Academic literature on the topic 'Polish book abroad'

After the defeat of September 1939, a large number of Polish historians found themselves, together with the army, scattered abroad. They lost their previous academic research base, aids and equipment, book collections, notes, etc. As early as the autumn of 1939, the first attempts to organise representatives of this group were made in allied France. The fall of France and the necessity to evacuate to Great Britain meant that a new stage of wartime activity began here for the Polish civilian and military leadership, the organisation of the army and the organisation of the community of Polish historians. The first institutions were established soon after arrival in the United Kingdom. After the end of the war, a number of Polish historians decided to remain abroad and the process of establishing academic institutions began, giving rise to Polish historical science in the UK. The General Sikorski Historical Institute was the first institution to be established, and other institutions soon followed, including the Piłsudski Institute in London, the Polish Underground Movement Study Trust, the Polish Historical Society in Great Britain, the Polish University Abroad, and the Polish Library.

Review of vols. 1–3 of a book series 'Muzyka polska za granicą' [Polish Music Abroad], eds. Beata Bolesławska-Lewandowska and Jolanta Guzy-Pasiak, Warszawa: Instytut Sztuki PAN, 2017–2020. Vol. 1: Twórcy – Źródła – Archiwa [Composers, Sources, and Archives]; Vol. 2: Między Warszawą a Paryżem (1918–1939) [Between Warsaw and Paris (1918–1939)]; Vol. 3: ‘American Dream’: Polscy Twórcy za oceanem [‘American Dream’: Polish Composers across the Atlantic].

The most famous Vilnius book-shop of the beginning of the 20th century was established on the 18th of January 1906. The official owner of the book-shop was M. Šlapelienė. She worked without break during all the time of the book-shop’s existing. The real manager was J. Šlapelis, who managed the commerce of the book-shop. The third owner E. Brazaitytė worked in the book-shop till 1907. The book-shop of M. Šlapelienė was acting without break during 39 years. It was rare case in history of lithuanian book-shops. Wars, national oppression realized by occupation power made the work of the book-shop very difficult. The most harmful were searches that were done by polish occupation power.The book-shop of M. Šlapelienė was of great cultural importance. During the war (1914) it provided with books and manuals new-established Lithuanian schools. Lithuanian libraries, acting in Lithuania and abroad, received books from this book-shop. The book-shop also had commercial lent library. The work of the book-shop was stopped in 1944, when Soviet government prohibited to hold private commercial institutions.

The History of Stupidity in Poland. The historiographic pamphlets [Dzieje głupoty w Polsce. Pamflety dziejopisarskie] was the most important publication by Aleksander Bocheński. The book was also one of the most representative reflections on the post-war trend of political realism in Poland. The journalistic reaction to the first edition of the book in the forties of the 20th century proved that the theses included in it were highly unpopular. The author’s criticism of insurrection trends in Polish politics met with opposition from Marxists as well as non-party intellectuals, both at home and abroad. Although motives of Bocheński’s concepts were usually understood, they were rejected as they served communists, were contrary to Marxist doctrine or had no moral foundations. Those opinions constitute an important contribution to the views of Polish intelligentsia on political realism at the beginnings of the Polish People’s Republic.

POLISH POST-WAR RESEARCH INTO THE HISTORY OF PUBLISHING IN POLAND: ACHIEVEMENTS AND RESEARCH PROPOSALSThe history of publishing in Poland encompasses many issues associated with the emergence and dissemination of printed books. Of fundamental significance to the study of these issues are the records of the publishing output: while we have nearly complete — though requiring further exploration — records of this output for 15th–18th centuries, documented in bibliographies and catalogues, the situation is worse when it comes to the 19th and 20th centuries, until the outbreak of the Second World War. In this respect what we need is not only a continuation, but a radical intensification of bibliographic work. This concerns works published in the Latin, Cyrillic, Hebrew and Greek scripts as well as musical notation. Polish book scholars devoted a lot of attention to the beginnings of printing in Poland; the historiography concerning various typographic workshops located in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth is rich, though it still requires further extensive studies. The scholars were also interested in phenomena influencing the content structure of printed publications, like publishing privileges in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, censorship as well as restrictions imposed by the partitioning powers and later by Poland’s communist authorities, as a result of which Polish publications had to be printed abroad and an independent publishing movement emerged. The scholars’ research interests also focused on books as products of the work of printers and publishers, on the publication of written works. They focused both on the various components of the book title page, printer’s signet, stemmata etc. and on its editorial composition as a whole.The scholars’ undoubted achievements in their studies of the history of publishing in Poland are significant, yet in many areas they need to be continued and expanded an important task is an edition of sources for the study of the history of Polish publishing, and concentrated on the phenomena that stem from developmental tendencies in modern book studies.

