1970s



•Moscow Protocol - Moscow Protocol demanded normalization = no reformators in CP •Normalization =
also period from August 1968 – November 1989
•Important  People loyal to the Soviet Union
•Slovakia – leader of CP Gustav Husák guaranteed at least  of some reforms
•Soviet leaders – back to period before Prague Spring




•A. Dubček - remained in office only until April 1969
•Anti - Soviet actions:
-Jan Palach burned himself  to protest against the regime in January 1969, † 19 January 1969 → 20
January demonstration march, 25 January – funeral
-Miroslav Malinka burned himself - 22 January 1969
-Blanka Nacházelová Committed suicide - gas poisoning – 22 January 1969 •L. Breznev – warned
Czechoslovak government - events after J. Palach's deaths - dangerous political character * - Jan
Zajíc burned himself 25 February 1969 – Anniversary of      February 1948
*- Evžen Plocek burned himself 4 April 1969
*
*

*






•Anti - Soviet actions:
*- March 1969 – Ice Hokey World Championship – Czechoslovakia beat USSR – DEMONSTARTION x Soviet
reaction →  Czechoslovakia's victory over the Soviet team in the World Ice Hockey Championships in
precipitated Soviet pressures for a CP Presidium reorganization → Gustáv Husák was named first
secretary (title changed general secretary in 1971)
•A program of "normalization"—the restoration of continuity with the pre-reform period was
initiated;  normalization entailed thoroughgoing political repression and the return to ideological
conformity
*
*




•A new purge cleansed the Czechoslovak leadership of all reformist  elements ( e.g. 115 members of
CP Central Committee, 54 were replaced; CP party membership, which had been close to 1.7 million in
January 1968, was reduced by about 500,000; top levels of government were purged)
•Publishing houses and film studios were placed under new direction and censorship was strictly
imposed and a campaign of militant atheism was organized •May 1971 Czechoslovakia and  USSR signed
the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance; Soviet advisers supervised the
functioning of the Ministry of Interior and the security apparatus
•V. Bilak became the most ardent advocate of Proletarian internationalism
•The purges of the first half of 1970 eliminated the reformists within CP
•Fall 1970 - ex-communist intelligentsia organized the Socialist Movement of Czechoslovak Citizens
- protest movement dedicated to the goals of 1968 (47 leaders of the movement were arrested )
•Organized protest was effectively stilled
*
*

•Czechoslovakia had been federalized under the Constitutional Law of Federation of 27 October 1968
•14th Party Congress 1971 G. Husák announced the 1968 14th CP Congress had been abrogated -
"normalization" had been "completed" and that all the party needed to do was consolidate its gains
•Cultural life - suffered greatly from the limitations on independent thought, as did
the humanities, social sciences and ultimately even natural sciences;  art had to adhere to a rigid
formula of socialist realism
•Government's emphasis on obedience, conformity, and the preservation of the status quo was
challenged by individuals and organized groups aspiring to independent thinking and activity
•Czechoslovakia had signed UN Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights and the Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights in 1968 •1975 The Helsinki Conference on Security and Cooperation in
Europe's Final Act ( Helsinki Accords), signed also by Czechoslovakia - also included guarantees
of human rights

•A new purge cleansed the Czechoslovak leadership of all reformist  elements ( e.g. 115 members of
the KSČ Central Committee, 54 were replaced. CP party membership, which had been close to 1.7
million in January 1968, was reduced by about 500,000. Top levels of government and the leadership
of social organizations were purged)
•Publishing houses and film studios were placed under new direction and censorship was strictly
imposed and a campaign of militant atheism was organized •May 1971 Czechoslovakia and  USSR signed
the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance; Soviet advisers supervised the
functioning of the Ministry of Interior and the security apparatus
•V. Bilak became the most ardent advocate of Proletarian internationalism
•The purges of the first half of 1970 eliminated the reformists within the party organization. In
the fall of 1970, the ex-communist intelligentsia organized the Socialist Movement of Czechoslovak
Citizens - protest movement dedicated to the goals of 1968 (47leaders of the movement were arrested
)
•Organized protest was effectively stilled
*
*

