French cultural diplomacy in the kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians in the 1920s.

This paper analyses French cultural diplomacy in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians, a country created after the First World War as a result of the Franco-Serbian military alliance during the war. Cultural diplomacy is examined as part of broader French political and economical action in Eastern Europe to organise the small newly created countries into the French field of interest and oppose Germany. French cultural diplomacy in the Kingdom of SCS had two aspects: the symbolical and the concrete. Its aim was to spread positive feelings towards France in the ex-Austria-Hungarian regions of the Kingdom, where France was unknown or seen as an enemy, and to maintain the pro-French attitude of the majority of Serbs. The aim was to contribute to the 'internal equalisation and strengthening' of the new ethnically and religiously heterogeneous country, by using culture as a 'soft power'. French cultural diplomacy in the Kingdom of SCS is analysed in its local, regional and European context and in a short- and long-term perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]