The article seeks to provide an answer to a question why the book <em>Uznanie nabytk&oacute;w terytorialnych w prawie międzynarodowym</em> (which translates to Recognition of territorial acquisitions in international law) by a Polish scholar, B. Wiewi&oacute;ra, did not receive wide acclaim abroad despite its scientific level being at least equal in quality to foreign monographs on the subject published at the time. It examines the life of B. Wiewi&oacute;ra, his scholarly achievements and accomplishments in the field of recognition of territorial acquisitions, including their importance for Polish literature on international law.

The history of publishing in Poland encompasses many issues associated with the emergence and dissemination of printed books. Of fundamental significance to the study of these issues are the records of the publishing output: while we have nearly complete, though still underexamined, records of this output for the period from the 15th to the 18th century, documented in bibliographies and catalogues, the situation is worse when it comes to the 19th and 20th centuries, until the outbreak of the Second World War. In this respect, what we need is not only a continuation, but a radical intensification of bibliographic work. This concerns works published in the Latin, Cyrillic, Hebrew and Greek scripts, as well as musical notation. Polish book scholars have devoted a lot of attention to the beginnings of printing in Poland. The historiography concerning various typographic workshops located in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth is rich; however, it still requires further extensive studies. Scholars have also been interested in phenomena influ- encing the content structure of printed publications, such as publishing privileges (in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth), censorship and restrictions imposed by the partitioning powers and later by Poland’s communist authorities, as a result of which Polish publications had to be printed abroad and an independent publishing movement emerged. The scholars’ research interests have also focused on books as products of printers and publishers and on the publication of written works. Scholars have examined both the various components of the book (title page, printer’s signet, stemmata, etc.) and its editorial composition as a whole. Their undoubted achievements in the studies of the history of publishing in Poland are significant, yet in many areas they need to be continued and expanded (one important task is the edition of sources for the study of the history of Polish publishing) and to investigate the phenomena that stem from developmental tendencies in modern book studies.

The aim of the article is to present Regina Wasiak-Taylor – a person of many talents, as a journalist, an efficient animator of the cultural life of the Polish diaspora in Great Britain, a president of the Union of Polish Writers Abroad [hereinafter: ZPPnO – Związek Pisarzy Polskich na Obczyźnie]. The following methods have been used: qualitative analysis of the press content, critical analysis of documents, heuristic analysis, interviews. We get to know Mrs Wasiak-Taylor’s scope of activity: involvement in the organisational life of the ZPPnO, in the Pamiętnik Literacki [Literary Memoir] edited in London, practicing socio-cultural journalism and literary criticism, writing scientific articles, popularisation of the emigration’s literary life and Polish ballet, organizing, among others, multimedia theatre and stage programmes – Poetic Scene [Scena Poetycka] at the Polish Social and Cultural Association [POSK – Polski Ośrodek Społeczno-Kulturalny] in London. Also: initiation of the Literary Parlour within the Polish Watchfire at the Exhibition Road, addressed to the Polish and international intelligentsia in London, active participation in international scientific conferences. Regina Wasiak-Taylor conducts editorial work on books. She is the author of readings, laudations, and her own publications: Dzieje Nagrody Literackiej ZPPnO 1951–2011 [The History of the Literary Award of the ZPPnO 1951–2011] (London 2011), Ojczyzna literatura [Literature Fatherland] (London 2013), Alfabet wspomnień Szymona Zaremby. II Rzeczpospolita, II wojna światowa, emigracja [Szymon Zaremba’s Alphabet of Memories, Second Polish Republic, World War II, emigration] (London 2015). She initiates and promotes books by Polish authors and moderates other meetings of literary and scientific circles at the Polish Embassy in London, at the International Book Fair in Warsaw and at literary events in various places.

Mieczysław Treter is by no means an ordinary individual: an art historian, aesthetician, museum practitioner and theoretician-museologist, an individual of many professions, lecturer, journal editor, member of numerous organizations, propagator of Polish art abroad, manager, exhibition organizer. In the interwar period one of the most influential critics and art theoreticians, among the museum circles he was mainly known as the author of the recently reissued 1917 publication called Contemporary Museums. Museological Study. Beginnings, Types, Essence, and Organization of Museums. Public Museum Collections in Poland and Their Future Development. Born on 2 August 1883 in Lvov, in 1904 Mieczysław Henryk Treter started working with the Prince Lubomirski Museum as the scholarship holder of the Lvov Ossolineum. In 1910, he became Curator at the Museum, performing this function until the outbreak of WW I. He participated in the First Congress of Polish Museologists, held in Cracow on 4 and 5 April 1914. During WW I, he was in Kharkov and Crimea, and it was there that he wrote his most important study Contemporary Museums. In 1917, having moved to Kiev he became involved in the activity of the social movement for the care of Polish monuments throughout the former Russian Empire. In 1918, he returned to Lvov, became member of the national Eastern Galicia Conservation Circle, and retook the position of the Curator at the Prince Lubomirski Museum, to finally become its Director. On 4 February 1922, Mieczysław Treter was appointed Director of the State Art Collections, the position he retained until 1924. In 1926, he became Director of the Society for the Promotion of Polish Art Abroad, whose main task was to promote works of Polish artists in Poland and abroad. He passed away in Warsaw on 25 October 1943. Systematizing the theoretical knowledge and the report on the existing museums in the country deprived of its statehood in the book Contemporary Museums created a departure point for its Author, who following Poland’s regaining independence worked out the organization of state collections. Treter’s proposals were to regulate the position of Polish museum institutions complicated due to the partition period, for them, while rivaling foreign museums, to become elements boosting the young state’s prestige.

