In this volume, Otto von Habsburg offers not a memoir but a reflection on Europe’s future through the lens of history and politics. The book appeared twenty-five years after Yalta, yet still two decades before the fall of the communist regimes in Central Europe – an era when Cold War divisions, the dissolution of colonial empires, the crises of modern societies, and the question of European unity were all shaping the continent’s destiny.

By then, the last ruler of Austria-Hungary had lain for half a century in the church at Monte on Madeira, his empire buried beneath the ruins of the Great War. His son sought no path back to the throne. Instead, drawing on dynastic experience and the catastrophes of the 20th century, he defined a political vocation that embraced the heritage of the Danube Basin, the Christian tradition, the defence of human dignity, and intellectual resistance to communism.

“I come from a family that has been in politics for 600 years.” These words provide a key to the author’s approach: he turns to the past for bearings amid the uncertainties of the present. He recalls the great figures of his family, reinterprets the Monarchy’s legacy, and traces one of the fault lines underlying the upheavals of the 20th century back to Königgrätz. Throughout, he considers the ethical limits of authority in contemporary public life.

His views may provoke debate, but that is precisely what keeps them alive. Otto von Habsburg’s understanding of the past informs his outlook on the future, reminding us that politics cannot be reduced to institutions, the pursuit of power, or economic systems. Without historical experience, moral discernment, and breadth of vision, it fails the very people it is meant to serve.

ISBN: 978 615 81817 6 1

Author: Otto von Habsburg

Copy editors: Lili Herczeg and Ferenc Vasbányai

Year of publication: 2026

Publishers: Helikon Publishing and the Otto von Habsburg Foundation

Place of publication: Budapest

Language: Hungarian

Translator: Péter Mesés

Pages: 335