ABSTRACT
Chapter 5 deals with the same period, covering East Central Europe. An immediate effect of Soviet dominance was the introduction of the Eastern border regime in all countries. Just as in the interwar years, when the region was the eastern periphery of the Western border regime, this time it became the western periphery of the Eastern regime. It seems that neither the Western nor the Eastern regime could take deep roots here in the 20th century. Some features of the Eastern regime were present even before Soviet rule was imposed. Then, under Stalin, the Soviet type of border regimes seemed to prevail. During this period, socialist countries isolated themselves and their territorialisation peaked. Virtual or real barriers like iron curtains were erected even inside the bloc. However, starting from 1955—surprisingly, at the demand of the Soviets themselves—their border regimes underwent liberalisation, although to varying degrees. The basic characteristics of the Eastern model survived until 1989 but the region could no longer be considered purely part of the Eastern system after the 1960s. Again, a transitional regime was formed. More importantly, states of the bloc grew apart: some of them operated significantly more open border regimes than others.