The authors present the characteristics of Jesuit libraries in the Kingdom of Hungary in terms of their content, with special focus on works by the most influential Jesuit authors, which were among the most numerous ones in Hungarian Jesuit libraries. The authors also draw attention to the most popular titles published by the Hungarian Jesuits in the 17th century, which can be considered bestsellers of Baroque Catholic literature not only in the Kingdom of Hungary, but also abroad. Many of them also found their readers in Poland and were translated into Polish. Furthermore, the authors point to the interconnection between Hungarian and Polish Jesuit book culture and the Jesuit Polonica in Hungarian Jesuit libraries and typographies of the 17th-18th century. The Hungarian book culture does not mean the book culture of contemporary Hungary, but of Kingdom of Hungary. This paper focus on the Jesuits from the Slovak territory, which was a part of Kingdom of Hungary for 800 years (from 11th century to 1918). The essential research sources are the international educational program Ratio Atque Institutio Studiorum Societatis Jesu and catalogues of Hungarian Jesuit libraries, located in Slovakia, from the years 1632–1782.

This book is a tribute to Giovanna Brogi Bercoff, Full Professor of History of Russian at the State University of Milan and a leading authority on Polish studies, mediaeval Russian literature and Ukrainian studies, both in Italy and abroad. Former Chairman of the Associazione Italiana degli Slavisti, she contributed to project Italian Slavic studies into an international dimension. Among the most significant aspects of her intense academic and teaching career we should mention the pioneering studies on historiography and the Baroque culture in the Slavic area, as well as the introduction of Ukrainian studies at the University of Milan. The authors of the essays collected here, which range from linguistics to philology, and from literary theory to history, are Italian and foreign scholars of different generations and different cultural backgrounds.

This book develops the theme of teaching Italian abroad, starting from the awareness of the motivations for foreign students to study the Italian language and the different methodological procedures in order to teach it.For this purpose, the book focuses on the problems concerning the training of teachers of Italian to foreigners and on the many aspects of teaching Italian in order to propose both a methodological reflection on the edulinguistic project and educational solutions aimed at improving the quality of the students’ learning.Part 1The first part focuses on edulinguistic teaching vision for the learning of the Italian language as a foreign language based upon the principles of the Humanistic Approach.1. Teaching Italian Language Abroad: Institutional Language Policy and StrategiesThis chapter focuses on the situation of Italian foreign language teaching in the world. It also describes the linguistic policy for the promotion of Italian languages abroad adopted by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the results obtained as the number of students involved in the different geographic areas.2. Teaching Trainer Courses as a Key Factor to Improve the Quality of Teaching Italian AbroadIn this chapter teaching trainer courses for Italian language teachers are considered as a part of a strategy to increase the students’ motivations and the learning process.3. Students as a Customer vs Students as a PersonLinguistic education and the Humanistic Approach aim to develop the students’ potential and create an autonomous language personality. Therefore, in this chapter, we outline a teaching perspective that considers the student as a person at the centre of teaching and learning Italian process.Part 2In the second part teaching methodologies to improve the quality of teaching and learning Italian language to foreigners are described.4. Effective Cooperative Learning Strategies to Teach Italian as a Foreign LanguageExamples of cooperative learning are given to illustrate how the following teaching methodology is possible in teaching Italian language even if it demands strong research and clear guidance for educators.5. How to Teach Italian Grammar to ForeignersThis chapter examines the existing research about using a deductive form of teaching grammar versus using an inductive form of teaching it.6. Teaching Italian Through Literature, Movies and CartoonsIn this chapter, different media and sources to teach Italian are examined. Using both classic and digital tools, students can explore the Italian language and culture from different points of view, developing a strategy to revisit thinking and to collaborate with others during the reading of classic texts or reading a cartoon.7. Humanistic Testing and Assessment for Italian as a Foreign LanguageFrom a Humanistic point of view, in this chapter, testing and assessment are considered as potential and relevant instruments to measure the progress and performance of individual students of Italian language.8. How to Plan and Use an Environment to Teach Italian to ForeignersThis chapter focuses on learning space to teach Italian to foreigners. The main aim is to provide practical advice and support to the teachers of Italian language schools that are going to explore how to develop and adapt learning spaces to the teaching activities and the students’ needs.

