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Havlova antipolitika na různý způsob. K Sukově knize o Václavu Havlovi

100%

Znoj M.

Soudobé dějiny (Contemporary History)

2014

issue 3

410-421

In this essay, the author first considers some of the sources of inspiration and interpretative frameworks of Suk’s book, which have led the author, Znoj, to consider the theme of the absurdity of the Socialist world as a component of Havel’s work as a dramatist and a dissident. In a nutshell, the author argues that the anti-politics of the Normalization period of the 1970s and 1980s took the place of the theatre of the absurd of the 1960s. He then describes anti-politics as the construction of a moral world that maintained a distance from the existing political order, and he points out its main features and analyses the meaning of that distance by considering Havel’s well-known essay, ‘The Power of the Powerless’ (1978). Suk’s book, according to the author, is the story of how the dissident’s word became political power. Suk, he argues, has thus demonstrated that he is the best historian of Havel’s dissidence and the end of the Communist regime led by Husák. This book is a solid historical work based on a thorough examination of the sources, but its author has gone beyond mere positivism; he has developed a suitable theoretical framework for historical interpretation. The result casts a penetrating light on recent Czech history. Suk’s emphasis on historical continuity gives the interpretation a unifying perspective while, according to the author, papering over some of the seams and smoothing out some of the conflicts of the period. First, Suk has omitted Havel’s distancing himself from Western democracies when he was a dissident, even his distancing himself from liberal democracy per se. Second, he has underestimated Havel’s reluctance to politicize the dissident movement when the matter was being hotly debated in 1989. And, third, Suk appears not to have fully appreciated Havel’s sudden change in his conception of ‘anti-politics’, which meant Havel’s becoming a political leader and using the methods of realpolitik in the struggle for power.

Totalitarismus a posttotalitarismus v Čechách

63%

Znoj M., Koubek J.

Soudobé dějiny (Contemporary History)

2009

issue 4

722-733

This article traces the changes in interpretations of the concept of totalitarianism in various ideological contexts since the concept emerged in the 1920s. The authors argue that if one discounts claims of a purely ideological nature, only two periods in twentieth-century Czech history were truly totalitarian: the ‘Protectorate’ (1939–45) and the fi rst few years of Communist rule, that is, from 1948 to 1953. Concerning the post-Stalinist period, the authors suggest that the concept of post-totalitarianism proposed by Juan Linz should be applied. This would make it possible, on the one hand, to distinguish between the goals that the system claimed to be putting into practice, and the reality prevailing in society. It would thus describe, for example, the changing importance of ideology and mass mobilization; on the other hand, the model offers a differentiated terminology for the early, mature, and, ultimately, ‘frozen’ stages of post-totalitarianism during the period of ‘normalization’.

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2 Soudobé dějiny (Contemporary History)

2 Znoj M.

1 Koubek J.

1 2014

1 2009

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Havlova antipolitika na různý způsob. K Sukově knize o Václavu Havlovi

Totalitarismus a posttotalitarismus v Čechách