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An Uncommon Course: Normalisation in Slovakia

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Czechoslovakia and Eastern Europe in the Era of Normalisation, 1969–1989

Abstract

This chapter deals with the specific features of Slovak development in the 1970s and 1980s. The normalisation regime had the same objectives in both the Czech lands and Slovakia, but the tactics on how to reach them differed. The post-1968 communist leadership utilised the differences between the Slovak and Czech situation to its advantage. Political persecution was less strict and more selective in Slovakia and ‘capitulation to normalisation’ was much more widespread and faster than in the Czech lands. The legitimacy of the Slovak ‘normalisation regime’ was not dependent solely on the material well-being of the population. Slovak national communists created a viable narrative, which promoted ‘real socialism’ as the fulfilment of the decades-long emancipatory efforts of the Slovak nation. Slovak opposition was weaker, less politicised and lacked a common platform and could not provide a political alternative to the existing regime. The results of the different approaches towards Czech and Slovak society during normalisation significantly influenced post-1989 developments in Slovakia, as well as the dissolution of Czechoslovakia.

This work was funded by the Agency for the Support of Research and Development, contract no. APVV-16-0047APVV-14-0644: ‘From Denarius to Euro: The Money Phenomenon in the History of Slovakia from the Middle Ages to the Present Day’. The research undertaken for this study was conducted under the auspices of the grant VEGA 2/0099/20: ‘University research in the context of the constitutional and political changes in the years 1918–1968’.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The committee existed from 1990–1992, when the Slovak republic was still part of the Czechoslovak federation.

  2. 2.

    R. Roško cited in J. Marušiak, ‘Slovenská spoločnosť a normalizácia’, in J. Madarásová (ed.), Česká a slovenská spoločnosť v období normalizácie (Bratislava, 2003), pp. 109–54 (here p. 145).

  3. 3.

    E. Steiner, The Slovak Dilemma (Cambridge, 1973), p. 201.

  4. 4.

    V. Průcha, ‘Economic Development and Relations, 1918–1989’, in J. Musil (ed.), The End of Czechoslovakia (Budapest, 1995), pp. 40–76 (here p. 42).

  5. 5.

    J. Musil, ‘Czech and Slovak Society’, in Musil (ed.), The End of Czechoslovakia, pp. 77–94 (here p. 90).

  6. 6.

    Marušiak, ‘Slovenská spoločnosť a normalizácia’, p. 128.

  7. 7.

    A. Slepička, Venkov a/nebo město lidé/sídla/krajina (Prague, 1981), pp. 32–3.

  8. 8.

    Musil, ‘Czech and Slovak Society’, p. 81.

  9. 9.

    By contrast, in the Czech lands the figures were 48.6 per cent and 14.6 per cent. See Průcha, ‘Economic Development and Relations, 1918–1989’, p. 74.

  10. 10.

    On the over-prioritisation of heavy industry, imbalances, poor productivity and the disastrous impact on environment and health, see ibid., pp. 67–70.

  11. 11.

    National Archive of the Czech Republic, Archiv Ústředního výboru KSČ, f. 02/2, sv. 302, a. j. 386. In the democratic elections of May 1946, the Communist Party polled 43.25 per cent in the Czech lands, but only 30.48 per cent in Slovakia.

  12. 12.

    M. Kučera and Z. Pavlík, ‘Czech and Slovak Demography’, in Musil (ed.), The End of Czechoslovakia, p. 39.

  13. 13.

    V. Široký, ‘Pomer Čechov a Slovákov v novej Československej republike: Prednáška v Slovanskom dome v Prahe’, 8 October 1945, in V. Široký, Za šťastné Slovensko v socialistickom Československu (Bratislava, 1952), pp. 96–108 (here pp. 101 and 108).

  14. 14.

    See J. Benko and A. Hudek, ‘Ideológia čechoslovakizmu a slovenskí komunisti’, in A. Hudek, J. Mervart and M. Kopeček (eds), Čecho/slovakismus (Prague, 2019), pp. 281–309.

