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Nanwe's Maps and Graphics Thread

OTL: 1920-30s Czechoslovak political party landscape
Czechoslovak Political Landscape in 1920: A few notes

One of the interesting aspects of Czechoslovak politics, particularly in the Czech lands, was how the same social cleavages cut within each ethnic group in a similar fashion, and how the way that Czechs and Germans voted in Bohemia was fairly similar, and the same was true in Moravia (& Silesia). So for instance:

Social Democracy:

Both Czechs and Germans had strong social democratic parties that in 1920 were about to split up 60:40 between socdems and communists [1].

So, for instance, you had the Czechoslovak Social Democratic Workers' Party (ČSDSD) and the German Social Democratic Workers' Party in Czechoslovakia (DSAP) as Marxist reformist parties. Both parties were ideologically very similar, with the exception of the issue of self-determination, as they both had been parts of the same party until the 1900s. After 1926, the two parties would begin cooperating quite closely, and in fact, their own respective trade unions would even merge.

There was also the SSČLP, a small, more Czech nationalist outfit that would merge back with the post-split Social Democrats after 1923.

Non-Marxist Socialism:

Then you had a strong Czech non-Marxist, socialist party with nationalist leanings and deeply tied to nationalist civil society. These were the Czechoslovak Socialist Party (ČSS) and the German National Socialist Workers' Party (DNSAP). Now, the ČSS had both quasi-left-liberals but also strasserites, but the party would force the latter out, whereas its German equivalent was basically dominated by pre-left-fascists. That is to say, the DNSAP in the 1920s was nominally democratic outwards (and internally was democratic, eschewing a Führerprinz organisation) and its ideology was economically corporatist, anti-Marxist, "moderately" anti-Semitic, and pro-federalist (being pro-Anschluss could get you banned). In terms of sociology, the ČSS was predominantly lower-middle class, whereas the DNSAP.

Political Catholicism:

Then you had the parties of religious Catholics, who were way stronger in Moravia than in Bohemia. These were the Czechoslovak People's Party (ČSL) and the German Christian-Social People's Party (DCVP). In 1920, the future Hlinka's Slovak People's Party ran with the ČSL. In 1920, this helped boost the vote share of the party.

Agrarianism:

Then you had the agrarian parties, stronger in the more secular countryside of Bohemia. The agrarian parties combined social conservatism, pro-market positions with a desire for land reform and some degree of social welfare (particularly inasmuch as it protected farmers). There was the Republican Party of the Czechoslovak Countryside (RSČV) which merged with the Slovak Agrarian Party in 1922, becoming the Republican Party of Farmers and Peasants (RSZML) on the Czechoslovak side, and the Farmers' League (BdL) on the German side.

Liberalism & National-liberalism:

Next up there were the national parties. On the Czechoslovak side, you had the ČsND, the Czechoslovak National Democracy, the direct descendant of the 19th century Young Czechs party. The party was the most Czech chauvinist and the most closely associated with big business. It was quite socially conservative too. During the 1930s, the party would drift from national liberal and national conservative positions to corporatist authoritarianism and quasi-fascism. Then there was also the Czechoslovak Traders' Party (ČŽOS), which thought of itself as a party in defence of the urban middle classes opposed to both trade unions and big business interests, and was less dogmatically nationalist than the National Democrats. The ČZOS cooperated with the agrarians in parliament.

On the German side, you had the German Democratic Freedom Party (DDFP), a small progressive left-liberal party with a similar base to the German DDP, including many German-speaking Jews. Among its MPs was Kafka's brother. The other, liberal party was the German National Party (DNP), which was a national-liberal party but erred more on the national than the liberal side of things. The party was, like the DNSAP, the most opposed to the existence of the Czechoslovak state and advocated for self-determination. The party's voters were largely upper-class Germans.

In 1920, the DNP and the DNSAP ran together as the German Electoral Coalition (Deutsche Wahlgemeinschaft, DWG).

Slovakia:

In Slovakia, politics were somewhat less (or more?) confusing. This is because, unlike the Czech lands, there was a much more limited parliamentary tradition in Slovakia, where politics had been far more centralised in Budapest and much more elitist owing to Budapest's hyper-restrictive franchise.

So basically, on the Slovak side of things, most of the Czechoslovak parties developed their Slovak wings. Some of them, like the Social Democrats essentially lost the entire party apparatus to the Communists when the party split so they had to start anew.

