This study is dedicated to my husband Peter who has been supporting my research for years, in academic and psychological terms. One could not wish for a better friend.
Foreword by Jan Peek
This year in August, the Slovaks and Czechs remember what happened fifty years ago: the Czechoslovak Spring of 1968 and its brutal end by Warsaw Pact troops. The Czechoslovak Spring has been well researched, or so the knowledgeable Western reader might think. This latest biography of Alexander Dubek by the Swiss political scientist and historian Josette Baer, a renowned specialist on Czechoslovak and Slovak history and political thought, presents a new approach to the political history of Slovakia and Czechoslovakia. As the first non-Slovak historian, Baer investigates two crucially important chapters of Slovak history that so far have been under-researched: the years of the Pre-Spring from 1963 to 1968 and the years of the so-called Normalization (19691989).
The liberalization of the Czechoslovak Communist regime began in 1963 with Dubeks election as First Secretary of the Slovak Communist Party KSS; the Czechoslovak Spring originated in Bratislava and, with Dubeks election to First Secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party KS in January 1968, the way for the reformers was free. Baer focuses on Dubeks career in the KSS in the 1960s and his dissent in the 1970s. After the Communist Party had relieved him from all functions in Party and state, Dubek, the former most powerful politician of Czechoslovakia, found employment at the State Forestry in Bratislava. The State Security Service StB monitored him and his family every day, exerting psychological terror to the maximum. The Normalization regime under General Secretary KS and President in personal union Gustv Husk wanted to delete Dubek and his reform course from Czechoslovak collective memory an endeavour that was not only unsuccessful but would backfire in November 1989: the Communist Party was brought down in 10 days by the people, who had not forgotten Dubek and his attempt at Socialism with a Human Face.
Baers biography closes important gaps in international and interdisciplinary scholarship about the Czechoslovak Spring. Her book is a must-read for everybody interested in the history of Central Europe in the 20th Century and the history of European Communism alike.
Jan Peek, Bratislava, August 2018
Abbreviations
Archives and libraries
ABS STRR Archiv Bezpenostnch Sloek stav pro Studium Totalitnch Reim esk Republiky Archives of the State Security Services at the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes of the Czech Republic, Prague.
AMSNP Archv Mzeum Slovenskho Nrodnho Povstania Archives of the Museum of the Slovak National Uprising, Bansk Bystrica, Slovak Republic.
H SAV Historick stav Slovenskej Akadamie Vied Institute of History at the Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovak Republic.
SNA Slovensk Nrodn Archv, Bratislava The Slovak National Archives, Bratislava, Slovak Republic.
SNK Slovensk Nrodn Kninica, Martin The Slovak National Library, Martin, Slovak Republic.
Political parties, associations and organizations; media
CC KS Central Committee of the Czechoslovak Communist Party
CC KSS Central Committee of the Slovak Communist Party
COMECON Council for Mutual Economic Assistance; see RVHP
CP Communist Party
SNB eskoslovensk Nrodn Banka Czechoslovak State Bank
SSD esk Strana Sociln Demokratick Czech Social Democratic Party
STK eskoslovensk Tlaov Kancelria Czechoslovak Press Chancellery
T esk Televize Czech National TV
DS Demokratick Strana Slovak Democratic Party
FZ Federlne Zhromadenie Federal Assembly
HG Hlinkova Garda Hlinka Guards
HSS Hlinkova Slovensk udov Strana Hlinkas Slovak Peoples Party
HZDS Hnutie Za Demokratick Slovensko Movement for a Democratic Slovakia
IMF International Monetary Fund
KPSS Komunistieskaia Partiia Sovetskogo Soiuza Communist Party of the Soviet Union
KRK KS stedn Kontroln a Revzni Komise KS Central Control and Revision Commission of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
KRK KSS stedn Kontroln a Revzn Komisia KSS Central Control and Revision Commission of the Slovak Communist Party
KS Komunistick Strana eskoslovenska Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
KSS Komunistick Strana Slovenska Slovak Communist Party
MP Member of Parliament
MV Ministerstvo Vntra Ministry of Interior, Slovakia
MZV Ministerstvo Zahraninch Vc Czechoslovak Ministry of Foreign Affairs
NAM Non-Aligned Movement
NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organisation
NF Nrodn Fronta National Front
NKVD Narodnii Kommissariat Vnutrnnikh Del The Peoples Commissariat for Internal Affairs
ODS Obansk Demokratick Strana Czech Civic Democratic Party
OF Obnsk Forum Czech Civic Forum
RVHP Rada vzjomnej hospodrskej pomoci Council for Mutual Economic Assistance
SDSS Socilnodemokratick strana Slovenska Social Democratic Party of Slovakia
SPS Slovensk Poslaneck Klub Slovak Parliamentarians Club
SS Slovensk udov Strana Slovak Peoples Party
SNP Slovensk Nrodnie Povstanie Slovak National Uprising
SNR Slovensk Nrodn Rda Slovak National Council
SNS Slovensk Nrodn Strana Slovak National Party
SSl Strana Slobody Slovak Party of Freedom
SSSR Soiuz Sovietskich Socialistieskich Respublik Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics
StB Sttn Bezpenost Czechoslovak State Security Service
STV Slovensk Televzia Slovak National TV
TASR Taov Agentura Slovenskej Republiky Slovak Press Agency
V KS stedn Vbor Komunistick Strana eskoslovenska Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
V KSS stedn Vbor Komunistick Strana Slovenska Central Committee of the Slovak Communist Party
VPN Verejnos proti nsiliu Slovak Public Against Violence
ZNB Zbor Nrodnej Bezpenosti Corps of National Security, Slovakia
Acknowledgements
Not another biography of Alexander Dubek! Surely, all there is to say about the Prague Spring of 1968 has already been said or so the historically informed reader might think. True, Dubeks reform programme ( akn program ) and the military invasion by Warsaw Pact troops on 21 August 1968 have been widely researched and analysed. Therefore, the eight months of the Czechoslovak Spring are not the focus of this political biography, but Czechoslovakia and Slovakias political history prior to and after the invasion of 1968, embodied in the life of Alexander Dubek. The archive material I found in Slovak and Czech archives is available to the English reader for the first time.
Two main aspects of Dubeks life are unknown to the Western reader; these are the gaps I aim to fill with this book. First, Dubeks career in the Slovak Communist Party KSS in the 1960s that culminated with his election as First Secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party KS in January 1968, providing him with the legislative, executive and judicial power to embark on his reform course. Second, his life after June 1969, when, back home after some months as Czechoslovak ambassador to Turkey, he was ousted from all functions in state and Party.
A principal goal of the Normalization regime (19691989) was to efface Dubek from the collective memory of the Czechoslovak people. The almighty StB (State Security Service) had him and his family under constant surveillance, but they could not silence him. After 1969, Dubek was a dissident in the truest sense of the Latin dissidere , which means sitting apart: a former insider who became an outsider, a fellow believer who dared to protest against the powers that be, among them, Gustv Husk.
