World War I in West Galicia are still very
much present in Europe and the European Union. To these common, unifying values
are respect for human dignity, democracy, human rights, including the rights of minori-
ties, and broadly understood pluralism. They also include the memory of those who has
passed away, and recognition of cultural heritage and past art as concepts bonding societies
and nations.89
The authors of the application emphasized above all the role played on the Eastern
Front during World War I by the so called ‘Gorlice Offensive’ of the Austro-Hungarian
and German army, which eventually held back the Russian army marching towards the
west of Europe, shifting the front-line – until Brusilov’s Offensive in June 1916 – several
hundred kilometres to the east. The breakthrough on the front at the ‘Little Verdun’ – as
the Battle of Gorlice is also known – came at great cost to both sides and, as a result of
which, the Łużna-Pustki Cemetery no. 123 is divided into quarters, according to military
affiliation, encompassing Austrian-Hungarian (912), German (65) and Russian (227)
army soldiers of various nationalities. Furthermore, the [m]ajority of earth and construc-
87
Interview with Joanna Florkiewicz-Kamieniarczyk, and the interview with Kazimierz Krok.
88
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “Criteria to be met by the candidate site”, p. 11.
89
Ibid., subsection 1.3 “The place and role of the candidate site in European history and European in-
tegration, its links with key European events, personalities or movements”, subsection 1.3 “The place
and role of the candidate site in the development and promotion of the common values that underpin
European integration”, p. 12. It is worth noting that in the supporting material provided by the Euro-
pean Commission in relation to the European values which need to be displayed there is a reference
to do: Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union states that ‘the Union is founded on the values of respect
for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including
the rights of persons belonging to minorities. The values are common to the Member States in a society in
which pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between women and men
prevail.’ The common values that underpin European integration are also described greater in detail in the
Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union.
tion works in both cemeteries was performed by war prisoners – mainly Russian ones. The
application stressed the fact also that the Pustki necropolis is the largest wartime cemetery
in IV District of Łużna and one of the most important – in terms of propaganda and artis-
tically – in the area of operation of the OGW [War Graves’ Department].90
The international and artistic character of the cemetery was emphasised in the ap-
plication by appealing to the art at the turn of the century that both of the creators of
the Łużna necropolis were excellent representatives. In the application we can read that:
[ Jan] Szczepkowski preferred a classicist and historical form, without monumentalism,
complemented with elements inspired by domestic art, particularly folk building and orna-
mental art. [Dušan] Jurkovič, on the other hand, drew inspiration from Vienna Secession
and Wiener Werkstätte, the Arts and Crafts movement, and the Slovakian and Moravian
folk art of Carpathian region. He was also a pioneer of open air (‘Skansen’) museums – he
co-organised the second Europe’s open air museum – the ‘Vallachian Chamber’ in Vsetín
and ‘Vallachian Village’ exposition during ethnographic exhibition in Prague (1895).91
The unique artistic value of the site was stressed in the following manner: The mon-
umental soldiers’ necropolis, established with great effort already during the war, which
makes it a unique place, is one of the most beautiful and important World War I cemeter-
ies in Europe.92
The new, previously untried idea of uniting all of the fallen in a common place for
both the victors and the vanquished is – of course – also mentioned in the application.
The cemetery itself is presented as: a burial place where all soldiers, the winners and the
defeated, were treated with equal respect regardless of the nationality, religion, or military
affiliation and given the right to decent burial, the cemetery has all element of a site –
a symbol important for European history and identity.93 In this manner, the Łużna ne-
cropolis extends its range to that of an ecumenical place of rest.
This unifying message was provided with additional support by the local authority
on the request of a panel of experts in Brussels. Particularly strongly stressed was the
ecumenical character of the cemetery: It [Łużna cemetery] very clearly embodies the idea
of ecumenism: identical treatment of winners and losers, independent of military, ethnic,
and religious affiliation. It offers ‘resting together in the same place’ to soldiers who were
reconciled in death.94
The heroism was also given another face: the fallen were showed equal respect here,
out of consideration for human dignity, remembrance, and soldierly reconciliation af-
90
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “Description of the site”, p. 8. The abbreviation
OGW stands for the Oddział Grobów Wojennych, Eng. War Graves’ Department of Austro-Hunga-
rian Military Headquarters.
91
92
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “Criteria to be met by the candidate site”, sub-
section 1.2 “The place and role of the candidate site in European history and European integration, its
links with key European events, personalities or movements”, p. 11.
93
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “Criteria to be met by the candidate site”, p. 11.
94
Additional material prepared for the panel of experts supplied by the Małopolska Provincial Office.
ter death which ends all fight and hatred. All were given the right to rest in peace in the
bosom of nature, as they all – having died in action – were heroes.95
The application procedure required the cemetery to be positioned according to es-
sence and achievement of contemporary EU values: The Łużna-Pustki cemetery – as
intended by its creators is a multi-national burial place, for over a century promoting the
values cherished by the European Union, such as respect for human dignity, equality and
brotherhood of people, reconciliation, and peace.96 The values which formed the basis of
the cemetery are also to be found in those which are being achieved by the EU: They
[the builders of the cemetery] tried to replace the chaos of the battlefield with harmony of
art and nature; the noise of the battle – with poetry; fighting – with consolation; hatred –
with love. In this way they opposed the very essence of war, trying in this symbolic way to
reverse its horrendous logic. These ideas are the foundations of the European civilisation
and integration.97
The cemetery in Łużna joins together in eternal rest: Catholics, Protestants, mem-
bers of the Orthodox church, Orthodox Jews, Muslims, Austrians, Russians, Hungar-
ians, Germans, Ukrainians, Jews, Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Bosnians, and others.98 All had
died a heroic death. The supranational character of the soldiers’ sacrifice amounted to
what all the fallen soldiers had in common: heroism, sacrifice for the home country,
truthfulness to their soldier’s oaths.99
The application faithfully reports the history of the forgotten cemetery in the
1920s: In the 1920s or 1930s, a single concrete gravestone was placed on one of the graves.
Before World War II, some tidying-up work was conducted, consisting mainly in the re-
placement of rotting wooden crosses, improving the structure of the earth graves and taking
care of the trees and other greenery.100 The document recalls the pilgrims who travelled
to the burial place of the soldiers. The underlying assumption was that all Galician cem-
eteries after the war were to become pilgrimage destinations for families and friends as
well as school trips, cared for by the reconciled European nations.101
95
section 1.1 “The cross‑border or pan‑European nature of the candidate sites”, p. 11.
96
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “Relevance of the application”, p. 10.
97
section 1.2, p. 12.
98
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “The place and role of the candidate site in
European history and European integration, its links with key European events, personalities or move-
ments”, subsection 1.3, p. 12.
99
section 1.2, pp. 11-12.
100
101
European Heritage Label Application Form 2015, point “The place and role of the candidate site in
European history and European integration, its links with key European events, personalities or move-
ments”, subsection 1.3, p. 12.
A EUROPEAN PRODUCT IN A LOCAL CONTEXT
The entry of a fourth Polish place on to the list of those holding a European Heritage
Label (EHL) is often presented as a ‘success’ of Polish historical policy in the European
arena.102 This is also true at the local level, where in the Informator Gminny. Łużna
once can read that this is a prestigious award and that presently there are 3 [other] ob-
jects in Poland which have a EHL. These are the Union of Lublin, the Gdansk Histori-
cal Shipyard and the Constitution of the 3rd of May, making Poland the leader amongst
states in Europe.103 Whilst it is difficult to deny this, the satisfaction with the (quanti-
tative) achieved success is symptomatic of the perception of Europe as a space/arena
in which various places (reported by national expert bodies in cooperation with local
authorities and non-governmental associations) can compete with one another and the
leader becomes the state that has – at least temporarily – the highest number of places
Fig.3. Page from the brochure prepared by the Local Authority of Łużna to mark the award of
the European Heritage Label
© photo: A. Ziobrowski, T. Machowski, D. Bugno, P. Sekuła; graphic design: T. Machowski, D. Bugno

© Łużna Commune Office
102
See: interview with Joanna Florkiewicz-Kamieniarczyk, and the interview with Kazimierz Krok.
103
“Cmentarz wojenny nr 123 Łużna-Pustki nominowany do Znaku Dziedzictwa Europejskiego”, Infor-
mator Gminny. Łużna, no. 6 (2015), p. 4.
d istinguished. In this context, the past is an area which is not so much complementary
at European level, but rather a diplomatic strategy aimed at presenting an object as
quickly as possible within the borders of a member state. This solution, from a purely
pragmatic point of view, simply blocks the possibility of choosing similar places (within
other countries) which may aspire to that distinction. The principle of the order and
degree of preparation of the application – even if it isn’t ideal – is, however, applied in
practice in the classification, valorization and distinguishing of European heritage.
As a result, ‘our’ places of memory and ‘our’ interpretation of the past (even if it is
only to apply to preselected places in the procedure application for a European Heritage
Label) is heard, present and taken into account in the European arena. It is a practical
expression of the historical policy conducted by a member state in the European arena.
CONCLUSIONS
It was not long ago that the war cemeteries of World War I were forgotten and today
they have become a tool and hope for the development of the whole region. This has
seen the transformation of heritage from a difficult and ‘foreign’ one into ‘our’ heri-
tage which can be utilised; this is a story of ‘orphaned’ heroes whose Fatherland has
vanished but another homeland – Europe? – has welcomed them into its hall of fame
in the second decade of the 21st century.104 This symbolic and discursive105 process is
accompanied by an economic element, making the cemetery complex a factor in the
development of the entire economy of the region.106 And in this new meaning, it is
subject – like any piece of heritage – to classification,107 planning, utilization, manage-
ment, etc. As a result, this ‘heritage without heirs’ has become a product of the Euro-
pean tourism market and historical pop culture.
The war cemetery no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki allows the identification of the multi-
farious nature of the resemiotization of this lieu de mémoire. It applies, amongst others,
to the classical device of Pro Patria Mortuis, and which moves from a narrow frame of
its national interpretation to enter the European. The cemetery itself becomes a means
104
On distinction between cultural goods and heritage see: A. Tomaszewski, “Europa Środkowa: do-
bra kultury a dziedzictwo kultury”, in J. Purchla (ed.), Europa Środkowa – nowy wymiar dziedzictwa.
Materiały międzynarodowej konferencji zorganizowanej w dniach 1-2 czerwca 2001, Kraków 2002,
pp. 133-134. On the subject of the theory of heritage and cultural goods see also: idem, “Dziedzic-
two i zarządzanie”, in K. Gutowska (ed.), Problemy zarządzania dziedzictwem kulturowym, Warszawa
2000, pp. 7-11.
105
L. Smith, Uses of Heritage, London 2006; L. Smith , N. Akagawa (eds.), Intangible Heritage, London–
–New York 2009.
106
More information on the economic/tourist exploitation on cemetery no. 123 can be found in: Infor-
mator Gminny Łużna, no. 2-6 (2015); no. 1-4 (2016).
107
G.J. Ashworth, “Heritage in Fragments: A Fragmented Instrument for Fragmented Policies”, in:
M. Murzyn, J. Purchla (eds.), Cultural Heritage in the 21st Century. Opportunities and Challenges, Kra-
ków 2007, pp. 29-30. See also: B. Graham, G.J. Ashworth, J.E. Tunbridge, A Geography of Heritage.
Power, Culture and Economy, London–New York 2000.
which can be used by local and European politicians, managers, enthusiasts, NGO’s
etc. This imperial sacrum becomes a European symbol and/or rather a product of cul-
tural policy.108
The memory present in the cemetery no. 123 in Łużna-Pustki is a subject of the
Polish policy of memory in the European arena, which results in the top-down Euro-
peanization of this particular lieu de mémoire. In this sense, the use of this cemetery is
a specific response to the institutional and top-down needs of the European past/heri-
tage/memory, which should be locally or nationally rooted but transnationally shared,
felt, and valorized.
It is worth noting that the selection of the Łużna-Pustki cemetery for a place on the
EHL list is a result of the synergy of what is locally valued and experienced as European
heritage (the bottom-up perspective), and what experts from national and/or Europe-
an level consider it to be (the top-down perspective). These two levels of use partially
meet. The local use of EHL consists in particular in the building of a tourist brand of
the region, while the European level is a space of historical policy pursued by the Polish
government. In other words, the economic pragmatism of the local level and the use of
the cemetery as a factor of economic development of the region coincides and comple-
ments the historical policy pursued by the Polish government in the EU arena.
One may connect this to the motto of the European Heritage Label that Europe
starts here, only that – after Jan Józef Lipski – it seems that it should be stressed that Eu-
rope does not begin everywhere but precisely there where mutually inflicted suffering
was overcome. This perspective not only takes into accounts our own suffering but –
what is most important – it does not overlook the sufferings of others. Lipski defined
this as we must tell ourselves everything, on the condition that everyone will talk about
their own guilt. Without this weight of the past, we will not be able to experience a com-
mon future.109
In this respect, the potential of the cemetery is exceptional and the European slogan
Europe starts here finds its expression in the inscription written by Hans Hauptmann
for the necropolis:
In life divided
Death has united
Noone knows their names
Friends and enemies
108
J. Purchla, “Management of Historical Cities and Market Forces. The Central European Experience”,
in idem (ed.), From the World of Borders to the World of Horizons, transl. by T. Bałuk-Ulewiczowa et al.,
Kraków 2001, pp. 99-111. Purchla wrote that: the heritage of Central European cities is not only some-
thing sacred but also a commodity – so this sphere also lies in the economic zone. This fact cannot be timidly
concealed. The co-joining of artistic and intellectual potential of our historical cities, and the abandonment
of the static model of protection are the most important lessons learned from our five-years’ experience in
transforming the reality of Central Europe (p. 109).
109
J.J. Lipski, “Odprężenie i pojednanie. Polemika z Gunterem Grassem”, in idem, Powiedzieć sobie wszyst-
ko... Eseje o sąsiedztwie polsko-niemieckim, Gliwice–Warszawa 1996, pp. 89-90.
Who they were, what they meant

Extinguished, passed on
All that remains
Is their loyalty.110
This inscription, nearly a century old, expresses a conviction about the great level-
ler which is death and finds a counterpart in the contemporary attempt to find in Eu-
rope such common, supranational, European places of memory where the memory of
past tragic events is not only transmitted from generation to generation but also where
its interpretation is guided by principles of unity and goes beyond the symbolic limes
which divide those who won from those who were defeated.
In reference to the inscription mentioned above, one may claim that the memory
present in the cemetery in Łużna is not completely free from the cultural context which
gave birth to it and it is within this framework that it is undergoing constant and con-
tinual evolution. It is a classic and romantic image of the unknown (or known) soldier-
hero who has given their life for the Fatherland and in return has received the laurels
of honour and glory, achieving eternal life in the memory of successive generations.111
In any reflection upon the cemetery in Łużna, the topos of ‘Pro Patria Mortuis’ can-
not be avoided since it crops up and returns in different forms and permits the necrop-
olis to be firmly anchored in the broader, European context. This mythical structure
endures and at the European level it organizes around itself senses, symbols, narratives,
objects, practices and rituals. The example of Łużna permits reflection on how mythi-
cal structures, which are firmly rooted in the national imagination, have the potential
to organise another imagination at a different, supranational European level. The ques-
tion of whether European heritage presented in this manner is more of a postulate than
a socially experienced fact remains open. I am of the opinion that it is not a simple de-
scription of reality but has a deeply mythological character. And in that sense, it does
not say how it is, but how it should be. And, for this reason, it has the character of a pos-
tulate and a moral signpost.
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teriały z konferencji naukowej, Gorlice 27.10.2007, Gorlice 2007.
Sanocka B., VIII Małopolskie Dni Dziedzictwa Kulturowego, Kraków 2006.
Schubert J., Austriackie cmentarze wojenne w Galicji z lat 1914-1918, Kraków 1992.
Schubert J., “Organizacja grobownictwa wojennego w Monarchii Austro-Węgierskiej. Dziewią-
ty Wydział Grobów Wojennych (Kriegsgräber-Abteilung) przy Ministerstwie Wojny – po-
wstanie i działalność w latach 1915-1918. Organization and Structure of Wartime Cemete-
ries in Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. The IX War Graves Division (Kriegsgräber-Abteilung)
at the War Ministry in Vienna in the Years 1915-1918”, Architektura. Czasopismo Technicz-
ne. Architecture. Technical Transactions, no. 13 (2009).
Showalter D.E., Tannenberg 1914. Zderzenie imperiów, transl. by R. Dymek, Białystok 2005.
Smith L., Uses of Heritage, London 2006.
Smith L., Akagawa N. (eds.), Intangible Heritage, London–New York 2009.
Tomaszewski A., “Dziedzictwo i zarządzanie”, in K. Gutowska (ed.), Problemy zarządzania
dziedzictwem kulturowym, Warszawa 2000.
Tomaszewski A., “Europa Środkowa: dobra kultury a dziedzictwo kultury”, in J. Purchla (ed.),
Europa Środkowa – nowy wymiar dziedzictwa. Materiały międzynarodowej konferencji zor-
ganizowanej w dniach 1-2 czerwca 2001, Kraków 2002.
Winter J., Sites of Memory, Sites of Mourning. The Great War in European Cultural History,
Cambridge 2008.
“Znak Dziedzictwa Europejskiego” (European Heritage Label), Ministerstwo Kultury

i Dziedzictwa Narodowego (Ministry of Culture and National Heritage), at <http://www.
mkidn.gov.pl/pages/strona-glowna/wspolpraca-z-zagranica/znak-dziedzictwa-europe-
jskiego.php>.
Interviews with
Joanna Florkiewicz-Kamieniarczyk, director, Department of the Conservation of Monuments
of Kraków and National Heritage, Małopolska Provincial Office in Kraków, 4 April 2016.
Kazimierz Krok, head of the Łużna local authority, 7 April 2017.
Conversation with
Zofia Żmijowska, a Polish teacher at the school in Łużna and amateur photographer, 20 April
2017.
Graphic material
Map prepared by the Małopolska Institute of Culture for the 8th edition of the Małopolska Her-
itage Days (20-21 May 2006).
Other materials
Application made to the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and by the Department of
the Conservation of Monuments of Kraków and National Heritage, Małopolska Provincial
Office in Kraków and the local authority of Łużna.
Documentation for the photographic competition entitled “Międzygminny Konkurs Foto-
graficzny”. 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Gorlice (version for primary and junior high
schools), material made available by the director of the school in Łużna, author’s own col-
lection.
Regulations of the Historical Knowledge Competition. 100th Anniversary of the Battle of
Gorlice, material made available by the director of the school in Łużna, author’s own col-
lection.
Regulations of the Regional Photographic Competition. 100th Anniversary of the Battle of
Gorlice (version for primary and junior high schools), material made available by the direc-
tor of the school in Łużna, author’s own collection.
Krzysztof KOWALSKI holds an MA degree in ethnology from the Jagiellonian Uni-

versity in Kraków (1993), a PhD in history from the same university (2000) and a Mas-
ter of Public Administration (2004, double degree programme) from the Universi-
ty of Economics in Kraków and Copenhagen Business School. He works and teaches
in the Department of European Heritage of the Institute of European Studies at the
Jagiellonian University. His specialization is the theory of heritage and anthropology
of Europe. During his academic career he has received many scholarships (including
those from the Swiss government, Stefan Batory Foundation, Swedish Institute). He
had a postdoctoral position in the Centre for European Studies at Lund University
(2015) and has frequently been a visiting professor at l’Institut d’Etudes Politiques in
Strasbourg as well as in Lyon (2015). He wrote O istocie dziedzictwa europejskiego –
rozważania (Kraków 2013) and co-edited with Barbara Törnquist-Plewa The Europe-
anization of Heritage and Memories in Poland and Sweden (Kraków 2016).
Elisabeth WASSERMANN
el.wassermann@gmail.com
THE POLISH DISCOURSE ABOUT