  15. 15.

    See S. Brown, ‘Socialism with a Slovak Face: Federalization, Democratization, and the Prague Spring’, East European Politics and Societies, vol. 22, no. 3 (2008), pp. 467–95.

  16. 16.

    J. Strinka, ‘Federalizácia a demokratizácia’, Kultúrny život, vol. 23, no. 14 (1968), pp. 1 and 6; P. Števček, ‘108 dní do federácie’, Kultúrny život, vol. 23, no. 28 (1968), p. 3.

  17. 17.

    P. Pithart. ‘Towards a Shared Freedom, 1968–1989’, in Musil (ed.), The End of Czechoslovakia, pp. 201–23 (here p. 204).

  18. 18.

    The numbers vary between 52,950 and 53,300. See, for example, S. Sikora, ‘Politický vývoj na Slovensku 1968–1971’, in M. Londák, S. Sikora and E. Londáková (eds), Od predjaria k normalizácií: Slovensko v Československu na rozhraní 60. a 70. rokov 20. storočia (Bratislava, 2016), pp. 11–130 (here p. 120).

  19. 19.

    M. Štefanský, ‘The Fall of Communism and the Establishment of an Independent Slovakia’, in M. Teich, D. Kováč and M. D. Brown (eds), Slovakia in History (Cambridge, 2011), pp. 351–69 (here p. 355).

  20. 20.

    M. M. Šimečka, Medzi Slovákmi (Bratislava, 2017), p. 11.

  21. 21.

    M. Kusý, ‘Slovenský fenomén’ (1985), reproduced in M. Kusý, Eseje (Bratislava, 1991), pp. 155–74 (here p. 169).

  22. 22.

    P. Zwick, National Communism (Boulder, CO, 1983), pp. 113–14.

  23. 23.

    This was the case for two enfants terribles communist intellectuals, Ondrej Pavlík and Vladimír Mináč. See Sikora, ‘Politický vývoj na Slovensku 1968–1971’, p. 118; and M. Štefanský, Slovensko v rokoch 1967–1970: Výber dokumentov (Bratislava, 1992), p. 601.

  24. 24.

    J. Marušiak, ‘Nezávislé iniciatívy na Slovensku v rokoch normalizácie’, in J. Pešek and S. Szomolányi (eds), November 1989 na Slovensku: Súvislosti, predpoklady a dôsledky (Bratislava, 1999), pp. 54–75 (here p. 59).

  25. 25.

    In Slovakia, the main representative of the ‘ultra’ group was the new ideological secretary of the Central Committee of the KSS, Ľudovít Pezlár.

  26. 26.

    G. Eyal, The Origins of Postcommunist Elites: From Prague Spring to the Breakup of Czechoslovakia (Minneapolis, MN, 2003), p. 49.

  27. 27.

    Sikora, ‘Politický vývoj na Slovensku 1968–1970’, pp. 121–2.

  28. 28.

    C. S. Leff, National Conflict in Czechoslovakia: The Making and Remaking of a State, 1918–1987 (Princeton, NJ, 1988), p. 261.

  29. 29.

    I. Kamenec, ‘O hľadaní dobra a zla v dejinách’, in I. Kamenec, Spoločnosť, politika, historiografia. (Bratislava, 2009), pp. 88–9.

  30. 30.

    As Martin Šimečka has noted, it was no coincidence that most of them were of ‘non-Slovak origin’—Jews (Ladislav Kalina), Czechs (Milan Šimečka) and Hungarians (Miklós Duray). The Slovak communists expected that the persecution of the ‘other’ would not upset the majority. Šimečka, Medzi Slovákmi, p. 20.

  31. 31.

    This was the case of the journalist Pavol Števček, one of the prominent voices of the Slovak liberalisation process, who in 1973 undertook self-criticism for his activities. See N. Kmeť, ‘Intelektuáli na Slovensku v rokoch 1948–1989 a premena ich vzťahu ku KSČ’, in J. Pažout (ed.), Komunističtí intelektuálové a proměna jejich vztahu ke KSČ (1945–1989) (Prague, 2013), pp. 54–75 (here p. 63).

