The paper deals with the topic of the employment of the Polish workers in post- -war Czechoslovakia. Analysed are mainly the features of the Czechoslovak workforce policy with some insight into the political context of the Czechoslovak-Polish relations. Despite the tensions, the employment of Polish citizens in Czechoslovak coal mines continued after the war in line with the laws of supply and demand. The advantages of the temporary border crossing, were enjoyed and quietly tolerated by both parties. First, with the start of the five- and six-year Plans in both countries, this development conformed with the demands of the centrally directed policy for the distribution of workforce stemming from a planned economy. From its very beginning, recruitment of Polish agricultural workers represented a method employed by the government in its attempt to cope with the permanent shortage of workers in the post-war Czechoslovak labour market. Just like the other emergency measures, it was accompanied by disproportions in economic costs. The influence of political symbols which were detrimental to the economy were also among the specific attributes of this arrangements. The development in both cases reveals a change in the economic as well as political thinking on the threshold of the communist rule.
Both publications (The Bloody Finals: The spring of 1945 in the Czech Lands and The Bloody Summer of 1945: Post-war violence in the Czech Lands) are extensive historical textual-and-pictorial guidebooks mapping the geography of violence in the Czech Lands in the end of the Second World War and shortly thereafter, and as such fit well into the broader portfolio of works of this type written by Jiří Padevět. In the reviewer’s opinion, the books are primarily intended as documentary, popularization and educational publications and therefore lack many attributes of a regular historical work, but their reflections in the media and society, which make their author a respected authority in the interpretation of modern Czech history, justify and perhaps even necessitate subjecting the books to a critical review. While fully respecting the author’s intentions and motives, which aim at a remedial selfreflection of the nation’s past and which he has obviously succeeded to achieve, there is one outstanding problem, namely that the books do not contain any definition of the genre selected by the author and its principles; the same applies to the theoretico-methodological basis. In addition, they neither contain an adequate reflection of previous research results nor provide an adequate publishing service and give up any attempt at an interpretation. In the reviewer’s opinion, the guidebooks lack relevant instructions for use and a key allowing the reader to evaluate the accumulated empirical information they contain. The reviewer further focuses on whether and how the two books advance historical knowledge, the questions they open, what they bring from the viewpoint of historical culture, and on their editorial and publishing quality.
CS
Obě publikace mají charakter rozsáhlých historických textově-obrazových průvodců, mapujících geografii násilí v českých zemích v závěru druhé světové války a po jejím skončení, a řadí se do širší produkce tohoto typu z pera Jiřího Padevěta. Podle recenzenta tyto svazky mají sice primárně dokumentační, popularizační a osvětové cíle a postrádají řadu atributů odborné historické práce, avšak jejich mediální a společenský ohlas, který autorovi a jeho dílu propůjčuje velkou autoritu při výkladu moderních českých dějin, zakládá oprávnění a snad i nutnost podrobit je kritické reflexi. Při plném respektu k autorovým záměrům a motivům, které míří k ozdravné sebereflexi národní minulosti a které se mu zřejmě daří naplňovat, však zůstává problémem, že v uvedených pracích není nijak definován zvolený žánr a jeho zásady, stejně jako nejsou naznačena teoreticko-metodologická východiska. Vedle toho neobsahují dostatečnou reflexi dosavadního výzkumu ani nenabízejí náležitý ediční servis a zcela rezignují na snahu o interpretaci. Průvodcům tak podle recenzenta schází relevantní návod k použití i klíč k vyhodnocení nahromaděných empirických poznatků. Dále se recenzent soustředí na otázky, zda a jak obě publikace posunují historické poznání a jaké problémy otevírají, co přinášejí z hlediska historické kultury a jaká je úroveň jejich redakčního a edičního zpracování.
The article studies the hypothesis that the evolution of new forms of participative democracy is associated with the modernization process and the value change which occurred during the second half of the 20th century. According to Ronald Inglehart’s theory of post-material values, the modernization process should increase citizens’ autonomy, education and cognitive skills and, in turn, help advance new forms of democracy. Based on the case of EU accession referendums in five Central and Eastern European countries, it is studied who participated in those referendums and which (primarily socio-demographic) factors influenced that participation. According to Inglehart’s theory (and related hypotheses), alternative/direct forms of participation should mobilize young generations, and an important role should be played by factors such as high education or increasingly critical attitudes towards representative democracy. The results of the analysis did not confirm this hypothesis. The analysis showed that direct democracy mobilizes those citizens who have participated in representative elections in the past and are generally more interested in politics. The hypothesis that young people should be more likely to participate in referendums was rejected as well.
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