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

Personally he was not threatened in 1956. He was expelled from
the university three times, but he did not have the feeling that his life
was in danger. But, as he recalls, one never quite knew. “I remember
a literature teacher who was arrested and sentenced to five
years in prison. He had been active in the French resistance movement.
And for the communists it was simple: ‘if he can resist them,
he can also resist us.”
As an outspoken critic of the regime, Konrád was under constant
observation by the secret police. They must have built up quite a file
on him. Did he have a look at his file? “Yes, I did. There were over
one thousand pages. It was extremely boring. The most literary element
in it was the description of a lecture I attended at the free
university: It was characteristic of the atmosphere at the lecture
that Konrád was sitting in the first row and slept immediately.”
We asked him about his experience with Western social democrats
and their contact policy in Eastern Europe. In the 1980s, a number
of social democratic parties developed contacts with established
communist parties in countries like Hungary. This policy was motivated
by the belief in the possibility of change from within the system
and the wish to build a common front against the deployment
of new nuclear weapons in Europe. It has often been criticised as
being too soft. Konrád believes that some of these social democrats
were heading in the wrong direction but his overall assessment is
mild. “Many social democrats in the West believed that it was extremely
important to look at the personal arrangements and formations
in the politburo. One could call them scholars in Kremlinology.
But I never believed this to be a relevant and adequate approach.
In my opinion, there were deeper movements and streams in politics.
Behind the members of the politburo, there were people like
Gorbachev and his team who brought new developments into politics.
This, in comparison with the question whether Gromyko stood
nearer to Molotov, was much more relevant.”
A personal experience illustrates his point. “Once, late in the
evening, the bell rang and there were two gentlemen in front of my
apartment. They were prominent members of the German SPD.
We had some glasses together. Quite soon I noticed that they were
excited. Not because I had offered to invite some members of the
democratic opposition, but because the next day they were official
65 György Konrád