  32. 32.

    Eyal, The Origins of Postcommunist Elites, p. xx.

  33. 33.

    Štefanský, ‘The Fall of Communism’, p. 355.

  34. 34.

    C. S. Leff, The Czech and Slovak Republics: Nation versus State (Boulder, CO, 1997), p. 128.

  35. 35.

    A. Gjuričová, ‘Too Ideal to be a Parliament: The Representative Assemblies in Socialist Czechoslovakia, 1948–1989’, in R. Aerts et al. (eds), The Ideal of Parliament in Europe since 1800 (London, 2019), pp. 199–218 (here p. 208).

  36. 36.

    J. Rychlík, Češi a Slováci ve 20. století: Spolupráce a konflikty 1914–1992 (Prague, 2012), pp. 509–14.

  37. 37.

    Leff, National Conflict in Czechoslovakia, p. 253.

  38. 38.

    Jan Rychlík has observed that in this respect the Czechoslovak federation was different from its Soviet equivalent in that ethnic Russians continued to occupy elite positions in all Soviet republics. J. Rychlík, ‘Normalizační podoba československé federace’, in N. Kmeť and J. Marušiak (eds), Slovensko a režim normalizácie (Prešov, 2003), pp. 8–46 (here p. 31).

  39. 39.

    G. Husák, ‘Z prejavu na zjazde KSS, 14. 5. 1971’, in V. Kún (ed.), V bratskej jednote. Zborník statí a prejavov k otázke vzťahu Čechov a Slovákov (Bratislava, 1979), p. 195.

  40. 40.

    Cited in Rychlík, Češi a Slováci ve 20. století, p. 542.

  41. 41.

    Rychlík, ‘Normalizační podoba československé federace’, p. 18.

  42. 42.

    J. Chovanec, Československá socialistická federácia (Bratislava, 1978), p. 53.

  43. 43.

    Ibid., p. 66.

  44. 44.

    J. Žatkuliak, ‘Deformácie ústavného zákona o československej federácií po októbri 1968’, Historický časopis, no. 4 (1992), pp. 473–85 (here p. 477).

  45. 45.

    Rychlík, Češi a Slováci ve 20. století, p. 531.

  46. 46.

    Leff, National Conflict in Czechoslovakia, p. 271.

  47. 47.

    M. Kusý, ‘Česi a Slováci’, in M. Kusý, Na vlnách slobodnej Európy (Bratislava,1990), p. 41.

  48. 48.

    Šimečka, Medzi Slovákmi, p. 24. Kysuce is a poor region in north-western Slovakia.

  49. 49.

    According to data from Historická statistická ročenka ČSSR (Prague, 1985) p. 655.

  50. 50.

    Průcha, ‘Economic Development and Relations, 1918–1989’, p. 73.

  51. 51.

    Rychlík, ‘Normalizační podoba československé federace’, p. 38.

  52. 52.

    J. Čarnogurský, ‘O Slovensku a Slovácích’, Alternativa, no. 1 (1989), p. 43.

  53. 53.

    In the sense that many Czechs believed they were essentially financing Slovak modernisation, while many Slovaks feared that the profits of Slovak factories were being siphoned off to their headquarters in the Czech lands.

  54. 54.

    J. Buzalka, Slovenská ideológia a kríza (Bratislava, 2012), p. 66.

  55. 55.

    L. Kalinová, K sociálním dějinám Československa v letech 1969–1989 (Prague, 1999), p. 60.

  56. 56.

    Ibid., p. 73.

  57. 57.

    J. Pešek and M. Barnovský, V zovretí normalizácie: Cirkvi na Slovensku 1969–1989 (Bratislava, 2004), pp. 8–9.

  58. 58.

