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Nikos Potamianos, The Radical Right and the Agrarian Question in the Early 20th Century. The Case of Christovassilis and the "Hellenism Asosociation"The subject of this article is an aspect of the history of the radical right in Greece, namely its intellectual and political response to the agrarian question which emerged in Greece at the end of the 19th century after the incorporation of new provinces where large landownership was predominant. In particular, the arguments and theses of a cadre of the biggest nationalist league of Athens in 1907 are examined, in contrast to its earlier views on the agrarian question and in contrast to the discourse of the radical supporters of the sharecroppers as well as the landowners. Christovassilis adopts a pro-peasant stand, attacking capitalist landowners and indirectly proposing the purchase of the land by its cultivators with the assistance of the state. However, his main aim was to prove that parliamentary democracy was incapable of improving the sharecroppers' situation, a task which only an authoritarian state could accomplish. Crucial in Christovassilis' arguments was the use of nationalist discourse in order to legalize sharecroppers' demands: he linked the peasants' struggle for land in the past with the national conflict with the Ottoman conquerors, equating land with fatherland and, therefore, the ownership of land of Thessaly with the peasants' participation in the nation. Christovassilis' earlier views which put emphasis on the social aspects of the agrarian question gave way to the pre-ponderance of the nationalist argument, which was in turn related to other aspects of the ideology of the radical right. "Hellenism" followed a strategy of appealing to the mobilized subordinate classes — but without totally adopting their point of view. It was always clear that the viewpoint of the association was that of paternalism, not of emancipation. One of the points of its criticism against the democratic state was that the latter was not powerful enough torepress the impending peasant revolt. The restoration of law and orderwas for the radical right more important than the improvement of the living conditions of the lower strata. And the adoption of popular demands, in general, proved to be merely rhetoric: when the class struggle became more intense, especially in the case of the agrarian movementof 1910, "Hellenism" remained aloof. ; Nikos Potamianos, The Radical Right and the Agrarian Question in the Early 20th Century. The Case of Christovassilis and the "Hellenism Asosociation"The subject of this article is an aspect of the history of the radical right in Greece, namely its intellectual and political response to the agrarian question which emerged in Greece at the end of the 19th century after the incorporation of new provinces where large landownership was predominant. In particular, the arguments and theses of a cadre of the biggest nationalist league of Athens in 1907 are examined, in contrast to its earlier views on the agrarian question and in contrast to the discourse of the radical supporters of the sharecroppers as well as the landowners. Christovassilis adopts a pro-peasant stand, attacking capitalist landowners and indirectly proposing the purchase of the land by its cultivators with the assistance of the state. However, his main aim was to prove that parliamentary democracy was incapable of improving the sharecroppers' situation, a task which only an authoritarian state could accomplish. Crucial in Christovassilis' arguments was the use of nationalist discourse in order to legalize sharecroppers' demands: he linked the peasants' struggle for land in the past with the national conflict with the Ottoman conquerors, equating land with fatherland and, therefore, the ownership of land of Thessaly with the peasants' participation in the nation. Christovassilis' earlier views which put emphasis on the social aspects of the agrarian question gave way to the pre-ponderance of the nationalist argument, which was in turn related to other aspects of the ideology of the radical right. "Hellenism" followed a strategy of appealing to the mobilized subordinate classes — but without totally adopting their point of view. It was always clear that the viewpoint of the association was that of paternalism, not of emancipation. One of the points of its criticism against the democratic state was that the latter was not powerful enough torepress the impending peasant revolt. The restoration of law and orderwas for the radical right more important than the improvement of the living conditions of the lower strata. And the adoption of popular demands, in general, proved to be merely rhetoric: when the class struggle became more intense, especially in the case of the agrarian movementof 1910, "Hellenism" remained aloof.

Δεν παρατίθεται περίληψη στα ελληνικά. ; Kostas Raptis, Merchants in Imperial Austria during the 'Long' Nine­teenth Century This article, which draws mainly on the Archives of the Austrian Ministry of Commerce, as well as on contemporary works and modern li­ terature, focuses on the examination of the historical course of merchants (above all the whole sale traders and the well suited shopkeepers and retail merchants) in Old Austria as a distinctive group within the Central European bourgeoisie. The contribution of the merchant­magnates (Großhändler) to the industrialization of the Austrian Half of the Habsburg Empire and the formation of a powerful business class, the importance of the involvement of businessmen from abroad in Austrian wholesale and foreign trade, the grip of the state and imperial allegiance in the commercial sector, the social position and the political activity of merchants– primarily at local and regional levels –as well as the attitudes of the multi­ethnic merchant class towards all kinds of nationalist movements in the late nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries, are the central issues of this essay. Merchant­magnates, among whom many of foreign provenance or/ and not of Catholic faith (Protestants, Jews and Greek­orthodox) established themselves as the most active entrepreneurial group within the Austrian bourgeoisie during most of the nineteenth century (at least until the 1870s), since they exploited promptly every new opportunity to accumulate and augment their capital and income: in industry, banking, insurance and other share­holding companies, transport, shipping and real estate. The bourgeois status of the Austrian merchants is confirmed for the same period by their participation in all sorts of (bourgeois) associations, their subscription to public benefit causes, their charitable and philanthropic activities. The imperial state's favorable disposition towards entrepreneurs in general and merchants in particular, its recognition and reward of their contribution to the Austrian economy and export trade, of their mercantile knowledge and professional experience, as well as of their charity and philanthropic work, are documented in the appointment of honorary consuls of Austria abroad or of consuls of foreign states in the capital and cities of the Monarchy, the conferring of the highest social distinctions on merchants by Emperor Franz Joseph through award of medals, honorary titles and titles of nobility or the merchants' collaboration with the Ministry of Commerce as elected members and officials of chambers of commerce, as experts, special advisers and commission agents. In addition to the merchants' indirect relations with politics there were direct ones too, in other words their active participation as elected representatives, primarily to municipal councils and secondarily to the local and imperial parliaments of Austria after the constitutional reforms of 1860­1861. During the so­called era of liberalism, from the 1860s up to the mid­1880's, it was mainly german­speaking merchants, who, together with industrialists and other middle class groups, dominated in most towns, whereas in the three decades which preceded the First World War –an era of increasing anti­semitism and nationalism– they had to share power with new emerging petit­bourgeois strata (among them many shopkeepers). The article concludes with a remark on the upheavals caused to the merchant world by the two World Wars and national­socialism, which destroyed the unified economic space of Austria­Hungary, nationalized its cosmopolitan bourgeoisie and finally led to the expulsion, material depravation or/and extermination of such a dynamic and prominent group, like the Jewish merchants and entrepreneurs, followed by the abolition of the capitalist economy by the new socialist regimes in Central and East­Central Europe after 1945.