History of the Universala Esperanto-Asocio

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The history of the Universala Esperanto-Asocio , i.e. the World Esperanto Federation , has its beginnings in the early attempts at organizing the planned language Esperanto, first published in 1887 . After a founding period in the years before the First World War, in which the World Federation was founded, the individual elements in the Esperanto movement endeavored to work together on an international level. In 1933/1934 the current structure of the World Federation was essentially created, which claims to represent the Esperanto movement as a whole.

"Experimental Years" 1908–1920

Hector Hodler, 1917

At the end of 1907 / beginning of 1908 a group of Esperanto speakers around the Swiss Hector Hodler initiated the Esperanto World Federation to promote the spread of Esperanto. Hodler believed that people who were learning Esperanto should be given additional benefits in order to keep them going. This included a network of correspondents and contact persons, discounts in hotels and other perks.

Since the World Federation still had to find its way, tried out various projects and also changed the statutes quite often, one speaks of the "experimental years" of the World Federation. The Swiss lawyer Eduard Stettler helped in the central office of the UEA in Geneva to make the World Federation an efficient and permanent organization.

The national Esperanto associations that had been founded in the individual countries were quite suspicious of the UEA. They feared an all-encompassing octopus with whom they would compete for resources and people.

Dispute over the umbrella organization 1920–1934 / 1947

The World War had partially interrupted the work of the Alliance, and afterwards the international network of employees had to be rebuilt. After the death of Hector Hodler in 1920, a new phase began with Eduard Stettler as chairman (1920 to 1924 and 1928 to 1934), Hans Jakob as office manager and Edmond Privat as editor of the Esperanto organization . In the early 1920s, efforts were made to establish contact with the League of Nations .

The "Helsinki" organs in Locarno, April 1926

There was cooperation with the national associations at the World Congress in Helsinki in 1922 . The UEA on the one hand and the national associations on the other elected and financed a joint central committee of the Esperanto movement. This represented the Esperanto movement to the outside and tried u. a. Promoting Esperanto in countries without organized Esperantists.

But the “Helsinki system” did not function satisfactorily, and the national associations also pushed for a reorganization. After violent disputes, the following was agreed at the World Congress in Cologne in 1933: The UEA became the umbrella organization for the entire Esperanto movement and accepted the national associations as regional associations. For this, the regional associations had to pay contributions and were allowed to send their representatives to the association council of the UEA.

In Stockholm in 1934 , some former functionaries were not re-elected, whereupon the UEA chairman Stettler resigned in protest. Louis Bastien from the French Esperanto Association became the new UEA chairman . He was also chairman of the Internacia Esperanto-Ligo , which was founded in 1936 after an internal conflict.

Persecution and “schism” 1936–1947

The World Esperanto Federation was unable to become active in the Soviet Union , and from 1933 National Socialism made Esperanto activities in Germany more difficult . Esperanto associations were also hindered and finally banned in other countries (in Germany 1936). As a result, the Alliance lost members.

Esperanto-Internacia , organ of the Internacia Esperanto-Ligo , 1937

There were also conflicts within the Esperanto movement. In 1936 the board wanted to move the association's headquarters from Geneva to London , where an office was cheaper to maintain than in Geneva. At that time the World Federation was financially on the brink of abyss.

Some Swiss members litigated against the move and were temporarily granted rights by the Geneva district court. Then Bastien and almost all board members, the national associations and most of the members of the UEA resigned and founded a new international Esperanto association, the International Esperanto-Ligo (IEL).

Between communism and anti-communism 1947–1955

In 1947 the differences between the two associations UEA and IEL were overcome and the associations were merged under the old name UEA (so-called “merged UEA”).

After the fall of National Socialism , communism posed the most concrete threat to the World Federation. Regional associations in the Eastern European countries tried to put their stamp on the World Federation. The board member Ivo Lapenna , a lawyer from Zagreb , did particularly well . At the World Congress in Bern in 1947 , he tried in vain to get a resolution through which was supposed to outlaw fascism, but not the suppression of Esperanto, which took place in the Soviet Union, for example.

