Podział i zjednoczenie Niemiec jako elementy ładów europejskich po drugiej wojnie światowej

The aim of the present work is to show division and then the reunificattion of Germany as elements that shaped the European order after the Second World War. The problem was how to describe the place and role of the division, and the subsequent unification, of Germany within the actually existing European order after the Second World War, i.e. the Yalta and Potsdam order, the inchoate post Cold War order, and the postulated orders. Bearing in mind that notion, „international order” is used in two different senses in the politological literature, the Author conducted his analysis on two planes, i.e. that of the really existing state of affairs in international relations (the real order), and that of the desirable level of international coexistence (the postulated order). To achieve this, the work includes, side by side with an analysis of the real European order, also a presentation of the leading concepts and postulates, formulated in the discussed period in European political thought, and containing certain visions of a new, European order. At the same time, the Author strove to emphasise the role that the postulate of a divided or united Germany played in the analysed conceptions. It has been also shown that there is a high degree of correlation between the proposals, appearing in particular epochs, of a new European order, and the really existing order. The main thesis of the article is that the division of Germany was one of the most important elements constituting the Yalta-Potsdam order, while the unification of Germany was one of the main symptoms of the crumbling of the old order, and, at the same time, an essential elements of the formation of a new European order. An important part of the present work consists in analysing the main factors that favoured and that hampered the functional influence of Germany on the required European order. On the basis on the tendencies apparent in the early nineteen nineties inside Germany and in international relations, the Author formulates the most probable scenarios of Germany’s influence on the shaping of the post Cold War order in Europe.