THE RIGHTEOUS AMONG THE NATIONS
BETWEEN COMMEMORATION, EDUCATION
AND JUSTIFICATION?1
ABSTRACT In recent years, the Righteous Among the Nations have become a particular
topic of interest for the official politics of memory, historians, NGO activists
and the public sphere in Poland. Against the background of an on-going debate
on Polish-Jewish relations during the Holocaust, the attitude of Polish society
during the war and the commemoration of Holocaust sites in the country, the
Righteous Among the Nations are presented as a positive aspect of this histo-
ry of which many Poles are still proud. Thus, the topic has been frequently ad-
dressed by different actors and in different commemoration projects in recent
years. This article aims to determine the various ways of how and with what aims
the story of the Righteous has been used and defines three main directions: com-
memoration, education and justification (the latter in the sense of an attempt
to cover up upcoming accusations of participation of Poles in the Holocaust).
Another aspect covered will be the political use of the narrative of the Righteous
in recent years, which will be shown on the basis of selected case studies. Based
on the findings, the article investigates if and how the heritage of the Righteous
is restricted to a national, patriotic context or goes further and comprises ele-
ments of what can be called a European set of values and contexts.
Key words: Europeanization, Righteous, collective memory, narratives, Poland
1
This text was finished in mid-January 2018 and therefore does not include the current international
controversy concerning the amendment to the Polish Act on the Institute of National Remembrance
(February-March 2018).
126 Elisabeth Wassermann POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
Human rights, pluralism and democracy are core values of the European Union. Eu-
ropeanization should therefore, if understood as an on-going process in political, eco-
nomic and social terms, include an on-going process in all spheres, and also encompass
collective memory, education and narratives of the past. Thus, the question of how the
past is depicted in an EU-country can give hints about the progress of Europeanization
in the sense of it ‘getting European’ (adopting European values) in the sphere of cul-
ture. This is even more true when speaking about historical events that affected entire
Europe and became an important reference point for the EU, as it is the case for the
Holocaust in its different dimensions. One of the main aspects of the memory of the
Holocaust and World War II, apart from the commemoration of the victims, are the
Righteous Among the Nations – non-Jews from all over the world who were awarded
a medal by Yad Vashem for rescuing Jews during World War II. This issue has become
a famous topic of interest for the politics of memory, historians and the public sphere
within Poland and many other European countries2 in the last years. Just recently, the
Polish Parliament proclaimed the Jan Karski Year3 (2014), accompanied by numerous
events and exhibitions all over the country. Furthermore, the Polish Righteous and
their appropriate commemoration have been subject to public debates, exhibitions and
other initiatives within Poland and beyond, which were not deprived of political claims
and undertones. Major commemoration initiatives in Poland in recent years involve
the planned monument for the Polish Righteous in Warsaw, the new Ulma Family Mu-
seum of Poles Saving Jews in World War II and a set of projects in honor of Jan Karski
in his native town Łódź.
The process of coming to terms with the past of the last world war has occupied
the Polish public discourse since the late 1980s, with the debates about the Jedwabne
2
For example, initiatives in other countries: Sweden celebrated the Raoul Wallenberg Year in 2012 (Wal-
lenberg was a diplomat and businessmen who saved tens of thousands of Jews – for more information
see: U. Zander, “Remembering and Forgetting the Holocaust. The Cases of Jan Karski and Raoul Wal-
lenberg”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization of Heritage and Memories in
Poland and Sweden, Kraków 2016, pp. 189-211). The Mémorial de la Shoah in Paris, France, has in-
stalled a ‘wall of the Righteous’ presenting the names of more than 3900 French Righteous. The initia-
tive Austrian Friends of Yad Vashem has developed a website and exhibition on the Austrian Righteous
Among the Nations, which is subsequently shown in different places in Austria (more information:
Die Gerechten unter den Völkern, at <http://gerechte.at/die-ausstellung/>, 26 September 2017).
K .-G. Karlsson, “The Holocaust as a Problem of Historical Culture”, in K.-G. Karlsson , U. Zander
(eds.), Echoes of the Holocaust. Historical Cultures in Contemporary Europe, Lund 2003, p. 40.
3
Jan Karski (born as Jan Kozielewski) was a Polish soldier and courier of the Polish government-in-exile
during World War II. He was awarded the medal “Righteous Among the Nations” for his attempts to
inform Jewish leaders and heads of states and government abroad about the on-going mass murders of
Polish Jews in 1982.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 The Polish Discourse… 127
massacre after Jan Tomasz Gross’s book Neighbours4 as a culmination point.5 In this
context, scholars have observed a shift from an exclusive victim narrative to a more dif-
ferentiated assessment of Polish war history.6 The period between the late 1980s and
now, as Aleida Assmann observes, marks a general shift in collective memory forma-
tion in the Western world: Today, we see that the future has lost much of its power to inte-
grate, while the past is becoming increasingly important in the formation of identity. This
shift of orientation from future to past occurred in the 1980s and 1990s with the growing
acknowledgement of historical traumas.7 The latest World War II-related debates in Po-
land were mainly linked to scholarly publications or controversies about the forms and
instruments of commemoration and have inspired the government to the inclusion of
the issue into its official historic-political discourse. State-driven politics of memory in
turn, among other strategic goals, aim at strengthening the positive collective memory
of a society.8 Events in local, regional, national or transnational history are picked ac-
cording to current political convictions and intentions and then propagated in society
by the mass media. Thus, the narrative of the Polish Righteous for the sake of this ar-
ticle will be primarily understood as a means of politics of memory, which is used to
achieve certain long-term aims within society by different actors. This approach does
not exclude bottom-up initiatives without predetermined functions, as those in many
cases occur as reaction to a trend started from above. One example is the government-
proclaimed Jan Karski Year, which inspired many Polish schools and smaller NGOs to
manifold commemoration initiatives.
While scholars still argue as to how far the Holocaust as such can be a foundation
and starting point for a common European or a distinct national identity,9 the memory
4
See: J.T. Gross, Neighbours. The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland, Princeton
2001. In the book, Gross writes about the responsibility of the local Polish villagers from Jedwabne
for the mass killing of the Jewish population of the town in July 1941. Although there was historical
evidence for this before, the revelation of the participation of Polish people in the pogrom was a shock
to public opinion.
5
For a distinct analysis of this issue, see: B. Törnquist-Plewa, “The Jedwabne Killings – A Challenge for
Polish Collective Memory”, in K.-G. Karlsson, U. Zander (eds.), Echoes of the Holocaust…, pp. 141-171.
6
The historian Joanna Michlic i.e. sees the debate about Neighbours as a reflection of the process of de-
mocratization of Poland’s political and social life after 1989 – J.A. Michlic, The Polish Debate about
the Jewabne Massacre, p. 33, at <http://sicsa.huji.ac.il/sites/default/files/sicsa/files/21michlic.pdf>,
29 August 2016. For a detailed collection of press reactions, please see: A. Polonsky, J.A. Michlic, The
Neighbors Respond. The Controversy over the Jedwabne Massacre in Poland, Princeton 2004. Histo-
rian Marcin Kula considers the discussion about guilt and responsibility of Polish townspeople with
regards to the killing of local Jews in Jedwabne (and other villages) to be the biggest debate about the
history of the war in Poland for a long time. M. Kula, Uparta sprawa. Żydowska? Polska? Ludzka?, Kra-
ków 2004, p. 132.
7
A. Assmann, “Europe: A Community of Memory? Twentieth Annual Lecture of the GHI, Novem-
ber 16, 2006”, GHI Bulletin, no. 40 (2007), at <http://www.ghi-dc.org/files/publications/bulletin/
bu040/011.pdf>, 16 April 2015, p. 11.
8
L. Nijakowski, Polska polityka pamięci. Esej socjologiczny, Warszawa 2008, p. 19.
9
The historian Dan Diner for example sees the Holocaust as a paradigmatic European lieu de mémoire.
See: A. Assmann, “Europe: A Community of Memory?...”, p. 13.
of the Righteous Among the Nations is thus vividly celebrated as positive connotation
in collective memory. Poland, on whose soil the Nazi German occupiers located all
major death camps as well as thousands of ghettos and killing sites, plays a specific role
in this phenomenon. Polish citizens were witnesses to the Holocaust on a daily basis
and apart from a number of debates on so-called ‘dark sides’ of Polish-Jewish relations
under German occupation in the last 15 years, Poland is at the same time the country
with the largest number of medals from Yad Vashem.10 In the second decade of the 21st
century, the number of initiatives, exhibitions, educational programs and workshops
related to the commemoration of the Righteous Among the Nations in Poland is con-
stantly on the rise. At the same time, Poland has repeatedly protested against the use of
the historically inaccurate term of ‘Polish death camps’ abroad in order to correct falsi-
fied depictions of history and deny wrong accusations.11
With respect to the difficult process of ‘coming to terms with the past’ in Poland
in the last 30 years, it is possible to identify three main ways of reaction: recognition
(i.e. openness to critical facts that questions established narratives), complete negation
(often linked to the reproach of anti-Polonism on the site of right-wing journalists) or
a mixture of both. These three ways of reactions are multi-leveled. Recognizing reac-
tions might occur on a formal, official level, i.e. state authorities, but can lack within
mainstream society. This was the case during the official commemoration ceremony
of the 60th anniversary of the Jedwabne massacre, where the then-president of Poland,
Aleksander Kwaśniewski, recognized and publicly apologized for the mass murder of
the local Jewish community by their Polish neighbors, while the atmosphere amongst
the local population was complete opposite.12
10
As of January 1, 2017, Yad Vashem gives an official number of 6,706 honoured Polish nationals. See:
“Names of Righteius by Country”, Yad Vashem, at <http://www.yadvashem.org/righteous/statistics.
html>, 16 February 2018.
11
According to official information from the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, more than 100 inter
ventions were issued to foreign authorities due to the use of the term ‘Polish death camps’ between
2008 and 2012 alone. See: “Przeciw ‘polskim obozom’ – Interwencje”, Archiwum MSZ, at <https://
archive.is/20120804162507/www.msz.gov.pl/Interwencje,6509.html>, 24 March 2017. Although
the topic was frequently addressed in the Polish media, it became subject to an international debate
after the speech of the Israeli ambassador to Poland, Anna Azari, who criticized the planned amend-
ment to the Act on the Institute of National Remembrance on the occasion of the 73rd anniversa-
ry of the liberation of KL Auschwitz-Birkenau on 27 January 2018. She expressed concern that the
amended version of the act would punish journalists or even Holocaust survivors sharing stories about
individual Polish collaborators. The new wording of the act prohibits ascribing Nazi crimes to the Po-
lish nation or the Polish state and thus it also penalizes the use of the term ‘Polish death camps’. The
amended version of the act came into force on 1 March 2018 but expert panels consisting of specialists
from Israel and Poland are planned for the coming months. In late January and early February 2018,
the topic was widely discussed in Poland and abroad, with Polish authorities frequently citing the high
number of Polish Righteous as an argument to demonstrate the allegedly common positive attitude of
Polish society towards Jews under the German occupation.
12
For a full transcript of the speech of President Kwaśniewski, please see: President Kwasniewski’s Speech
at the Jedwabne Ceremony, 10 July 2001, at <http://www.radzilow.com/jedwabne-ceremony.htm>,
29 September 2016. Reactions can be found in the book: A. Polonsky, J.A. Michlic, The Neighbors
Respond…
In this article, I propose to base these three approaches on the concept of different
uses of history introduced by Klas-Göran Karlsson, who stresses that history is made use
of, when aspects of a historical culture are activated in a communicative process in order for
certain groups in a certain society to satisfy certain needs or look after certain interests.13
Using history for contemporary aims can, according to Karlsson, takes different forms
depending on the respective aims. Among them are the moral, political-pedagogical
and ideological use.
The moral use of history corresponds with the commemoration function of Righ-
teous narratives in Poland. It is based on the conviction that the heroic deeds of Polish
Righteous are too little present in Polish society and abroad and attempts to restore
this memory. According to Karlsson, the moral approach also functions as a counter-
reaction14 to denying or trivializing efforts from some parts of society. Commemoration
therefore is not only perceived as a value per se, but also as a means to restore the ‘ob-
jective historical truth’ and to adjust the image of Poland in the eyes of the world. Al-
ternatively, the approach can be widened to contemporary education of young people
or entire societies about tolerance, human rights and anti-discrimination based on the
heroic deeds of the Polish Righteous during World War II.15 This concept corresponds
with the political-pedagogical use of history proposed by Karlsson, which uses the past
as an aid in attacking what are felt to be severe and concrete political and social prob-
lems in a later era.16 In this regard, the concept is narrow, as it is restricted to connect
historical events and current politics. Similarities between past events and the present
situation are identified and mapped in order to make a certain point. Education – no
matter if the focus is put on children and youth or on society in general – is used to
connect the past with the present and future.17 World War II and the moral dilemmas
of individuals confronted with the persecution and mass murder of their Jewish neigh-
bors as well the threat of losing their own lives are used as a kind of canvas against the
backdrop of which one can tackle actual issues, like discrimination against ethnic or
sexual minorities or genocides in other parts of the world after 1945. This universal ap-
proach includes a wider perspective and is in line with views that see Europeanization
as an attempt to define a common set of values, including democracy, human rights
and tolerance.18 The third approach is the justification narrative, which uses history
13
K.-G. Karlsson, “The Holocaust as a Problem…”, p. 38.
14
Ibid., p. 40.
15
For an account on the role of the Righteous in Polish collective memory, see: K. Suszkiewicz, “The
Rise of the Righteous Among the Nations as a New Model for the Polish Hero”, in K. Kowalski,
B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization…, pp. 213-240.
16
17
See i.e.: the Toolkit on the Holocaust and Human Rights Education in the EU, at <http://fra.europa.
eu/fraWebsite/toolkit-holocaust-education/index.htm>, 28 March 2017, where the initiators (the
Fundamental Rights Agency – FRA and Yad Vashem) emphasize the correlation between preservation
of memory and the shaping of a better future.
18
Ł. Piekarska-Duraj, “Democratization as an Aspect of Heritage Europeanization. The Museum Trian-
gle”, in K. Kowalski, B. Törnquist-Plewa (eds.), The Europeanization…, p. 41. For a detailed account
for ideological aims (Karlsson) and tries to create an alternative world-view. Although
ideological elements can always influence, or be part of, any approach, the distinction
of a specific ideological use of history is useful in this regard. Attempts to whitewash
one’s own history, negate its dark sides or hide the inglorious aspects of their own past
are a frequently used method for creating common narratives and identities. Thus, by
concentrating on the heroic deeds of individuals, narrators attempt to cover negative
aspects of Polish-Jewish relations during the Holocaust with the heroism of the Right
eous. History is therefore employed in order to build legitimacy, dictated by a desire to
convince, influence, rationalize and authorize with the aid of […] history.19
As the inner-Polish debate on Polish-Jewish relations during World War II and the
role of Polish gentiles during the occupation has shown,20 justification is one of the pos-
sible reactions to the unveiling of what is perceived as dark spots in the own national
history. The most famous example was the country-wide emotional debate about the
Jedwabne massacre in 2001.21 Also during earlier controversies about the planned es-
tablishment of a Catholic monastery in one of the historical buildings next to the site
of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (1989-1990)22 and the papal cross next to
the Auschwitz museum site (1998),23 the range of reactions on the Polish side included
charges of anti-Polonism and historical denial. Both denying any negative aspects of
history and solely focusing on positive figures and events (i.e. Jan Karski, the Righ-
teous) would be a symptom of justification as a strategy to handle the past and form
a collective memory in the future.
A discourse within society is then to be considered as democratic if it includes con-
tradicting narratives which are debated on different levels by different actors. There-
fore, the main landmark issue is if and how the three narratives of commemoration,
education and justification function and interact in Polish society and public debate
and which actors are actually involved. For this purpose, the following questions will be
asked: In which contexts and environments did and does a discourse about the Righ-
teous appear in Poland? Is there a visible tendency of ‘using’ this discourse to defend
a certain world-view of ‘good Poles’ or ‘bad Poles’? Is it possible to identify cases, where
the heroic deeds of the Righteous are used as a sort of refuge, in order to avoid serious
historical debates about the attitude of Polish society during the war? Which one of the
three groups of narratives (commemoration, education, justification) dominated the
discourse? Does the respective initiative go further than just presenting the personal
on the problem of heritage democratization, see: K. Kowalski, O istocie dziedzictwa europejskiego – roz-
ważania, Kraków 2013.
19
20
For more information, see: J.T. Gross, Neighbours…, and idem, Fear. Anti-Semitism in Poland after Au-
schwitz. An Essay in Historical Interpretation, Princeton 2006.
21
For more details about the debate, see: A. Polonsky, J.A. Michlic, The Neighbors Respond…; M.J. Cho-
dakiewicz, The Massacre in Jedwabne, July 10, 1941. Before, During, After, New York 2005.
22
See: W.T. Bartoszewski, The Convent at Auschwitz, New York 1990.
23
See: G. Zubrzycki, The Crosses of Auschwitz. Nationalism and Religion in Post-communist Poland, Chi-
cago–London 2006.
fates of one or many Righteous and does it include more than a regional/local context
(typical for the commemoration function), by touching upon more general, contempo-
rary questions (educational function)?
For the sake of this analysis, the term ‘discourse’ shall be understood as a compila-
tion of both press and media publications and initiatives, exhibitions and workshops.
The aim of this broad definition is to include a large spectrum of contemporary discus-
sions and activities concerning the commemoration of Polish Righteous Among the
Nations in the public sphere.
The term ‘Righteous’ itself has been used with different meanings by different
memory agents in the last couple of decades. Subsequently, probably the best known
definition of Yad Vashem is only one of many ways of capturing the term. Until re-
cently, the term ‘Righteous’ was even exclusively linked to Yad Vashem and the medal
in honor of gentiles rescuing Jews during World War II. Since 1963, the Yad Vashem
Institute honors non-Jews who (1) were actively involved in saving one or several Jews
from death during the Holocaust, (2) risked their life, liberty or position by doing so
and (3) provided aid which was unbiased/unpaid.24 Moreover, the medal was awarded
exclusively based on the request of the saved person, supported by appropriate testi-
monies and documentation. In this sense, the term ‘Righteous’ is formally defined and
strictly linked to the decision process of the Yad Vashem Institute.
In contrast, the Polish Institute of National Remembrance (INR) has developed
a broader concept of so-called ‘rescuers’. The INR historians focus on all examples of
support and aid and therefore not solely on cases where the gentile party was awarded
the official medal “Righteous Among the Nations” of Yad Vashem. The Institute deals
also with cases of documented help and rescue, where the rescuing action ended with
the death of both/either rescued and/or rescuers. In the last 15 years, INR has carried
out a series of extensive research projects concerning Polish-Jewish relations, followed
by a number of significant publications.25 Yet another, much broader definition was ad-
opted by the European Parliament on the occasion of the introduction of a European
Day of Remembrance for the Righteous.26 This initiative wants to honor all people who
saved lives during all genocides and mass murders […] perpetrated in the 20th and 21st
century.27 It therefore includes, among others, rescuers during the genocides in Rwanda
24
“About the Righteous”, Yad Vashem, at <http://www.yadvashem.org/righteous/about-the-righteous.
html>, 16 February 2018.
25
The first project (2001-2006) concerning this topic ended with the two publications by P. Machce-
wicz, K. Persak (eds.), Wokół Jedwabnego, vol. 1: Studia, vol. 2: Dokumenty, Warszawa 2002, and the
book by A. Żbikowski (ed.), Polacy i Żydzi pod okupacją niemiecką 1939-1945. Studia i materiały,
Warszawa 2006. Since 2007, the INR is publishing a series called “Kto Ratuje Jedno Życie…” about the
aid provided to Jews by Polish society.
26
For more details about World War II related EU and international remembrance days, please see:
E. Büttner, K. Suszkiewicz, “Remembrance Days in European Union – between Oblivion, National
Manifestations and an European Narrative?”, Studia Żydowskie. Almanach, vol. 6 (2017), pp. 141-159.
27
Declaration of the European Parliament of 10 May 2012 on support for the establishment of a Euro-
pean Day of Remembrance for the Righteous, at <http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.
do?pubRef=-//EP//TEXT+TA+P7-TA-2012-0205+0+DOC+XML+V0//EN>, 17 January 2015.
and Cambodia. According to the official declaration of the European Parliament of

10 May 2012 on support for the establishment of a European Day of Remembrance for
the Righteous, apart from honoring the Righteous, the education of the young genera-
tion is one of the major aims of the initiative.28 In this respect, the focus of the Euro-
pean Day of the Righteous is placed more on general human values and attitudes than
on a specific case, date or group of victims/aid providers and aims at education of future
generations.
PLANNED MONUMENT IN HONOR OF THE POLISH

RIGHTEOUS IN WARSAW
The discussion about the erection of a monument initially entitled “For the Righteous
Poles who rescued Jews” is still underway and subject to constant debates. Already the
title “From Those You Saved” itself could be seen as problematic, as Polish journalist
Beata Chomątowska noted: Despite the existing testimonies, the title could suggest that
this [aid-providing – E.W.] was the prevailing attitude in society.29 The question, which
attitude prevailed in Polish society towards the persecution of Jews by Nazi Germany,
has been debated for many years in Poland with more and more critical evidence com-
ing to public attention. Major controversies however evolved around the location of
the monument. The Warsaw City Council opted in an official decision for Grzybowski
Square in the area of the former Warsaw ghetto and Jewish quarter. The initial idea of
a group of activists around Zygmunt Rolat30 in contrast foresees the square in front of
the new POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, also in the heart of the former
ghetto. This idea was perceived very critically. Scholars and publicists claimed that the
support of the Righteous did not take place on the territory of the Warsaw ghetto.31
According to the critics, the combination of the well-known Monument to the Ghetto
28
Quote from the Declaration (link above): Whereas the remembrance of good is essential to the process of
European integration because it teaches younger generations that everyone can always choose to help other
human beings and defend human dignity, and that public institutions have a duty to highlight the exam-
ple set by people who managed to protect those persecuted out of hate.
29
B. Chomątowska, “O warszawskie pomniki idziemy w bój”, Tygodnik Powszechny, no. 10 (2015), p. 20.
30
According to Konstanty Gebert, the initial idea for a monument in honor of the Righteous came from
the Association of Children of the Holocaust in Poland and the Polish Association of the Righteous
Among the Nations, who contacted the Polish-Jewish American businessman and philanthropist Zyg-
munt Rolat. Later on, Rolat invited a number of other personalities to engage into the founding pro-
cess of the monument, among them the former Polish politician Daniel Rotfeld and Gebert himself.
From the very beginning, the square in front of the POLIN Museum was meant to be the potential site
for the monument. See: interview with Konstanty Gebert, member of the Remembrance and Future
Foundation, which engages in the project since the very beginning, conducted on 28 June 2016.
31
This argument was brought up among others by Henryk Grynberg, as Konstanty Gebert relates. See:
interview with Konstanty Gebert.
Heroes32 and a separate, new memorial installation for the Polish Righteous would not
only lead to an overload of memory messages in one single place, but might also evoke
the impression of one story being deliberately pushed into the foreground at the cost
of another.33
In 2015, Zygmunt Rolat as part of the foundation Remembrance and Future34 final-
ly organized an international tender for a monument entitled “From Those You Saved”.
The winner was the project “Forest” by Austrian architects Eduard Freudmann and
Gabu Heindl, which included a tree nursery to be installed in the square in front of
the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, with the trees to be transferred to
villages with former Jewish communities all over Poland after a period of 18 months.
However, the project was rejected by Rolat himself, who did not accept it as a perma-
nent monument and was concerned about budget issues.35 In the summer of 2016, the
foundation asked the renowned Israeli sculptor Dani Karavan, the author of the Holo-
caust Memorial in Berlin, to develop a new project, which is expected to be ready in the
coming months and will then need to undergo a series of approvals by local public au-
thorities.36 Although the debate is currently sidetracked, it will be supposedly re-evolve
after the official presentation of the new project by Karavan and its possible realization.
The still on-going debate about the monument in honor of the Righteous in War-
saw can be seen as an example for what Karlsson called the moral use of history – com-
memoration is used as a way to ‘unveil’, so far perceived as underrepresented and less-
known, aspects of the past to the national and international public in order to present
a subjectively ‘true’ picture of Polish-Jewish relations. In general, the subject of com-
memoration is often deliberately chosen by the actors involved in the construction of
collective memory. One form to create collective memory are monuments that have
existed and functioned as preservers of the past since antiquity. As Peter Carrer writes,
their function is the cohesion of social groups via the cultivation of collective memories.37
Although Carrer argues that in times of digital advertisements and billboards, tradi-
tional monuments are intrinsically invisible to society due to their familiarity, lack of
32
The Ghetto Heroes Monument (Pl. Pomnik Bohaterów Getta) was erected in 1948 and commemo-
rates the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943. Numerous public ceremonies have been held in the square
in front of the monument since then, with the visit of the then chancellor of the Federal Republic of
Germany Willy Brandt in 1971 as the most well known example.
33
See: interview with Konstanty Gebert. Gebert gives a longer relation on the course of the discussion
about the localization and authorship of the future monument, in which he also mentions the major
arguments brought up for and against the localization next to the POLIN Museum of the History of
Polish Jews.
34
See English website of the foundation and the planned monument: “From Those – You Saved”, Re-
membrance and Future Foundation, at <http://www.raff.org.pl/en>, 19 April 2017.
35
“Muranów. Dani Karavan tworzy dla Warszawy pomnik Polaków ratujących Żydów”, Gazeta Wybor-
cza. Warszawa, 3 July 2016, at <http://warszawa.wyborcza.pl/warszawa/1,34862,20339462,muran
ow-dani-karavan-tworzy-dla-warszawy-pomnik-polakow-ratujacych.html>, 13 July 2016.
36
Ibid.
37
P. Carrer, Holocaust Monuments and National Memory. France and Germany since 1989, New York–
–Oxford 2005, p. 16.
aesthetic values and their outdated visual character,38 the meaning of the Warsaw mon-
ument in honor of the Righteous is significant – despite the fact that the monument
itself does not exist yet, it has been subject to a debate that unveiled the intentions and
concerns of the different actors involved. The discussion about the monument for the
Righteous should therefore be conceived in at least two wider perspectives: the social
and political discourse, which always and everywhere accompanies the process of erect-
ing public monuments on the one hand, and the specific sensitive discourse of Polish-
Jewish relations during World War II and nowadays on the other hand. The main sup-
porters of the monument, as Konstanty Gebert emphasizes, belong to a foundation of
a Jewish business man (Rolat) and also the support committee is Polish-Israeli-Amer-
ican – the monument itself is supposed to be an expression of gratitude to the Pol-
ish heroes.39
The question of whether to build a monument at all is not subject to major contro-
versy in Poland, as it would unquestionably be part of a positive narrative about Polish
war history and therefore be congruent with the wider historical policy of the Polish
government.40 As a logical consequence, the danger emerges and is perceived by part of
the discussants, that the deeds of the Righteous might be identified with the attitude
of entire Polish society during the war. The ‘use’ of the monument, its localization and
final message should therefore be the subject of further investigation after its final con-
struction and unveiling.
In terms of the pedagogical use of history (education), the potential of a monument
per se is less variable than of an exhibition. Nevertheless, the POLIN Museum of the
History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, which functions next to the planned localization of
the monument, has initiated a number of events and a short exhibition on the history
of the Polish Righteous.41 In combination with the museum, the monument can there-
fore play a significant role in tackling what are felt to be severe and concrete political and
social problems42 in the present – namely, for example, the perceived need for a positive,
38
Ibid.
39
Interview with Konstanty Gebert. Gebert goes on: I would be very glad if the Polish State did more in
this question [i.e. commemorating Polish Righteous – E.W.], but this does not relieve us [the Jewish
community – E.W.] from the obligation to show gratefulness!
40
An example for this policy is the launch of a campaign to commemorate the so-called ‘Cursed Sol-
diers’, i.e. anti-communist resistance fighters at the end of World War II and in its aftermath. During
the inauguration of the works on a Strategy for Polish Historical Policy in November 2015, President
Andrzej Duda emphasized that the development of a historical policy based on civic and patriotic
values is one of the most important tasks for the president. See: “‘Polityka historyczna służy budowaniu
potencjału państwa’”, Prezydent RP, 17 November 2015, at <http://www.prezydent.pl/aktualnosci/
wydarzenia/art,67,musimy-ksztaltowac-postawy-obywatelskie-i-patriotyczne.html>, 27 March 2017.
41
One example is the exhibition They Risked Their Lives – Poles Who Saved Jews During the Holocaust,
which was presented in the museum in March-April 2014. For details, see: They Risked Their Lives –
Poles Who Saved Jews During the Holocaust Exhibition, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish
Jews, at <http://www.polin.pl/en/event/they-risked-their-lives-poles-who-saved-jews-during-the>,
29 September 2016.
42
patriotic politics of memory in Poland, as the president, Andrzej Duda, emphasized in

an official speech on the occasion of a joint meeting about the strategy for a national
politics of memory in 2015: Politics of memory generally aim at building the potential of
a state, not only society as such, but precisely state potential […].43 If the need to create state
legitimacy will be the leading motive for creating memory initiatives, history is used for
ideological aims. The memory of the Polish Righteous would then be in danger of be-
ing abused to cover cases of blackmailing, massacres or indifference, which indisputably
also were part of war history in Poland.44
THE ULMA FAMILY MUSEUM OF POLES SAVING JEWS