As for 'indigenous' parties, there was the Slovak National and Peasants' Party (SNaRS), the merger of the Slovak National Party (SNS) and the Slovak agrarians. The party's delegation in Prague split up in 1922, between the Slovak nationalists and the agrarians. The Agrarians would become the Slovak wing of the RSZML.

On the Hungarian side of Slovak politics, there were 3 parties running in 1920.

First, there was the Hungarian and German Christian‐Socialist Party (the future OKSzP), the main party of the Hungarian minority. The party was politically Catholic and the most willing to cooperate with the new authorities in Prague, although it would slowly move towards more hostile positions as a result of internal conflicts and Budapest's influence on the party.

Then, the Hungarian-German Social Democratic Party (MNSDP, UDSDP). The party would last a few months after the election, as the majority of the party defected to join the Slovak wing of the KSČ. The rump party would split, with its German members becoming DSAP's German wing, and its remaining Hungarian members forming the Hungarian Social Democratic Party (MSDP), which would merge in 1926 with the ČSDSD Slovak wing.

Lastly, there was the Hungarian Party of Smallholders (MKP, the full name was "National Hungarian Smallholders' and Landowners' Party"). The party started out as the Hungarian agrarian party but would radicalise, like all other Hungarian parties, over the course of the 1920s and 1930s becoming essentially an irredentist, nationalist party.

Honorary mention to the Jewish Party - which I'm sure you can guess what its political programme was about - which obtained nearly 80,000 votes across Czechoslovakia. But as it failed to obtain 20,000 votes or one seat in at least one constituency, it didn't cross the threshold to be able to obtain seats in the second and third rounds, so it got 0 seats.

Trade Unionism

The Czech lands, and Bohemia in particular, were among the most industrialised parts of Europe at the time. The Sudeten was home to an export-oriented good-focused, consumer light industry aimed at exporting towards the greater Austrian-Hungarian Empire. After the fall of the Empire, all these German-owned industries suffered considerably due to the creation of new tariffs. Meanwhile, the Bohemian central plains were home to a largely Czech-owned heavy industry, particularly engineering and chemicals.

As a result, the share of unionised workers, both white- and blue-collar was among the highest in the world at the time. Between 1920 and 1935, the share of unionised workers and professionals hovered between 35 and 60% of the workforce. And basically all parties had their own union wings.

This is some data from (iirc) 1931, when trade union membership rates were at its lowest - 35% of the workforce.

Captura de pantalla 2019-11-04 a las 10.42.41.png

As you can observe, even pro-big business parties like the National Democrats had their own trade unions.

[1] Even then it's important to note that until 1929, the KSČ was a communist party but not one fully controlled by Moscow. The purge of the party's leader, Haken, and his executive and their replacement by Gottwald was the coup de grâce.
 
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OTL: Alternate April 2019 Spanish general election
Since today I have to vote again, here's the map under my Swedish-inspired electoral system for Spain.

The results are as follows (out of 400 seats: 354 elected in constituencies, 6 by citizens abroad, 40 compensatory seats):

PSOE: 124 seats
PP: 69 seats
Cs: 66 seats
UP: 59 seats
Vox: 42 seats
ERC: 16 seats
JxCAT: 8 seats
EAJ-PNV: 7 seats
EH Bildu: 3 seats
CC: 2 seats
N+: 2 seats
Compromís: 1 seat
PRC: 1 seat

Majorities (201/400):
PSOE+UP+Com+PRC: 185 seats
- Majority+PNV+ERC: 208 seats
PP+Cs+Vox+N+: 179 seats
PSOE+Cs+CC+PRC: 193 seats

So the more proportional result would have weakened the result for the left and put the country in a (even more than OTL) three-way blockade, as a left-wing minority would be weaker as it would need the support of ERC more so than OTL, and a PSOE-Cs centrist coalition (unlike OTL) lacked sufficient support to form a majority coalition even adding in pork-barrel-focused centrist parties.




jLhaahl.png
 
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Since today I have to vote again, here's the map under my Swedish-inspired electoral system for Spain.