•1975 Conference in Helsinki – Final Act -signed the declaration in an attempt to improve relations
between the Communist bloc and the West
ØSovereign equality, respect for the rights inherent in sovereignty
ØRefraining from the threat or use of force
ØInviolability of frontiers
ØTerritorial integrity of States
ØPeaceful settlement of disputes
ØNon-intervention in internal affairs
ØRespect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the freedom of thought, conscience,
religion or belief
ØEqual rights and self-determination of peoples
ØCo-operation among States
ØFulfillment in good faith of obligations under international  law
*

•The document was seen both as a significant step toward reducing Cold War tensions and as a major
diplomatic boost for the Soviet Union at the time, due to its clauses on the inviolability of
national frontiers and respect for territorial integrity, which were seen to consolidate the USSR's
territorial gains in Eastern Europe following the Second World War
•1976 Soviet Block signed pact of UN – human rights
•Reflection of Helsinki – “Charter 77”,…

•January 1977 - Charter 77 appeared in FDR newspapers, document was translated and reprinted
throughout the world
•The original manifesto reportedly was signed by 243 people; among them were artists, former public
officials, and other prominent figures - Zdeněk Mlynář (secretary of CP Central Committee in
1968), Václav Slavík (Central Committee member in 1968) and Ludvík Vaculík (author of "Two Thousand
Words")
•Charter 77 defined itself as "a loose, informal, and open community of people" concerned with the
protection of civil and human rights; it denied oppositional intent and based its defense of rights
on legally binding international documents signed by the Czechoslovak government and on guarantees
of civil rights contained in the Czechoslovak Constitution
•Charter 77 had over 800 signatures by the end of 1977, including workers and youth
•G. Husák regime - claimed that all rights derive from the state and that international covenants
are subject to the internal jurisdiction of the state, responded with fury to the Charter 77

•Text was never published in the official media; signatories were arrested and interrogated;
dismissal from employment often followed; Czechoslovak press launched vicious attacks against the
Charter 77; public was mobilized to sign either individual condemnations or various forms of
"anti-Charters„
•Closely associated with Charter 77 - Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Persecuted was
formed in 1978 with the specific goal of documenting individual cases of government persecution and
human rights violations

*
*


•Edward Gierek (4th First Secretary CP)
•"New Development Strategy" - based on import-led growth - program faltered suddenly because of
worldwide recession and increased oil prices
•1975 Helsinky Accords
•E. Gierek government's growing difficulties led also to increased dependence on USSR e.g. economic
cooperation
•Constitution (amended in February 1976) - formalized the alliance with USSR and the leading role
of CP → proposed changes was softened after protests by intellectuals and the Church, but the
regime felt it needed additional authority given the indebtedness to the West and the deepening
economic crisis → divisive issues raised helped to coalesce the emerging circles of active
political opposition
•




•As a result of the 1970 worker rebellion food prices remained frozen and were artificially low
until 1976
•June 1976 - in an attempt to reduce consumption the government introduced a long-announced and
several times delayed, but radical price increase: basic foodstuffs had their prices raised by an
average of 60% → nationwide wave of strikes, with violent demonstrations, looting and labor unrest
at the factory near Warsaw, in Radom, Płock and other places
•The government quickly backed down and repealed the price rises, but the strike leaders were
arrested and put on trial
• A series of "spontaneous" large scale public gatherings was staged by CP leadership in a number
of cities, but the Soviet pressure prevented further attempts at raising prices
•E. Gierek's cordial in the past relations with L. Brezhnev were seriously damaged
•Food ration cards - introduced because of the destabilized market in August 1976, were to remain a
feature of life in Poland for the duration of the People's Republic

*
*A queue, a common sight in Poland's shortage economy in the 1970s and 1980s


•The regime's retreat, having occurred for the second time in several years, amounted to an
unprecedented defeat; within the rigid political system, the government was neither able to reform
(it would lose control and power), nor to satisfy society's staple needs, because it had to sell
abroad all it could to make foreign debt and interests payments → this quandary, combined with the
daily reality of the lack of necessities, facilitated the consolidation of organized opposition
•1976 group of intellectuals led by Jacek Kuroń, Antoni Macierewicz, Jan Józef Lipski and Adam
Michnik founded and operated the Workers' Defence Committee
•More opposition groups indeed soon followed - Movement for Defense of Human and Civic Rights, Free
Trade Unions of the Coast and the Confederation of Independent Poland
•The periodical  "The Worker" was distributed in factories from September 1977
*