IN WORLD WAR II
In contrast to the international involvement in the monument debate in Warsaw, the

Ulma Family Museum in Honor of Poles Rescuing Jews in Markowa (opened in March
2016) is an example of a Polish local commemoration initiative. The museum honors
Poles from the Podkarpacie region, who provided aid to Jews during World War II. The
village of Markowa once was home to the Ulmas, a poor Polish peasant family with six
children. The entire family was killed by German police forces, assisted by several Pol-
ish Navy-Blue police men, together with a group of 8 Jews who were sheltered by the
Ulmas in their house.45
The initiative to build a museum dedicated to Poles who provided aid and rescued
Jews was brought up by members of the local municipal council and the marshal of the
Podkarpackie voivodship.46 This local government institution now finances the mu-
seum together with a subsidy of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. The
museum contains six main sections covering different aspects of the war, the fate of the
Ulma family and post-war commemoration: (1) the life of Poles and Jews before the
outbreak of the war, (2) reality under the German occupation, (3) the support of perse-
cuted Jews by local Poles, (4) the case of the Ulma family, (5) the trial of the perpetrator
Josef Kohort and (6) aspects of commemoration since 1945.
43
See: Speech of President Andrzej Duda on the occasion of the joint meeting of the National Develop-
ment Council on “Politics of Memory: Contexts, Ideas, Realizations”, which took place on 17 Novem-
ber 2015 in Warsaw. Full text in Polish retrievable under: Zapis spotkania dot. Strategii Polskiej Polityki
Historycznej, p. 5, Prezydent RP, at <http://www.prezydent.pl/kancelaria/dzialalnosc-kancelarii/art,-
18,zapis-spotkania-dot-strategii-polskiej-polityki-historycznej.html>, 25 April 2017.
44
See: B. Engelking, Jest taki piękny słoneczny dzień… Losy Żydów szukających ratunku na wsi polskiej
1942-1945, Warszawa 2011; J. Grabowski, Hunt for the Jews. Betrayal and Murder in German-Occu-
pied Poland, Bloomington 2013.
45
For more information on the Museum and the Ulma family, see the official museum website:
“The Ulma Family”, the Ulma Family Museum of Poles Savings Jews in World War II, at <http://
muzeumulmow.pl/en/museum/history-of-the-ulma-family/>, 18 July 2016.
46
Interview with Bożena Knotz-Beda, employee of the Castle Museum in Łańcut and coordinator of the
Markowa museum project, 10 April 2015.
According to the concept, the museum mainly concentrates on the local context
of the tragedy of the Ulma family, which the visitor experiences via video clips, maps,
photographs, holograms and the modern architecture of the museum site. The Ulma
Family Museum is mainly based on data gathered by the Polish Institute of National
Remembrance. Subsequently, the discourse therefore emerged on the local level, the
museum is funded by local means of the voivodship and the Polish Ministry of Culture
and National Heritage47 without EU or other international institutions or foundations
involved. Although a broader historical and political context is shown in the introduc-
tion part of the exhibition, the narrative focuses strictly on rescuers and the support
provided in the Podkarpackie region. Here, the earlier discussed concept of ‘rescuers’ is
used, which implies that the number of those honored is much bigger than the number
of holders of the Yad Vashem medal “Righteous Among the Nations”.
An important part of the vision of the Ulma Family Museum is the education of dif-
ferent groups in society. One example is the project “The World of the Righteous – the
Heroic Example of the Ulma Family”,48 which includes two modules with a circle of ten
workshops. The program is addressed to inmates of prisons from the Rzeszów region
and offers the opportunity to discuss issues, such as family, values, respect, empathy
and the identification with victims. In this regard, the program links the past (history
of the Ulma family, the role of the family father Józef Ulma in the local society) with
the present (identification with victimized individuals nowadays, empathy for handi-
capped people) and aims at the transfer of timeless values. According to the project ini-
tiators, by learning about the emotions of the historical protagonists, [participants] get the
chance to develop social skills, a set of values and empathy, as well as to learn the identifica-
tion with victims of undeserved aggression and violence. They are taught that even if your
own life is in danger, you are always free to take your own decision – to respect the health,
life and values of others.49 History is here used as a means to educate society and form
attitudes towards recent, contemporary problems.
Due to the limited size of the museum and the so-far restricted financial means, the
subject of the exhibition focusses on aid-providing and the phenomenon of denuncia-
tions is not explicitly problematized. However, the exhibition does not lack references
to this problem – the contemporary witnesses shown in the available video materials ex-
plicitly mention incidents of hostility towards persecuted Jews in their neighborhoods.
Although the focus of the exhibition is regional, the initiators declare an openness to
47
The entire project amounted to almost €9 million, according to the museum director, Mateusz
Szpytma, while the Ministry of Culture contributed €1 million. See interview with Mateusz Szpyt-
ma: M. Szpytma, K. Przewrocka-Aderet, “Zmiana krajobrazu pamięci”, Tygodnik Powszechny, no. 14
(2016), at <https://www.tygodnikpowszechny.pl/zmiana-krajobrazu-pamieci-32994>, 25 April 2017.
48
Project description in Polish language on the homepage of the Ulma Family Museum, see: “Inaugura-
cja programu ‘Świat Sprawiedliwych – bohaterski przykład rodziny Ulmów’”, Muzeum Polaków Ra-
tujących Żydów podczas II Wojny Światowej im. Rodziny Ulmów w Markowej, 5 September 2016, at
<http://muzeumulmow.pl/pl/wydarzenia/inauguracja-programu-swiat-sprawiedliwych-bohaterski-
przyklad-rodziny-ulmow/>, 28 March 2017.
49
Ibid.
cooperate on broader basis with institutions from Poland and abroad; furthermore,
a dedicated cinema room within the museum is supposed to hold travelling exhibitions
from other institutions50 and leaves the possibility to tackle different aspects of the war.
THE COMMEMORATION OF JAN KARSKI IN ŁÓDŹ
The third case study includes commemoration initiatives on the occasion of the Jan
Karski Year (2014) in Karski’s home city Łódź. Jan Karski was Polish officer and mem-
ber of the resistance during World War II. Performing his secret duties during the
German occupation, he got to meet many famous personalities including Winston
Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt, to whom, as one of his tasks, he related the an-
nihilation of Polish Jewry. After the war, he emigrated to the United States and was
employed as a professor at Georgetown University. He became known to a broader
public after Claude Lantzmann included parts of an interview with him in the famous
documentary Shoah. Karski was awarded the medal “Righteous Among the Nations” in
1982. Łódź, the city, where he was born and spent his childhood, holds a lot of initia-
tives connected to his legacy and commemoration.
The main institution dealing with the legacy of Jan Karski in Łódź is the Marek
Edelman Dialogue Center, a secular institution of culture founded in 2010 and de-
voted to promoting the multicultural and multiethnic heritage of the city with a spe-
cial focus on Jewish heritage. Its aims are combating racism, anti-Semitism, xenophobia
and disrespect towards people with different origin, culture and world views. Further-
more, the institution engages in multicultural education and the commemoration of
the Righteous and the Holocaust victims.51 According to the official information of
the center, about 10,000 secondary school students from the region participated in
educational initiatives about the multicultural past of Łódź, the history of the Łódź
ghetto and famous individuals like Marek Edelman and Jan Karski.52 The offer includes
a workshop about the Righteous and their moral dilemma during the war and an educa-
tional game on the mission of Jan Karski, where the participants study the complicated
Polish-Jewish relations before World War II and learn about the mechanisms behind
the social stigmatization of persecuted groups.53
Another initiative commemorating both survivors of the Łódź ghetto and the
Righteous from the region, is the Survivor’s Park in the historical Jewish district of the
city. The idea of the park, which was opened in 2004 with the planting of hundreds of
50
Interview with Bożena Knotz-Beda.
51
More details on the aims and initiatives of the Center can be found under: “O nas”, Centrum Dialo-
gu im. Marka Edelmana w Łodzi, at <http://www.centrumdialogu.com/o-nas/o-centrum-dialogu>,
24 July 2016.
52
Information from the e-book on the educational offer of the Centre, available under: “Oferta eduka-
cyjna”, Centrum Dialogu im. Marka Edelmana w Łodzi, p. 2, at <http://www.centrumdialogu.com/
ebooks/oferta_edukacyjna>, 24 July 2016.
53
Ibid., pp. 8-11.
trees in honor of the Saved and the Righteous, stemmed from a survivor of the ghetto
and was supported by the then-mayor of the city. After the inauguration of the park,
a monument in honor of Polish gentile rescuers was established within the area. The
monument combines a star of David and a plinth with the Polish eagle and encom-
passes blocks with a thousand plaques for the Polish Righteous and the name of their
home cities. The park dates to 2004, the year of the 60th anniversary of the liquidation
of the Łódź ghetto.
An example for an exhibition concept on the commemoration of the heroism of the
Righteous is the exhibition Karski – Don’t let the world forget. Originally created under
the auspices of the National Centre for Culture, it was presented in the Marek Edelman
Dialogue Center in Łódź between April and December 2014. Currently, it is available
in a multimedia version via the website of the centre.54 The narrative is divided up into
five main plots: biographical information about Jan Karski, including historical facts
and a variety of quotes showing his feelings, opinions and personal interpretations of
facts; matters of universal meaning, i.e. the importance of individual attitudes in the
face of evil; the influence of parents and the environment on the evolution of young
people’s attitudes towards minorities and perceived ‘others’; problem of anti-Semitism
in interwar Poland; and reactions from the outside world to the Holocaust.
The exhibition can be seen as an example of an attempt to link historical facts with
contemporary issues in Europe and the world. The history of the Jews in the Łódź
ghetto and their gentile rescuers is used as a canvas to understand the mechanisms of
marginalization, persecution, blackmailing, help, morality in unmoral times and life
rescuing during the war. With this approach, the discourse unequivocally presents
a universal approach which links education for tolerance and human rights with his-
torical education on the Holocaust and World War II. This approach is an example of
both a moral and political-pedagogical use of history. The exhibition Karski – Don’t let
the world forget is a very clear example of a multi-faceted approach to the commemo-
ration of the Righteous. The narrative does not use the discourse in order to defend
one group and discredit another or ‘whitewash’ black cards of history, as the following
quote from the exhibition catalogue illustrates: Who was Jan Karski and who is he for
us nowadays? A hero? A witness of the biggest crime in human history? Or maybe – a re-
proach for our conscience?55
Moreover, the narrative does not explicitly target a national (Polish) audience, it
is directed to all potential visitors from anywhere in the world. The unspoken ques-
tion ‘have you done enough?’ is therefore not exclusively reserved to contemporaries
of Karski, it rather addresses all humans alive nowadays, wherever they are witnesses
to mass murders, tortures or persecution and do nothing to provide aid and prevent.
Furthermore, the exhibition contains an number of critical questions regarding the pre-
54
Available under: “Wirtualny spacer po wystawie Karski. Nie dać światu zapomnieć”, Centrum Dialo-
gu im. Marka Edelmana w Łodzi, at <http://www.centrumdialogu.com/wydarzenia/1494-wirtualny-
spacer-po-wystawie-qkarski-nie-da-wiatu-zapomnieq>, 29 September 2016.
55
Karski. Nie dać światu zapomnieć, Exhibition catalogue, Łódź 2014, p. XX.
dominating imagination of history: What happened to the Jews, aroused different feelings
within Polish society and provoked different reactions. Some people were petrified by the
cruelty of the Germans towards their Jewish fellow citizens, others uttered their satisfaction
that ‘Hitler finally cleaned up with the Jews’, many others just remained passive.56 This
quote demonstrates the critical and anything but one-sided approach of the concept.
It both emphasizes the proportions between helpers, bystanders and blackmailers and
mentions the imminent death penalty for helping Jews. At the end of the exhibition,
there is another quote of Jan Karski, which provides a summary and addresses once
more the universal meaning of the Holocaust for the contemporary world: The second
primeval sin was committed by man as a consequence of self-imposed ignorance, insensiv-
ity, selfishness, hypocrisy or soulless rationalization. This sin will persecute humankind un-
til the end of the world. It persecutes me personally. And I want it to do so.57 This quote
morally obliges the visitors of the exhibition to examine their own conscience and to
understand the importance of remembering, regretting, commemorating and teaching
about the Holocaust in the future. Furthermore, it emphasizes the universal message of
the exhibition and links the past with the present and future, in line with contemporary
trends of human rights education.58
CONCLUSION
As the analysis of the chosen case studies has shown, the emphasis and focus of a com-
memoration initiative always depends on the intentions and worldviews of the actors
involved. In the case of the planned Warsaw monument in honor of the Polish Right
eous, the commemoration narrative seems to prevail, although the justification aspect
also emerged in the course of the public debate on the location of the memorial. Among
other reproaches, accusations emerged that the monument could possibly be used as an
alibi for some observers to claim that no negative sides of Polish-Jewish relations dur-
ing the war ever existed.59 The concerns also pertain to the fact that the planned monu-
ment is to be entirely financed by private donations from Jewish communities in Israel
and abroad.60 Presumably, this could open the way for speculations that the monument
proves the ‘truth’ of Polish heroism as the one and only reaction to the Holocaust and
56
Ibid., p. 57.
57
Ibid., p. 147.
58
See i.e.: the DARE network (Democracy and Human Rights Education in Europe) with 48 member
organizations from 26 countries in Europe, at <http://www.dare-network.eu>, 29 September 2016,
and the online Toolkit on Holocaust and Human Rights Education in the EU, at <http://fra.europa.
eu/fraWebsite/toolkit-holocaust-education/index.htm>, 29 September 2016.
59
Gebert refers to a comment by Polish historian Jan Grabowski, who expressed his doubts about the
monument during the debate. According to Gebert, some of the critics are likely to use the monument
and the fact that it is a Jewish initiative to claim that Polish-Jewish relations during the occupation pe-
riod were positive and all Poles heroes. See: interview with Konstanty Gebert.
60
For more information, see: “From Those – You Saved”…
that after years of critical debates and resentments also ‘the Jews’ had to acknowledge
this historical fact.
The second case study, the Ulma Family Museum, as a smaller local Polish initiative
concentrates both on commemoration and education. Despite limited financial means,
due to the educational projects and visits of important personalities at the museum, the
institution aims at informing society about the heroism of local gentile aid providers,
the danger for their own lives and the contemporary meaning and value of their moral
dilemma during the war. In the course of the analysis of the main museum exhibition,
critical voices of the witnesses and Righteous of the portrayed time have been found.
This of course does not imply that an ideological use of history would be impossible, as
the prevailing positive undertone of the exhibition contents can at any point be ‘used’
by observers to justify their own worldviews and convictions. However, the exhibition
itself does not show signs of the ideological use of history.
The most unequivocal example for an open approach to history is represented by
the exhibition Karski – Don’t let the world forget in the Marek Edelman Dialogue Cen-
ter in Łódź (2014). With its critical questions, the discussion of moral dilemmas and
the stressed universality and timelessness of Karski’s moral legacy for contemporaries, it
can be seen as an ideal example for the Europeanization of heritage. Karski and his life
and legacy are not only proudly presented to the world, but function also as a canvas
for a universal message and to link the (not only Polish) past with the future. This way,
history is employed both for education and commemoration purposes without limit-
ing the message down to the sheer transfer of historical facts.
An important role in the overall-assessment is played by the actors involved in the
chosen commemoration initiatives. While the Warsaw monument is being planned by
a Jewish foundation and paid for by Jewish donations from abroad, the Ulma Family
Museum is a local Polish project with public funding and the Marek Edelman Dialogue
Center in Łódź is an independent public, secular institution of culture. As the analysis
has shown, not only the character of the initiating institutions has an influence on the
contents presented to the public – if present, public debates and discourses can also
be important landmarks for the assessment of trends and developments in collective
memory formation.
Another difference between the discussed cases relates to the assumed definition
of Righteous. The planned Warsaw monument strictly concerns the Polish Righteous
Among the Nations honored by the Yad Vashem Institute, the Ulma Family Museum
works with the definition of ‘rescuers’ and the Karski exhibition in Łódź focuses on
contemporary attitudes towards minorities and ‘others’ in a wider sense. This way, it
comes closest to the ideal of the European Day of the Righteous, which tends to be
most inclusive and link past, present and future.
Finally, is the discourse in the presented cases used as a ‘justification’, ‘excuse’ or at-
tempt to hide other aspects of history? Generally speaking, Poland has gone a long way
towards confronting painful questions. Especially in the Łódź initiatives, the issue of
individual approaches and anti-Semitism of part of society is discussed (see above). The
exhibition in the Ulma Family Museum also contains hints about the various types of
reaction in Polish society and those who refused to aid or even denounced persecuted
Jews. As discussed above, during the course of the debate about a monument in honor
of the Righteous in Warsaw, voices emerged that reproached the initiative for counter-
ing Holocaust commemoration with the narration of the Righteous.
The aim of the article was to confront the chosen case studies with three tendencies
(commemoration, education and justification). As the analysis has shown, all three nar-
ratives emerged in the discourse. Especially where the material commemoration of the
Righteous in the public sphere is concerned (i.e. the Warsaw monument), the reproach
of a misuse of the heroism of the Righteous to cover up the dark sides of Polish-Jewish
history comes up. Linking universal values, human rights and contemporary conflicts
with historical education is, as the Jan Karski exhibition in Łódź demonstrates, a way to
avoid a nationally focused and one-sided narrative.
Due to the specific situation of Polish society under German occupation as forced
witnesses to the mass murder of millions of Jews in camps, ghettos and the countryside,
the temperature of the public discourse about Polish-Jewish history in the war period is
very high. The late Jan Błoński splendidly formulated what it means to live with an im-
perative of reflection and commemoration in 1987: Our country is not a hotel in which
one launders the linen after the guests have departed. It is a home which is built above
all of memory; memory is at the core of our identity. We cannot dispose of it at will, even
though as individuals we are not directly responsible for the actions of the past. We must
carry it within us even though it is unpleasant or painful. We must also strive to expiate it.61
This legacy can and will be used in different ways, depending on actual political trends
and the nature of the actors involved. Currently, a national-oriented approach seems to
prevail in the Polish state administration, as the following quote of President Andrzej
Duda shows: I have no doubts: Europe is and will be an Europe of national states.62 As the
discussed cases have shown, the exact direction of future commemoration initiatives –
not only with regards to the Holocaust and World War II – will however also depend
on NGOs as well as public and private actors from abroad.
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Interviews with
Konstanty Gebert, member of the Remembrance and Future Foundation, Warsaw, 28 June
2016.
Bożena Knotz-Beda, employee of the Castle Museum in Łańcut and coordinator of the Mar-
kowa museum project, 10 April 2015.
Elisabeth WASSERMANN holds an MA degree in European Studies from the Fac-

ulty of International and Political Studies at the Jagiellonian University (2010). Cur-
rently, she is a PhD candidate at the same faculty (Holocaust studies track). Her disser-
tation deals with German prisoners at the Auschwitz concentration camp. Her research
interests include: anti-Semitism, the history of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration
camp, Polish-Jewish and Polish-German relations and collective memory. She works
as a translator, volunteer at the Galicia Jewish Museum in Kraków and was a trainee at
the Polish-German Youth Organisation in Warsaw (2009) and the International Youth
Meeting Center in Oświęcim, where she developed two historical workshops for youth
groups (2011). Furthermore, she cooperates with the Center for Holocaust Studies at
the Jagiellonian University.
Katarzyna SUSZKIEWICZ
suszkiewicz.katarzyna@gmail.com
MUSEUMS IN SITU AS PLACES

