The Ruling Elite of Kaunas City in 1918–1940

Annotation

Studies of the elite conducted by sociologists, political scientists and historians have long been popular around the world. This monograph focuses on the ruling elite of Kaunas, the former capital of Lithuania. The ruling elite comprises the people of the city's local government institutions who are elected by the city's residents and make important decisions for the city. However, we also include ordinary workers, illiterate people, and manual labourers in this elite, as they were elected to city government institutions and trusted to make political decisions. This study aims to reveal the collective portrait of the ruling elite of Kaunas and the social face of the group, as well as showing the peculiarities of their activities and mutual relations. It is hoped that this monograph will clarify the biographies of many prominent figures in interwar Lithuania and that the identities of the local ruling elite, which are being established and named for the first time, along with the factual material presented, will be useful for future research.

This monograph was produced as part of the "The Ruling Elite of Kaunas City 1918–1940" project, which was funded by the Lithuanian Council for Science. It is based mainly on material from the Kaunas Regional State Archives (KRVA) and the Kaunas City Municipality (f. 219), the Kaunas City Municipality Tax Inspectorate, the Lithuanian Central State Archives VRM Municipalities Department, and other sources.