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

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comprehend the overwhelming contradiction between communist ideals and everyday life. After 1963, Czechoslovakia experienced escalating levels of liberalisation. It became possible to speak relative openly in the media, an unmistakable sign of change. Czechoslovakia began to steer unambiguously towards democracy and plurality, not only politically but also economically – with one exception: criticism of the Central Committee of the KSČ and criticism of the Soviet Union were not permitted. Nevertheless, the events of 1968 could never have happened without the support of left-wing intellectuals and high level officers of the party. Support which was not simply opportunistic in the way it often was after November 1989 but which for many was the result of an often very painful process of reflection and transformation. These people confessed their previous errors, confessed that they had allowed themselves to be intoxicated with the drug of ideology. Admitting to this is never a simple matter. I would particularly like to remember two important protagonists of this turbulent period who in their mature years entered the ranks of the Czechoslovak Social Democratic movement. Their names are Alexandr Dubček, the first secretary of the KSČ Central Committee, and Věněk Šilhán, who represented him in the agitated August days of the KSČ Vysočany congress. The Prague Spring also inspired an attempt to re-establish the ČSSD in Czechoslovakia. Renewal of the Social Democratic Party in 1968 would have signified a radical rupture in the communists’ monopoly of power and a fundamental change in the post-February political system. The KSČ recognised this danger and these attempts met with immediate opposition from the conservative and, to some extent, progressive elements in the KSČ. The wider populous, including many well-known personalities, closely followed and supported social democrat activity. The social democrats were of course aware that the attitude of the KSČ leadership towards their efforts to re-establish was determined in part by increasingly tense relations between Moscow and its satellites. They did not want to endanger the democratisation process and in this spirit the preparatory committee of the ČSSD suspended its activities, at Dubček’s request, prior to a meeting of the chairs of the 225 Jiři Paroubek
Czechoslovak and Soviet Communist Partys in Čierná nad Tisou. After the Soviet invasion in August, all activities were ended on September 2, 1968. In this short period, our party had, however, been renewed in all of the Bohemian and Moravian territories. Local renewal commissions had spontaneously formed, and thousands of potential members and sympathisers had come forward and endorsed them. That the ideas of the Prague Spring of 1968 were very dangerous to totalitarian communist power is unambiguously underlined by the reactions of Brezhnev, Ulbricht, Gomulka and Zhivkov who did not hesitate to unleash the largest military operation Europe had seen since the Second World War. The Prague Spring significantly disrupted the international communist movement. Andrei Sakharov described the Prague Spring and its repression as a turning point in his life and as the beginning of his engagement for civil rights and the fight for a change to the communist system. The mighty repression of the events that took place in Czechoslovakia meant a marked international turn away from the Soviet communist system. In this way, Czechoslovakia influenced the trajectory of the entire world – not, as we would have wished, by replacing communism with socialism with a human face, but by discrediting cooperation with the USSR and its satellites, and by discrediting communist parties. 226
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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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aristocratic, Estates-based ‘nati
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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 224 and 225: Social Democracy and the Prague Spr
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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