Matthias Kaltenbrunner

From Vienna to Warsaw: Austria and the informal car market in late socialist Poland

Dr. Matthias Kaltenbrunner

 

In the Cold War era, Vienna was a major hub for the informal exchange of consumer goods from both sides of the Iron Curtain. In the late 1980s, the Austrian capital became an area of supply for cars that were subsequently smuggled to Poland. Based on documents of the Polish Ministry of the Interior as well as files of the criminal court in Vienna, I investigate an extensive network of actors involved in the informal transnational car trade.

Dr. Matthias Kaltenbrunner earned his Ph.D. from the University of Vienna in 2015. He is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Kule Folklore Centre, University of Alberta. In addition on his book project titled "The Globally Connected Village: A Ukrainian-Canadian History" he is working on a project on the informal car market in Poland in the 1980s and 1990s.