Since 1949, however, the Eastern European associations were gradually hindered and ultimately had to stop their activities for Esperanto. This period of late Stalinism lasted until around 1955, considerably longer in some countries. In the GDR , a working group of Esperanto Friends (in the Kulturbund ) could only be established in 1965 (later: Esperanto Association in the Kulturbund of the GDR ).

The Ivo Lapenna era 1956–1974

Around 1955 the image of the World Federation changed in several ways: The Eastern European regional associations gradually came back; the central office moved from England to Rotterdam ; the statutes were changed and the new general secretary Ivo Lapenna was installed. He had left Yugoslavia in 1949 and was now living in London . It became the engine of the Alliance's activities, especially in the field of public relations. As early as 1954, his successes included the UNESCO resolution, which recognized Esperanto's achievements in promoting international understanding. In 1964 Lapenna became chairman of the UEA.

His authoritarian leadership style had a negative impact, which contributed to the fact that he was only barely re-elected in 1971. When he realized that he would no longer have a majority at the World Congress in Hamburg in 1974 , he did not even run for office. His claim that a communist coup had ousted him from the presidency found faith in only a small group of supporters.

Expansion of universality 1974–1989

The British-American literary scholar Humphrey Tonkin became the new chairman . Under his chairmanship, the administration was restructured and the statutes were renewed: Now the World Federation no longer demanded that the state associations be neutral (which was not possible in dictatorships), but only that they respect the neutrality of the World Federation.

During this epoch the World Federation got new national associations in Asia and South America , more members in Africa and also offices in New York , Antwerp and Budapest . The climax of this development was the accession of the Soviet regional association founded in 1979 in 1989. The fact that a Latvian and a Lithuanian league was formed at the same time indicated a new era.

In 1980 the Belgian finance inspector Grégoire Maertens took over the chairmanship, and in 1986 Tonkin began another three-year period. In this Tonkin coordinated the activities around the great anniversary year 1987 (one hundred years of Esperanto).

Since the fall of the Berlin Wall

The changes in Eastern Europe also had consequences for the Esperanto movement. From the regional associations there, state-fed, but also gagged associations have now become free associations of citizens. The breakup of the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia brought the UEA a number of new regional associations. At the same time, the membership numbers of the World Federation, which had previously been artificially high through collective memberships in some Eastern European countries, shrank from over 43,000 to 18,000.

Chair of the UEA

According to the statutes of the Esperanto World Federation, the chairman of the UEA is a member of the board and represents the Federation externally. The chairmen since the founding year 1908 were:

Swiss period

So-called "Geneva UEA"

From 1936 to 1939 the “Geneva UEA” had only one Provizora Komitato under Karl Max Liniger. Only in 1939 was a board re-established.

  • 1939–1941: Karl Max Linger ( Switzerland )
  • 1941–1947: Hans Hermann Kürsteiner (Switzerland)

British period

Dutch period

UEA Board of Directors, April 2004 (with the Director General, the Editor and two observers), Rotterdam

(The periods are named after the headquarters of the central office.)

literature

  • Peter Glover Forster: The Esperanto Movement , Haag u. a. 1982 (Hull 1977)
  • Ulrich Lins : Utila Estas Aligho. Tra la unua jarcento de UEA , Universala Esperanto-Asocio. Rotterdam 2008
  • Marcus Sikosek (Ziko van Dijk): The neutral language. A political history of the World Esperanto Federation , Bydgoszcz 2006, ISBN 978-83-89962-03-4

supporting documents

  1. ↑ Marcus Sikosek: The neutral language. A political history of the Esperanto World Federation , Bydgoszcz 2006, p. 64.
  2. ↑ Marcus Sikosek: The neutral language. A political history of the World Esperanto Federation , Bydgoszcz 2006, pp. 331/332.
  3. ^ Ulrich Lins: Utila Estas Aligho. Tra la unua jarcento de UEA , Universala Esperanto-Asocio. Rotterdam 2008, p. 101.
  4. ^ Ulrich Lins: Utila Estas Aligho. Tra la unua jarcento de UEA , Universala Esperanto-Asocio. Rotterdam 2008, pp. 34/35.
  5. ↑ Marcus Sikosek: The neutral language. A political history of the World Esperanto Federation , Bydgoszcz 2006, p. 371/372, p. 382.