This book examines the role of the papacy and the crusade in the religious life of the late twelfth through late thirteenth centuries and beyond. Throughout the book, the contributors ask several important questions. Was Innocent III more theologian than lawyer-pope and how did his personal experience of earlier crusade campaigns inform his own vigorous promotion of the crusades? How did the outlook and policy of Honorius III differ from that of Innocent III in crucial areas including the promotion of multiple crusades (including the Fifth Crusade and the crusade of William of Montferrat) and how were both pope’s mindsets manifested in writings associated with them? What kind of men did Honorius III and Innocent III select to promote their plans for reform and crusade? How did the laity make their own mark on the crusade through participation in the peace movements which were so crucial to the stability in Europe essential for enabling crusaders to fulfill their vows abroad and through joining in the liturgical processions and prayers deemed essential for divine favor at home and abroad? Further essays explore the commemoration of crusade campaigns through the deliberate construction of physical and literary paths of remembrance. Yet while the enemy was often constructed in a deliberately polarizing fashion, did confessional differences really determine the way in which Latin crusaders and their descendants interacted with the Muslim world or did a more pragmatic position of ‘rough tolerance’ shape mundane activities including trade agreements and treaties?

The relevance of the book is determined by the growing demand on the part of the state and society for the formation of the state historical policy of Russia. The spread of anti—Russian historical myths, including revisionist myths regarding the history of the Second World War, issues of patriotic education of Russian citizens, the need to form a common civil identity - all this actualizes the state's targeted appeal to the problems of history, which was reflected in the relevant amendments to the Constitution of the Russian Federation. The textbook reveals the basic foundations of the methodology, techniques and content of the formation of historical policy, summarizes the world and Russian experience of its implementation. The problematic agenda, challenges and threats for Russia related to the perception and interpretation of the past both at home and abroad are reconstructed.&#x0D; Meets the requirements of the federal state educational standards of higher education of the latest generation.&#x0D; The presented textbook is aimed at use in the university educational process in preparation for bachelor's and master's degree courses on 03/41/04 and 04/41/04 "Political Science", but can be used in the training of historians and history teachers.

This chapter examines the American career of Tadeusz Zygfryd Kassern. It recalls the personality of Kassern as a forgotten composer and one of the most neglected Polish composers of the twentieth century. It also references Violetta Kostka's book Tadeusz Zygfryd Kassern as the most substantial source of information about him. The chapter looks into Kassern's appointment as cultural attaché in the Polish consulate in New York in October 1945, of which the decision was based on his experience as a lawyer, familiarity with the Polish cultural milieu in Poland and abroad, and knowledge of several foreign languages. It recounts how Kassern organized shipments of printed music, books, musical instruments, and clothes and food to Poland as part of the Chopin Fund that was initiated by the pianist Artur Rubinstein.

(Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1997); pp. xiv + 190 + 28 illus. The author of this book is well known among Polish historians. Since 1983 he has visited Poland several times and studied Polish–Jewish relations on site. In his new book he undertakes the difficult task of analysing the changing attitudes of Polish society towards the Holocaust, until 1995. He is probably the best person to write such a book. The Polish and Jewish historians who spent the Second World War in Poland or who are living now in Poland seem the best situated for gathering sources. They are, however, significantly affected by past and contemporary debates over the problems discussed in this book, and it would be difficult for them to free themselves from their own personal experiences. Yet most of the scholars living abroad are too far from the primary sources. Michael Steinlauf, who was born in France, speaks all the necessary languages (Polish and Yiddish, notably), has spent a long time in Poland, and has many Polish friends. He is free from the most significant personal biases and, at the same time, has the necessary knowledge of Polish literature, the press, and the people. He can, therefore, understand the problems and has sufficient distance from Poland and her current hot quarrels to view them with a properly critical eye....

This chapter looks at Jerzy Tomaszewski's A Republic of Many Nations (1985). This book began, as is often the case, in a much humbler form, as a cycle of articles published in 1981 in the Warsaw weekly Folksztyme, the organ of Poland's now non-existent Jews. The articles took as their subject, the Jews of Poland in the inter-war years 1918–1939. The author, Professor Jerzy Tomaszewski, is an outstanding economic historian, a Pole who knows Yiddish and is also concerned with the history of national minorities in Poland. The weekly Folksztyme is read by Jews abroad and also has its Polish readers. Tomaszewski's articles found a keen audience among the latter.

This chapter investigates how pictures taken by photographers from outside the east European Jewish community became widely familiar throughout the post-war period, none more so than the work of one photographer, Roman Vishniac. Taken during a series of trips he made to Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Romania from the mid-1930s until the start of the Second World War, some of these photographs have been republished frequently, including in five books devoted solely to the photographer's work. Vishniac's images figured prominently in the first exhibitions and books of photographs of pre-war east European Jewish life to appear in the United States after the Second World War, and not a decade has passed since without some of these photographs being published or exhibited there, as well as abroad. Although these pictures are the product of a limited phase in Vishniac's career, they are his best-known accomplishment. For many post-war Americans, in particular, some of his images have served as key visual points of entry into the culture of pre-war east European Jewry.