The results are as follows (out of 400 seats: 354 elected in constituencies, 6 by citizens abroad, 40 compensatory seats):

PSOE: 124 seats
PP: 69 seats
Cs: 66 seats
UP: 59 seats
Vox: 42 seats
ERC: 16 seats
JxCAT: 8 seats
EAJ-PNV: 7 seats
EH Bildu: 3 seats
CC: 2 seats
N+: 2 seats
Compromís: 1 seat
PRC: 1 seat

Majorities (201/400):
PSOE+UP+Com+PRC: 185 seats
- Majority+PNV+ERC: 208 seats
PP+Cs+Vox+N+: 179 seats
PSOE+Cs+CC+PRC: 193 seats

So the more proportional result would have weakened the result for the left and put the country in a (even more than OTL) three-way blockade, as a left-wing minority would be weaker as it would need the support of ERC more so than OTL, and a PSOE-Cs centrist coalition (unlike OTL) lacked sufficient support to form a majority coalition even adding in pork-barrel-focused centrist parties.




jLhaahl.png
Would you consider posting this on AJRElectionmaps (or allowing @Ares96 to do so with attribution to you?) It would make a nice theme with the Canada-as-Sweden one he did.
 
Would you consider posting this on AJRElectionmaps (or allowing @Ares96 to do so with attribution to you?) It would make a nice theme with the Canada-as-Sweden one he did.

Yeah, sure, I'd be happy to. Although in that case, I'd have to ask Max to explain to me how the distribution of the compensatory seats works exactly, since I might try a more pure Swedish-styl election map too.
 
Yeah, sure, I'd be happy to. Although in that case, I'd have to ask Max to explain to me how the distribution of the compensatory seats works exactly, since I might try a more pure Swedish-styl election map too.
That'd be good - I've also retweeted Max's map from the SLP account (as it's AH) so that would fit with a theme.
 
So no maps for now. I just finished moving into my new place and this week is crazy. But in return, I have some cool graphics. I decided to make a graphic of the seat allocation in the Swiss National Council:

Once the 200 seats were established as the Council's size in 1963, it gets easier to compare the evolution go seats. And it is frankly stable with some discernible patterns like Bern continuously losing population or the suburbanisation of Basel. Or the considerable growth of Zürich in the first half of the 20th century, roughly.

Screenshot 2019-12-09 at 09.02.01.png
 
So I'm not sure if I'm going to develop this into a full-blown world (seeing as how I never manage to go through with these things...) but as a part of the whole idea, I developed some toponymic things for a 1930s surviving Czechoslovakia.

Basically, derived from the constitutional principles ingrained into the Czechoslovak Constitution and the proposed 1938 Nationalities Statute, any city or region with over 15% specific minority population, gets bilingual/trilingual/quatrilingual names and signs.

States
Bohemia (Officially, State of Bohemia; Země Česká, Land Böhmen)
Moravia-Silesia (Off. State of Moravia-Silesia; Země Moravskoslezská, Land Mähren-Schlesien)
Slovakia (Off. State of Slovakia; Země Slovenská, Tartomány Szlovákia)
Ruthenia (Off. Subcarpathian Rus; Підкарпа́тська Русь, lat. Pidkarpats'ka Rus’; Kárpátalja) [1]

  • Prague is Praha (Officially, Hlavní město Praha, meaning Capital City Prague)
  • Brno / Brünn (Officially, Zemské hlavní město Brno, Landeshauptstadt Brünn, meaning 'State Capital City Brno').
  • Ostrava / Ostrau
  • Bratislava / Preßburg / Pozsony [2] (Officially, Zemské hlavní město Bratislava, Landeshauptstadt Preßburg, Tartományi fővárosa Pozsony).
  • Plzen
  • Košice / Kassa
  • Olomouc / Olmütz
  • Aussig / Ústí nad Labem
  • České Budějovice / Budweis
  • Reichenberg / Liberec
  • Troppau / Opava
  • Gablonz an der Neiße / Jablonec nad Nisou
  • Prostejov
  • Komotau (Chomutov)
  • Eger (Cheb)
  • Jihlava / Iglau
  • Teplitz-Schönau / Teplice-Šanov
  • Pardubice
  • Brüx / Most
  • Užhorod / Уґоград (lat. Ugohrad) or У́жгород (lat. Užhorod) / אונגוואר (lat. Ungvar) / Ungvár (Officially, Zemské hlavní město Užhorod, ?, ?, Tartományi fővárosa Ungvár)
  • מונקאטש‎ (lat. Munkatsh) / Мукачево (lat. Mukachevo) or Мукачів (lat. Mukachiv) / Munkács (Mukačevo in Czecho-Slovak)

Titles in Hungarian might be wrong, whereas I have no idea what things would be in Rusyn/Ukrainian or in Yiddish.

[1] Owing to the special nature of Ruthenia, it is not referred to as a state (Země, Land, Tartományi) but simply as the 'Carpathian Rus'. In official Czech(-Slovak) documents, it is referred to as 'Podkarpatská Rus'. In Ruthenia, both Rusyn and Ukrainian spellings are accepted (this is a politically controversial issue), but luckily for the name of the region, the spelling is the same.

