Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1)

Studie a eseje

The Beginnings of the Czechoslovak and Yugoslav Exile Governments in London during the Second World War. Expectations, Possibilities, and Reality

Milan Sovilj

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):5-28  

In his partly comparative study, the author focuses on a specifi c chapter in Czechoslovak- Yugoslav relations in the 20th century, namely contacts of the exile governments of both countries after their occupation by the German army in March 1939 (remnants of Czechoslovakia) and April 1941 (Yugoslavia). Supported by document from Prague’s and Belgrade’s archives, he recalls circumstances of the German occupation of Yugoslavia and compares the formation of the Czechoslovak and Yugoslav political representations in exile, the different ways they took to London, the problems they encountered during early years in exile, and their positions...

Possibilities of Research into the Catholic Church in the Czech Lands in the Early Stage of the Communist Dictatorship

Martin Pácha

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):29-44  

In the author´s opinion, research projects dealing with the Catholic Church in the Czech Lands since the instalment of the Communist regime in 1948 are somewhat closed in that there is very little communication between “ecclesiastic” and “non-ecclesiastic” historians. The article aims to describe causes of the situation and propose a way in which research into the history of the Catholic Church in the period referred to above could be included in broader discussions about the nature of the Communist dictatorship. The author opines that one of the reasons of the introversion is an intensive overreliance on works of the historian...

Street Politics. Student Demonstrations in Prague in the 1960s, and the Disintegration of the ČSM University Structures

Michael Polák

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):45-72  

In the end of October 1967, a spontaneous demonstrations of students protesting against poor living conditions in Prague´s Strahov Dormitory, was quashed with force. The author asks a question why something seemingly as trivial as a power blackout in a student dormitory resulted, at the end of the day, in the disintegration of structures of the Czechoslovak Union of Youth at universities. In doing so, he follows the grammar of the social confl ict through a prism of social movement formation and of the so-called politics of the street. The author describes a shift in the attitude of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia toward students in the 1960s,...

The Ukrainian Factor of the Prague Spring? Petro Shelest and the Czechoslovak Year 1968 in the Light of Documents of the Ukrainian Security Service

Luboš Veselý

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):73-103  

Petro Shelest (1908–1997), the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic and a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, was one of the strongest advocates of an armed invasion of Czechoslovakia among Soviet leaders in 1968. The Soviet leadership tasked him to maintain contacts with the so-called healthy forces in the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia; in the beginning of August, Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia Vasil Biľak (1917–2014) secretly handed over to him the notorious “letter of invitation”...

“It Is Necessary to Draw a Lesson”. The Development of Political Structures of the Warsaw Treaty Organization between 1985 and 1989

Matěj Bílý

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):103-149  

The study analyzes the functioning of political structures of the Warsaw Treaty organization between the advent of Secretary General of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev and the collapse of the state socialist dictatorships in Central and Eastern Europe in the end of the 1989, which has hitherto been examined only superfi cially. Using results of research in Czech, German, and Polish archives and drawing from studies of published documents, it describes in detail the substantial changes in the day-to-day operation of political structures of the organization, which took place at that time. It attempts...

Prague Chronicle

Prague Conference on the Memory of Communism

Oldřich Tůma

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):150-152  

This report assesses the conference “How We Remember: The Memory of Communism. Its Forms, Manifestations, Meanings” that took place in Prague on 17 and 18 September 2019. Its major aim was to have a broad transnational debate on forms, manifestations and meanings of the memory of communist regimes in various settings and environments.

Trajectories of Romani Migrations and Mobilities in Europe and Beyond (1945 – present)

Eszter Varsa

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):153-157  

The conference Trajectories of Romani Migrations and Mobilities in Europe and Beyond (1945–present) was held in Villa Lanna in Prague on 16–18 September 2019. It examined multiple dimensions of Romani mobilities since 1945 and analyzed connections between forms of past mobilities and migrations and the most recent movements of various Romani groupings. It was intended as a response to a lack of refl ection in the emerging fi eld of Romani migration and mobilities studies on historical continuities and social trajectories. The conference pointed to the need for more comparative, intersectional and historically rooted research.

The Equivocal Legacy of 1989 and the Crisis of Liberal Democracy in Central Europe. Report on the “Democratic Revolution 1989: Thirty Years After” Conference

Kristina Andělová

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):158-162  

On the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution in November 2019, the international conference “The Democratic Revolution 1989: Thirty Years After” took place in the Senate of the Parliament of the Czech Republic. Its co-organizers included the Institute for Contemporary History of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic and the Senate of the Parliament of the Czech Republic. The conference presented the most recent research into the history of late communism, 1989 and the 1990s. Thirty years after the end of communism...

Recenze

Political Echoes of Buchenwald

Jakub Šlouf

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):163-167  

The book From my Memories of the Czech historian, journalist, and publicist Miloslav Moulis (1921–2010) are a sequel of his previous book of memoirs, Vlaky do neznáma (Trains Heading for the Unknown) (Třebíč, Akcent 2011), which depicts the era of the fi rst Czechoslovak Republic and the Nazi occupation during which the author, a member of the resistance movement, was imprisoned. The loose sequel starts with his return from the Buchenwald concentration camp and describes his life in post-war Czechoslovakia. As a Communist activist, he fi rst held various administrative jobs and started studying history in the 1960s. In the reviewer s opinion,...

Reflections from Elsewhere. Latinos on the Czechoslovakia of the 1940s and 1950s

Hana Bortlová-Vondráková

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):168-172  

The anthology Czechoslovakia in the eyes of Latin American intellectuals 1947–1959, assembled by a Latin American studies specialist Michal Zourek, brings testimonies of fourteen Latin American intellectuals, which describe the time they spent in Czechoslovakia between the onset of the Cold War and the outbreak of the Cuban revolution. Almost all authors of these texts, most of which can be characterized as reportages, including world-renowned writers such as Gabriel Garcíá Márquez, Pablo Neruda or Jorge Amado, shared a left-wing world outlook and claimed allegiance to Marxism. Actually, it was in the end of the 1940s and in the early 1950s that...

Prison Experience of the 1950s as a Specific Historical Phenomenon?

Marta Edith Holečková

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):173-181  

In her work titled Until the end of life: Political prisoners of the 1950s – trauma, adaptation, identity, the authoress attempted to capture the prison experience of Czechoslovak male and female political prisoners of the 1950s as a complex socio-psychological phenomenon, from their arrest through their detention and interrogation, sentencing and subsequent internment until their release and long-term consequences the ex-prisoners had to put up with. According to the reviewer´s opinion, however, she has fulfilled her goal only partly. The reviewer admits that the authoress has long been interested in transformations of prison systems in many...

The Colourfulness of Prefab Grey

Petr Roubal

Czech Journal of Contemporary History 2020, 8(1):182-186  

Both collective publications (Prefab houses 1: Fifty prefab housing schemes in the Czech Lands. A critical catalogue of the “Prefab house story” series of exhibitions and Prefab houses 2: History of housing schemes in the Czech Lands 1945–1989. A critical catalogue of the “Residence – prefab housing scheme: Planning, realization, housing 1945–1989” exhibition) are products of a broadly conceived interdisciplinary research project the deliverables of which included, inter alia, exhibitions in Prague and all regional capitals of the Czech Republic and which were awarded the prestigious Magnesia Litera prize in...