To combat communism abroad, the United States not only lent support for democratic struggles abroad but became more welcoming to groups and regions that were anti-communist and believed in the virtues of democracy. On the heels of the Immigration Act of 1965, which removed discrimination measures against Southern and Eastern Europeans, Asians, and other non–Western and Northern European ethnic groups, the Cuban Adjustment Act made permanent residency easier for Cubans. Drawing on the long, shared history of the United States and Cuba, President Lyndon Johnson supported Cuban exiles escaping Castro’s regime. The Cuban Adjustment Act was a foreign policy measure intended to promote the tenets of U.S. democracy in the face of communist aggression.

In the 1930s, Congress watched the expanding war in Europe with concern. Many in Congress did not want to become involved in another European war, preferring to remain neutral. Some of these legislators thought that American foreign policy should be directed toward keeping America isolated from the conflicts abroad. President Franklin Roosevelt did not agree with the policy of isolation, or restraint from involvement in foreign affairs, particularly wars. The Neutrality Acts of 1935 and of 1937, written with the intent to keep America safe when other nations were at war, prevented American industry from selling weapons and ammunition to nations involved in war. The idea was that by not selling arms to any side involved in a war, America could remain neutral and continue to trade non–military products with both sides.

At 8:30 in the evening on September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush addressed the nation on television and radio. His five-minute address was delivered in response to terrorist attacks on the nation that had taken place some twelve hours earlier. The attacks would become a defining moment in the Bush presidency and for the nation, leading ultimately to changes in American foreign policy, military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq, and years of controversy about appropriate and legal ways to combat terrorism at home and abroad. In his address, the president attempted to rally the nation to fight terrorism, to reassure people that the U.S. government was still functioning, to enlist the support of other nations in opposing terrorism, and to vow to bring to justice those responsible for the attacks.

At 8:30 in the evening on September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush addressed the nation on television and radio. His five-minute address was delivered in response to terrorist attacks on the nation that had taken place some twelve hours earlier. The attacks would become a defining moment in the Bush presidency and for the nation, leading ultimately to changes in American foreign policy, military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq, and years of controversy about appropriate and legal ways to combat terrorism at home and abroad. In his address, the president attempted to rally the nation to fight terrorism, to reassure people that the U.S. government was still functioning, to enlist the support of other nations in opposing terrorism, and to vow to bring to justice those responsible for the attacks.

Abstract The open door policy was an integral part of China’s new development strategies adopted by the country’s leadership since 1978 to modernize its economy. A comprehensive evaluation of China’s open door strategy requires a detailed analysis of its six main features, which are trade liberalization, foreign direct investment (FOI) liberalization, utilization of foreign loans, exports of labour for construction work abroad, the development of special economic zones, and the development of the tourist industry. Within the space limitations of this book it is impossible to discuss all of these policy elements or to analyse them exhaustively. Instead this and the following chapter focus on the first and second elements, namely trade and FDI liberalization only.

Abstract Chapter 2 lays out the two key questions the book asks and answers. First, when do leaders fear that a revolution abroad will infect their own polity? It argues that the fear of contagion is more the product of the host than the infecting revolutionary agent. Leaders fear contagion effects when they have significant revolutionary movements of the same character as the revolutionary state. Whether the revolutionary state has a policy of exporting revolution is not the critical factor. Second, what are the international effects of this fear of revolutionary contagion? When leaders have these contagion concerns, they will be hostile toward the revolutionary state and cooperate with states that have similar concerns, sometimes in contrast to geopolitical pressures. The chapter describes how the theory will be tested and provides a preview of the findings.

The depopulation of rural areas in Bulgaria is a complex and long-lasting process that began in the mid-20th century. The sizable internal population movements from rural to urban areas in Bulgaria during the communist era led to rapid urbanisation. This was as the result of forced collectivisation and industrialisation. Further rural depopulation was exacerbated by mass emigration abroad in the first two decades of the post-communist transition. This led to a serious deterioration in the demographic, economic, social, and cultural characteristics of rural areas. However, in the last decade, although the general trend of decreasing rural population (and the country’s population in general) has been maintained, the number of movements from rural to urban areas has been smaller than those in the opposite direction. These movements include both returnees to their ancestral villages and new settlers buying rural property. The newcomers also include Bulgarian citizens who have returned from living and working abroad, as well as foreigners who have chosen to settle in Bulgarian villages. The paper aims to provide an overview of the research work on counter-urbanisation in the country that has been carried out by a research team from the Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Studies with Ethnographic Institute and Museum of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences since 2018. The conceptual framework of the research will be presented. Aiming to investigate the forms and mechanisms of social, cultural, and economic interaction between rural newcomers themselves and with local residents, and how this affects rural transformation, we integrate ethnography with approaches from other disciplines such as social geography, rural sociology, human ecology, policy studies, etc. Key research questions that we address include: What attitudes and prerequisites do locals and newcomers have towards each other? How are different cultural perceptions reconciled in rural settings? How are different knowledge and habits transferred and assimilated? To what extent are compromises made in a diversifying rural environment? What are the potential sources of conflict and what are the strategies for resolving them? How the practices and activities of each group affect the rural landscape and shape the ways in which existing local environments, assets and resources are used.

