Politics of the past: the use and abuse of history - Socialists ...

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Social Democracy and the Prague Spring 223 Jiři Paroubek This year we commemorate the fortieth anniversary of the 1968 Prague Spring and the Czechoslovakian Communist Party’s attempt at renewal, prematurely stymied by the course of events. Sixty years have passed since 1948 when, following the February Communist putsch, our party (the Czechoslovakian Social Democratic Party) was merged – contrary to its constitution – with the Czechoslovakian Communist Party (KSČ). Seventy years have passed since the Munich Agreement was signed precipitating the withdrawal of our party from the Socialist Workers’ International. And finally, this year is also the 130th anniversary of the founding of our party. All of these events had a significant influence on the democratic left in Czechoslovakia. Without them and without the experience of a democratic past, the popular uprising in the spring of 1968 could not have taken place. These events also influenced other parties of the democratic left. We live in a context of world interconnectedness. The beginnings of the Czech workers’ movement reach all the way back to the 1860s. It was at that time that the first trade unions and educational associations for Czech labourers were established. Cooperation between Czech workers and workers in other parts of Europe began in the same period. In 1870 Czech and German workers held a mass demonstration in Ještěd. From there, it was only a small step to the birth of the Czechoslovakian Social Democratic Party (ČSSD) which had been an offshoot of the Social Democratic Party of Austria. ČSSD subsequently became an independent political party in 1893. Some four years later it already had seats in the Austrian Imperial Parliament. In the second half of the 1930s, the ČSSD supported the struggle of Spanish democrats against the pro-Franco putschists and they, for their part, were significantly involved in efforts to protect the Czechoslovak Republic, supporting Beneš’ concept of collective Jiři Paroubek is Chairman of the Czech Social Democratic Party (ČSSD). From April 25, 2005 to August 16, 2006, he was Prime Minister of the Czech Republic.
security. In the spring of 1938, the ČSSD organised a great demonstration in support of a May mobilisation that was held to mark the sixtieth anniversary of the party’s founding. Altogether some 400,000 people took part in this event in Prague to demonstrate their support for democracy and peace. 1938 was a difficult year for Czechoslovakia. As a result of the political events in Munich in autumn 1938, the public’s antipathy towards parliamentary parties was increasing. A non-parliamentary government had been installed and nationalist political parties joined together to create two blocs – the Party of National Unity and the National Labour Party. It was an attempt to replace the system that had failed in Munich with an utterly different system based on two large parties along the lines of Great Britain and the United States. After the war, the ČSSD was re-established as one of four postwar parties but the communists’ populist rhetoric was, at that time, enjoying success and the Czechoslovakian Communist Party quickly became the greatest political power in the country. The democratic left, represented by the ČSSD, was too great a threat to the communists and they had to destroy it. The ranks of the ČSSD were infiltrated by communists and a very strong pro-communist wing was created within the party which then helped the communists take power in 1948. As early as the first week after the coup in February 1948, several social democratic leaders went into exile and in May of that year established the ČSSD’s Central Executive Committee in London. Several months after the communist putsch, the Social Democratic party had, against the wishes of a clear majority of its members, been absorbed by the KSČ. The communist regime in Czechoslovakia, especially before Stalin’s death, inflicted immense material and moral damage upon our society, the consequences of which are still evident today, fifty years later. At the same time, this turbulent and tragic period was midwife to the intellectual rebirth of many people, without which the events of the Prague Spring would not have taken place. Many people gradually became aware of the monstrous nature of communism and their original enthusiasm gave way to opposition and scepticism. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union’s 1956 congress, at which Khrushchev heavily criticised Stalin, helped many to 224
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Twenty years after the end of the C
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Dedicated to Bronisław Geremek Bro
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Table of contents Preface: Never Ag
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Preface Never again 7 Martin Schulz
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Preface The Past Does Not Go Away A
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Introduction by the Editors In 2008
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about the tense and ambivalent rela
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another debate formulated by Richar
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theoretical and practical impossibi
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History and national identity Histo
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the subject of much controversy, th
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everything on Stalin and communism:
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Prague Spring: “In the mid-1950s,
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Literature Arendt, Hannah (1951) Th
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Common Memory and European Identity
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cried the Ossies as the Berlin Wall
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the first phase of negotiations aft
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eference to a common destiny, and t
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The ‘enlargement fatigue’ obser
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on each other. The only way of chan
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“The Word Concentration Camp mean
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I think history is essential to thi
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denying it is like saying evil does
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Soviet camp, not because he had don
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Q: In Germany there is a strong fee
