Чешкият национален въпрос в концепциите на Карел Крамарж и Томаш Гарик Масарик
The Czech National Question in the Conceptions of Karel Kramar and Thomas Garrigue Masaryk

Summary/Abstract: The article examines the problem of the Czech national question in the conceptions of two of the Czech politicians of the early 20th century T.G. Masaryk and K. Kramar. Their views on the future of the Czech lands constituted a comprehensive revision of the ideological principle to that moment which dominated in the policy of the Czech parties: Austro-Slavism. On the eve of World War I the leader of the Young Czechs Karel Kramar drew up a programme for the future of the Czech lands which emerged as a turn in his previous conception for the preservation of Austria-Hungary as a counterbalance of Germany. In it the Czech politician also excluded the independent existence of the Czech lands but saw the future of the Czechs within the framework of a big Slav Empire headed by the Russian Tsar. In the programme K.Kramar described in detail the political structure of the so-called “Slav Empire”, mentioned the states that it should incorporate and outlines the boundaries of the Czech Kingdom. Kramar’s idea of a “Slav Empire” proved to be illusory in view of the situation on the Eastern Front: the defeats of the Russian army by the German and Austro-Hungarian troops and the February Revolution that broke out in early 1917. The programmes of T. G. Masaryk for an “Independent Bohemia” appeared during World War I. In them the Czech politician pointed out that the future Czechoslovak State should comprise the historical lands of the Czech Kingdom and Slovakia. For political and diplomatic considerations T. G. Masaryk supported the idea that the future Czechoslovak State should be a monarchy. He was convinced that Russia would play an important role in establishing the new State. After the outbreak of the February and October Revolutions in Russia T. G. Masaryk launched the view of a republican system of the State. Masaryk’s programmes were prepared in the form of memoranda, designed for the governments of the countries of the Entente. At the same time the future President of Czechoslovakia supported the idea of an alliance between the Slav South State and Poland as a counterbalance to Germany in Central Europe. His projects of this kind, however, did not materialize owing to the conflict with Poland after World War I.

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