Search

The extension of legal protection to natural areas has often been artificially confined within the borders of given countries. The border between Poland and Slovakia offers a very good example of this. While the very beginnings of this trend date back to the eighteenth century, it was here in the 1930s that early cross-border cooperation made its appearance. The solutions arrived at justifying their pioneering status, by the standards of Europe and the globe. Initiatives included the establishment in the Pieniny Mountains of Europe's first (and the world's second) transboundary protected area, as well as the founding of a world-first tripartite UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in the Eastern Carpathians. The article outlines the development of the areas under legal protection from their origins through to the eve of the accessions of Poland and Slovakia to the European Union. It draws on legal documents and analyses of scientific works, regarding the dilemmas associated with the founding of protected areas, and interviews with the administrations of the protected areas concerned. Emphasis is laid on the geopolitics of historic cross-border conservation and cooperation. • Explores the intersection between border geographies and historical nature preservation. • Studies how legally protected natural areas took shape over five periods in the twentieth century. • Demonstrates that borders isolate conservation communities and prevent cooperation. • Explains the idea of Europe's first transboundary Parks and the world's oldest tripartite Biosphere Reserve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study addresses the issue of "covidfencing" (the resurrection of borders during the COVID-19 pandemic) in the context of the historically and ethnically complex region of Cieszyn Silesia / Těšínské Slezsko / Śląsk Cieszyński / Teschener Schlesien on the Czech-Polish border. Conducting interviews with cross-border workers, representatives of municipalities or cross-border regions, and a street survey in a border town, this study analyses the impacts of covidfencing on this region between March 2020 and March 2021. Applying the concept of Balibar (2002), this study shows that the border between Czechia and Poland in the Cieszyn Silesia region has characteristics of a polysemic border. Some inhabitants experienced the border closure due to the pandemic situation as an existential threat, some organised protests because they perceive the border region as a whole to be their home, some claim that the resurrection of the border did not influence anything in their lives. This study introduces the complex network of cross-border relationships and discusses the possible reasons for different perceptions of the border. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of International Journal of Legal Studies ( IJOLS ) is the property of International Institute of Innovation Science-Education-Development in Warsaw and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study is a reflection on the quality of life of the countryside dwellers in the Polish–German borderland. It has been assumed that the assessment made is conditioned by the consequences of changes within the functioning of the state borders. Based on the findings from the research conducted in 1993 and 2010, an analysis of the changes of social reality in the place of the countryside dwellers’ residence was made, followed by an attempt to define determinants of the attitude of the countryside dwellers towards given social, economic and political aspects of the reality, as assessed and expressed by them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]