Mediterranean and Central European Communist Parties in the Cold War

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH, 2025 (roč. 32), číslo 3

Studie a eseje

“Czechoslovakia Has Opened the Eyes Even of the Blind” / The Impact of the Prague Coup on the Italian Elections of April 1948

„Československo otevřelo oči i slepým“ / Vliv pražského komunistického převratu na italské volby v dubnu 1948

Mark Gilbert

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):693-720 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.027

The communist coup d'état in Czechoslovakia in February 1948 critically shaped the Italian general elections of April that same year, with lasting consequences for Italy's democratic trajectory. As Italian political scientist and historian Giorgio Galli observed in 1958, "the events that took place in Prague at the end of February 1948 contributed decisively to shifting the character of the electoral debate in Italy from the alternative of reform versus conservatism to that of parliamentary democracy versus communist dictatorship". Christian Democracy (Democrazia Cristiana, DC) interpreted the Prague coup as a harbinger of what might happen in Italy...

The Peace Propaganda in Cold War Narratives / Czechoslovak and Spanish Communist Parties after the February Prague Coup (1948–1953)

Mírová propaganda v narativech studené války / Československá a španělská komunistická strana po únorovém pražském převratu (1948–1953)

Diego Ruiz Panadero

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):721-755 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.045

This article examines how the concept of peace became a central instrument of propaganda within the communist world at the outset of the Cold War, focusing on its deployment by the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (Komunistická strana Československa, KSČ) after the 1948 communist coup, and by the Communist Party of Spain (Partido Comunista de España, PCE). Following the seizure of power in February 1948 - celebrated in official communist historiography as "Victorious February" (Vítězný únor) - the KSČ incorporated the language of peace into a broader strategy of legitimization that combined Marxist-Leninist ideology with narratives of national...

Contradiplomacy and Solidarity / Spanish and East German Communists in the Context of Relations between Francoist Spain and the GDR (1949–1977)

Kontradiplomacie a solidarita / Španělští a východoněmečtí komunisté v kontextu vztahů mezi frankistickým Španělskem a NDR (1949–1977)

Xavier María Ramos Diez-Astrain

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):756-789 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.042

The Communist Party of Spain (Partido Comunista de España, PCE) and the Communist Party of Germany (Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands, KPD) had historically been united through their membership of the Communist International and their shared experiences in the Spanish Civil War. After the establishment of the German Democratic Republic (GDR), the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands, SED) - the East German successor of the KPD - developed extensive solidarity with the PCE, which the PCE reciprocated with the limited resources at its disposal. Until the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, this solidarity...

The Champion of CMEA Specialization Cooperation? / The Electronics Industry in State-socialist Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic, and Poland

Přeborník specializační spolupráce v rámci RVHP? Elektronický průmysl v komunistickém Československu, Německé demokratické republice a Polsku

Ondřej Klípa – Falk Flade

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):790-827 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.028

This article examines the challenges and failures of specialization cooperation within the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA), focusing on the electronics industry in state-socialist Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic, and Poland. The authors contend that, although specialization was theoretically designed to optimize production and efficiency across the Soviet Bloc, in practice it often led to resistance, parallel production, and inefficiencies. The study demonstrates how economic planning mechanisms, national self-sufficiency policies, and mutual distrust among CMEA member states undermined efforts at coordinated specialization,...

Between Moral Authority and Politics / The Confederation of Political Prisoners after the Fall of Communism in Czechoslovakia (1989–1994)

Mezi morální autoritou a politikou / Konfederace politických vězňů po pádu komunismu v Československu (1989–1994)

Klára Pinerová

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):828-860 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.044

In the early days of the Velvet Revolution in the autumn of 1989, former political prisoners revived the idea of creating a new organization to defend their interests, demand rehabilitation and compensation, and investigate and document the crimes of the communist dictatorship. In the weeks that followed, they decided to establish a new organization called the Confederation of Political Prisoners of Czechoslovakia (Konfederace politických vězňů Československa, KPV), which rapidly expanded its membership and within a few months had more than 16,000 members and more than eighty regional branches. This membership base was interested not only in advocating...

The Budapest Spy Who Never Was / Deconstructing the Accusations of the Czechoslovak State Security against the “Slovak Bourgeois Nationalist” Ivan Horváth and His Alleged Espionage Network

Budapešťský špion, který nebyl / Dekonstrukce obvinění „slovenského buržoazního nacionalisty“ Ivana Horvátha československou Státní bezpečností ze špionáže

Vanda Bessenyei

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):861-899 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.047

The largest political trial in communist Czechoslovakia, known as the "Anti-State Conspiracy Centre Headed by Rudolf Slánský", took place between 20 and 27 November 1952. Although the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (Komunistická strana Československa, KSČ) regarded the trial as a success, it did not mark the end of the search for "enemies within the party apparatus"; a series of follow-up trials soon followed. One of these was the trial of the so-called Slovak bourgeois nationalists, held two years after the Rudolf Slánský trial, in 1954. The group of the "Slovak bourgeois nationalists" was fabricated in accordance with the current ideological framework...

Recenze

The Perennial Alliance? / 75 Years of NATO

Petr Luňák

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):903-917 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.039

How to Interpret the End of the Warsaw Pact? / About the Latest Book by Mark Kramer

Matěj Bílý

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):918-927 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.015

“Informers” – between Victimhood and Guilt? / Foreign Authors on State Security Collaborators and the Limits of Interpretation

Prokop Tomek

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):928-936 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.035

The Czech/German/Polish Giant Mountains / The Rise of Modern Tourism amidst Contested Ethnic Coexistence

Kateřina Vnoučková

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):937-942 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.040

On “Epistemic Arrest” and Different Forms of Capital / A Bourdieusian Analysis of Czechoslovak Ethnography

Veronika Pehe

Soudobé dějiny / CJCH 2025, 32(3):943-948 | DOI: 10.51134/sod.2025.037

Soudobé dějiny

Czech Journal of Contemporary History