The core aim of this doctoral research is to write an international comparative history about local public spheres in a border region during the First World War. Public spheres are central spheres of social life. If we want to understand the various changes and its consequences for everyday life, it is absolutely necessary to examine the transformation of the public spheresduring wartime.In order to attain significant results, we are dealing with three case studies, whose location is absolutely unique in the world. Nowhere else than in todays Euregio Meuse-Rhine can be found a border triangle in the composition of a Central power (German Empire), an entete power under occupation (Belgium) and a neutral country (the Netherlands). Inspired by the two volumes of Jay Winter's studies about capital cities in wartime, we can regard a town as the meeting point between the imagined community of the nation and the experienced community of the neighbourhood. Hence, this study aims at exploring the war experience beyond and below national boundaries.