Czechoslovakia: the Velvet Revolution and Beyond PDF
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Czechoslovakia: the Velvet Revolution and Beyond Czechoslovakia: the Velvet Revolution and Beyond Robin H. E. Shepherd © Robin H. E. Shepherd 2000 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2000978-0-312-23068-5 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, london W1 P OlP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Published by PAlGRAVE Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N. Y. 10010 Companies and representatives throughout the world PALGRAVE is the new global academic imprint of st. Martin's Press LLC Scholarly and Reference Division and Palgrave Publishers Ltd (formerly Macmillan Press Ltd). Outside North America ISBN 978-0-333-79188-2 hardcover ISBN 978-0-333-92048-0 paperback In North America ISBN 978-1-349-62811-7 ISBN 978-1-137-07975-6 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-1-137-07975-6 This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Czechoslovakia : the velvet revolution and beyond / Robin H. E. Shepherd. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Czech Republic--Politics and government-1993-2. Czech Republic -Economic conditions. 3. 5lovakia-Politics and government-1993- 4. Slovakia-Economic conditions. I. Title. DB2244.7 .544 2000 943.705-dc21 99-051860 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 01 To Patt Jonathan and the memory ofTony Contents List of Tables viii Acknowledgements ix Map x Introduction 1 1 Building the State 9 2 The Cornrnunists Take Power 21 3 Havel - Power to the Powerless 39 4 Politics After Cornrnunisrn SS S The Econorny - Capitalisrn without Property 7S 6 Civilising Society 103 7 The Velvet Divorce 127 8 Surviving MeCiar 149 Conclusion - Prospects for the EU 171 Notes 179 Bibliography 19S Index 199 vii List of Tables 5.1 Development of Contentment with Economic Reform 76 5.2 Number of bankruptcies 89 5.3 Czech GDP comparisons 96 7.1 Czech and Slovak preferences on independence 138 8.1 Results of 1998 Slovak parliamentary elections 164 viii Acknowledgements Many people are owed thanks for encouraging and helping me write this book. David Bolchover read through the first three chapters. Jonathan Stein made several helpful suggestions to Chapter 4. Josef Poeschl was methodical in his perusal of Chapter 5 on the economy, the biggest in the book. Jana Dorotkova added several points to Chapter 8 on the potentially hazy subject of post-communist Slovak politics. In a more general sense, Paul Lewis was a source of both encouragement and lively debate. The book has benefited from sug gestions by all of the above, but any errors, oversights or weaknesses are the sole responsibility of the author. There are many others who should, but for various reasons cannot, be mentioned. I am grateful to them. ix r / c: ;0: ::EI l> 2 m -? '" \. . " NIA __ Roads Railways -.....,...""" Rivers N II r p 8 .r" J-r.r!. ( \,. • " ~ V·J ~D. ''"l..'~.;> ___ •• ( ..... . Ruz~mber(;k v Ä--if""". S L 0 REPUBLlC' Kosice • . "\. I . " /\"..,.~ .' ..",/ ..... y ,/ . ,.......j . / ROMA.I A L - O - ' w P r. c' '" ...., Wrocla (\ .. .., ..• • f" . A I R T S U Introduction The events in Czechoslovakia and elsewhere in eastern Europe in late 1989 were genuinely revolutionary in character. This is so in the sense that the positions of the powerless and the powerful changed such that those who were in jail, threatened with jail or freshly freed from jail took control of the apparatus of state power and those that had held it were reduced to the status of political outcasts. It is also true in the wider sense that the economy and the sodal base which it engendered were destined for change at the most fundamental level. Finally, it shared in common with other genuine revolutions the deviant characteristic of not in fact being able to entirely remove members of the old elite from the establishment. The former communists who did survive, however, could wield authority as individuals but not as representatives of apower structure which the revolution had demolished. What followed the revolutions in eastern Europe was bound to be affected by what had gone before. This is, of course, a truism. But it does at least focus our attention on the particularly unusual condi tions under which Czechoslovak and other Soviet bloc dtizens lived. It simultaneously brings us to the core issue under discussion in this book: How far has the legacy of communism been shaken off and how much remains to be done? The uniqueness of the system of rule practised by communist regimes was its totalitarian character. The model totalitarian state was developed by Lenin and perfected and completed by Stalin in the Soviet Union in the 1930s. Its main features have generally been subdivided into the following six categories: a single monopoly party 1
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