Reflections on the complex question of how societies consolidate or even reinvent themselves after experiencing war and violence. The Second World War had an impact in Poland, as in other European countries, far beyond the immediate combat actions. Occupation, forced labor, political and racial persecution, as well as border changes, shaped the lives of the civilian population. Many of the surviving residents of the Republic of Poland found themselves involuntarily in other regions, within the territories of newly formed states, or in exile after the end of the military conflicts and the conclusion of the Holocaust. The contributions in this volume assume that there was no end to the war either in Poland or in its neighboring countries. In Lublin, a Soviet-controlled transitional government was established as early as 1944 after the liberation by the Red Army.