Agrarianism as an Ideology of Peasant Movements in Bulgaria and Poland Until World War II

Abstract

This study deals with the problems of formation and adoption of agrarianism in Eastern Europe (on the basis of Bulgarian and Polish example) as an ideоlogy of peasent movement. Al the begining of 20 century it turned out that the peasanls were pushed to find an ideology of their own, which would defend their specific interests in the backward Easteuropean societies. Agrarianism become such an ideology. The evolution of the ideas of agrarianism (the Bulgarian term for it is "estate theory") led the peasant movement to the idea of the necessity of taking political power. In Bulgaria Bulgarian agrarian people's union came to power and tried to realise the Ideas of agrarianism during the period 1919 - 1923. This attempt proved that „the third way" between capitalism and stalinist socialism was not possible in the existing conditions. Nevertheless the ideas of agrarianism survived in Buigarian sociely, in Polish society they remained as an alternalive for development, in spite of their later adoption (after 1931). In Bulgaria, as well as in Poland, this alternative is democratic, but it is based on the possibility of preserving the existing society of pre-capitalist period, which is the basic reason for its utopian character.