OF RECONCILIATION
YOUTH MEETINGS AND EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES
AT FORMER CONCENTRATION AND DEATH CAMPS
ABSTRACT Museums at former concentration and death camps pose great challenges for
their curators. The Holocaust – as a symbol of the collapse of European val-
ues – is interpreted differently by certain nations and states. These approaches
are connected both with the past and with current historical policy, as well as
with collective memory. This article focuses on the moment of the physical en-
counter between different national groups during educational activities at mu-
seums in situ such as the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, the State Museum
at Majdanek, and the Museum of Struggle and Martyrdom in Treblinka. Such
meetings may (or should) be an opportunity to learn about and understand
(sometimes very) different national perspectives. Participation in educational
projects may also become a catalyst to understand and promote reconciliation
with the Other. The analysis is based on the philosophy of dialogue of Martin
Buber, Emmanuel Levinas and Józef Tischner.
Key words: Holocaust, education, philosophy of dialogue, youth international

encounters, reconciliation
The International Council of Museums (ICOM), during its the 22nd General Assembly
in Vienna on 24 August 2007, adopted the definition of a museum as a non-profit, per-
manent institution in the service of society and its development, open to the public, which
acquires, conserves, researches, communicates and exhibits the tangible and intangible
heritage of humanity and its environment for the purposes of education, study and enjoy-
146 Katarzyna Suszkiewicz POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
ment.1 Such an approach presents museums as places which have various functions, as
they promote different types of education and entertainment and seek to serve society.
One type of museum includes institutions located at the sites of former Nazi German
concentration and death camps. In her work on history in museums2 Anna Ziębińska-
Witek, a historian and researcher from the Marie Curie University in Lublin, enumer-
ated the former Nazi German concentration camps as primary examples of Holocaust
exhibitions. She emphasized that on those exact sites of genocide, the first Holocaust
museums were created.3 The Holocaust, as a symbol of the collapse of basic Europe-
an values including human dignity, human rights, and the value of life itself, has been
deeply problematic for individuals and societies. Among those deeply troubled by the
Holocaust, to say the least, have been museums and their curators, because of the many
interpretations and perspectives the Holocaust seems to invite. This was especially true
as the Holocaust systematically became the subject of historical policies, and their (ab)
usage, in many countries.
The aim of this article is to investigate the possibilities of understanding and rec-
onciliation between two or more national youth groups during educational programs
taking place in museums located in situ, where genocide actually occurred. This work
attempts to answer the following questions: what are the educational offers at the mu-
seums, who participates in such programs, and do those initiatives strengthen feelings
of tolerance and European unity? Are former Nazi German concentration and death
camps considered by young Europeans to be European heritage? And if so, what value
do these sites have for them? Does visiting authentic historical sites bring young Euro-
peans closer to an understanding of representatives of other nations, and does it help in
combating prejudice?
This analysis was based on the sources provided by the museum institutions them-
selves: encounter programs, summaries, yearly reports, and statistical data, as well as
on reflections provided by participants of the programs. The materials were provided
by museums either upon request or were taken from their official websites. Usually,
programs were presented in the form of short notes with very basic data, i.e. about its
character, the target group, time and place and the results of the encounter. Sometimes,
however, the notes were very comprehensive and included evaluations from the par-
ticipants, their opinions and reflections. Considering that all of the analyzed programs
were already finished, observatory study trips or extended interviews were impossible.
Thus, the most valuable materials are evaluations and reflections of participants. In or-
der to present the encounter in a proper way, a variety of citations was included.
1
Official website of the International Council of Museums, at <http://icom.museum/the-vision/
museum-definition/>, 16 August 2017. See: ICOM Code of Ethics for Museums, at <http://icom.
museum/fileadmin/user_upload/pdf/Codes/ICOM-code-En-web.pdf>, 16 August 2017.
2
A. Ziębińska-Witek, Historia w muzeach. Studium ekspozycji Holokaustu, Lublin 2011.
3
Ibid., p. 135. The State Museum at Majdanek was opened in 1944, and Auschwitz-Birkenau State Mu-
seum in 1947.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 Museums in situ as Places of Reconciliation... 147
DIALOGUE – WHO IS MEETING WHOM
The philosophy of dialogue, based on existentialism and phenomenology, has its be-
ginnings in the 1920s and focuses on contesting Western idealism and searching for
inspiration in religious sources (Bible). Nevertheless, the question of the epistemology
of another human being is at the core of this trend and is much older, dating back to
the time of Descartes.4 The basic rule of dialogue states that an individual exists only
in relation to another individual. The conditions for an encounter, and its meaning,
have been described and analyzed in various ways by representatives of the philosophy
of dialogue.5
Martin Buber is one such representative. Buber was born in 1878, in Vienna, to
a family of Galician Jews, and died in Jerusalem in 1965. Throughout his life he was fas-
cinated by Chasidism and considered it a source of creative religious experience. He was
also fond of the idea, which Chasidic Jews promoted, that everything in life contains
the experience of sanctity. Although he lived in Jerusalem from the time that he was de-
ported from Germany through the rest of his life, he rejected the idea of Zionism, be-
cause of which he was shunned by some Jewish circles. In 1923 he published the book
Ich und Du (translated into English as I and Thou), where he explained his philosophy
of an individual’s existence in depth.6
Martin Buber claimed that reality presents itself to in two different ways, depending
on the attitude which an individual takes towards reality. Those two attitudes are strict-
ly connected with two pairs of word-rules (Pl. słowa-zasady): I-It (which he further de-
scribed as an experience) and I-Thou (which he defined as a relation).7 In an I-It situa-
tion, we treat the other (whether a thing or a person) as an object of our experience, as
when we experience something or somebody. In this case an individual, as a subject, is
the center of the situation and the one on which everything depends.8 The I-It pair is
very much an imbalance.
The second example, I-Thou, is diametrically different. First, it is a relation to some-
body, and not an experience of somebody.9 As Martin Buber wrote, we experience the
things and with people we are creating relations.10 This second pair lays the foundation
for the situation of authentic dialogue. Such an encounter must meet certain condi-
tions: it is direct, and occurs in the presence of others. The fact that a dialogue can
neither be predicted, nor repeated in the same form or shape, shows the fundamental
4
T. Gadacz, Historia filozofii XX wieku. Nurty, vol. 2, Kraków 2009, p. 503.
5
Ibid., p. 507.
6
Ibid., p. 553.
7
M. Buber, Ja i Ty. Wybór pism filozoficznych, transl. by J. Doktór, Warszawa 1992, p. 39. See original
and English versions: idem, Ich und Du, Heidelberg 1983; idem, I and Thou, transl. by R.G. Smith,
New York 2000.
8
Ibid., pp. 40-41.
9
Ibid., p. 43.
10
Ibid. See: T. Gadacz, Historia filozofii..., p. 569.
uniqueness of each dialogue situation. Furthermore, this relation is exclusive, and con-
sists only of two elements, the subjects I and Thou. Buber emphasized that the pre-
condition for this type of meeting is to remove everything which might stand between
two people or two subjects of relation, such as past memory or future projections.11
This is crucial because the core of the relation is a bond, a certain kind of community,
which might be created between I and Thou. In this bond the I and the Thou do not
lose their individual characters in order to create an impersonal We.12 The ideal dia-
logue situation creates this bond, but it is not always created. The I-Thou relationship
is a choice, and one must both choose and be chosen, as it contains active and passive
presence at once. Buber explained that the value of the relation is not in admitting that
another’s right is more important than one’s own, but rather in accepting that another
person is different.
The characteristics of the I-Thou relation were criticized by Emmanuel Levinas,
another Jewish philosopher. Levinas was born in Kaunas, in 1906, and studied biblical
studies first in Lithuania and later in France. Almost his entire family was murdered by
the Nazis during the Holocaust. His philosophy has deep roots in experiences of terror,
sufferings and death caused by totalitarian regimes, but also has a significant religious
dimension.13
Levinas introduced new categories into the philosophy of dialogue such as loneli-
ness, separation, the face of the Other, and responsibility. He claimed that real loneliness
is ontological, and has its roots in the form of existence of an individual who is radically
different from an Other.14 This separation is egoism, as a person may feel good with
oneself, but might also be a refusal of subordination to any types of order or totalities.15
The Other is the one who could extract us from our separation. A person experiences
the Other by seeing his face, which calls us to an ethical challenge.16 The face provides
a person with the possibility to start discourse, and this discourse is itself the authentic
relation.17 Levinas also mentioned responsibility as the primary bond which exists even
before any personal or intimate relation occurs. We are responsible for Others even before
we start a relationship with them.18 Only the individual who is responsible for the Other
could be in relation to him.19 In this discourse, we cease to care for our own self-interest,
11
M. Buber, Ja i Ty..., p. 45.
12
Ibid., p. 47.
13
T. Gadacz, Historia filozofii..., pp. 577, 590.
14
See: E. Levinas, Czas i to co inne, transl. by J. Migasiński, Kraków 1999. In French and English: idem,
Le temps et l’autre, Montpellier 1979; idem, Time and the Other, transl. by R.A. Cohen, Pittsburg
1987.
15
T. Gadacz, Historia filozofii..., p. 592. See: E. Levinas, Całość i nieskończoność. Esej o zewnętrzności,
transl. by M. Kowalska, Warszawa 2014.
16
Ibid., p. 593. See: idem, Etyka i Nieskończony. Rozmowy z Philipp’em Nemo, transl. by B. Opolska-Ko-
koszka, Kraków 1991.
17
Ibid., p. 50.
18
T. Gadacz, Historia filozofii..., p. 594.
19
E. Levinas, Imiona własne, transl. by J. Margański, Warszawa 2000, p. 29.
and we avoid separation.20 In contrast to Buber’s I-Thou, Levinas presented the I-Other
relationship as imbalanced: the Other always has a higher position than the I.21
The third philosopher, Józef Tischner, was a Polish priest born in 1931, in Stary
Sącz, and who studied theology in Kraków before joining the Solidarity movement.22
He was fond of Levinas’ work, and developed his idea that the Good is the founda-
tion of metaphysics.23 He agreed with Buber on the equal status of I and Thou, and
prioritized freedom over Levinas’ idea of responsibility. Tischner understood free-
dom as a way of the existence of the Good,24 and he introduced the categories of values
and drama to the philosophy of dialogue. He claimed that the individual serves values
by fulfilling them, and that values serve the individual by saving them. Values such as
truth, beauty, and good, however, are in constant conflict with each other. The world
is a scene, and the human being takes part in its drama. The individual is the subject of
a meeting, which is an event but is also a voluntary gift.25 For Tischner, each individual
drama as part of a bigger one, which is the relation between a human and God.26
In summary of this rich field of philosophy of dialogue, several points are particular-
ly important for this analysis. First, the situation of encounter is a very particular type
of meeting. The individual cannot treat the Other (Thou) as an object of experience,
but must rather treat the Other as an equal, or even a superior, partner. The result of
an encounter is the bond created between people who take part in such an event. The
crucial element, which must not be forgotten, is responsibility for the Other. In other
words, dialogue in a true encounter requires an individual to focus on the presence and
emotions of other participant(s), and to foster the relationship between himself and
others. It also demands an attempt to understand the Other’s point of view, and the
ability to discuss as well as to express consoling and empathetic gestures.
In practice, situations of dialogue appear when a few circumstances are fulfilled.
Firstly, participants must value the encounter itself as an important and perhaps even
life changing experience for them. Secondly, they should be focused on the other par-
ticipants and, while noticing the difference, they must accept this fact. Furthermore,
they ought to consider the other participants to be equal project partners or be even
more considerate about their emotions and viewpoints than their own. Another factor
to check in order to assess if a dialogue situation occurred would be the aspect of re-
sponsibility. The participants should feel responsible for each other and their common
project performed during the encounter. Such responsibility might either be verbalized
by words or gestures of sympathy and support, by touch, smiles or hugs. The last fac-
20
T. Gadacz, Historia filozofii..., p. 595. See: E. Levinas, Inaczej niż być lub ponad istotą, transl. by
P. Mrówczyński, Warszawa 2000.
21
E. Levinas, Imiona własne, pp. 21-39.
22
W. Bonowicz, Tischner, Warszawa 2003.
23
T. Gadacz, Historia filozofii..., p. 631.
24
Ibid., p. 632.
25
Ibid., p. 636. See: J. Tischner, Filozofia dramatu, Kraków 1998.
26
See: J. Tischner, Spór o istnienie człowieka, Kraków 1998.
tor would be a specific bond between the participants as a result of an encounter. This
might be confirmed by the assurance of keeping the contact in the future, after the en-
counter is finished.
At this point it is worth while recalling the findings of Nina Simon, a museum di-
rector and author of The Participatory Museum,27 which is a practical guide for collabo-
ration between community members and museum visitors in order to create a more dy-
namic and relevant institution. In her work, she describes four models for participation
in a museum: contributory, collaborative, co-creative, and hosted. The main differenc-
es lie in the aim of the project which takes place, the amount of visitor participation
needed, and the amount of power that museum staff and curators are able to surrender.
For example, in the contributory model there is content which the museum requests
and which visitors provide, while in the collaborative model both sides, museum staff
and visitors, work together on the project much closely. In the co-creative model mu-
seum staff and visitors are equal partners in a project, and in the hosted model the mu-
seum only provides the basic guidelines, and the creation and implementation of the
project is almost entirely the visitors’ responsibility.28
Simon emphasizes that none of the models are better than others, and that they
depend on the museums’ decision regarding which might best meet their needs. She
furthermore presents three values which accompany the implementation of the partici-
patory model: the learning value, according to which visitors can develop new skills or
understandings; the social value, according to which visitors develop a greater connec-
tion to the hosting institution, and can gain confidence in the worth of their contribu-
tions; and the work value, according to which participating visitors do concrete work
for the institution.29 These models of participation and values will be useful in further
analysis of the youth encounter case studies.
MUSEUMS AND HERITAGE – WHERE ENCOUNTERS TAKE

PLACE AND WHAT THEY ENTAIL30
The youth encounters which will be analyzed further occur in specific spaces: on
the sites of former Nazi German concentration and death camps. The museums lo-
cated in places of World War II genocide belong to the category of museums in situ.
Ziębińska-Witek stresses that the creation of Holocaust exhibitions in such locations
might be difficult for various reasons and primarily because they present traumatic phe-
27
N. Simon, The Participatory Museum, Santa Cruz 2010.
28
Eadem, at <��
http://www.museumtwo.com/publications/Participatory_Museum_chart.pdf�� >, 16 Au-
gust 2017.
29
Eadem, “Chapter 5: Defining Participation at Your Institution”, in eadem, The Participatory Museum,
at <http://www.participatorymuseum.org/chapter5/>, 16 August 2017.
30
Small parts of this subchapter which deals with the visits in museums in situ were based on the
PhD thesis of the author: K. Suszkiewicz, The Matter of the Holocaust in Political History of Israel
1948-2012, defended at the Jagiellonian University in 2017.
nomena. Visitors confronted with specific and peculiar matter might feel disoriented,
scared, and anxious, and exhibitions can also stir intense emotions of anger, sadness,
and shame.31
For an exhibit curator it is crucial to expose the value of the authentic place, not to
overshadow or dominate it with the collection itself. The inclusion of new elements,
including those needed for the preservation of historical objects, must not be taken
lightly.32 Authenticity is the principal factor which differentiates a youth meeting in
a classroom from a true encounter at a museum in situ, and is the factor which allows
for it to be a unique educational opportunity.
Methodological materials which educators use to help prepare young people for
study visits present three aspects of these programs. The first aspect is to disseminate
appropriate and rich factual content about World War II, the Holocaust, and a particu-
lar memorial site. The second aspect is to evoke an emotional response in students, and
to make them more aware of the problems of modern racism, prejudice, and stereo-
types. The last aspect of the visit is to foster empathy towards victims of the Holocaust
through commemoration, which could take place in the form of a prayer.33
A study visit to a museum in situ presents not just an unusual way of experiencing
history, but also a powerful opportunity to reflect on one’s own attitudes towards oth-
ers and moral choices.34 Thomas Lutz, director of Topography of Terror in Berlin, dis-
cussed it when he stated that an authentic memorial site brings the motivation to confront
history,35 and that a visit in such a museum differs from other educational trips by evok-
ing more questions on one’s own behavior and contemporary social conditions.36
Wiesław Wysok, a vice-director of the State Museum at Majdanek and an expert on
teaching techniques, agreed with this opinion and claimed that today, when students
have easy access to facts and information (e.g. through the internet), it is all the more
important to create an educational situation. More emphasis must be placed on the at-
tempt to change the attitudes of visitors towards other people than on providing them
with factual knowledge.37 To summarize Lutz’s and Wysok’s perspectives, a major shift
is needed away from teaching facts, dates and events, in order to shape the attitudes of
students towards others and to influence behavior in museums in situ by affecting stu-
31
A. Ziębińska-Witek, Historia w muzeach..., p. 159.
32
Ibid., p. 161.
33
R. Szuchta, P. Trojański, Jak uczyć o Holokauście. Poradnik metodyczny do nauczania o Holokauście
w ramach przedmiotów humanistycznych w zreformowanej szkole, Warszawa 2012, p. 55.
34
T. Kranz, Edukacja historyczna w miejscach pamięci. Zarys problematyki, Lublin 2009, p. 11.
35
T. Lutz, “Muzea upamiętniające ofiary nazizmu. Rozważania o rozwoju i aktualnych zagadnieniach
w Polsce i Niemczech”, in T. Kranz (ed.), Zbrodnie nazizmu w świadomości i edukacji historycznej
w Polsce i Niemczech, Lublin 1998, p. 155.
36
Ibid., p. 159.
37
W. Wysok, International Conference entitled “Education in Memorial Sites in Poland and Hungary”,
POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, 9 June 2014, at <https://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=2N0XW5KRpIw&feature=youtu.be&noredirect=1>, 16 August 2017.
dents emotions. This is possible, for example, by presenting the Holocaust through par-
ticular biographies of survivors with whom students could identify.
Considering this background, an encounter between two separate national groups
is especially difficult to prepare. Each group of students, due to different processes and
inheritances of collective memory, perceives memorial sites at museum in situ different-
ly. The understanding of the Holocaust and its meaning varies among perpetrators and
their descendants, just as it does among victims or bystanders and their descendants.
A further issue is the expectations of the encounter’s organizers, the particular results
they are working towards, and their definitions of reconciliation both in theory and,
more importantly, in practice.
ENCOUNTERS – WHAT DO THEY LOOK LIKE IN PRACTICE
Two factors were crucial in choosing which examples of encounters to discuss in this
article. The first factor was that only encounters between two or more national groups
would be considered. The analysis omits all cases in which non-Poles came to former
Nazi German concentration and death camps located in Poland, took part in an edu-
cational activity (such as a study trip, a seminar etc.), but did not meet with another
national group. The second factor was that the encounter had to include a visit at a mu-
seum in situ. Because of this, gatherings which occurred between two national groups,
but without a common visit, were excluded from the analysis. Those excluded encoun-
ters included annual Polish-Israeli youth meetings, which take place during Israeli high
school trips to Poland.
The author divided the included youth encounters into two categories, depend-
ing on the type of organizer. The first category of encounters are those initiated and
organized by the museum in situ itself, and created at the location of former concen-
tration or death camps. These programs are organized by museum staff, often by both
academic and educational departments of museums, and offered to groups. The second
category consists of programs designed by institutions which are not museums, but
which use a museum in situ visit as a small or dominant part of the encounter. In such
programs the museum is limited in their ability to shape the encounter. The museums
are simply the providers of an authentic site, and the preparers of the historical and fac-
tual content which the encounter organizers use. The latter category includes, for ex-
ample, programs created by the International Youth Meeting Centre in Oświęcim, the
Zamość Volunteering Centre, and the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews
in Warsaw. The analysis encompasses nine educational projects, out of which five were
organized by the museums in situ themselves, and four by NGOs.
Although the museum at the former Nazi German concentration camp Bełżec of-
fers various educational activities, including museum classes, study visits, historical
workshops, and teachers’ seminars, their programme has a lack of international youth
meetings.38 The situation is similar at the museums in Sobibór and Chełmno. It seems
odd that even the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, internationally recognized as the
major symbol of the Holocaust, has organized activities for politicians, educators, and
students for years, but does not offer special programs for intercultural encounters.39
At the State Museum at Majdanek and at the Museum of Struggle and Martyrdom in
Treblinka, however, international work camps and international meetings connected
to the German Association Action Reconciliation Service for Peace (Germ. Aktion
Sühnezeichen Friedensdienste) have been held for over 15 years. As this brief survey
shows, offers of intercultural and international meetings at museums in situ located at
former Nazi German concentration and death camps are occasional and inconsistent.
Several such meetings have taken place, however. A program called “Young Peo-
ple Shape the Future” was launched in May 2012, at the State Museum at Majdanek.
Katholische Jugendsozialarbeit from North Rhine-Westphalia, and the Provincial
Headquarters of the Voluntary Labour Corps in Lublin, co-organized this project
along with the museum itself. Young people from Poland and Germany visited the site
and then joined together for conservation work. For some of them, this program was
a first visit to a concentration camp.40 Later that summer, in August 2012, another work
camp was organized in cooperation with the ‘One World’ Association from Poznań,
which is the Polish branch of Civil Service International and which specializes in Eu-
ropean volunteering for the promotion of peace and intercultural understanding.41 It
was the tenth year of these institutions’ cooperation. Participants from Poland, Ger-
many and the Czech Republic devoted their time to conserving the shoes of the victims
of the Majdanek camp. The programs also included lectures, workshops, and tours of
the museum, as well as discussions and participation in cultural events in Lublin. Jakub
Kruzik, one of the participants in the encounter, summarized it as follows: It has been
very nice to discover a bit of Polish culture and history. I think our work has been beneficial
and useful for other people. We should work together for a better future.42 This statement
clearly shows focusing on the Other’s world (in this case Polish culture and history) and
the aspect of responsibility for others, for future underlined by Levinas.
The State Museum at Majdanek also hosts international historical and educational
projects, which take place either as historical workshop or study tours. In addition, the
38
“Educational Offerings”, Museum – Memorial Site in Bełżec, at <http://www.belzec.eu/en/
education/oferta_edukacyjna/6>, 30 April 2017.
39
“Educational Projects”, Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum, at <http://auschwitz.org/en/
education/educational-projects/>, 30 April 2017.
40
“‘Young Workers for Future’ – Polish-German Workcamp”, Museum of the Former Death Camp
in Sobibór, 29 May 2012, at <http://www.sobibor-memorial.eu/en/news/mlodziez_ksztaltuje_
przyszlosc________polsko-niemiecki_workcamp/310>, 30 April 2017.
41
Official website of ‘One World’ Association: Stowarzyszenie ‘Jeden Świat’, at <http://jedenswiat.org.
pl>, 30 April 2017.
42
“Workcamp at the Memorial Site. Volunteers from Poland, Czech Republic and Germany at Majda-
nek”, Museum of the Former Death Camp in Sobibór, 3 July 2012, at <http://www.sobibor-memorial.
eu/en/news/workcamp_w_miejscu_pamieci__wolontariusze_z_polski__czech_i_niemiec_na_
majdanku/320>, 30 April 2017.
museum hosts projects to maintain its physical site, which are implemented by Ger-
man youth. The museum also facilitates, in smaller numbers, cross-cultural exchanges
such as Polish-Ukrainian and Polish-Ukrainian-Belarusian meetings.43 According to
the State Museum at Majdanek educational department, more than 3,774 people from
abroad participated in 131 organized intercultural encounters from 2009 to 2017, and
these numbers are steadily growing.44
It is worth mentioning that since 2012 there has been continuous cooperation be-
tween Lower Secondary School no. 24 in Lublin and Georg Büchner Gymnasium in
Darmstadt. This partnership began as an international project called “Discover His-
tory Together”, devoted to the history of the German occupation in the Lublin district.
Participants had the opportunity to visit the museum, work in groups, meet a local sur-
vivor, and commemorate the victims of the Holocaust.45 In the next few years students
continued to learn about the history of Majdanek and its prisoners, and through this
learning to work for dialogue and reconciliation. A distinct advantage of this project
has been the approach used: student participants work in groups and learn from each
other using a peer-to-peer method.46
The museums at Majdanek and Treblinka both take part in the initiative of the Ger-
man Association Action Reconciliation Service for Peace. This movement began in
1960 as the result of an appeal by the Evangelical Church in Germany, and its acknowl-
edgment of German guilt for Nazi crimes. The initiators of the Action Reconciliation
were convinced that the first moves towards reconciliation should be done by perpe-
trators and their descendants.47 The aims of the Association are the reconstruction of
material losses, and mutual work for peace and understanding with the countries which
suffered under the Nazi regime. In 2012, at the State Museum at Majdanek, partic-
ipants from Germany, Ukraine, Great Britain and Poland reflected on the genocide
which took place there.48 In 2013 they focused on the Holocaust in the Zamość region
and met with Stanisława Kruszewska, a former Majdanek prisoner. The next year the
program implemented a new form of education, the peer-to-peer method. The partici-
43
“Educational Offerings”, Państwowe Muzeum na Majdanku, at <http://www.majdanek.eu/en/
education/oferta_edukacyjna/2>, 30 April 2017.
44
Data from the Educational Department at the State Museum at Majdanek.
45
“Discover History Together”, Museum of the Former Death Camp in Sobibór, 3 July 2013, at <http://
www.sobibor-memorial.eu/en/news/wspolne_poznawanie_historii/405>, 30 April 2017.
46
“Remembrance for Reconciliation – Intercultural Workshops”, Museum of the Former Death Camp
in Sobibór, 26 June 2014, at <http://www.sobibor-memorial.eu/en/news/pamiec_na_rzecz_
pojednania_____warsztaty_miedzykulturowe/517>, ��
30 April 2017; “Międzykulturowe warsz-
taty. Pamięć na rzecz Dialogu”, Museum of the Former Death Camp in Sobibór, 18 June 2015, at
<http://www.sobibor-memorial.eu/pl/news/miedzykulturowe_warsztaty__pamiec_na_rzecz_
dialogu/616>, 30 April 2017.
47
“History of ARSP in Germany”, Action Reconciliation Service for Peace, at <https://www.
actionreconciliation.org/about-us/history/germany/>, 30 April 2017.
48
“Young Volunteers Preserve Memory and Peace”, Museum of the Former Death Camp in Sobibór,
19 July 2012, at <http://www.sobibor-memorial.eu/en/news/mlodzi_wolontariusze_pielegnuja_
pamiec_i_pokoj/327>, 30 April 2017.
pants divided into groups to study particular aspects of history and to share what they
learned.49 At the Museum of Struggle and Martyrdom in Treblinka, this program lasted
from 1999 to 2009. Imke Hansen, the coordinator of the group in Treblinka, explained
her motivation for participating in this encounter: Those are neither my sins nor the sins
of my generation. But we as a German nation want to show that we are closer to friend-
ship between the nations, especially with those who suffered during World War II. We don’t
want another war to break out in the future, whether in Europe or in the whole world. By
cleaning the territory of the camps we realized much more the vastness of the tragedy which
occurred here.50 Here, she refers to the responsibility for world peace and friendship be-
tween nations, not focusing on her own nation, but looking towards others. A partici-
pant named Peter, from another year of this same program, expressed similar hopes: We
don’t feel guilty because of the Holocaust, but we want to take responsibility for today and
for tomorrow. The fascism, genocide, and millions of victims of World War II – this is the
legacy and the burden given to us by our grandparents. We cannot refuse it, or say that this
is not our problem. By doing so we will not build peace.51
The Museum of Struggle and Martyrdom at Treblinka also offers a program called
“We Are Together” (Pl. “Jesteśmy razem”) which consists of workshops with young
people from Poland and Israel, as well as meetings with representatives of local authori-
ties. In 2014, the program was based on Jan Karski (2014 was officially announced as
the Year of Jan Karski), on Janusz Korczak, a Jewish educator from Warsaw who died
in Treblinka along with the orphans under his care, and on Righteous Among the Na-
tions. The integration activities were provided by the Forum of Dialogue among the
Nations. Unfortunately there are very few sources about this program, so it is difficult
to draw conclusions about its impact. From the small number of opinions expressed by
Polish participants, however, it can is clear that participants evaluated the meeting posi-
tively, and did not expect the Israeli youth to be so ‘nice and tolerant’. They also valued
the meeting itself, regardless of its content, because they normally have no contact with
Jewish minorities. In these reflections there is no indication that participants wanted
or saw a need for continued intercultural contact, but it is not clear whether this ques-
tion was asked.52
49
“Workshop for the Volunteers from the Association Action Reconciliation/Service for Peace”, Mu-
seum of the Former Death Camp in Sobibór, 15 July 2014, at <http://www.sobibor-memorial.eu/
en/news/zajecia_dla_wolontariuszy_stowarzyszenia_akcja_znak_pokuty_sluzba_dla_pokoju/523>,
30 April 2017.
50
R. Domański, “Posprzątać Obóz”, Gazeta Powiatowa, 22 August 1999, Muzeum Walki i Męczeń-
stwa Treblinka, 13 December 2013, at <http://www.treblinka-muzeum.eu/index.php/akcja-znaku-
pokuty/1999-rok>, 30 April 2017.
51
B. Luczewska-Matejak, “Nigdy więcej...”, Muzeum Walki i Męczeństwa Treblinka, 13 December 2013,
at <http://www.treblinka-muzeum.eu/index.php/akcja-znaku-pokuty/2001-rok>, 30 April 2017.
52
“Projekt ‘Jesteśmy razem’ w Treblince”, Muzeum Walki i Męczeństwa Treblinka, 29 October 2014,
at <http://www.treblinka-muzeum.eu/index.php/8-aktualnosci/172-projekt-jestesmy-razem-w-
treblince>, 30 April 2017.
Several instances of the second type of encounter, which is created by organizations