Sometimes, unofficially referred to as the 'Země Podkarpatoruská'. (Subcarpathian Rus' State)

[2] The city's name in Slovak can be somewhat politically tricky, as 'old Bratislavers' (often better off, bilingual or trilingual) refer to the city as 'Prešporok'. Slovak immigrants from the countryside are the 'new Bratislavers', usually more nationalistic and refer to the city as 'Bratislava'. There would be some type of chasm in city politics between old Bratislavers (plus Hungarians and Germans) on the one side; and new Bratislavers on the other. Imported Czech people would be too well-off and too Czechoslovak nationalist to side with either group.
 
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Those road signs in Ruthenia would be obscene.

I imagine it being a bit like Belgium, so you better know the multiple names of cities. Like, the moment you go from Wallonia to Flanders, Liege goes from being called Liège on signs to being called Luik. Like with most other cities you can manage (Gand, Gent, Bruges, Brugge) but that one would confuse anyone.

I picture Ruthenia being the sort of place where each decennial census makes local authorities dread the amount of wasted budget on (re-)labelling.
 
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Those road signs in Ruthenia would be obscene.

On second thought, I'm thinking that federal highways would be labelled in Czechoslovak (Czech spelling in Bohemia, Moravia and Ruthenia; Slovak in Slovakia) and German/Hungarian/Rusyn depending on the state.

Then state roads (and local ones too) would potentially contain more languages (German and Rusyn in Slovakia, Polish in parts of Moravia, Yiddish in Ruthenia).
 
To continue with the whole "wy is Ruthenia part of Czechoslovakia" data. I found some data on the 1921 census "(partial) illiteracy" whatever that means, and the differences are staggering. So the percentage of (partially) illiterate people by historical land in the 1921 census were thus:

Bohemia: 2.4% (2.1% for men, 2.8% for women)
Moravia: 3.1% (2.9% for men, 3.4% for women)
Silesia: 3.7% (3.6% for men, 3.8% for women)
Slovakia: 15% (13.2% for men, 16.8% for women)
Ruthenia: 50.2% (45.0% for men, 55.1% for women)
---
Czechoslovakia: 7.4% (6.6% for men, 8.1% for women)

For comparison, in France at the time, illiteracy was 8.2% for men, 10.2% for women. In Finland, 1.1% and 0.9% respectively. In neighbouring Hungary and Poland, numbers were way worse, at 13.1% and 17.1%; and 32.8% and 38.2% for men and women respeticvely.

To boot, according to the 1930 census, 37% of all Ruthenians were under 14. By comparison, only 22% were under-14 in Bohemia.
 
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Staggering indeed.

I can imagine Hungary being consistently bad at promoting literacy for non-Magyars, but that doesn't really mesh with Slovakia, does it. (Then again, maybe if we had breakdowns between Slovaks and Hungarians/Germans in Slovakia, that would be eye-opening too)
 
Staggering indeed.

I can imagine Hungary being consistently bad at promoting literacy for non-Magyars, but that doesn't really mesh with Slovakia, does it. (Then again, maybe if we had breakdowns between Slovaks and Hungarians/Germans in Slovakia, that would be eye-opening too)

Your wish is my command.


Slovak illiteracy numbers (overall) by ethnicity were:
Ruthenians (43.6%), (Czecho-)Slovaks (15.7%), Hungarians (10.2%), Germans (9.6%), Jews (5.49%). Others at 69.7% illiteracy (large number of Roma people).

Ruthenian illiteracy numbers:
Ruthenians (65.7%), Jews (31.6%), Germans (18.7%), Czechoslovaks (16.3%), Hungarians (16.1%). Others at 83.1% illiteracy (Roma people and Romanians mostly).

Most Czechoslovak people in Ruthenia in 1921 were either Slovak farmers or (more likely) Czech civil servants, policemen and teachers shipped off to Ruthenia to "bring the locals into the 20th century".

EDIT: I think the common thread here is the lack of development in Ruthenia. Most economic life was quasi-feudal in nature plus the large number of nomadic Ruthenian groups living in the mountains, those numbers explain themselves that way.

The same goes for Jews too. Whereas the Jewish community in Bohemia, Moravia and Slovakia had consistently the lowest illiteracy numbers of any community (usually also the lowest share of under-14 people, which would indicate a well-off community), Jews in Ruthenia were both recent arrivals (18th century mostly) and not socially or economically different from their Ruthenian neighbours.
 
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