ABSTRACT
The Republic of Poland began its independent life after World War I as a backward, predominantly agrarian country. Some three-quarters of its population of around thirty million lived on the land. In the provinces east of the Curzon Line, comprising nearly half the territory of that time and inhabited by about a third of the population, the proportion living on the land was much larger: it ran to over five-sixths. Here also the living standards were lowest. The greater part of the inhabitants in these regions were Byelorussians and Ukrainians, while estate owners were chiefly Poles. A difficult minority problem was thus added to a difficult social situation. 1