other than the hosting museum, take place as well. The creation of the Internation-
al Youth Meeting Centre in Oświęcim by Volker von Törne (1934-1980), a poet and
former director of the German Association Action Reconciliation Service for Peace,
had many political, educational and symbolic consequences. The idea for this Meeting
Centre entered public discourse in the 1970s, after the signing of agreements between
Poland and the Federal Republic of Germany. The centre, after many debates and ob-
stacles but with the overwhelming support of former victims of Nazi German camps,
opened in 1986. The mission of the centre is disseminating knowledge of national so-
cialism, presenting the consequences of his ideology, and promoting mutual partner-
ship by undoing stereotypes and combating prejudice.
One of the programs offered by the centre, a collaboration between the Bergen-
Belsen Memorial and the Foundations for Freedom, and Ukrainian Action: Healing
the Past, is called “History Begins in the Family”. From 2015-2016, youth groups from
Germany, Poland and Ukraine met in each of these two countries in order to study
history through the stories of local families.53 During their stay in Germany, students
visited the Bergen-Belsen Memorial and studied the stories of Bergen-Belsen survivors.
The second encounteroccurred in Poland, and the extensive evaluation created there
by the Ukrainian group illustrates this program’s impact. The participants emphasized
the value of encounter itself. Serhiy Zalevskyi wrote: The “History Begins in the Family”
project changes perspectives, breaks stereotypes, and serves as a great push for self-improve-
ment and self-development. The second part of the project showed how important fam-
ily for all of us. It was a great pleasure to observe the care with which project participants
opened their hearts and shared things that private and vulnerable. Our weak was really
fascinating. Every day was bright and unique. We prepared our own projects, expressed our
thoughts regarding problematic events in history, and did different interesting tasks, which
helped us to learn gripping and astounding facts. The process of integration was so easy that
I now have many friends from Germany and Poland who constantly message me and sup-
port me.54 Thus, he underlined the bond which was created between participants of the
encounter, which confirms that the dialogue situation took place. He also talked about
other participants who supported him, so were focused on him as the Other according
to Buber’s philosophy.
Roman Zvarych wrote in a similar tone: Dialogues, numerous discussions, trainings,
and interview presentations – all of this made my week in Oświęcim. I don’t know when
I’m going to come there again, but I’ll keep it in my mind forever. Now I have 29 new
friends on Facebook, a lot of new pictures, and positive emotions. I am very grateful to the
organizers of the project for that. This citation proves the importance of new bonds cre-
ated during the encounter. The value of encounter, and meeting other young people,
53
“Historia zaczyna się w rodzinie…”, Międzynarodowy Dom Spotkań Młodzieży w Oświęcimiu, at
<http://www.mdsm.pl/pl/edukacja/inne-programy-menu/976-historia-zaczyna-sie-w-rodzinie>,
30 April 2017.
54
Ibid.
was a tremendous relief while visiting the Auschwitz-Birkenau former Nazi German
concentration and death camp. Yulija Levytska has written about this in precise words:
Your own helplessness is murderous. You can’t save the starving children, whose eyes are
begging you for help from the museum wall picture. You are just passing by and reaching
another circle of hell. Suddenly, somebody from your group gently fixes your hood. And you
start believing again that a better world exists, because it is a place of care. The consola-
tion and gentle gestures shown to each other during difficult and traumatic moments,
as reported here, are an example for Levinas’ concept of responsibility.
Lilia Trubka, in a very emotional post, explained the value of experiencing the pro-
gram together with her Polish and German peers: But after all these things, we always
came back to the youth center and felt completely safe. It was the place where we were told
that we had to remember the past in order not to allow its repeating. The place where one
could keep silence for an hour or so or say just one word and everyone would easily under-
stand you. The people are what I’ll remember after this trip. Although we argued some-
times, we always came to understanding. We talked a lot, we laughed out loud, and sang
songs in different languages. And we did it with all our hearts. We saw and heard dread-
ful things in Auschwitz-Birkenau, but we went through all of this together, and this is the
point. Lilia presented both value of the bond which was created between the partici-
pants as well as process of understanding the differences between them. The last part of
the project involved a trip to Lviv and reflections on local Soviet heritage. This program
included crucial sessions, such as: ‘Dialogue and non-violent communication’, ‘Trust:
to foster understanding and reconciliation’, and ‘Solving problems which were not cre-
ated by us’.55
Another project which uses local heritage of the Holocaust and focuses on person-
al stories was organized by the Zamość Volunteering Centre in March 2015.56 In the
framework of the European Union Erasmus+ program, the project “Let Me Tell You
a Story” was created. Representatives of NGOs from Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Repub-
lic, Romania, Turkey, Hungary and Poland gathered in Zamość in order to learn about
the children who lived in this region during World War II and were displaced by the
Nazis. All participants took part in workshops on journalism techniques and intercul-
tural dialogue in order to prepare themselves to perform interviews with survivors.57
The project included a study visit to the Museum – Memorial Site in Bełżec.58 The
project resulted in an English publication of five interviews created by the participants,
55
“History begins in the family…” Polish-German-Ukrainian project for the Youth. Programme of third en-
counter in Lviv, Międzynarodowy Dom Spotkań Młodzieży w Oświęcimiu, at <http://www.mdsm.
pl/images/download/historia_geshichte_programme_ukraine.pdf>, 30 April 2017.
56
Stowarzyszenie Zamojskie Centrum Wolontariatu, at <http://wolontariatzamosc.pl/>, 30 April
2017.
57
“Międzynarodowi ‘zbieracze wspomnień’ spotykają się w Zamościu”, Lajf. Magazyn Lubelski, 2 March
2015, at <http://lajf.info/?p=8375>, 30 April 2017.
58
“The Youth from Seven Countries Met in Bełżec”, Museum of the Former Death Camp in Sobibór,
11 March 2015, at <http://www.sobibor-memorial.eu/en/news/mlodziez_z_siedmiu_krajow_
spotkala_sie_w_belzcu/579>, 30 April 2017.
and was considered highly successful by its sponsors. Because of this, the project con-
tinued in 2016 under the title “Let Me Tell You a Story II. A Tale from the Forest”.59 In
the second year, young people from all over Europe focused on the topic of resistance
during the war, and especially on the Zamość uprising.60
Almost a decade before the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, built
its magnificent facility in the Muranów district of Warsaw, it led a wide range of edu-
cational activities. The first of which was the program called Polish-Israeli Youth En-
counters (PIYE), launched in 2006.61 This program is a joint educational initiative of
POLIN and the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute in Poland (Pl. Stowa
rzyszenie Żydowski Instytut Historyczny), the organization responsible for the cre-
ation of the POLIN Museum’s core exhibition. The goal of the program was to sup-
port university students in learning about Polish-Jewish relations, both in historical
and current aspects, and to bring students together to create artistic projects. Through
this combination of knowledge and practice, students would overcome preexisting ste-
reotypes and prejudices. Since its inception in 2006, almost 200 young people have
taken part in the exchange.62
The framework of the program is twofold. In the beginning of the program the
Israeli group comes to Poland, and for two weeks of summer break they experience
the country where most of their ancestors lived. The Polish students are mentors and
guides in this voyage. The participants take part in a series of lectures, workshops, and
cultural and artistic activities. The second part of the PIYE program is the visit of Pol-
ish participants to Israel, which takes up to three months. During this time the Polish
students have an opportunity to study at the Tel Aviv University School for Overseas
Students. They learn about Polish-Jewish relations but also about modern Jewish his-
tory, the Holocaust, and Israel. They also have a chance to participate in Hebrew class-
es. During this part of the program the Israelis assist their Polish colleagues.63 Over the
years, the formula for this program has changed significantly. In 2009, Polish partici-
pants were required to interview Polish Jewish Holocaust survivors who had emigrated
to Israel. This was a quite a powerful experience for Polish students who were able to
59
See: “Let Me Tell You a Story II. A Tale from the Forest”, Stowarzyszenie Zamojskie Centrum Wolon-
tariatu, 16 April 2016, at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTtoA2sA0lg>, 30 April 2017.
60
“Międzynarodowi miłośnicy naszej ziemi – znów w Zamościu”, Zamość. Oficjalna strona miasta,
6 April 2016, at <http://www.zamosc.pl/news/3239/1/miedzynarodowi-milosnicy-naszej-historii-
ndash-znow-w.html>, 30 April 2017.
61
“Polish-Israeli Youth Exchange (PIYE)”, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, at <http://
www.polin.pl/en/education-culture-education/polish-israeli-students-exchange-program>, 30 April
2017.
62
“Reunion i podsumowanie 2. części programu PIYE 2016”, Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich POLIN,
17 January 2017, at <http://www.polin.pl/pl/aktualnosci/2017/01/17/reunion-i-podsumowanie-2-
czesci-programu-piye-2016>, 30 April 2017.
63
Regulamin rekrutacji i uczestnictwa w Programie Polish-Israeli Youth Exchange – PIYE dla uczestni-
ków z Polski, Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich POLIN, at <http://www.polin.pl/pl/system/files/
attachments/regulamin_wymiany_studenckiej_piye_2017.pdf>, 30 April 2017.
meet someone who could still testify to the events of World War II and the Shoah. It
was also a useful experience, as participants gained skills in oral history.
Since the opening of the core exhibition of the POLIN Museum in 2014, the mu-
seum itself has become the main focus for presenting the multicultural face of Poland
and the long history of mutual Polish-Jewish relations. The museum itself offers vari-
ous ways to involve students while they are in Poland. During the first two weeks of
the program, participants in Polish-Israeli pairs participate in activities organized by
different POLIN Museum departments.64 In 2016, one such activity was an inventory
of the Kielce65 Jewish cemetery, in service of Virtual Shtetl, the division of the POLIN
Museum which is responsible for collecting materials on the Jewish past in Poland and
disseminating them through an online database. It was a major challenge for the par-
ticipants, because Kielce is well known from the infamous 1946 Jewish pogrom which
took place there. During this activity Israeli students translated inscriptions and docu-
mented the site together with their Polish colleagues. In the last few years, participants
have also been encouraged to express their involvement in the program in a more artis-
tic way. In 2015, they created short movies and, in 2016, in Poland they prepared a city
game in Warsaw.66
In the past, one mandatory part of the PIYE program was a visit to the ��
Auschwitz-
-Birkenau State Museum.67 This visit was jointly prepared by both groups of students.
The participants chose literary texts, like testimonies and poems, as well as selections
from modern culture, in order to create a ceremony at the Auschwitz site. This cer-
emony was a climax after the group visits to Auschwitz, which were moving for both
sides. The students’ emotional reactions were particularly intense because the visits and
ceremonies were jointly organized. Most participants, both Israelis and Poles, already
knew Auschwitz, through field trips and international study tours. Those tours, how-
ever, are mainly used to promote a particular national point of view, while during the
PIYE program participants were forced to experience this overwhelming site of geno-
cide together, and to see it in a broader context. The joint study visit and the final cer-
emony were moments where both sides attempted to understand the Other’s point of
view, and gave comfort to new friends in a shared project.
The author of this article remembers that in 2008, during one such visit, an Israeli
girl pointed to a barracks, and indicated that her grandmother may have lived there.
64
“Last Day of the Internship for PIYE Participants”, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, 3 Sep-
tember 2013, at <http://www.polin.pl/en/news/2013/09/03/last-day-internship-piye-participants>,
30 April 2017; “PIYE Participants Becomes Museum’s Reporters”, POLIN Museum of the History
of Polish Jews, 29 August 2013, at <http://www.polin.pl/en/news/2013/08/29/piye-participants-
became-museums-reporters>, 30 April 2017.
65
“Na cmentarzu żydowskim w Kielcach policzyli i uporządkowali nagrobki”, Echo Dnia, 26 August
2013, at <http://www.echodnia.eu/swietokrzyskie/wiadomosci/kielce/art/8694935,na-cmentarzu-
zydowskim-w-kielcach-policzyli-i-udokumentowali-nagrobki-zdjecia,id,t.html>, 30 April 2017.
66
“Israel under Your Nose”, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, 30 August 2013, at <http://
www.polin.pl/en/event/israel-under-your-nose>, 30 April 2017.
67
Now it is not obligatory as the coordinator of the program in 2016 told the author over the phone call.
Her Polish colleague replied that his own grandmother may have been in the same bar-
racks, as she too was incarcerated in Auschwitz. This situation both exposed and rem-
edied the ignorance of some Israeli participants, who did not know that Poles were also
prisoners in this former Nazi German concentration camp. But much more important
was the moment which allowed Polish and Jewish students to understand how similar
their pain and suffering really were.
Since 2012, the dominant element of PIYE has been the artistic project which is
created by the participants, including short movies which both deal with the past68
and touch upon very current Polish-Israeli issues, such as Israeli delegations to Poland,
and perceptions of Poland as a Jewish cemetery.69 Through daily collaboration in small
teams of Poles and Israelis – generally pairs – students have a chance to get to know
each other better, in a much more natural setting than lectures or formal programs.
The aim of the whole program, as mentioned above, is to create a new platform
for Polish-Israeli dialogue by showing young people both the richness of the common
Polish-Jewish past, and the vibrancy of the present, and in so doing counteract negative
stereotypes and prejudices which might have been created either by prior education or
by knowledge transferred from previous generations. The great advantage to this work
today is that young people did not have a personal experience of World War II. This re-
lieves them from personal memory and traumas, so that while their knowledge is root-
ed in post-memory,70 their experience is somehow indirect and inherited, and therefore
less resistant to change.
Another advantage is the duration of the program, as PIYE offers an uncommonly
long encounter. It seems obvious that exposure to longer meetings with the Other can
help a person to change one’s mind on issues of relationship. Franciszek Bojańczyk,
from the PIYE 2012 program, wrote: The experience of staying, the advantages of being
in Israel […] are not only support in studies, but also the stories we share with our friends,
the image of Israel which we felt and saw. It is a great advantage of the program, the one
we see only now, weeks after our return. PIYE is a type of testimony. We have stopped look-
ing at the Middle East through the lens of the conflict. Israelis started to see a living Po-
land, green, so different from the stereotypical country-cemetery. Maybe it sounds pathetic
but PIYE is one of the best months I have ever spent. Months of struggle with Hebrew
grammar, but also the company of Shira, Yaara, Maayan, Shirlee, Barak, Omri and Guy.
68
Searching No Remains, PIYE 2015, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, 17 September
2015, at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAHBNKS5Zdw&list=PLeMNRKVk1rbQ7ATgt
Zni0_CLdw9DEey6N&index=4>, 30 April 2017.
69
Security Reasons – film studentów z Polski i Izraela (PIYE 2014), POLIN Museum of the History of
Polish Jews, 16 September 2014, at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?x-yt-cl=84503534&x-yt-ts
=1421914688&v=uDinmCErMsQ>, 30 April 2017; Welcome to Warsaw, PIYE 2015, POLIN Mu-
seum of the History of Polish Jews, 17 September 2015, at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gY
lX8qG_QM&index=2&list=PLeMNRKVk1rbQ7ATgtZni0_CLdw9DEey6N>, 30 April 2017.
70
M. Hirsch, The Generation of Postmemory. Writing and Visual Culture after the Holocaust, New York
2012.
Months which are physically over, but still exist somehow within us. And so it will stay
this way.71
All members of the PIYE 2016 edition evaluated the program positively and were
willing to recommend it to others. The vast majority described the program’s partic-
ipants, and casual conversations, as its most valuable element. One of the members,
Weronika, said: I liked the evenings at the hostel, and all the quiet times around War-
saw we had to sit and talk with everyone. Her Israeli colleague Maayan agreed: The best
part of our program were definitely the people. I enjoyed most hanging out with them in
the hostel and other places in Warsaw, especially talking, playing silly games, and playing
guitar. Another emotional reflection expressed by Yaara shows that those talks were
connected with the mutual relations and world view of Poles and Israelis: I loved sitting
with the Poles the most, to hear their point of view about things and to learn a little bit of
their language. They are really warm and interesting people and thanks to them I really
felt at home in Warsaw.72 In those two opinions it can be clearly seen that the girls were
focused on the other participants and valued the relations which were created during
the encounter.
The results of the program, the friendships created during PIYE, continue in the
form of both personal one-on-one contacts and involvement of previous PIYE mem-
bers in the current activities of the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, as
well as in yearly reunions.73
CONCLUSION
The purpose of this article was to analyze museums in situ as places of reconciliation
for various national groups. The hypothesis was that the inter-group meetings which
take place at museums in situ located at former Nazi German concentration or death
camps might cause or initiate a reconciliation process among young people from dif-
ferent backgrounds.
The obstacles in this process of analysis are worth mentioning. The author’s expec-
tation that museums first of all provide such programs and, more importantly, collect
evaluations, was false. To the author’s surprise, international encounter programs were
not a major interest for most museums, aside from those at Majdanek and Treblinka. If
they did take place, encounters were generally organized by third parties such as NGOs,
foundations, and other cultural institutions. Sometimes the museums did not keep a re-
71
“Relacje z PIYE 2013”, Muzeum Historii Żydów Polskich POLIN, at <http://www.polin.pl/pl/
edukacja-kultura-dzialalnosc-edukacyjna-wymiany-studentow-z/relacje-z-wymiany-2012>, 30 April
2017.
72
“PIYE Participants about the Program”, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, 5 September
2013, at <http://www.polin.pl/en/node/1249>, 30 April 2017.
73
“Film Screening of PIYE of 2012 and Reunion”, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, 30 Au-
gust 2013, at <http://www.polin.pl/en/news/2013/08/30/film-screening-piye-2012-and-reunion>,
30 April 2017; “Reunion i podsumowanie…”.
cord of such meetings, and sometimes they kept only statistical data. Furthermore, the
institutions which kept records were not necessarily willing to share their information.
This is a serious flaw for forming a conclusive statement regarding any type of research.
In many cases, as explained by museum employees, the programs were evaluated
orally, in a summary session which was not recorded, obviously preventing further
analysis. In cases where the analysis of the documents was possible, especially for those
documents discussed in this article, it must be remembered that all the answers pres-
ent only the declarative level of response. In no cases was a deeper interview performed
by the encounter’s organizing institution. This was another limit to this research, but
it is still worth searching for deeper answers and meanings in the summaries prepared
by participants, and in evaluations of their creative projects (e.g. short movies made by
PIYE fellows).
The way encounters were performed fits the framework developed by dialogue phi-
losophers. The encounters were direct, and the groups emphasized the value of their
encounters as special events or as life-changing moments, which follows Buber’s under-
standing of dialogue. Furthermore, participants valued the aspect of responsibility for
the other, discussed by Levinas, and responsibility for future relationships, which was
explicit in the reflections given by fellows of Action Reconciliation. It was evident that
encounters pulled students out of their comfort zones (Levinas’ separation stage), and
through joint activities the borders of communities of memory cracked. Visits to me-
morial sites, especially, were moments in which group members assisted others, consol-
ing them and sharing emotions.
During most of the programs, various elements were mixed. Participants received
formal, factual knowledge through lectures and workshops, but also worked collabora-
tively. Most of the programs which were analyzed offered either a contributory model
of participation (e.g. work at the conservation department of a concentration or death
camp) or a co-creative model (e.g. work creating short movies), according to Simon’s
classifications. Museums invited participants to contribute to institutional work, but
also gave the members of the projects relative freedom in performing their tasks. In ad-
dition, most of the projects concentrated on local history, and tried to present the Ho-
locaust through the biographies of individuals.
The summary which might be considered a legitimate finding is that, while con-
ducting programs that included a study trip at a museum in situ, the reconciliation
which took place was closely connected to the intercultural character of the dialogue.
The representatives of the two or more national groups became open for each other,
but not as representatives of certain nationalities. Mostly, they simply opened up to
each other as fellow human beings, as was evident in their evaluations. In other words,
their painful heritage became, as an object, a reason for interpersonal encounters, in-
stead of as an object for critical interpretation. Only later, after initiating relationships
and creating the beginning of friendships, did historical reflection occur.
It must be said that all of the programs discussed in this article focused on the au-
thenticity of their places, and used local history as a major element of the intercul-
tural encounter. Those programs which offered common projects (artistic ones, such
as PIYE films, or interviews in Zamość) seemed to effectively create lasting bonds be-
tween participants. Some of the programs also included more than one visit, or signifi-
cantly longer stays, which multiplied the effects of the encounter. Overall, participants
supported each other with empathy and with understanding. Instead of historical and
factual understanding as members of different nations, they met each other initially
simply as youth, without reference to their origins. On the one hand, this seems to be
a positive effect. However, if heritage is only an excuse for the encounter, is it possible
this meeting to be a strong foundation for the future? The question remains open and
demands further and much deeper research.
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Katarzyna SUSZKIEWICZ obtained an MA in European Studies (2009) and a PhD

