Prometeizm po prometeizmie. Zarys historii ruchu prometejskiego po 1939 roku
Post-Promethean Prometheism. An Outline of the History of the Promethean Movement after 1939

Summary/Abstract: In colloquial terms, Prometheism denotes the active policy of the Polish authorities in the East, directed at the dismemberment of Russia and the Polish-supported struggle of peoples conquered by Tsarist or Communist Russia to regain their independence. In fact, the term Prometheism refers both to Promethean thought, which aims at the idea of a common struggle of nations enslaved by Russia to regain their independence, and to the Promethean movement, which was one of the attempts to put Promethean thought into practice. The Promethean movement was a part of the interwar period, had well-defined organizational structures and was actively supported by the Polish authorities. The Promethean thought lasted much longer and used to be present in various national and political traditions. The aim of this paper is to try to answer, based on the programme texts, what the Promethean movement was and what it aimed to achieve. The analysis also covers the question of the chronological framework of the Promethean movement - both its beginning and its end. Particularly the latter sparks quite a debate in the scholar community. The study includes 1939, 1941, 1945 as well as later years. The most important part of the paper focuses on the activities of the Promethean movement during and after World War II. Can they be considered a continuation of earlier activities or merely an attempt at reactivation in a completely different political setting? An analysis of the main lines of activity after 1939 allows us to conclude that the Promethean movement, which was formally started in 1925, continued to function until the outbreak of World War II. Attempts to reactivate this activity both after 1939 and after 1945 failed, mainly due to the change in the international situation and the difficulty of finding a country interested in supporting the movement in its previous form. The activities related to Promethean movement faded away in the mid-1950s. Paradoxically, one of the most important achievements of the Promethean movement was the promotion of the Promethean idea, which was still alive and used as a model for building other similar structures in the second half of the 20th century.

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