Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1)
Studie a eseje
Ten Propositions about Munich 1938. On the Fateful Event of Czech and European History - without Legends and National Stereotypes
Vít Smetana
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):5-14 
This essay examines, in ten clearly formulated propositions, the causes and the long-term impact of the Munich Agreement of September 1938. This complex theme is approached through not purely national lenses. The term "betrayal" as a dominant label of the actions of the two West European democratic powers is thus questioned. The author claims that the British and French unwillingness to go to war because of Czechoslovakia's border regions is, in the light of previous historical developments, understandable and, in a way, even rational. He also points out certain deficiencies in the Czechoslovak treatment of its German minority. At the same time, Czechoslovakia's...
When We Walk Down Wenceslas Square… A Picture of the Return of Czech Legionnaires to Their Homeland in Their Recollections and Autobiographic Novels
Dalibor Vácha
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):15-43
The study stems from the author's long-time interest in the history of the Czechoslovak foreign resistance during the Great War, particularly in Russia. As to its sources, it draws from a collection of published recollections of Czechoslovak legionnaires and their autobiographic novels and other texts of prose. The author attempts to reconstruct the picture of the return of Czechoslovak legions from Russia to their home country; due to the nature of his sources, however, his intention is not to convey an authentic experience of the return in the first days and weeks, but rather to examine the construct created by the legionnaires' memories and novels....
Jozef Tiso: My Enemy - Your Hero?
Jan Rychlík
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):44-64
The author first summarizes the career of Jozef Tiso (1887-1947), a politician and a Roman Catholic priest. His entire political life was linked to Hlinka's Slovak People's Party; he was always a representative of its moderate faction, and even represented it as a minister of the Czechoslovak government. In 1939, he became its chairman. In the First Czechoslovak Republic, he was a dyed-in-the-wool federalist; since the proclamation of the Slovak State in March 1939 until the end of his life, an advocate of Slovakia's independence. As the president of the Slovak Republic between 1939 and 1945, he was responsible for Slovakia's political regime, alliance...
Cleansing of Industrial Plants from Collaborationists and "Anti-Social" Elements in 1945. A Political Machination, Retribution Excess or an Incubator of Revolutionary Morals?
Jakub Šlouf
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):65-110
Using results of extensive research in central and company archives, the author studies the cleansing of industrial plants from collaborationists and so-called anti-social elements in Czechoslovakia in 1945. He describes it as a standard-setting process during which the form of a new revolutionary value system and guilt criteria in relation to the occupation past arising therefrom were negotiated and established in practice in factories and plants. Both escalated nationalism and social egalitarianism, sometimes developing into class antagonism, found their use in it. In addition to acts prosecuted under official legislation, the cleansing process incorporated...
"You Have to Fight the Struggle Yourselves." The Political Role of the Soviet Army and Its Local Allies in "Normalization" of Czechoslovakia (1968-1969)
Marie Černá
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):111-142
The study deals with political activities of the Soviet Army in Czechoslovakia after the intervention on August 21, 1968, and its sympathizers from the ranks of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. The authoress examines the topic in the early stage of the so-called normalization (until the spring of 1970), focusing on the local level; however, she sets her research into a broader period context and derives general conclusions from its results. Although the official agreement on the temporary stay of Soviet troops in the territory of Czechoslovakia declared that the Soviet Army should not interfere with domestic affairs of the Czechoslovak state,...
Debates on Czechoslovakism and Czechoslovaks at the End of the Federation, 1989-1992
Tomáš Zahradníček
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):143-161
This article focuses on the early post-1989 period when the "Slovak question" returned with full force to the gradually democratizing political arena and surprised Czech society and its budding political elite, who were both unprepared to address the question. The author reveals the imbalance of "Czechoslovakism" - its story and historical lesson - between the two sides of the once united country. In Slovakia, Czechoslovakism was "part of the living language of politics and journalism of the Slovak experience," whilst in Czech society, its reception was lukewarm and superficial. Thanks to his insight into federal and republican politics in the early...
Prague Chronicle
Doyen of Czech Contemporary History, Karel Kaplan
Oldřich Tůma
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):162-165
In his contribution, Oldřich Tůma describes the life story of historian Karel Kaplan, who celebrated his 90th birthday in 2018. His career is a typical example of fates of a whole generation of Czech historians - it also holds true in the sense that he was not only a historian, but in many respects also a participant in and co-creator of the latest Czechoslovak history. He was born on August 28, 1928, in Horní Jelení in the region of Pardubice in eastern Bohemia. Since 1948, he worked for sixteen years in different positions in the apparatus of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. He became a full-fledged historian in 1964, when he started working...