    The accusation by Hungarian communist leaders of nationalist tendencies among Slovak communists was later used in the political trials of the Slovak ‘bourgeois nationalists’. See M. Barnovský, ‘Sovietsky zväz, komunisti a riešenie maďarskej otázky’, in Z. Kárník and M. Kopeček (eds), Bolševismus, komunismus a radikální socialismus v Československu, vol. III (Prague, 2004), pp. 153–82.

  59. 59.

    Barnovský, ‘Sovietsky zväz, komunisti a riešenie maďarskej otázky’, p. 179.

  60. 60.

    J. Marušiak, ‘Maďarská menšina v slovenskej politike v rokoch normalizácie’, in Kmeť and Marušiak (eds), Slovensko a režim normalizácie, pp. 222–79 (here p. 233).

  61. 61.

    Manual workers constituted 46 per cent of Slovak Hungarians; only a paltry 1.6 per cent held college degrees. See ibid., p. 258.

  62. 62.

    The primary cause for these restrictions was economic: to prevent shopping trips to Hungary, where items in short supply and ‘Western’ merchandise were more accessible. See ibid., p. 247.

  63. 63.

    National communists never openly threatened the ruling authorities. For example, the decision of the Slovak National Council in 1975 that the outbreak of the Slovak National Uprising (August 1944) would no longer be a national holiday went without protest.

  64. 64.

    J. Žatkuliak (ed.), 1989. November a Slovensko: Chronológia a dokumenty (Bratislava, 1999), pp. 17–61.

  65. 65.

    Kusý, ‘Slovenský fenomén’, p. 170.

  66. 66.

    See M. Bútora, ‘Pozitívni devianti alebo odklínanie stigmatizovaných’, Slovenské pohľady, no. 12 (1989), pp. 112–18; and D. Doellinger, Turning Prayers into Protests: Religious-Based Activism and Its Challenge to State Power in Socialist Slovakia and East Germany (Budapest and New York, 2013), pp. 186–7.

  67. 67.

    Šimečka, Medzi Slovákmi, p. 38.

  68. 68.

    Even contacts between the opposition in the two biggest Slovak cities, Bratislava and Košice, were effectively curtailed.

  69. 69.

    Leff, National Conflict in Czechoslovakia, p. 266. In 1989, less than 50 of the 1883 Charter 77 signatories were Slovaks. The majority of signatories lived in Prague.

  70. 70.

    This benevolent ignorance was typical of the vast majority of Czech intellectuals since the establishment of Czechoslovakia in 1918. Despite occasional criticism from both Czechs and Slovaks, the situation did not change until the dissolution of the state in 1993.

  71. 71.

    See M. Kusý, ‘Charta 77 a ľudské práva’, 13 October 2007, at https://www.olp.sk/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/charta_77_prof_kusy.pdf (last accessed 4 August 2021).

  72. 72.

    J. Čarnogurský, ‘Mýty o protikomunistickom odboji’, Impulz, no. 3 (2009), at http://www.impulzrevue.sk/article.php?466 (last accessed 4 August 2021).

  73. 73.

    Its representatives, František Mikloško and Ján Chryzostom Korec, did not sign Charter 77 explaining that they did not have a mandate to enter the civic-political platform. See V. Prečan, ‘Charta 77 na Slovensku aneb Slovensko a Charta 77’ (1994–2019), at http://www.csds.cz/cs/g6/3361-DS.html#dsy3361-DS_A1a (last accessed 4 August 2021).

  74. 74.

    E. Londáková, ‘Nežná revolúcia pred rokom 1989’, in P. Petruf et al., Slovensko a Československo v XX. storočí (Bratislava, 2010), pp. 305–15 (here p. 308).

  75. 75.

    Pešek and Barnovský, V zovretí normalizácie, p. 56.

  76. 76.

    Over 60 per cent of the participants at Velehrad were from the younger generation. See ibid., p. 146.

  77. 77.

    Ibid., p. 148.

  78. 78.

    For the so-called Petition of Moravian Catholics, see J. Šimulčik, Čas svitania. Sviečková manifestácia - 25. marec 1988. (Prešov, 1998), p. 26

  79. 79.