•The idea of independent trade unions was first raised by the Gdańsk and Szczecin workers striking
in 1970–71, but was later developed and promoted by  Workers' Defence Committe and its leftist
collaborators - led to the establishment in 1978 of Free Trade Unions, the precursor of Solidarity
• Confederation of Independent Poland represented right-wing of the Polish opposition (opposition
members tried to resist the regime by denouncing it for violating the Polish constitution, Polish
laws and Poland's international obligations, they called for human rights movements in Soviet Bloc)
•For the rest of the 1970s, resistance to the regime grew, assuming also the forms of student
groups, clandestine newspapers and publishers, importing books and newspapers, and even a "Flying
University" (regime practiced various forms of repression against the budding reform movements)
•16 October 1978 Cardinal Karol Wojtyła, the archbishop of Kraków, was elected pope at the Vatican
- John Paul II

*



•1966 Central Committee approved the "New Economic Mechanism " - moved away from a strictly planned
economy towards a system more reminiscent of the decentralized Yugoslavian model
•Over the next two decades of relative domestic quiet
• J. Kádár's government responded alternately to pressures for minor political and economic reforms
as well as to counter-pressures from reform opponents
•Dissidents still remained closely watched by the secret police however, particularly during the
anniversaries of the 1956 uprising in 1966, 1976, and 1986

•Walter Ulbricht's (first secretary of CP) foreign policy from 1967 to 1971 responded to the
beginning of the era of “détente “  with the West
•1968 East German Constitution proclaimed the victory of socialism and restated the country's
commitment to unification under communist leadership
•August 1970 USSR and FDR signed the Moscow Treaty
• May 1971 CP Central Committee chose Erich Honecker as the party's first secretary
•E. Honecker combined loyalty to the Soviet Union with flexibility toward détente
•8th CP Congress June 1971 - E. Honecker presented the political program of the new régime
•In his reformulation of GDR foreign policy: E. Honecker renounced the objective of a unified
Germany and adopted the "defensive" position of ideological Abgrenzung (demarcation or separation)
•Under this program, the country defined itself as a distinct "socialist state" and emphasized its
allegiance to USSR.
•Abgrenzung - defended GDR sovereignty, in turn contributed to the success of détente negotiations
that led to the Four Power Agreement on Berlin (Berlin Agreement) in 1971 and the Basic Treaty with
FGR in December 1972

•Berlin Agreement and Basic Treaty normalized relations between East Germany and West Germany
(Berlin Agreement - effective June 1972:  signed by US, GB, France, and USSR - protected trade and
travel relations between West Berlin and FGR and aimed at improving communications between East
Berlin and West Berlin)
•USSR - West Berlin would not be incorporated into FGR
•Basic Treaty (effective June 1973) - politically recognized two German states, two countries
pledged to respect one another's sovereignty;  under the terms of the treaty, diplomatic missions
were to be exchanged and commercial, tourist, cultural, and communications relations established
•September 1973 GDR and FGR joined UN
•GDR participated in the Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe in Europe in July 1975
signed the Helsinki Final Act, which was to guarantee the regime's recognition of human rights.
•The Final Act's provision for freedom of movement elicited approximately 120,000 East German
applications for permission to emigrate, but the applications were rejected

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Eastern Europe. London 2011. •Hett, B. – C.: Crossing Hitler: the man who put the Nazis on the
witness stand. New York, 2008.
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after the Hungarian Revolution in 1956: an oral history. Budapest, 2003. •Plesch, D.:
America, Hitler and the UN [electronic resource]: how the Allies won World War II and forged a
peace . London 2011. •Průcha, V.: The system of centrally planned economies in central-eastern and
south-eastern Europe after world war II and the causes of its decay.  Prague, 1994.
•Snyder, T.:  Bloodlands : Europe between Hitler and Stalin. New York, 2010.
•Stedman, A.:  Alternatives to appeasement: Neville Chamberlain and Hitler’s Germany. London 2011.
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