in social science, with a specialization in: political science at the Jagiellonian University
in Kraków (2017). Her thesis deals with Holocaust perception in the political history
of Israel. Her research interests revolve around the Holocaust, Israel, Polish-Israeli rela-
tions and issues of heritage and memory. She gained most of her academic experience
collaborating with the Centre for the Holocaust Studies, where she was coordinator of
the international seminar “Antisemitism and Racism in Europe – Fascist Ideology and
Practice” (2008) and the project “Polish Prisoners in Norway during Second World
War” realized under the supervision of the Falstad Memorial and Human Rights Cen-
tre in Norway (2010-2011). She has also been a recruiter for the International Teach-
ers’ Summer Institute “Teaching about the Holocaust” (2008-2012). She also worked
at the Galicia Jewish Museum in the exhibition department. She is co-author of the les-
son plan for teachers “Hostility. Indifference. Rescue” for the POLIN Museum of the
History of Polish Jews (2011) and author of the plans in “Identity-Heritage-Memory”
for the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in Poland (2009).
Adrian VELICU
independent scholar
adrian.velicu01@gmail.com
PARATOPIC RECOLLECTIONS
COMMUNISM IN SWEDISH COLLECTIVE MEMORY
ABSTRACT This paper discusses the collective memory of communism in Sweden after 1989
and its role in the process of Europeanization. Sweden lacks the direct experience
of communism and any such recollections are bound to be mediated. Such mem-
ories of experiences outside the Swedish political and social context (para-con-
textual or para-topic instances) are examined in terms of transnational collective
memory. That is why the analysis treats these memories as part of the process
of Europeanization. The material amounts to institutional and rhetorical exam-
ples featuring the memory of communism. Three sets of concepts help scrutinize
these sources: Klas-Göran Karlsson’s view of three-wave European integration
(economic, political and cultural), Avishai Margalit’s distinction between ‘thick’
(family, nation) and ‘thin’ (humanity) communities of remembrance where the
ethics of memory can work transnationally in a context of human rights, and
Jeffrey Andrew Barash’s connection between ‘public memory’ and ‘imagination’.
By discussing the material within this framework, the argument concludes that
paratopic recollections and the dynamics of Europeanization converge, high-
lighting a new aspect in this process of integration.
Key words: memory, communism, Sweden, Europeanization, paratopic
Sweden never experienced communism as a local political system. The general public
learned about the concrete phenomenon of communism through media, various ac-
counts provided by groups and individuals visiting Eastern Europe (in one telling case
by the return of a group of emigres to Soviet Union), translations, films and the occa-
sional scholarly work that reached a wider readership, to take only some of the main
sources. There was in fact a small communist party in Sweden, as well as a number of
left-wing organizations of various degrees of militancy. The public stance of the estab-
168 Adrian Velicu POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
lished communist party and the rivalries within the fissiparous left-wing movement
offered an ideological perspective which the public could take an interest in or ignore.
Lacking the experience of communism, but willing to come to terms with its memo-
ry such as it had accumulated in Sweden before 1989, the process of recollection was
bound to occur at a transnational level.
The aim of this study therefore is to clarify the nature of the Swedish memories of
the crimes of communism as a contribution to the process of Europeanization. An at-
tempt to make sense of this kind of collective memory benefits from placing it in a Eu-
ropean context. More specifically, this context is that suggested by Karl-Göran Karls-
son, amounting to three successive waves of European integration: economic, political
and cultural.1 The particular case of Sweden, concerning itself with the manifestations
of communism and attempting to integrate it within its collective memory, would be-
long to the third (cultural) wave of European integration. The circumstances of this
sort of recollection amount to an instance of transnational collective memory. Due to
the mediated characteristics of this memory, the analysis has to resort to principles and
common values that explain the relevance of one community recollecting the mediated
experience of other communities, i.e. the Swedes remembering the Eastern-European
experience of communism.
These common values have to do with concepts emerging throughout the modern
history of Europe: the Renaissance view of the individual as an autonomous being, the
Enlightenment outlook on the role of reason and the benefits of education, and the
emerging status of citizenship along with the accompanying civic rights. These clus-
ters of values and principles have featured significantly in the formation of a European
identity, but subsequently they have not remained exclusively European, spreading be-
yond its confines. What grants them their defining role as far as Europe is concerned
is the particular historical sequence with all the complex intellectual and political fer-
ment which has enabled their rise. These constellation of circumstances included the
post-Westphalian beginnings of religious toleration, along with its embryonic idea of
observing the sovereignty of the emerging states as well as the increasingly necessary
principle of the balance of power. These common values add up to a comprehensive
ensemble of principles and concepts. What is particularly important when discussing
the memory of communism is the set of values concerning human rights. Articulating
the manner in which Sweden shares these basic values when it comes to communism,
reconfirms its place in the cultural and political legacy that characterizes Europe.
There has been extensive work on the significance of the memory of the Holocaust
for the institutionalization of a European collective memory.2 Some of the scholarly
work on the memory of communism after 1989 appears to situate it also in this pro-
cess of institutionalization. The addition of such missing components and therefore
1
K.-G. Karlsson, “The Uses of History and the Third Wave of Europeanisation”, in M. Pakier, B. Stråth
(eds.), A European Memory? Contested Memories and the Politics of Remembrance, New York 2010, p. 38.
See also: K.H. Jarausch, “Nightmares or Daydreams? A Postscript on the Europeanisation of Memories”,
in M. Pakier, B. Stråth (eds.), A European Memory?..., pp. 309-310.
2
K.-G. Karlsson, “The Uses of History…”, p. 295.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 Paratopic Recollections… 169
the consolidation of the European collective memory has occasionally been marked by
controversy. However, there is a need and a place for a number of potential components
of this transnational collective memory that have remained unexplored.
What might appear as the paradoxical case of the memory of communism in Swe-
den presents a challenge because of its extra-contextual nature (or para-contextual, in-
deed, para-topic feature, to coin a term). Yet, this challenge can be overcome by the very
fact that, in search of a site of memory, it calls for a transnational approach and reinforc-
es its meaning once it is located in a European constellation. It is along these lines that
the present study attempts to make sense of the memory of communism in Sweden.
This study distinguishes between the perceptions of communism in Sweden over
time, quite often as part of various encounters with the realities of the Soviet Union
(but also of Russia before 1917 after 1991), and the mediated memory of communism
related to universal principles with an eye to the process of European integration. As far
as the Swedish perceptions of communism go, there has been a certain amount of schol-
arly work. The studies collected in Rysk spegel. Svenska berättelser om Sovjetunionen –
och om Sverige are representative examples.3 The ‘memory turn’ in some fields within
the humanities is yet to be exploited on a wider scale in the specific area of the recollec-
tions of communism in Sweden. Some reflections on the significance of this ‘turn’ in
a historical context suggest fertile lines of inquiry.4 The present study attempts to make
a further contribution in this area.
This discussion proceeds as follows. An introductory section clarifies the theoreti-
cal outlook and the methodological approach. A more substantial section presents
a number of cases that are particularly significant for the present argument. The analy-
sis identifies those aspects that justify the conceptual outlook of the argument. The
discussion concludes with several thoughts on the relevance of these specific cases to
European and memory issues.
The process of ‘Europeanizing’ the memory of communism presupposes the inte-
gration of this memory within an explanatory framework based on the political values
defining Europe as they have taken shape during and after the Early Modern period.
Besides the importance of maintaining the state and of wielding power in relation to
the subjects’ safety (as argued by Machiavelli and Hobbes), increasingly modern issues
as rule by consensus (Locke) and the civic status of the individual in a nation-state (as
argued beginning with the French Revolution) have shaped a political landscape con-
taining two elements relevant here: the presence of borders and that of values tran-
scending borders.
3
K. Gerner, K.-G. Karlsson (eds.), Rysk Spegel. Svenska berättelser om Sovjetunionen – och om Sverige,
Lund 2008. See also some of the contributions in: H. Blomqvist, L. Ekdahl (eds.), Kommunismen – hot
och löfte. Arbetarrörelsen i skuggan av Sovjetunionen 1917-1991, Stockholm 2002 and in: M. Engman
(ed.), Väst möter öst. Norden och Ryssland genom historien, Stockholm 1996; also, selected sections on
Sweden in: V. Lundell, Det omstridda arvet. Den kommunistiska erfarenheten i dansk och svensk histo-
riekultur, Lund 2017.
4
For example, K.-G. Karlsson, “The Uses of History…”.
The analysis of any entities that are in the process of being Europeanized entails
a discussion in a transnational context. That is why it is profitable to place an investi-
gation of the Swedish memory of communism in a context of transnational collective
memory. Scholars have pointed out the need for more work on the various aspects of
transnational memory.5 This brief study of the memory of communism in Sweden in-
tends to add to the range of cases making up transnational memory and hope to clarify
one aspect of this phenomenon.
A relevant dimension to the present discussion is Avishai Margalit’s concept of
the moral witness and his distinction between two types of human relations: thick ones
and thin ones.6 The former concerns the family and the close community, the latter
concerns humanity as a whole. Indeed, Margalit’s concept of ‘thick’ human relations
converges with that of transnational/transcultural recollections, outlining even more
clearly the kind of context employed here. The lack of the direct experience of com-
munism in Sweden places the recollections of communism as mediated and (partially)
integrated in the collective memory within the framework of ‘thin’ human relations; in
other words they are assimilated in Sweden as part of the issues that regard humanity in
general. Forcing the issue somewhat, it might be argued that, in a sense, the Swedes can
only remember the crimes of communism as Europeans recollecting events that have
affected other Europeans.
In a recent discussion of collective memory Jeffrey Andrew Barash explored the
connection between ‘public memory’ and ‘imagination’.7 Aware of the caveats when it
comes to accept the concept of ‘collective memory’ as viable, Barash searched for a jus-
tification of using the term ‘memory’ in the absence of ‘encounters in the flesh’ with the
event itself and finds it in the role played by imagination. His argument draws on the
connotation of imagination as used in Benedict Anderson’s ‘imagined communities’
where the process is one of achieving social cohesion. Barash argues further that this re-
course to the term imagination permits us to avoid the dilemma that the concept of ‘collec-
tive memory’ would seem to introduce, since imagination as a capacity to maintain and re-
vivify an ‘image of communion’ on a large scale in no way requires that we invoke the most
original feature intrinsic to remembrance of past experience, which is to have encountered
what is remembered in the flesh.8 Barash admits the risk of blurring the distinction be-
tween a social cohesion resting on fantasy (fictional recollections) and one that it may
also lay claim to a basis in a ‘remembered’ past, even where recollection is indirect and bor-
5
A. Erll, Memory in Culture, transl. by S.B. Young, Basingstoke 2011, p. 66; F. Whitling, “Damnatio Me-
moriae and the Power of Remembrance: Reflections on Memory and History”, in M. Pakier, B. Stråth
(eds.), A European Memory?…, p. 92; K.H. Jarausch, T. Linderberger, “Contours of a Critical History of
Contemporary Europe: A Transnational Agenda”, in iidem (eds.), Conflicted Memories. Europeanizing
Contemporary Histories, New York 2011, pp. 1-20; see also: A. Velicu, “The Return of World Histo-
ry and Transcultural Memory”, Buletin Ştiinţific. Revistă de Etnografie, Ştiinţele Naturii şi Muzeologie
(Serie Noua), vol. 21, no. 34 (2014), pp. 74-79.
6
A. Margalit, The Ethics of Memory, Cambridge, Mass. 2003, p. 7.
7
J.A. Barash, Collective Memory and the Historical Past, Chicago 2016, pp. 44-45.
8
Ibid.
rowed from past experience reported by others.9 The concept of ‘borrowed memory’ has
already been used by Halbwachs when he distinguished between autobiographical and
historical memory. The term reappears this time under the name of ‘indirect recollec-
tion’; either way, it constitutes a credible theoretical tool. In so far as the process of Eu-
ropeanization aims at increasing cohesion of various kinds, the link between memory
and imagination acquires a fresh dimension. Consequently, imagination has a necessar-
ily complementary role in the present case, considering the indirect nature of the Swed-
ish memories of communism.
Thus, Karlsson’s third wave (cultural) of European integration, Margalit’s distinc-
tion between thin and thick communities in the context of collective memory and
Barash’s argument about memory and imagination achieving cohesion establish the
theoretical framework of the present discussion. The analysis scrutinizes the empirical
cases in the light of these three conceptual tools with the constant reminder that this
approach requires a transnational framework in order to prove fruitful when it comes
to Sweden.
The subsequent discussion examines a limited but significant number of exam-
ples that illustrate the recollection of communism in Sweden. Here follows a concise
account of the material used. More details below, as the analysis explores each exam-
ple in turn.
There is only one case where direct experience of communism, albeit outside Swe-
den, is involved: the experience recounted in the 1950s and later by the returning survi-
vors and descendants of a group of Swedes who emigrated to Soviet Union in the 1920s
and 1930s. The next case, an experiment of a commune based on communist principles
in the 1970s offers a further instance of direct experience that has become part of the
recollections of communism after 1989. Otherwise, this study has selected examples
of recollections of communism after its collapse; these instance occur in several public
debates where ideological, ethical, scholarly criteria converge in various constellations.
Here the evidence is constituted by rhetorical statements, political declarations or pub-
lic support expressed towards the communist dictatorships, all these remembered after
1989 in a context of confronting earlier compromising stances with the (European)
values that they infringed upon. A case that contains such evidence is the controversy
provoked by the decision to include the crimes of communism in an official campaign
set up to disseminate information on the Holocaust. Another case that supplies further
proof for the present argument concerns the efforts of the Swedish Communist Party
to cope and come to terms with its past, as it divested itself of its ideology and of its de-
fining attribute (‘communist’) after 1989.10
9
Ibid., p. 45.
10
The Swedish Democratic Left Party (from 1921 the Communist Party of Sweden, from 1967 the Left
Party-Communists, and from 1990 the Left Party) emerged in 1917, after a split within the Swedish
Social Democratic Party. Between 1919 and 1943, the Party was a section of the Comintern and, the-
refore, subordinated to Moscow. The loyalty towards the Soviet Union diminished somewhat after
1956, but Marxism-Leninism remained the Party’s ideology until 1990 when it was removed from the
charter along with the word ‘communist’. The Party, one of the smallest in Sweden, has never been part
THE KIRUNA AFFAIR
Several groups of (mainly) communist Swedes emigrated to Soviet Union in the 1920s
and the 1930s convinced that they would contribute to the creation of a better soci-
ety. Many came from the northern town of Kiruna and the surrounding area, but quite
a few were from other areas in Sweden. Their case became known as that of the ‘Kiruna
Swedes’. Besides, quite a few Scandinavians, including Finns, who had settled in USA
and Canada joined them, re-settling in Soviet Union.
Kiruna is a mining town which experienced increased unemployment in the early
1920s. The region has had a tradition of strong left-wing sympathies. The perception of
the kind of society that emerged after 1917 in Russia and the propaganda of the Swed-
ish Communist Party determined hundreds of dissatisfied Swedes to emigrate along
with their families, most of them in the early 1930s. There were also some immediate
incentives: the Kiruna district, which was dominated by communists, subsidized the
move and the recruiters (members of the Swedish Communist Party) were paid by the
Soviet Legation in Stockholm.11 It is not clear to what extent the Swedish Communist
Party’s contributed, but there seems to have been some more or less informal financial
support, apart from help with the formalities. Thus, groups including whole families
with small children moved to Soviet Union.12
The idea was that they would be settled in the part of the Karelian region that be-
longed to the Soviet Union. Soon enough, most of them were moved on to far more
distant regions, many were arrested and died in prison camps. A very few returned to
Sweden with great difficulty. In a series of radio and TV documentaries, books, inter-
views and other forms of testimonies they recollected their life in the Soviet Union,
giving in the process an image of the effects of communism in that country. The pres-
ent discussion of the ‘Kiruna Swedes’ proceeds now in two stages: the returned Swedes’
memory of communism and the manner their recollections were processed and inte-
grated (or not) in the collective memory of communism in Sweden chiefly after 1989.
Some of emigres who returned in the 1950s actually presented favorable accounts
of life in the Soviet Union in radio interviews and, when asked, answered that they
might well think of returning.13 One of them did admit that things got a bit ‘awkward’
about 1937 when there was ‘more control’. However, other returning Swedes gave a far
of any government coalition, but has been present in the Riksdag (the Swedish Parliament) and has
supported at times the Social Democrats. See, for example: P. Bergner, Med historien som motståndare.
SKP/VPK/V och det kommunistiska arvet 1956-2006, Stockholm 2013, pp. 7-8 and passim.
11
K. Eneberg, Förnekelsens barn. Svenskarna som drog österut, Stockholm 2003, pp. 24-25. According to
archive documents, some recruiters were paid 100 Swedish kronor per worker who emigrated, appro-
ximately 600-1,000 euros in today’s money.
12
“Kirunasvenskarna”, Forum för Levande Historia, 2013, at <http://www.levandehistoria.se/fakta-
fordjupning/kommunistiska-regimers-brott-mot-manskligheten/kirunasvenskarna>, 10 February
2017; K. Eneberg, Tvingade till tystnad. En okänd historia om några svenska familjeöden, Stockholm
2000, pp. 24-25.
13
“Kirunasvenskarna – drömmen om Stalins Sovjet”, Sveriges Radio, 3 May 2015, at <http://sverigesradio.
se/sida/avsnitt/537025?programid=2519>, 11 February 2017.
less flattering picture. They talked about arrests, deportations to Siberia, trials and sen-
tences based on imaginary accusations of espionage and, on the whole, general poverty
and a dysfunctional economy. These people were harshly criticized and occasionally
bullied by local members of the Swedish Communist Party, while being ridiculed in
its newspaper Norrskensflamman. At least one emigre returned as late as 1991, as the
Soviet Union was about to collapse. All in all, through such public recollections and
accounts, the general public learned more and more of these Swedes’ life and suffering
under the Soviet regime. These recollections can be summed up by one of the women
interviewed for the radio documentary mentioned above: she was haunted by the hor-
rible memory of the Soviet terror.14 Her father had been arrested and was never heard of
again (according to subsequent archive research, he was executed), at the age of eigh-
teen she was summarily tried by an improvised court of three officers and sentenced to
ten years in prison for spreading anti-Soviet propaganda when she was seven years-old.
A further accusation was that of espionage.15
When Kaa Eneberg, a retired journalist from the main Swedish daily Dagens
Nyheter, started to research the story, including visiting the recently (and in some case
temporarily) accessible archives of the former KGB/NKVD/OGPU, she found evi-
dence of Swedish emigres being arrested, imprisoned on trumped up charges, or execut-
ed. The individual memories of the returned emigres and their general status became
the subject of wider debates. The Swedish (formerly Communist) Left Party had to
deal with this issue, this time publicly, while being confronted by an avalanche of new
information originating in the former Soviet Union. The question of an apology owed
by the Party to the surviving ‘Kiruna Swedes’ gradually emerged and a letter of apology
to their relatives was drafted. It was supposed to be signed by the Party leader at the
time (2000), Gudrun Schyman, and by two previous Party leaders. The text circulated
for a while and it appeared that the Party Secretary (and later leader, Lars Ohly) had
cut out the word ‘apology’ and he had also edited out references to the communist ter-
ror. The cuts were in response to the protests of the northern Party district (compris-
ing Kiruna) who wanted to know why the Party should apologize at all. That letter was
never sent, but four years later, an investigative TV documentary into the past of the
Communist Party in Sweden interviewed Ohly on the Kiruna issue. The politician got
entangled in contradictory explanations, claiming that the cuts in the letter were agreed
on collectively. On the whole, although faced with the reporter’s evidence, Ohly denied
that the Party and he himself had supported the communist dictatorships before 1989.
The subsequent TV debate and the national Swedish press brought the subject to the
attention of the general public. Eventually (2004), Ohly did apologize to the relatives
of the emigres for the way the Party treated the survivors on their return from the So-
viet Union.
Further evidence of how delicate this issue has been can be found in the repeated
attempts of the Liberal member of the Swedish Riksdag (Parliament) Gunnar Andrén
14
Ibid.
15
Ibid.
to move a resolution concerning the case of the ‘Kiruna Swedes’. As late as 2013 he
reminded his colleagues in his bill that it was the ninth time he tried to have a par-
liamentary debate and decision on this subject without any success. The resolution
was dismissed once more, although previously the Minister of Culture had admitted in
principle that the subject merited closer examination.
After the toing and froing regarding the apology of the Left (formerly Commu-
nist) Party to the survivors among the ‘Kiruna Swedes’, in 2015 the Party tried to make
amends by suggesting in parliament the raising of a memorial to the members of this
group.16 The authors of the proposal argued that disseminating knowledge about po-
litical terror would enable us to draw a lesson for the future. Further, honoring these
people for the suffering under the ‘Stalinist terror’ is a matter for the entire nation, not
just one party. The word ‘terror’ recurs throughout this brief proposal and its recollec-
tion through a memorial is regarded as a lesson. It is not clear what kind of lesson the
recollection of the Soviet terror would imply for a country that never experienced com-
munism and this is not the place for scrutinizing the thought behind the proposal. One
can only suggest a line of enquiry on the phrasing in this proposal and elsewhere that
learning the lesson by imagining the terror is the kind of mechanism that helps to create
an indirect memory, lacking direct experience. It should be noted that the Parliament
dismissed the proposal the following year, referring to the work already being done by
the Living History Forum (more on the Forum in a subsequent section below).
Irrespective of the proper legal course to be followed, it is significant that Leo Eriks-
son, the son of one of the returned women from Soviet Union and the person who be-
came a spokesman for the surviving emigres, turned to the Swedish Communist Party
for an apology. His recorded discussion with two of the party leaders witnessed by the
journalist Kaa Eneberg where Leo Eriksson presented his claim, the hesitation of the
leadership concerning an official apology, the subterfuges, the delayed apology, as well
as the debate show how delicate the matter was for the Swedish (former) communists,
but also for legislators.
In the case of the people returning from Soviet Union and recounting their experi-
ences, memory works without needing the contribution of the imagination. Without
a comprehensive inventory of the Swedes’ direct exposure to the communist system it
can only be argued here that these emigres’ memory of communism is the only instance
where imagination, as discussed by Barash, need not enter in the process of shaping col-
lective memory. As they place their recollections in the public domain, these accounts
may be shared by the general public or not. It is at this subsequent stage that imagina-
tion is required in order to integrate these recollections in the collective memory. In ad-
dition, the range of reactions to the emigres’ accounts shows the extent to which their
fellow-countrymen at home are willing to share and internalize these memories, thus
joining the ‘thin community’ structured by values and human concerns, in the sense
used by Margalit.
16
Motion till riksdagen 2015/16:101 av Mia Sydow Mölleby m.fl. (V). Minnesmärke för Kirunasvenskarna,
at <https://data.riksdagen.se/fil/4D125B74-6D00-481A-ACAD-2B3C1894DE50>, 12 February
2017.
As for sharing these memories, the reactions of those close to the emigres, as summed
up above, speak for themselves. At the time of the return, the local community was
hostile, while the Communist Party, through its newspaper and some of its members,
was downright aggressive. This is evidence indicating that those socially and politically
closest to the emigres were reluctant to integrate the recollections of communism with-
in the local collective memory. After 1989, the general public re-discovered the episode
through newspaper articles, TV and radio documentaries and the debates on the apol-
ogy that the (former) Communist Party may or may not owe to the emigres. The events
of 1989 and, in the emigres’ case more emphatically, the collapse of Soviet Union in
1991, vindicated the emigres’ accounts. The politicians and other individuals more or
less directly involved in this case tended to place their post-1989 recollections in a rath-
er self-righteous context, trying to distance themselves from the pre-1989 reactions.
A MAOIST INTERLUDE
A brief but intense experiment undertaken by one of the Swedish extreme left-wings
parties in the early 1970s has become publicly known after 1989 and has entered
the collective memory of communism. In 1967 a small Maoist group in the Swedish
Communist Party split from the organization and set up its own political outfit called
KFML (the Communist Marxist-Leninist League). A further split occurred early in
1968 when an even tinier group who called themselves ‘The Rebels’ and occasionally
‘The Double Maoists’ established their own organization.
Such splits echoed the ideological tension between Soviet Union and China that
had been gradually intensifying throughout the 1960s. The political background
was also altered by the fact that the Soviet system was losing some of its appeal after
Khrushchev’s speech of 1956 where he criticized Stalin, after the invasion in Hungary
in the same year and after the invasion in Czechoslovakia in 1968. In the late 1960s,
Solzhenitsyn’s works became widely known in the West, adding to the dissatisfaction of
some members of left-wing circles with the Soviet Union. They started to look further
afield, towards China and the Maoist model, for inspiration.17 Significantly, on-going
disputes characterized the Swedish Communist Party as well: the adepts of the ideo-
logical mainstream, the new Leninist and the ‘old communists’ featured repeatedly in
the internal arguments of the Party between 1967 and 1977.18
A radio documentary called ‘The Rebels’ broadcast in 1997 and again in 2009 ex-
plored the memory of the miniscule group of Maoists mentioned above who started
17
J. Stenfeldt, Dystopiernas seger. Totalitarism som orienteringspunkt i efterkrigstidens svenska idédebatt,
[Höör] 2013, pp. 173-191.
18
See: L. Berntson, S. Nordin, Efter revolutionen. Vänstern i svensk kulturdebatt sedan 1968, Stockholm
2017, p. 21.
their underground communist organization.19 Its members lived in communes mainly