For the first time, one of the popular children’s magazines of the Western Ukrainian Diaspora “Young Friends” became the subject of research. Founded in March 1955, it ceased to exist in 1984. There is no complete filing of this newspaper in any book collection of Ukraine, it has not been digitized yet, the editorial office did not have a site. For this reason, the author conducted a study of this journal in the library-archive of the Union of Ukrainians in Great Britain (UUB) in London. The peculiarities of journal formation and the specifics of the editorial policy are clarified. The experience of publishing a Ukrainian children’s magazine abroad for a long time (in color and on chalk paper) without any financial support from the state, but only by public money, is quite instructive for the current situation in Ukraine when children’s periodicals have almost disappeared from the national information space due to indifferent contemplation of the state.

Banco de la República is celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2023. This is a very significant anniversary and one that provides an opportunity to highlight the contribution the Bank has made to the country’s development. Its track record as guarantor of monetary stability has established it as the one independent state institution that generates the greatest confidence among Colombians due to its transparency, management capabilities, and effective compliance with the central banking and cultural responsibilities entrusted to it by the Constitution and the Law. On a date as important as this, the Board of Directors of Banco de la República (BDBR) pays tribute to the generations of governors and officers whose commitment and dedication have contributed to the growth of this institution.1 Banco de la República’s mandate was confirmed in the National Constitutional Assembly of 1991 where the citizens had the opportunity to elect the seventy people who would have the task of drafting a new constitution. The leaders of the three political movements with the most votes were elected as chairs to the Assembly, and this tripartite presidency reflected the plurality and the need for consensus among the different political groups to move the reform forward. Among the issues considered, the National Constitutional Assembly gave special importance to monetary stability. That is why they decided to include central banking and to provide Banco de la República with the necessary autonomy to use the instruments for which they are responsible without interference from other authorities. The constituent members understood that ensuring price stability is a state duty and that the entity responsible for this task must be enshrined in the Constitution and have the technical capability and institutional autonomy necessary to adopt the decisions they deem appropriate to achieve this fundamental objective in coordination with the general economic policy. In particular, Article 373 established that “the State, through Banco de la República, shall ensure the maintenance of the purchasing power of the currency,” a provision that coincided with the central banking system adopted by countries that have been successful in controlling inflation. In 1999, in Ruling 481, the Constitutional Court stated that “the duty to maintain the purchasing power of the currency applies to not only the monetary, credit, and exchange authority, i.e., the Board of Banco de la República, but also those who have responsibilities in the formulation and implementation of the general economic policy of the country” and that “the basic constitutional purpose of Banco de la República is the protection of a sound currency. However, this authority must take the other economic objectives of state intervention such as full employment into consideration in their decisions since these functions must be coordinated with the general economic policy.” The reforms to Banco de la República agreed upon in the Constitutional Assembly of 1991 and in Act 31/1992 can be summarized in the following aspects: i) the Bank was assigned a specific mandate: to maintain the purchasing power of the currency in coordination with the general economic policy; ii) the BDBR was designatedas the monetary, foreign exchange, and credit authority; iii) the Bank and its Board of Directors were granted a significant degree of independence from the government; iv) the Bank was prohibited from granting credit to the private sector except in the case of the financial sector; v) established that in order to grant credit to the government, the unanimous vote of its Board of Directors was required except in the case of open market transactions; vi) determined that the legislature may, in no case, order credit quotas in favor of the State or individuals; vii) Congress was appointed, on behalf of society, as the main addressee of the Bank’s reporting exercise; and viii) the responsibility for inspection, surveillance, and control over Banco de la República was delegated to the President of the Republic. The members of the National Constitutional Assembly clearly understood that the benefits of low and stable inflation extend to the whole of society and contribute mto the smooth functioning of the economic system. Among the most important of these is that low inflation promotes the efficient use of productive resources by allowing relative prices to better guide the allocation of resources since this promotes economic growth and increases the welfare of the population. Likewise, low inflation reduces uncertainty about the expected return on investment and future asset prices. This increases the confidence of economic agents, facilitates long-term financing, and stimulates investment. Since the low-income population is unable to protect itself from inflation by diversifying its assets, and a high proportion of its income is concentrated in the purchase of food and other basic goods that are generally the most affected by inflationary shocks, low inflation avoids arbitrary redistribution of income and wealth.2 Moreover, low inflation facilitates wage negotiations, creates a good labor climate, and reduces the volatility of employment levels. Finally, low inflation helps to make the tax system more transparent and equitable by avoiding the distortions that inflation introduces into the value of assets and income that make up the tax base. From the monetary authority’s point of view, one of the most relevant benefits of low inflation is the credibility that economic agents