Austro-Hungarian Activities in China, 1894-1914 PhDr. Jan Kočvar My Ph.D. thesis evaluates Austro-Hungarian activities in China between 1894 and 1914, especially their political aspects. I would like to explain the nature of Austro-Hungarian contacts with China and their significance for the Dual Monarchy. The main source for my thesis was constituted by the materials in Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv in Vienna. Austria-Hungary concluded diplomatic relations with China in 1869, but her position in China remained weak. After the Sino-Japanese War, the Far East became a focus of interest of the Great Powers, and in 1896 was appointed the first Austro-Hungarian Minister to China. During the Scramble for Concessions in late nineties, Austro-Hungarian navy conducted survey of Chinese littoral and contemplated an establishment of a naval base in China, but finally rejected this idea. Austro-Hungarian trade and other interests in China were too insignificant to justify such an action. The peak of Austro-Hungarian presence is connected with the Boxer Uprising of 1900. Austria-Hungary didn't contribute to its genesis. During the uprising, Austro-Hungarian sailors were fighting in besieged Legation Quarter in Beijing, as well as in the metropolitan province of Zhili. Thereafter, Austro-Hungarian diplomacy took...

This paper describes nationalism as a phenomenon that has become an integral part of Czech society in the 19th century and its manifestations. It describes the main motives Czech nationalist ideology created by T. G. Masaryk. It also described the political situation during the First World War and the circumstances of the independent Czechoslovak state and its share in breaking the Austro - Hungarian monarchy. The work deals with the problem of modernism in the Catholic Church, whose adherents later became the founder of the Church of Czechoslovakia. Briefly describes the lives of the founders of the church and their relationship to nationalist political movements. The core of the work is the analysis of texts relating to the reform movement of the Czech Catholic clergy and the Czechoslovak church, from the period between 1906 - 1931, which is determined by the definition of nationalism seeks to assess its impact on the formation and other life Czechoslovak Church.

The goal of this study is to describe the way Austria-Hungary followed to create and develop a modern navy in 1897-1914, and to determine, which factors were decisive in creating the final composition of the fleet. As the base for the research, a number of works related to the subject were studied, but far more important was detailed research of primary sources located in Austrian State Archives. The main line of the research as well as of this study follows negotiations on navy's budgets because of the assumption that the very base for building ships and developing the navy are financial resources. Among the more important subtopics are the way the navy had to award producers form both state, Austria and Hungary, with adequate portion of contracts, the Austro-Italian naval arms race, and the structure of the Austro- Hungarian fleet. The research revealed, that the ideal fleet as imagined by the commanders of the navy was a product of theories concerning a decisive battle and naval supremacy then widely widespread, and of the rivalry with Italy. However, the extent to which the ideal could have been followed, depended on the economic situation of both states; in the process of discussing and voting navy's budgets, the decisive word belonged to governments, not to delegations. The way the navy had...

Liberale politische Veränderungen in der Habsburgermonarchie zu Ende der 1860er und Anfang der 1870er Jahre, gegeben durch die Dezember-Verfassung von 1867 und die folgende Schulgesetze schufen den notwendigen rechtlichen Rahmen für die Gründung deutscher und tschechischer Schulvereine, die durch den Bau der sogenannten "Minderheitenschulen" jeweils eine einsprachige nationale Schulbildung in Böhmen durchsetzten. Bald wurden lokale Organisationen von den zentralen Schulvereinen abgelöst, nämlich dem Deutschen Schulverein und der Ústřední Matice Školská in Prag. Beide Organisationen wurden 1880 gegründet, um Schulen in sprachlich und damit national umkämpften Regionen entlang der sogenannten "Sprachgrenze" zu errichten. Diese Studie behandelt die Dynamik des nationalen Wettbewerbs um die Schulbildung vor dem Ersten Weltkrieg und vergleicht die Aktivitäten dieser beiden Vereine vor dem Hintergrund der politischen Demokratisierung, Massenmobilisierung und sozialen Frage der Fin de Siècle-Zeit. Die vergleichende Analyse von Proklamationen, Aktivitäten und politischen Kontakten der konkurrierenden nationalen Schulvereine zielt darauf ab, Thesen über die Position und Bedeutung dieser Organisationen zu revidieren und ihre sehr enge Abhängigkeit von sozialen und politischen Prozessen der...

The thesis Political Programmes of the Czech Representation in the Second Halve of the 19th Century focuses on both programme documents and actual work of Czech political parties, whether more or less institutionalized, between the years 1848 (March Revolution) and 1918 (the downfall of Austria-Hungary). At first it summarizes the historical development in the respective period (Chapter 1), next, it analyses programmes of political parties in three broadly defined topics: 1) Organisation of the empire, question of the Czech State Right (Chapter 2); 2) Constitutionalism, civil rights and role of a citizen (Chapter 3) and 3) National matters (Chapter 4). The attitudes about each of these areas of the following political parties are defined: Bohemian nobility, National Party (till 1874) or Old Czechs (since then), Young Czechs, Social Democrats, Agrarians, Catholic parties, National Socialists, Progress parties and parties of the Radical State Right, Realists and Anarchists. For the conclusion, the author of the thesis attempts to characterise and evaluating the Czech political representation, as well as its importance for the development since 1918.