ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the challenges newly emerging states of East Central Europe confronted and how various ethnic groups were accounted for. Back then, Europe’s new political architecture changed markedly, for the first time in a hundred years. A major issue faced by all the new states was their ethnic diversity, a political problem impossible to resolve fairly. Without exception, they were all multi-ethnic and multicultural. National minorities were alienated and felt disenfranchised as more often than not the new states treated them as disloyal communities that could not be trusted. This heralded difficult years to come for all, not least because defeated powers such as Bolshevik Russia or Weimar Germany wanted to retrieve lost territories, which further fuelled tensions. The fate of Jews was a separate matter; they did not feel welcome in any of the states because of anti-Semitic sentiments, among other issues. All this made up an explosive mix, waiting to detonate.