acquire in inflation targeting, which turns it into an effective nominal anchor on price levels. Upon receiving its mandate, and using its autonomy, Banco de la República began to announce specific annual inflation targets as of 1992. Although the proposed inflation targets were not met precisely during this first stage, a downward trend in inflation was achieved that took it from 32.4% in 1990 to 16.7% in 1998. At that time, the exchange rate was kept within a band. This limited the effectiveness of monetary policy, which simultaneously sought to meet an inflation target and an exchange rate target. The Asian crisis spread to emerging economies and significantly affected the Colombian economy. The exchange rate came under strong pressure to depreciate as access to foreign financing was cut off under conditions of a high foreign imbalance. This, together with the lack of exchange rate flexibility, prevented a countercyclical monetary policy and led to a 4.2% contraction in GDP that year. In this context of economic slowdown, annual inflation fell to 9.2% at the end of 1999, thus falling below the 15% target set for that year. This episode fully revealed how costly it could be, in terms of economic activity, to have inflation and exchange rate targets simultaneously. Towards the end of 1999, Banco de la República announced the adoption of a new monetary policy regime called the Inflation Targeting Plan. This regime, known internationally as ‘Inflation Targeting,’ has been gaining increasing acceptance in developed countries, having been adopted in 1991 by New Zealand, Canada, and England, among others, and has achieved significant advances in the management of inflation without incurring costs in terms of economic activity. In Latin America, Brazil and Chile also adopted it in 1999. In the case of Colombia, the last remaining requirement to be fulfilled in order to adopt said policy was exchange rate flexibility. This was realized around September 1999, when the BDBR decided to abandon the exchange-rate bands to allow the exchange rate to be freely determined in the market.Consistent with the constitutional mandate, the fundamental objective of this new policy approach was “the achievement of an inflation target that contributes to maintaining output growth around its potential.”3 This potential capacity was understood as the GDP growth that the economy can obtain if it fully utilizes its productive resources. To meet this objective, monetary policy must of necessity play a countercyclical role in the economy. This is because when economic activity is below its potential and there are idle resources, the monetary authority can reduce the interest rate in the absence of inflationary pressure to stimulate the economy and, when output exceeds its potential capacity, raise it. This policy principle, which is immersed in the models for guiding the monetary policy stance, makes the following two objectives fully compatible in the medium term: meeting the inflation target and achieving a level of economic activity that is consistent with its productive capacity. To achieve this purpose, the inflation targeting system uses the money market interest rate (at which the central bank supplies primary liquidity to commercial banks) as the primary policy instrument. This replaced the quantity of money as an intermediate monetary policy target that Banco de la República, like several other central banks, had used for a long time. In the case of Colombia, the objective of the new monetary policy approach implied, in practical terms, that the recovery of the economy after the 1999 contraction should be achieved while complying with the decreasing inflation targets established by the BDBR. The accomplishment of this purpose was remarkable. In the first half of the first decade of the 2000s, economic activity recovered significantly and reached a growth rate of 6.8% in 2006. Meanwhile, inflation gradually declined in line with inflation targets. That was how the inflation rate went from 9.2% in 1999 to 4.5% in 2006, thus meeting the inflation target established for that year while GDP reached its potential level. After this balance was achieved in 2006, inflation rebounded to 5.7% in 2007, above the 4.0% target for that year due to the fact that the 7.5% GDP growth exceeded the potential capacity of the economy.4 After proving the effectiveness of the inflation targeting system in its first years of operation, this policy regime continued to consolidate as the BDBR and the technical staff gained experience in its management and state-of-the-art economic models were incorporated to diagnose the present and future state of the economy and to assess the persistence of inflation deviations and expectations with respect to the inflation target. Beginning in 2010, the BDBR established the long-term 3.0% annual inflation target, which remains in effect today. Lower inflation has contributed to making the macroeconomic environment more stable, and this has favored sustained economic growth, financial stability, capital market development, and the functioning of payment systems. As a result, reductions in the inflationary risk premia and lower TES and credit interest rates were achieved. At the same time, the duration of public domestic debt increased significantly going from 2.27 years in December 2002 to 5.86 years in December 2022, and financial deepening, measured as the level of the portfolio as a percentage of GDP, went from around 20% in the mid-1990s to values above 45% in recent years in a healthy context for credit institutions.Having been granted autonomy by the Constitution to fulfill the mandate of preserving the purchasing power of the currency, the tangible achievements made by Banco de la República in managing inflation together with the significant benefits derived from the process of bringing inflation to its long-term target, make the BDBR’s current challenge to return inflation to the 3.0% target even more demanding and pressing. As is well known, starting in 2021, and especially in 2022, inflation in Colombia once again became a serious economic problem with high welfare costs. The inflationary phenomenon has not been exclusive to Colombia and many other developed and emerging countries have seen their inflation rates move away from the targets proposed by their central banks.5 The reasons for this phenomenon have been analyzed in recent Reports to Congress, and this new edition delves deeper into the subject with updated information. The solid