in the Stockholm area and were organized in cells that did not know of each other’s
whereabouts and doings. A strictly hierarchical leadership with a central committee
and one leader at the top controlled all activities and information. Children were taken
away from their parents to be brought up separately at addresses unknown to their par-
ents. Ideologically ‘suspect’ books, records and other materials were destroyed, an as-
cetic life style was cultivated and sustained political instruction went on, including en-
ergetic self- and mutual criticism accompanied by psychological and, allegedly, physical
pressure. The experiment lasted for a few months. The movement split yet again and
most members left the faction.
In this documentary, as well as other radio programs,20 former members of the
movement remember their ideals and actions about 30 years later as historians, along
with other observers, attempt to make sense of these recollections. As practically the
only known instance of what might be called applied communism in Sweden, however
severely confined in time and space, the case of the short-lived Maoist commune has
been registered by the Swedish collective memory in a peculiar way. This brief experi-
ment appears to have been recollected as an odd episode, regarded as an extravagant
escapade rather than as a sinister warning. Its extreme nature deprived it of realism for
the ordinary citizen who may have missed the worrying dimensions of this practice of
the theory and theory in practice. Therefore, the way to retain it in the public memory
is by considering it a manifestation of a specific, extreme left-wing, tiny political party
(KFML), rather than an expression of the applied ideology of communism.
The Kiruna affair and the Maoist experiment constitute two examples where the
memory of communism is based on palpable experiences. They may appear rather in-
significant in view of the recent history of Central and Eastern-European countries
scarred by five or more decades of communist dictatorship. Nevertheless, these exam-
ples acquire a particular intensity in a country like Sweden which was spared the direct
experience of communism. The present discussion proceeds now by recounting and
analyzing a different type of example. These examples deal with recollections to medi-
ated images of communism, filtered through rhetoric, ideology and political tactics, all
this projected against a background of European integration.
THE LIVING HISTORY FORUM
A controversy that is particularly significant for the memory of communism in Swe-

den was provoked by the decision of the Living History Forum (Forum för Levande
Historia) to extend its initial information campaign on the Holocaust to disseminating
19
“Rebellerna”, Sveriges Radio, 28 June 2009, at <http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=
909&artikel=2895155>, 29 January 2017.
20
See, for instance: “Om bokstavsvänstern”, Sveriges Radio, 24 September 2015, at <http://sverigesradio.
se/sida/avsnitt/620692?programid=4747>, 30 January 2017.
information on the crimes of communism as well. The background to the setting up of

the Forum was the ignorance of school students about the Holocaust revealed by opin-
ion polls and scholarly work in 1997. The Swedish Prime Minister at the time, Göran
Persson, initiated at first an information campaign called Living History which was to
be coordinated and steered by established scholars.
In 2003 this activity was allocated resources and staff on a permanent basis and was
thus consolidated as a state institution. Its purpose has been that with the starting point
in the Holocaust, to promote democracy, tolerance and the equal worth of all human be-
ings.21 After the general election in the autumn of 2006, the Social-Democrat govern-
ment was replaced by an alliance of center and right-of-center parties. The new gov-
ernment asked the Forum to include in its information the crimes of communism in
addition to those of the Holocaust. The focus would be on Soviet Union, China and
Cambodia during 1917-1989. Consequently, the rephrased aim of the Forum has been
to inform about the Holocaust and about the crimes against humanity of the communist
regimes.22
The timing of expanding the remit of the Forum may have been due to several fac-
tors. It could be argued that the new non-socialist government was more readily dis-
posed to throw light on the crimes of communism. It should also be pointed out that as
early as January 2006, the Council of Europe published a resolution condemning crimes
of totalitarian communist regimes.23 International scholarship such as the collection of
studies Stalinism and Nazism. Dictatorships in Comparison was also drawing attention
to the parallelism between the Holocaust and the crimes of communism.24
The rapporteur in the case of the Council of Europe’s resolution was the Swedish
politician Göran Lindblad (the Group of the European People’s Party). The earlier Re-
port to the Political Affairs Committee (16 December 2005) that led to the Resolu-
tion included the recommendation to launch a public awareness campaign on the crimes
committed by totalitarian communist regimes at European level.25 It is worth dwelling on
the distinction made in the report between ideology and practice, since it is particularly
relevant for the subject of the present discussion. The author of the report states that
Personally, I do not share the position of some colleagues that a clear distinction should be
made between ideology and practice. The latter drives [sic; misprint for ‘derives’] from the
former and sooner or later the initial good intentions are overtaken by the totalitarian one
21
“Om oss”, Forum för Levande Historia, at <http://www.levandehistoria.se/om-oss>, 17 January 2017.
22
Ibid.
23
“Resolution 1481 (2006): Need for international condemnation of crimes of totalitarian communist re-
gimes”, Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, 25 January 2006, at <http://assembly.coe.
int/nw/xml/XRef/Xref-XML2HTML-en.asp?fileid=17403&lang=en>, 15 February 2017.
24
I. Kershaw, M. Lewin (eds.), Stalinism and Nazism. Dictatorships in Comparison, Cambridge 1997.
25
“Doc. 10765: Need for international condemnation of crimes of totalitarian communist regimes”, Parlia-
mentary Assembly, 16 December 2005, at <http://assembly.coe.int/nw/xml/XRef/X2H-Xref-View
HTML.asp?FileID=11097&lang=EN>, 15 February 2017.
party system and its abuses.26 In the subsequent Resolution Need for international con-
demnation of crimes of totalitarian communist regimes published about a month later,
the rapporteur’s opinion appears to have prevailed over the position of some colleagues.
The Resolution specifies that The crimes were justified in the name of the class struggle
theory and the principle of dictatorship of the proletariat. The interpretation of both prin-
ciples legitimised the ‘elimination’ of people who were considered harmful to the construc-
tion of a new society and, as such, enemies of the totalitarian communist regimes.27 Thus,
some of the chief principles of Marxism are to be condemned as part and parcel of the
political system that collapsed in 1989/1991. The nature of the condemnation urged
by the Resolution suggests that ideology and practice were entangled in a web where
the mutually corrosive naïve utopianism, semi-literate dogmatism, self-righteous justi-
fications and ruthless exercise of power annihilated one another along with vast num-
ber of people.
The official decision that information on the crimes of communism should be in-
cluded in the activity of the Forum touched a raw nerve. The reaction amounted to
protests, controversies and criticism of an intensity unknown during the initial cam-
paign on information about the Holocaust.28 An appeal signed initially by over 250
scholars (mainly historians) protested against the government’s ‘ideological aspects’ in
its information campaigns. Although the protesters wrote that they were of various
political persuasions, their number included a considerable number of publicly com-
mitted left-wing persons (on the website set up for the purpose, the number of signato-
ries eventually reached 466 by 22 October 2010).29 The reactions to this appeal can be
summed up by the intervention of the political scientist Bo Rothstein who pointed out
the lack of consistency in the attitude of the signatories: they protested against a non-
socialist government’s initiative when it comes to communism, but they were silent
when the Social-Democrat government behaved similarly when it financed and, hence,
steered work on other specific subjects and fields.30
The chief comments in the main press were mostly favorable to the Forum’s extend-
ed activity to include disseminating information on the crimes of communism. An edi-
torial in the Swedish daily with the widest circulation, Dagens Nyheter, wrote that there
were good reasons to draw attention to the communist wholesale murder and genocide.31
Yet, the editorial distinguished between the need to investigate the crimes of commu-
nism and whether it is proper for a state authority to act as an opinion maker. The
newly appointed superintendent of the Forum, the theologian Eskil Frank, declared
26
Ibid.
27
Ibid.
28
On the different standards and outlooks in Sweden regarding Nazism and communism, see: U. Zan-
der, Fornstora dagar, moderna tider. Bruk av och debatter om svensk historia från sekelskifte till sekelskifte,
Lund 2001, pp. 448-450.
29
“Upprop mot statlig kampanjhistoria”, Lista över samtliga undertecknare, at <http://www.
historieuppropet.se>, 11 February 2017. See also: J. Stenfeldt, Dystopiernas seger…, pp. 265-271.
30
B. Rothstein, “Forskaruppropet i DN saknar konsekvens”, Svenska Dagbladet, 5 April 2008.
31
Dagens Nyheter, 23 December 2006.
that investigating the crimes of communism was just as important as investigating Nazi
crimes and it may contribute to stopping these crimes from happening again.32 An edi-
torial in the Swedish daily Svenska Dagbladet introduced a distinction worth pursuing
in another study. The daily was somewhat skeptical about the Forum’s insistence on
regarding their assignment as dealing with crimes against humanity during communist
regimes and not with the crimes of communism against humanity as the government re-
phrased the initial assignment in 2007.33
This brief account of one example concerning the memory of communism in Swe-
den has confined itself to a few selected interventions in the media. In this absence of
an exhaustive scholarly survey, it is at this level that one may try to gauge the presence
of particular collective recollections and to identify attempts to revive them or, indeed,
suppress them. The inconsistency of the signatories of the appeal is plain to see. What
is more elusive in this case is the set of reasons that fuel the commitment of the protest-
ers. They restated the argument in terms of general policy. Further, they argued that
the authorities should have no say in the orientation or diffusion of this information.
Next, they reminded the public that the value-free teaching and dissemination of his-
tory along with the credibility of scholars must be preserved. On the whole, hardly any
genuine intellectual would object to this line of thought.
However, given the public image of quite a few of the protesters in the Swedish con-
text, there is more than a touch of special pleading here. The sudden worry about (un-
comfortable) ‘ideological aspects’ can hardly conceal the ideological sensitivity when it
comes to examining the crimes of communism in a country lacking its direct impact;
such an examination would include a scrutiny of a number of the signatories’ ideolog-
ically-driven work and public stance. According to a recognizable pattern that resorts
to deflecting methods, the signatories of the appeal responded to the initiative on the
crimes of communism by referring to the need for examining the crimes of colonialism
and the inequality existing in the capitalism system. The protesters refused to engage
with the specific claims that the Forum adduces about communism, but reacted in gen-
eral terms on matters of principle or widened the discussion as a way of avoiding a pre-
cise answer on a specific issue. In fact, the protesters’ stance took its place among the
various mechanisms of forgetting. Given the para-contextual nature of recollection in
this case, namely the ‘borrowed memories’ of events located elsewhere, the appeal of the
466 amounts to avoiding a form of transnational memory sharing that would otherwise
reinforce a common European background.
How representative are the 466 signatories of the general public? For the sake of
balance, one should mention that among them there are people from at least one lib-
eral think-tank (Timbro) known for its objections to state intervention and who most
likely signed on these grounds. As far as a certain category of left-leaning academic in-
tellectuals are concerned, they seem to present a reasonable reflection of the academic
world; less so, of the wider world. This case supplies however a regional correction to
32
E. Frank, “Nu granskar vi kommunismen”, Svenska Dagbladet, 2 September 2007.
33
“Kommunismens brott mot mänskligheten”, Svenska Dagbladet, 11 March 2008.
Tony Judt’s statement that With the post-Communist re-ordering of memory in eastern
Europe, the taboo on comparing Communism with Nazism began to crumble.34 Judt’s oth-
erwise penetrating insights and valuable scholarly work offer a useful background to
post-89 Europe against which to contemplate the Swedish case discussed here. While
Judt is of the opinion that politicians and scholars started to insist upon such compari-
sons35 20 years after the collapse of communism, here we witness the case of hundreds
of Swedish scholars (and some politicians) who campaign a g a inst such comparisons.
The rather steady and smooth process assumed by Judt’s observations seems therefore
to be more problematic in Sweden. Various categories of intellectuals appear to be out
of step with each other, judging by the lack of consensus on the Forum’s initiative treat-
ing Nazism and communism in the same manner.
Swedes can only recollect the practice of communism located elsewhere, as men-
tioned above; yet, they can recollect the constellation of debates, appeals and various ar-
guments ranging from crude to cultivated ones, invoking the ideology of class struggle
and of the dictatorship of the proletariat. These undercurrents of memory drag along
quite a few individuals whose intellectual investment in, and political commitment for,
principles such as class struggle and dictatorship of the proletariat impels them to try
and rescue the ideology.
The European Parliament announced the European Day of Remembrance for Vic-
tims of Stalinism and Nazism in 2008, as a result of the Prague Declaration on Europe-
an Conscience and Communism. Pursuing the same idea, along with similar initiatives,
the European Parliament proposed in the following year the creation of a “Platform of
European Memory and Conscience” which became an educational project in 2011. At
about the same time, an all-party group of members of the European Parliament took
the initiative of launching the Reconciliation of European Histories Group, an infor-
mal group which co-operates with the “Platform of European Memory” project. As
the Living History Forum has included in its activity the dissemination of information
on the crimes of communism, despite the appeal of 466 and other objectors, it may be
argued that Swedish collective memory on this issue has been in tune with the Euro-
pean outlook.
THE HAUNTING CONSONANT
The post-1989 initiative of the Swedish Communist Party to render a public account
of certain aspects of its past is quite instructive. At its congress in 1990 the Party de-
cided to commission a report of its former relations with other communist parties, in-
cluding the East European ones. In 1991 the Executive Committee selected a group of
34
T. Judt, Postwar. A History of Europe since 1945, London 2007, p. 826.
35
Ibid.
individuals to draft this report and the text appeared in 1992.36 The foreword provided
a few background details to justify the sketchiness of the report: one author abandoned
the project, another one was drafted at short notice and a third one (the historian of
ideas Sven-Eric Liedman) explained in his contribution that initially he declined the
invitation because of lack of time and due to his own similar work in progress; how-
ever, since he was allowed to contribute on his own terms, he assumed that he may offer
a few brief personal reflections on the ‘guilt’ of the Party.37 Under these circumstances,
the authors amounted to two historians and a political scientist, all three ‘independent’
scholars but ‘close’ to the Party, as the authors put it in the foreword. A local politician
contributed a text as well.
The result was a slim ‘report’ made up of uneven contributions. The book was dis-
cussed publicly at the Party’s congress of 1993. The limited time framework, the rather
hurried process of recruiting the authors and the narrowly focused aim of the work give
pause for thought. This was supposed to be an undertaking where, after the collapse of
communism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, a Western Communist Party in-
vites established scholars to survey decades of the Party’s activity. It was an opportunity
to come to terms with a range of grave and delicate issues, as one’s ideological adversar-
ies relentlessly pointed out that their opposition has been vindicated: communism has
imploded in peacetime. Yet, the enterprise appears hastily cobbled together to get the
matter out of the way. The report on the narrow issue of the Party’s relations with com-
munist parties in Eastern Europe (but also elsewhere) commissioned immediately after
the collapse of communism signaled in what field the Party considered that it ought to
make amends. This was also an indirect indication that no other sphere of activity of
the Party was in need of scrutiny.
The similar haste to drop the letter ‘k’, and the word ‘kommunist’ from the name of
the Party (Vänsterpartiet Kommunisterna, abbreviated as VPK) bears the same mark.
As a further attempt to come to terms with the past, this particular initiative indicates
a wish to forget rather than to confront one’s earlier actions and (allegedly) former ide-
ology. I return below to the fate of the word ‘communist’ in the Swedish Communist
Party’s name, as an attribute to be accepted, discarded, accepted again and then once
more discarded by members of its leadership and other adepts.
The report appears to have made a stir mainly in left-wing publications. On the
whole, the report covers institutional and ideological matters which the Swedish Com-
munist Party deemed that required examination after the collapse of communism. The
authors confine themselves to surveying institutional contacts with communist par-
ties abroad and exchanges of congratulatory messages (with the exception of Sven-Eric
Liedman’s few pages which do come close to the heart of the matter but don’t expand
the argument beyond a few personal reflections). There is little if any comment on the
36
“Uppdrag och uppläggning”, in L.-A. Norborg, S.-E. Liedman, U. Nymark, Lik i garderoben? En rapport
om SKP/VPks internationella förbindelser, Stockholm 1992, p. 3.
37
Ibid., pp. 3-4. Also: S.-E. Liedman, “Ovetenskaplig efterskrift”, in L.-A. Norborg, S.-E. Liedman, U. Ny-
mark, Lik i garderoben?..., p. 105.
way the party has been perceived in Sweden over the decades or on the Party’s interven-
tions on the few occasions when it was put to the test, as in the case of the return from
Soviet Union of the disappointed emigres. Significant enough for the subject of this
paper is the response to the publication of the Swedish translation of Stephen Cour-
tois’s The Black Book of Communism. According to the writer and journalist Per Lan-
din, the book provoked an ‘outcry’ in several European countries, but this was not the
case in Sweden.38
In 1990 the Swedish Communist Party dropped the word ‘communist’, and thus the
initial ‘k’ from its abbreviated name, being known thenceforward as the Left (Wing)
Party (Vänsterpartiet, now abbreviated as V). This attempt to draw a veil over the ide-
ological past only stimulated recollections of the party’s earlier politics. Gone was the
letter that stood for what now the party considered a compromising past; yet, the ab-
sent initial became the haunting initial. The media and the public at large kept return-
ing to the decision of the party, perpetuating thus the memory of its communist past.
Newspapers along with television and radio programs gave voice to a wide range of
people criticizing the party for opportunistically trying to shake off a dubious ideologi-
cal past or for just undertaking a cosmetic change.39 These debates occasioned a review
of the crimes of communism in Central and Eastern Europe, accompanied by rather
specious distinctions from the Left between the still intact ideal and the flawed prac-
tice. The party’s active effort to forget uncomfortable chunks of its past by modifying
its name and trimming its ideology simply drew even more attention to what was there
to be remembered. And those who knew little of this past became curious to find out
what was there to be reviewed and reconsidered.
It is difficult to assess whether renouncing the key word in the name of the Party was
a way of performing mea culpa or not, but the brief and selective commissioned report
and the Party’s reactions to it conveyed the point that, on the whole, there was nothing
to be guilty about. Strictly speaking this was true: there was no specific wrongdoing in
practice since the Party never had power in Sweden. What remained to be examined
was the ideology which, as seen in the European resolution above, goes hand in hand
with (potential) practice and should be judged accordingly.
The Party acquired a new leader early in 1993, Gudrun Schyman. The word which
had been dropped from the name of the party was still fresh in the memory of the ra-
dio reporter who asked Schyman in an interview whether she had ever been a commu-
nist. She denied.40 The reporter reminded Schyman of her membership in the Marx-
ist-Leninist Militant Association in the 1970s (Oh, you go that far back in history, she
laughingly realized), and of the political program of the Association which included
‘armed struggle’ against the political system. Schyman admitted her membership but
38
Dagens Nyheter, 20 January 2000. See also: J. Stenfeldt, Dystopiernas seger…, pp. 278-281, and L. Bernt-
son, S. Nordin, Efter revolutionen…, pp. 205-214.
39
See, for instance, the links to the news programmes referred in the present text.
40
“Schyman: Jag har aldrig varit kommunist”, Sveriges Radio, 17 August 2006, at <http://sverigesradio.
se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=1602&artikel=906656>, 14 February 2017.
dismissed any suggestion that she was a communist or that she joined the organization
on ideological grounds (there were other reasons […] [laughter]).41 In this particular
case, the reporter confronted the party leader with the recollection of the violent aims
of the Association’s political program: ‘armed struggle’, ‘armed revolution’, ‘the working
class should be armed’. The reactions of the radio listeners to this and similar interviews
merit a separate study; suffice it to be said here that the element of violence dismissed
in this interview by means of a few flippant remarks was not a purely theoretical sup-
position, but it set up resonances of the real violence in Eastern Europe at the time
brought to the knowledge of the Swedish public by the media after 1945. The nature of
this interview may well require a clarification. Needless to say, one should distinguish
between Schyman’s levity as such and its status as evidence for the present argument.
Things became even more confusing when a subsequent leader of the Party (Lars
Ohly) kept changing his mind about his own political allegiance, one moment an-
nouncing that he was a communist, then that he was not.42 When Ohly claimed in
2004 that he actually was a communist, questions accumulated: what did this return to
the fraught term mean, why was the word removed from the party’s name and from its
program in 1990, and indeed what did it mean prior to 1989. A couple of party mem-
bers asked Ohly to stop calling himself a communist since the party must show that it
is on the side of democracy.43 The party leader stuck to his guns, for a while. However,
it appeared that Lars Ohly never ceased to reflect on the matter. In October 2005, he
explained that, after all, he would stop calling himself a communist since the term is as-
sociated with oppression.44 He further elaborated that this change was necessary because
the word ‘communist’ hindered proper political discussions on topical issues.
The first decade of the 21st century witnessed a number of television documentaries
that investigated the past of the Swedish Communist Party. Lars Ohly, was one of the
protagonists in these programs, partly because of his position but also as an individual
whose shifting outlook aroused particular interest in his real attitude. On one level
there has been his changing attitude about his own political identity; apart from the
vacillations mentioned above, he denied in 2010 that he was a Leninist only for the re-
porter to remind him that he did say he was a Leninist in an interview granted to Brit-
ish publication as late as 1999. On another level there has been the extent to which he
mirrors the Communist Party’s stance whose standpoints (past and present) he had to
account for as its leader. The media’s interest in the matter was accompanied by Party
members’ criticism, but also support of their leader and of the Party’s actions in general.
These have been periodical reminders of the trajectory of communism in Sweden prior
to 1989 and the fitful attempts of coming to terms with the past after 1989. In so far as
41
Ibid.
42
For a retrospective of these claims, see: Lars Ohlys mörka förflutna, Sveriges Television, 16 August 2009,
at <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbzRZWFZHs4>, 31 January 2017.
43
“Tungt vänsteravhopp i protest mot Ohly”, Sveriges Radio, 14 October 2004, at <http://sverigesradio.
se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=83&artikel=486827>, 31 January 2017.
44
“Lars Ohly slutar kalla sig kommunist”, Sveriges Radio, 30 October 2005, at <http://sverigesradio.se/
sida/artikel.aspx?programid=83&artikel=723787>, 1 February 2017.
the general public has taken an interest in this subject, the collective memory of com-
munism is still in the process of taking a recognizable outline, but decisive evidence is
difficult to come by.
The hurried initiatives undertaken by the Party could only stimulate similar initia-
tives coming from other quarters such as media, the academic world, certain political
circles and popular writers. If the Party itself wanted to readjust its image by erasing
(indeed, forgetting) uncomfortable terms and arguments, others wanted to examine
this image by reviving the past. One ought to make a distinction between the popular
and the academic contributions to the memory of communism in Sweden. These two
kinds of contributions occur in different contexts. There has been a popular one that
has tended to approach the subject in terms of the role and actions of communist or-
ganizations in Swedish politics. Then there has been an academic one characterized by
historical scholarship as well as theoretical perspectives (e.g. genetic or structural per-
spectives) and concepts (e.g. intention or function as decisive factors), in comparisons
between communism and fascism/Nazism. These different sorts of contributions may
concisely be illustrated by the survey of the Swedish Radio’s correspondent in East Eu-
rope Kjell Albin Abrahamsson on the one hand and by scholars mentioned above such
as Karl-Göran Karlsson.45 In their own particular manner, such accounts work at vari-
ous levels in the overall perception of communism in Sweden and are available to be re-
trieved from the collective memory, depending on the kind of (mediated) recollection
needed in national or transnational arguments.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
The ontological status of the features that define Europe has varied over the years.
These features and values have manifested themselves at some point in history in cer-
tain areas, but not at other moments when they were suppressed or were assumed to
have, or did have, a latent existence. For practical purposes, in such cases these defining
features are absent. This eclipse of characteristic values occurs during periods such as
the communist rule. Once these values re-emerge, or the context allowing their exis-
tence re-appears, it becomes possible to contrast their renewed presence with their tem-
porary absence. In other words, it becomes possible to recollect the communist period
as a break in the process of shaping and upholding the characteristic European traits.
The nature of this recollection, whether condemnatory, critical or otherwise, places the
collective memory of communism in a context of recognition of those areas that un-
derwent the ordeal as, once more, part of Europe. I suggest that this is one way in which
the dynamics of the process assumed by the term ‘Europeanization’ and the dynamics of
the process of collective memory can be brought together and explain one another. The
etymological connotations of ‘re-cognition’ play their additional part in this process.
45
K.A. Abrahamsson, Låt mig få städa klart! Om kommunister, kryptokommunister och antikommunister,
Stockholm 2015.
The use of the term ‘totalitarian’ in the European documents mentioned above
points to the justification of tackling the issue of the crimes of communism in the same
manner one has tackled the Holocaust. At times and in certain places, as seen above,
the condemnation of the latter has been less controversial than that of the former. The
Nazi ideology’s dire consequences for universal values can already be seen in its theo-
retical premises, such as they are. In the case of communism, commendable Enlight-
enment values (emancipation, rationality) have been emphasized but woven together
with later concepts, occasionally toned down, such as class struggle (with its ominous
implications): a diffuse alternation between theory and practice that tended to cloud
the issue and obscure the flaws. However, as empirically established when implement-
ed, the communist ideology’s outcome turns out to be nefarious in similar ways to that
of Nazism, except for the former’s sinuous trajectory from its imposition to its collapse
in 1989/1991.
The analytical demands of a concept such as ‘totalitarianism’ (categorization, com-
parison) invite a close scrutiny of the crimes of communism on the same empirical
premises as the examination of the Holocaust. Such a comparative undertaking reveals
occasionally a lop-sided approach that has to be redressed, as was the case with the lat-
ter campaign of the Living History Forum. An outlook that has totalitarianism as its
defining feature should help the sheltered observer to detach the reality of dictator-
ships from the would-be redeeming components of ideology.
Given the unusual circumstances of the collective memory of the crimes of com-
munism in Sweden, this brief study has addressed the elusive question of location. This
issue has to do with the way these recollections are accommodated in the much more
comprehensive sphere of Swedish collective memory in general. Neither the palpable
aspect of sites of memory, nor the more abstract one such as, for example, the politi-
cal sphere exclusively could properly host these mediated recollections of communism.
The level at which they are stored is bound to be the transnational one of the constella-
tion of principles shared within the European cultural space as a whole.
Barash has argued that the function of collective memory is providing continuity
and cohesion, once social, political and cultural continuity has been disrupted.46 The
hiatus occasioned by communism in the history of Europe and the recollections of that
period constitute an interruption whose account has to find its place in a wider narra-
tive of Europe’s history. The very effort of exploring the case of Sweden in connection
with its memory of communism may well encourage further examination of the inter-
play between transnational remembrance and the dynamics of Europeanization.
46
J.A. Barash, Collective Memory…, p. 212.
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Erll A., Memory in Culture, transl. by S.B. Young, Basingstoke 2011.
Frank E., “Nu granskar vi kommunismen”, Svenska Dagbladet, 2 September 2007.
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Remembrance, New York 2010.
Jarausch K.H., Linderberger T., “Contours of a Critical History of Contemporary Europe:
A Transnational Agenda”, in K.H. Jarausch, T. Linderberger (eds.), Conflicted Memories.
Europeanizing Contemporary Histories, New York 2011.
Judt T., Postwar. A History of Europe since 1945, London 2007.
Karlsson K.-G., Europeiska möten med historien. Historiekulturella perspektiv på andra världskriget,
förintelsen och den kommunistiska terrorn, Stockholm 2010.
Karlsson K.-G., “The Uses of History and the Third Wave of Europeanisation”, in M. Pakier,
B. Stråth (eds.), A European Memory? Contested Memories and the Politics of Remembrance,
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sverigesradio.se/sida/avsnitt/537025?programid=2519>.
“Kommunismens brott mot mänskligheten”, Svenska Dagbladet, 11 March 2008.
“Lars Ohly slutar kalla sig kommunist”, Sveriges Radio, 30 October 2005, at <http://sverigesradio.
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watch?v=RbzRZWFZHs4>.
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den, a period of studies and part-time teaching in the history of ideas at Gothenburg
University led to a PhD in the History of Ideas (Versions of Exile Morality. Refugees
in Britain, 1790-1845, Göteborg 2001). His interest in the 18th century resulted in
several shorter studies and the monograph Civic Catechisms and Reason in the French
Revolution (London 2010). At Karlstad University (2003-2015), apart from teaching
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During 2018, Adrian Velicu is visiting researcher at the University of Copenhagen, De-
partment of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies.
ARTICLES CONCLUSION
Zdzisław MACH
zdzislaw.mach@uj.edu.pl
SOME REMARKS ON MEMORY AND HERITAGE