Reflections on the Conference "A Hundred Student (R)Evolutions"
Jana Wohlmuth Markupová
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):166-172
This text offers a reflection of the conference "A Hundred Student (R)Evolutions", which took place in the Václav Havel Library in Prague on 24 May 2019. Its main purpose was to present conclusions of an oral history based longitudinal research about Czech student activists from 1989, published in a book One Hundred Student Evolutions (Prague, Academia 2019), which is a continuation of a book One Hundred Student Revolutions (first published in 1999). The author sums up key moments from all presented contributions and focuses also on the discussion and its overlap from a historical conference to the present days.
Recenze
A Thrown Gauntlet. Josef Serinek and Jan Tesař as a Challenge for Current Research into the History of the Roma in the 20th Century
Helena Sadílková
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):173-187
TESAŘ, Jan: Česká cikánská rapsodie [The Czech gypsy rhapsody]. Vol. 1: Vzpomínky Josefa Serinka [Recollections of Josef Serinek]; IDEM: Místo epilogu: Rozhovor s Josefem Ondrou [Instead of an epilogue: An interview with Josef Ondra; Documents]; Dokumenty [Documents]; Vol. 2: IDEM: Komentáře ke vzpomínkám Josefa Serinka [Comments on the recollections of Josef Serinek]; Vol. 3: Mapy, tabulky, diagramy: Partyzáni na Vysočině [Maps, tables, charts: Partisans in the Vysočina region]; IDEM: Serinkovské inspirace [Serinkian inspirations]. Praha, Triáda 2016, 502 + 635 + 208 pages, ISBN 978-80-87256-86-2.The authoress comments on the three-volume publication...
Ethnic Composition of Czechoslovak Units during the Second World War
Martin Čížek
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):188-193
MARŠÁLEK, Zdenko: "Česká," nebo "československá" armáda? Národnostní složení československých vojenských jednotek v zahraničí v letech 1939-1945 [A "Czech" or "Czechoslovak" army? The ethnic composition of Czechoslovak military units abroad 1939-1945). Praha, Academia 2017, 528 pages, ISBN 978-80-200-2608-8.The author examines in detail the ethnic structure of Czechoslovak units which were formed in France, Great Britain, Soviet Union, North Africa and Middle East during the Second World War. His work is based mainly on a statistical analysis of an extensive set of data stored in the complete electronic database of soldiers of the Czechoslovak...
The Persistent Bond of Socialism
Petr Chalupecký
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):194-202
SUK, Jiří: Veřejné záchodky ze zlata: Konflikt mezi komunistickým utopismem a ekonomickou racionalitou v předsrpnovém Československu [Public lavatories made of gold: The conflict between communist utopianism and economic rationality in Czechoslovakia before August 1968]. Praha, Prostor 2016, 325 pages, ISBN 978-80-7260-341-1.In the reviewer s opinion, this book is an important contribution to studies of the evolution of economic thinking in Czechoslovakia in the 1960s and of the reform process culminating in the Prague Spring in 1968, hitherto unparalleled in Czech historiography. However, the author does not focus only on the economic theory prevailing...
The Unbearable Lightness of Women's Rights?
Adéla Gjuričová
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):203-209
WAGNEROVÁ, Alena: Žena za socialismu: Československo 1945-1974 a reflexe vývoje před rokem 1989 a po něm [Woman under socialism: Czechoslovakia 1945-1974 and the reflection of the development before and after 1989]. (Gender sondy [Gender probes], Vol. 12.) Translated from German by the author. Praha, Sociologické nakladatelství 2017, 262 pages, ISBN 978-80-7419-252-4.The publication is a Czech translation of Alena Wagner s book Die Frau im Sozialismus: Beispiel ČSSR (Hamburg: Hoffmann & Campe, 1974) which was originally published in German, supplemented by several later essays dealing with the situation of women and women's movements in Czechoslovakia...
The "Velvet Revolution" in a Kaleidoscope of Fates of "Ordinary People"
Lucie Rajlová
Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2019, 7(1):210-214
VANĚK, Miroslav - MÜCKE, Pavel: Velvet Revolutions: An Oral History of Czech Society. New York - Oxford, Oxford University Press 2016, 251 pages, ISBN 978-0-19-934272-3. If a publishing house as renowned as Oxford University Press publishes a book representing it, it is in the reviewer's opinion an exceptional success of the Czech historiography. As a matter of fact, this is what Miroslav Vaněk and Pavel Mücke have achieved with their Velvet revolutions: An oral history of Czech society. It is a pioneering work which, using oral history, systematically conveys and interprets perceptions, thinking, opinions, and attitudes of "ordinary people" during...