institutional and technical base that supports the inflation targeting approach under which the monetary policy strategy operates gives the BDBR the necessary elements to face this difficult challenge with confidence. In this regard, the BDBR reiterated its commitment to the 3.0% inflation target in its November 25 communiqué and expects it to be reached by the end of 2024.6 Monetary policy will continue to focus on meeting this objective while ensuring the sustainability of economic activity, as mandated by the Constitution. Analyst surveys done in March showed a significant increase (from 32.3% in January to 48.5% in March) in the percentage of responses placing inflation expectations two years or more ahead in a range between 3.0% and 4.0%. This is a clear indication of the recovery of credibility in the medium-term inflation target and is consistent with the BDBR’s announcement made in November 2022. The moderation of the upward trend in inflation seen in January, and especially in February, will help to reinforce this revision of inflation expectations and will help to meet the proposed targets. After reaching 5.6% at the end of 2021, inflation maintained an upward trend throughout 2022 due to inflationary pressures from both external sources, associated with the aftermath of the pandemic and the consequences of the war in Ukraine, and domestic sources, resulting from: strengthening of local demand; price indexation processes stimulated by the increase in inflation expectations; the impact on food production caused by the mid-2021 strike; and the pass-through of depreciation to prices. The 10% increase in the minimum wage in 2021 and the 16% increase in 2022, both of which exceeded the actual inflation and the increase in productivity, accentuated the indexation processes by establishing a high nominal adjustment benchmark. Thus, total inflation went to 13.1% by the end of 2022. The annual change in food prices, which went from 17.2% to 27.8% between those two years, was the most influential factor in the surge in the Consumer Price Index (CPI). Another segment that contributed significantly to price increases was regulated products, which saw the annual change go from 7.1% in December 2021 to 11.8% by the end of 2022. The measure of core inflation excluding food and regulated items, in turn, went from 2.5% to 9.5% between the end of 2021 and the end of 2022. The substantial increase in core inflation shows that inflationary pressure has spread to most of the items in the household basket, which is characteristic of inflationary processes with generalized price indexation as is the case in Colombia. Monetary policy began to react early to this inflationary pressure. Thus, starting with its September 2021 session, the BDBR began a progressive change in the monetary policy stance moving away from the historical low of a 1.75% policy rate that had intended to stimulate the recovery of the economy. This adjustment process continued without interruption throughout 2022 and into the beginning of 2023 when the monetary policy rate reached 12.75% last January, thus accumulating an increase of 11 percentage points (pp). The public and the markets have been surprised that inflation continued to rise despite significant interest rate increases. However, as the BDBR has explained in its various communiqués, monetary policy works with a lag. Just as in 2022 economic activity recovered to a level above the pre-pandemic level, driven, along with other factors, by the monetary stimulus granted during the pandemic period and subsequent months, so too the effects of the current restrictive monetary policy will gradually take effect. This will allow us to expect the inflation rate to converge to 3.0% by the end of 2024 as is the BDBR’s purpose.Inflation results for January and February of this year showed declining marginal increases (13 bp and 3 bp respectively) compared to the change seen in December (59 bp). This suggests that a turning point in the inflation trend is approaching. In other Latin American countries such as Chile, Brazil, Perú, and Mexico, inflation has peaked and has begun to decline slowly, albeit with some ups and downs. It is to be expected that a similar process will take place in Colombia in the coming months. The expected decline in inflation in 2023 will be due, along with other factors, to lower cost pressure from abroad as a result of the gradual normalization of supply chains, the overcoming of supply shocks caused by the weather, and road blockades in previous years. This will be reflected in lower adjustments in food prices, as has already been seen in the first two months of the year and, of course, the lagged effect of monetary policy. The process of inflation convergence to the target will be gradual and will extend beyond 2023. This process will be facilitated if devaluation pressure is reversed. To this end, it is essential to continue consolidating fiscal sustainability and avoid messages on different public policy fronts that generate uncertainty and distrust. 1 This Report to Congress includes Box 1, which summarizes the trajectory of Banco de la República over the past 100 years. In addition, under the Bank’s auspices, several books that delve into various aspects of the history of this institution have been published in recent years. See, for example: Historia del Banco de la República 1923-2015; Tres banqueros centrales; Junta Directiva del Banco de la República: grandes episodios en 30 años de historia; Banco de la República: 90 años de la banca central en Colombia. 2 This is why lower inflation has been reflected in a reduction of income inequality as measured by the Gini coefficient that went from 58.7 in 1998 to 51.3 in the year prior to the pandemic. 3 See Gómez Javier, Uribe José Darío, Vargas Hernando (2002). “The Implementation of Inflation Targeting in Colombia”. Borradores de Economía, No. 202, March, available at: https://repositorio.banrep.gov.co/handle/20.500.12134/5220 4 See López-Enciso Enrique A.; Vargas-Herrera Hernando and Rodríguez-Niño Norberto (2016). “The inflation targeting strategy in Colombia. An historical view.” Borradores de Economía, No. 952. https://repositorio.banrep.gov.co/handle/20.500.12134/6263 5 According to the IMF, the percentage change in consumer prices between 2021 and 2022 went from 3.1% to 7.3% for advanced economies, and from 5.9% to 9.9% for emerging market and developing economies. 6 https://www.banrep.gov.co/es/noticias/junta-directiva-banco-republica-reitera-meta-inflacion-3