    Čarnogurský considered Duray a Hungarian nationalist, not a dissident. See Marušiak, ‘Maďarská menšina v slovenskej politike’, p. 257.

  80. 80.

    M. Kopeček, ‘The Socialist Conception of Human Rights and Its Dissident Critique: Hungary and Czechoslovakia, 1960s–1980s’, East Central Europe, vol. 46, nos 2–3 (2019), pp. 261–89 (here p. 283).

  81. 81.

    Marušiak, ‘Maďarská menšina v slovenskej politike’, p. 275.

  82. 82.

    For details, see M. Spurný, ‘Mezi vědou a politikou. Ekologie za socialismu a kapitalismu (1975–1995)’, in M. Kopeček (ed.), Architekti dlouhé změny: Expertní kořeny postsocialismu v Československu (Prague, 2019), pp. 267–89.

  83. 83.

    Bratislava/nahlas, at https://monoskop.org/images/1/1d/Budaj_Jan_ed_Bratislava_nahlas.pdf (last accessed 4 August 2021).

  84. 84.

    However, the communist intellectual and member of the CC KSS, Vladimír Mináč, openly disagreed with the persecution of environmentalists around Bratislava/nahlas.

  85. 85.

    M. Huba, ‘Bratislava/nahlas po dvadsiatich rokoch’, Pamäť národa, no. 4 (2007), pp. 104–6.

  86. 86.

    However, members of the Slovak Catholic opposition also published samizdat articles sympathetic to representatives of the ľudak regime. See, for example, the journal Historický zápisník (Historical Notebook) from 1986 devoted to the memory of Jozef Tiso, at http://www.samizdat.sk/priloha/historicky-zapisnik-1986-1.pdf (last accessed 4 August 2021).

  87. 87.

    In Italian and French leftist and communist circles, Dubček was an important symbol of democratic socialism.

  88. 88.

    J. Žatkuliak, ‘Udalosti, ktoré viedli slovenskú spoločnosť k novembru 1989’, in Petruf et al. (eds), Slovensko a Československo v XX. storočí, pp. 329–44 (here p. 336).

  89. 89.

    See J. Marušiak, ‘Bratislavská päťka. Prejav agónie komunistického režimu’, in V. Bystrický et al., Storočie procesov: Súdy, politika a spoločnosť v moderných dejinách Slovenska (Bratislava, 2013), pp. 241–58. The ‘five’ were Ján Čarnogurský, Miroslav Kusý, Hana Šolcová-Ponická, Anton Selecký and Vladimír Maňák.

  90. 90.

    M. Bútora, ‘Sociológovia prezidentovi Husákovi: buď, alebo’, Denník N, 6 August 2018, at https://dennikn.sk/1547095/sociologovia-prezidentovi-husakovi-bud-alebo/ (last accessed 4 August 2021).

  91. 91.

    Londáková, ‘Nežná revolúcia pred rokom 1989’, p. 314.

  92. 92.

    Marušiak, ‘Slovenská spoločnosť a normalizácia’, p. 143.

  93. 93.

    Šimečka, Medzi Slovákmi, p. 30.

  94. 94.

    Musil, ‘Czech and Slovak Society’, p. 88.

  95. 95.

    See Eyal, The Origins of Postcommunist Elites.

  96. 96.

    M. Bútora, Z. Bútorová and A. Miltová, Ale snad i pro toto jsme žili, ne? Výber z korešpondencie Milana Petruska a Aleny Miltovej s Martinom Bútorom a Zorou Bútorovou, 1985–1989 (Prague, 2016), p. 386.

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    Adam Hudek

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  1. Department of Humanities, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK

    Kevin McDermott

  2. Department of Humanities, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK

    Matthew Stibbe

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Hudek, A. (2022). An Uncommon Course: Normalisation in Slovakia. In: McDermott, K., Stibbe, M. (eds) Czechoslovakia and Eastern Europe in the Era of Normalisation, 1969–1989. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-98271-3_5

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