IN EUROPE
ABSTRACT The text concludes the contributions of the volume, accentuating the general
reflections on European heritage which can be found described herein by the ar-
ticles’ authors. The conclusion refers to the general ideas of Europe with its spe-
cific values and the concepts of democratization, dealing with collective trauma
as well as various narrative strategies used in the process of heritage invention
and social use. Finally, a significant example of heritage interpretation is provid-
ed and focused on in the form of the #heritage exhibition held at the National
Museum in Kraków. Special attention in this case is drawn to two contradicto-
ry paradigms of heritage interpretation, while the exhibition becomes a symbol
of the complexity of the present debate on European identity in contemporary
Poland/Europe.
Key words: heritage, Europeanization, exhibition, museums
In the history-conscious European societies, heritage has become a central and simul-
taneously highly contested issue. In the search for common identities on different lev-
els, from the local to the European, attempts have been made to construct heritage as
a cultural and historical basis on which the feeling of belonging can be built. And yet,
heritage is also highly politicised, subject to manipulation and the ‘politics of memory’.
In modern Europe, in the post-Enlightenment spirit of rationality, the hierarchi-
cal organisation of society and the dominating narrative of development and progress,
heritage was employed in the construction of history determined by the evolutionary
perspective and a set of values seen as objective and universal. Modern museums, to
which much attention in the present volume has been devoted, are an example of such
an approach to heritage. They aim at representing the objective truth about the past
and culture, while their main goal is didactic, educational, telling the public the truth
about cultural development and progress in a one-way communication which also rep-
190 Zdzisław Mach POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
resents and commemorates culture. Museums tell us what deserves to be remembered

and ‘rescued’ and why, at the same time they confirm the dominant role of those who
decide on the criteria and choose what and who is worthy of rescue.1 By establishing the
criteria of progress they also confirm the hierarchies.
In the European Union, the search for a common European identity was originally
focused on the common contents and events in the European past.2 This idea was in-
formed by the modern concept of cultural and social evolution which suggested the
need to create a narrative showing the progressive development of Europe through
significant stages, markers and milestones of progress of universal significance. Then,
in the spirit of diversity and pluralism, the new idea of integrating different national
perspectives into a common value framework that would make possible for the different
views on the past to co-exist without causing conflicts was formulated as the main Euro-
pean narrative of heritage.3 Of course, this perspective required a consensus as to the
basic European values which would be acceptable for all as the frame of reference in
their collective identification and which would not exclude anyone on the basis of their
heritage. These values, as expressed in European treaties, are freedom, human dignity,
democracy, tolerance, pluralism, rule of law, and human rights. These values are seen as
the foundation on which this common European identity is to be constructed, and they
determine the present approach to the European heritage.
What then are the main challenges which the EU is now confronted with in the
attempt to build its identity and to use heritage as a tool in this endeavour? There are
some crucial questions and problems which ought to be mentioned in this context.
A tension still exists and is reflected in European discourses between the modern
(as described briefly above) and the postmodern, or late modern, approach to heritage.
The former looks for hierarchical development and progress, for objective criteria of
value, and the construction of meaning based on objective historical knowledge and
a developmental perspective. The distinctions between high and popular culture, cen-
tre and periphery, still exist and inform many interpretations, constructions and repre-
sentations of heritage. The second is decentralised, relativistic, egalitarian and inclu-
sive, trying to democratise the narrative of heritage and make its representation more
dialogical and interactive. For the European narrative, the former approach encourages
the presentation of Europe as based on its solid foundation of Ancient Greek philoso-
phy, Roman law, and Christianity, reinforcing its external boundaries, often exclusive
and protecting its collective identity based on values of cultural tradition. The second
is more inclusive, open and dialogical, based on values not so much rooted in tradition
and the past but oriented to the future, representing Europe through those elements of
heritage which suggest individualism, a critical approach, dialogue and the negotiation
of meaning. Individual creativity with its roots in the Renaissance, liberal philosophy
of man, and the ideas of pluralism, openness and tolerance define such an approach.
1
See: the article by Łukasz Bukowiecki in this volume.
2
See: the article by Łucja Piekarska-Duraj and Barbara Törnquist-Plewa in this volume.
3
See: ibid.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 Some Remarks on Memory and Heritage in Europe 191
On a national level, a good example of such a duality of approaches to heritage was

the exhibition #heritage which in recent months was to be seen in the main building of
the National Museum in Kraków.4 It consisted of a large collection of symbolic repre-
sentations and objects, artistic visualizations and literary associations which all referred
in an affirmative way to the most popular, often stereotypical images and concepts with
which the very traditional, past oriented, national-centred (often nationalistic) version
of Polish national identity has been constructed. The narrative was so one-sided and
uncritical that one could think it was not serious, but a kind of provocative joke or
pastiche. On the second floor of the same museum building there was a simultaneous
installation linked to the main exhibition of a much smaller, modest kind, consisting
of a number of individual visual representations of symbolically significance objects,
people and events, each of which individually having considerable significance in the
Polish national narrative. Visitors to the installation were encouraged to create their
own composition by combining these elements – images into their own syntax, repre-
senting their individual interpretation of national heritage. The main exhibition and
the installation represented two opposing approaches to heritage – one imposed in an
authoritative way as a top-down construction, another democratic, participatory, and
individually creative.
The presence of Europe in heritage construction is another interesting and impor-
tant question. How is Europe represented? How, if at all, it is referred to in museums,
exhibitions and many other representations of heritage? Here a comparison between
a Polish and a Swedish case, as described in this volume, is a good example.5 In the
Swedish case of museum narrative, Europe is implicit, not explicitly mentioned ‘by
name’, but present in its values which are represented. In the Polish case, on the other
hand, Europe is mentioned frequently. The message that Poland belongs to Europe is
sent across directly, as if it may not be obvious and taken for granted by visitors. As far
as European values are concerned, the Polish museum was largely nation-centred, un-
like the Swedish one, and the European context of values was either not understood or
ignored. This comparison confirms that, in Poland at least, Europe is a myth, a symbol-
ic reference to an external being, attractive but distant. But it is not a reality of values
involved in social practices, policies and visions.
There is no doubt that heritage is a valuable asset in the struggle for recognition
and also for dominance. The democratization and integration of Europe require that
a more equal balance should be created regarding the presence of heritage of different
nations, regions, and communities in the European symbolic space, in which European
heritage and identity are integrated. Previously marginalised areas and communities
may now have their voice heard, and their own heritage, if understood and integrated
in the European symbolic space, may enrich Europe and the treasury of its values. But
this approach requires more balanced relations of power, especially in its symbolic as-
4
The exhibition #heritage – whose curator was Andrzej Szczerski – was held in the National Museum
in Kraków (23 June 2017 – 14 January 2018).
5
See: the article by Łucja Piekarska-Duraj and Barbara Törnquist-Plewa in this volume.
192 Zdzisław Mach POLITEJA 1(52)/2018
pect. Such a dialogue of heritage and values which it represents may also lead to the rec-
onciliation of nations and communities which find a European frame of reference to
be a platform of dialogue. But in such a context of democratization and egalitarianism
of heritage, another problem is hidden. Here may be, and indeed there is, a conflict be-
tween values regarded as central to Europe, the EU and its integration (such as the rule
of law, liberal democracy, pluralism, openness, gender equality and others), on which
there has been a consensus within the mainstream European public sphere, and particu-
lar, often marginal, but nevertheless present and sometimes noisy expressions of values
which are not compatible with it. The example is the right-wing populism increasingly
present in many EU member states, or illiberal democracies which have become the of-
ficial political and axiological doctrine of Poland and Hungary.
Conflict over memory and heritage also often develop within one national com-
munity, as it is the case of Poland, where ‘politics of memory’ is one of the main instru-
ments used by the state authorities in its search for the legitimacy of power. One aspect
of it is a contrast between what they call ‘pedagogy of shame’, which they attribute to
the previous, liberal government, and their own ‘pedagogy of pride’. The argument here
is that the ‘pedagogy of shame’ consisted in making Polish society remember their own
responsibilities for domination over others and for causing the suffering of others in its
turbulent national history in order to learn the lessons of the past. The ‘pedagogy of
pride’, in contrast, emphasizes those moments in history that Poles ought to be proud
of. In particular, this conflict of construction of memory refers to the Holocaust and
memory of World War II. The ‘pedagogy of shame’ makes Poles remember the dark
side of the past, especially the indifference of most Poles with regard to the Holocaust
and the crimes of those who collaborated with the Nazis. The ‘pedagogy of pride’ re-
members those Poles who risked their lives to help the Jews. The memory of the Holo-
caust is a perfect example of the Europeanization of heritage. Even if in some nations,
including Poles, this is primarily a national memory and is represented as such, mem-
bership of an integrating Europe requires that the memory of the Holocaust be devel-
oped and represented in the European frame of reference, as a common European heri-
tage and the commemoration of the darkest moment in a common European history.6
The present volume discusses various aspects of the diversity of heritage and mem-
ory in Europe, using in particular interesting comparisons between Poland and Swe-
den – two national societies with very different histories but facing many common
challenges, of which Europeanization is not the least important. This comparison helps
us to understand the dilemmas which Europe must try to solve in order to progress
in its integration. Heritage and memory, including the politicization of them, iden-
tity construction on different levels, the reconciliation and struggle for recognition of
marginalised communities, and the creation of a common, European symbolic space as
a forum of dialogue and democratization of memory – these are but a few of those di-
lemmas which will determine the future of Europe.
6
See: the article by Elisabeth Wassermann in this volume.
POLITEJA 1(52)/2018 Some Remarks on Memory and Heritage in Europe 193
Zdzisław MACH is a professor of sociology and anthropology at the Jagiellonian

University. He was the founder and first head of the Institute of European Studies at
the Jagiellonian University, and one of the main authors of the European Studies cur-
riculum in Poland. He has broad international teaching experience from both Europe
and America. His teaching and research appointments include Université Paul-Valéry
Montpellier III, University of Exeter, University College Dublin, University of Chica-
go, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study, the Amer-
ican Council of Learned Societies, University of Edinburgh and St. John’s College at
Oxford University. His research interests cover identity and heritage issues in relation
to nationalism, minorities and ethnicity, the development of European citizenship, mi-
gration and the reconstruction of identity, the ethnic origin of a nation and construc-
tion of identities as well as the development of the idea of Europe.
INFORMATION FOR THE AUTHORS
Politeja is an academic journal brought out by the Faculty of International and Political Studies
of the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland. It publishes articles belonging to the field of
broadly understood Political Sciences, International Relations and Cultural Studies. We invite
academics as well as PhD students, both from academic centres in Poland and abroad, to submit
scholarly articles and book reviews that are original, not published before and not at the same
time reviewed by any other editor. We accept articles written in Polish and in English. The fi-
nal decision of the Editorial Board depends on the positive result of an anonymous reviewing
process. The reviewers are selected by the Editorial Board from among the specialists of a given
discipline.
Formal requirements:
1. Texts in Word format are to be sent to the e-mail address: politeja@uj.edu.pl.
2. The length of an article should not be less than 40 000 characters (including foot
notes and spaces) and it should not exceed 40 standard pages. The texts should include
bibliography.
3. On the first page of the article the following data should be given:
name of the author
affiliation
e-mail address
address for correspondence
number of characters (with spaces and footnotes).
4. The text should include an abstract in English (max. 12 verses), with the English transla-
tion of the article’s title, an abstract in Polish, and the author’s bio-data. A downloadable
example of an abstract is available on the Politeja website (http://www.politeja.wsmip.
uj.edu.pl).
5. Footnotes should be prepared according to the system used in Politeja (available on the
Politeja website).
Authors of Politeja 52:
Niklas Bernsand Łucja Piekarska-Duraj
Łukasz Bukowiecki Katarzyna Suszkiewicz
Krzysztof Kowalski Barbara Törnquist-Plewa
Zdzisław Mach Adrian Velicu
Eleonora Narvselius Elisabeth Wassermann
ISSN 1733-6716
www.akademicka.pl

Diversity and Unity How Heritage Becomes The Narrative For Europe's Future

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The Journal

of the Faculty of International and Political Studies

DIVERSITY AND UNITY

5 Krzysztof Kowalski, Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa,

MUSEUMS, HERITAGE AND MULTICULTURALITY

25 Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa, Europeanization

57 Niklas Bernsand, Eleonora Narvselius, Cultural Heritage in Sweden

MEMORIES OF WARS AND TOTALITARIAN SYSTEMS

95 Krzysztof Kowalski, The Europeanization of the Cemeteries of World War I

145 Katarzyna Suszkiewicz, Museums in situ as Places of Reconciliation. Youth

167 Adrian Velicu, Paratopic Recollections. Communism in Swedish Collective

189 Zdzisław Mach, Some Remarks on Memory and Heritage in Europe

Krzysztof Kowalski, Łucja Piekarska-Duraj, Barbara Törnquist-Plewa

WHAT IS MISSING AND WHO MISSES IT?

ABSTRACT The idea of a permanent public exhibition of translocated pieces of pre-modern

Key words: heritage, modernity, nostalgia, open-air museum

na wolnym powietrzu w Europie18 (Open-air museums in Europe) by Jerzy Czajkowski,

museums in Europe (translocation of Swedish invention abroad) and as an open-air

THE SKANSEN AS A MODERN INVENTION

THE SKANSEN MODEL AND ITS POLISH ADOPTION

franchisement of peasants on small allotments in Poland); (2) common beliefs about

THE SKANSEN AND THE SKANSENS IN LATE MODERNITY

Nowadays, those intentions could also be seen as a manifestation of historically con-

Łukasz BUKOWIECKI is a PhD candidate, cultural studies researcher and cultural

EUROPEANIZATION IN REGIONAL MUSEUMS?

Key words: regional museums, heritage, democratization, Europeanization

THE ‘NEW MUSEOLOGY’ AND EUROPEANIZATION

PUDDING: WHAT DOES IT STAND FOR?

THE KULTUREN MUSEUM IN LUND

THE MISSION AND VISION OF KULTUREN

THE TARNÓW MUSEUM

THE TOWN HALL EXHIBITION IN TARNÓW

COMPARATIVE REMARKS AND CONCLUSIONS

not Europeanized in terms of the adoption of ideas of modern European museology

COM(2011) 173 final, at <http://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regdoc/rep/1/2011/EN/1-

Regionalt uppdrag, Kulturen, at <https://www.kulturen.com/om-kulturen/vardegrund-vision-

Anonymous content analysis questionnaire conducted during “Local Museum in a Glob-

Łucja PIEKARSKA-DURAJ holds an MA in European Studies (2002) and a PhD in

Barbara TÖRNQUIST-PLEWA is a professor of Eastern and Central European Stud-

CULTURAL HERITAGE IN SWEDEN

Key words: Sweden, cultural heritage, debates, Sweden Democrats, Romani

FIELDS OF POWER AND THE INSTITUTIONAL LOGICS

CULTURAL POLITICS AND HERITAGE WORK IN SWEDEN:

ditions and folklore.29 This reflects a broad conceptualization of heritage correspond-

analysis builds on projects and publications featuring heritage professionals, academ-

NORMATIVE CRITICISM AND THE LOGIC OF

ESSENTIALISM STRIKES BACK: THE UNINTENDED

REPRESENTING ROMANI TRAVELLERS: WHOSE LOGIC WINS?

many people responded with interest.95 It strikes us as perfectly possible to empower

TWO WAVES OF MEDIA DEBATES ON HERITAGE IN THE 2000s:

This article focuses on the transformations of heritage-related discourses and practices

ABSTRACT Focusing primarily on the Łużna-Pustki military cemetery constructed by the

Key words: World War I, cemeteries, lieux de mémoire, discourse, Europeani-­

© photo: A. Ziobrowski, T. Machowski, D. Bugno, P. Sekuła; graphic design: T. Machowski, D. Bugno

THE SITUATION ON THE EASTERN FRONT (1914-1915)

AN OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY, ORGANIZATION

THE SLAVIC ARTISTIC DIMENSION AND OTHER STYLISTIC

PILGRIMAGES IN THE INTERWAR PERIOD

THE AFTER WAR PERIOD AND THE MAŁOPOLSKA HERITAGE

© Małopolska Institute of Culture

PREPARATIONS FOR THE CENTENARY OF THE BATTLE

A considerably different stress was to be found in the school photography competition

CENTENARY CELEBRATIONS FOR THE BATTLE OF GORLICE

Key words: World War I, cemeteries, lieux de mémoire, discourse, Europeani-