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the 17 th century so that the South
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forests near Minsk. I was taken the
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harmonious and prosperous, with the
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were doing and why they were doing
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an explanation. I told him that I e
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This movement once had a big meetin
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guests of Imre Pozsgay, minister of
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HISTORICAL DILEMMAS
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National myths Every society has a
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confessions. The culmination of thi
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First, few countries undertake a th
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Finally, confronted with the experi
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no better placed than governments t
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compartments, and that one must som
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Such an approach certainly has its
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History and Politics: Recommendatio
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The tension between academic histor
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oth a collective and individual exo
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Europe’s responsibilities It is c
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egimes provides a deeper understand
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and accounts for professionals deal
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This shift later inspired the devel
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In Germany, public historical cultu
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Historical Bias in Poland: Lustrati
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The Polish United Workers’ Party
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The right’s criticism of the meth
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epresents one more step in the broa
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European Social Democracy and 20 th
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the KPD - even now - is not about p
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esisted them in many cases. The ove
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turned some of them against the SPD
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The Interpretation of the Soviet Un
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the result of a war of liberation a
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Molotov-Ribbentrop protocol? How di
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pen in Lithuania. The idea was adva
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and politician Giovanni Amendola to
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The most influential analytical mod
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2. A single mass party consisting o
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their differences. Most comparative
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communism are legal heirs of the En
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the world war and to exculpate the
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They also criticized “revisionist
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seen above, after careful scrutiny
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The Real Problem Latvians Have with
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not see it as something important e
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structures Latvian domestic politic
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the language of instruction in scho
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Diversity in Historical Education:
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and sometimes in adjustment and ada
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For the Record: PSE MEPs react 159
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F. especially the Nazi- and the Sta
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having always been victims, trying
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SPECIAL REPORT: SLOVAKS AND HUNGARI
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Much has happened in the last two y
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The conference concentrated, as the
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Page 175 and 176: A person’s identification with a
Page 177 and 178: ians to evaluate the extent to whic
Page 179 and 180: more intensive part in forming the
Page 182 and 183: A Common Past, a Divided History 18
Page 184 and 185: nearly seven hundred kilometres of
Page 186 and 187: It is extremely important to note,
Page 188 and 189: historical public opinion and self-
Page 190 and 191: thousands of Hungarian and Slovak c
Page 192: enewed historiography will also be
Page 195 and 196: we shall turn our attention to two
Page 197 and 198: In response to these questions, two
Page 199 and 200: While more than 80% of the oldest a
Page 201 and 202: Table 2 Opinions of respondents of
Page 203 and 204: 6,0 5,5 5,0 4,5 4,0 3,5 3,0 2,5 ▼
Page 205 and 206: we consider the trends suggested be
Page 208 and 209: Resistance and Exile Miguel Angel M
Page 210 and 211: it was necessary to formulate socia
Page 212 and 213: degree of generosity, activism and
Page 214: the ICFTU. There my work focused on
Page 217 and 218: After Stalin’s death, most of the
Page 220 and 221: Moscow versus Prague 219 Boris Orlo
Page 222 and 223: Of all the problems that my country
Page 226 and 227: comprehend the overwhelming contrad
Page 228 and 229: Renaissance of Socialism Observatio
Page 230 and 231: My Personal Encounters with History
Page 232 and 233: Over a decade later, political chan
Page 234 and 235: monument, its location and particul
Page 236: Minister, Dimitri Rupel, I founded
Page 239 and 240: people exactly know what actually w
Page 241 and 242: tablished democracies. What was the
Page 244 and 245: Memory is a Loaded Gun An Epilogue
Page 246 and 247: Post office, Gdansk
Page 248 and 249: Solidarność Memorial
Page 250 and 251: Krzysztof Pomian, a well known Poli
Page 252 and 253: effective and positive factor in gi
Page 254: Martin Schulz, leader of the PSE Gr
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