POLb1135, Spring 2020
Study Material – V. Mečiar
Basic information:
Vladimír Mečiar was the leading figure of politics in Slovakia for more than one decade. He
started his political career before 1989 and was active in the Communist Party. Although he
was expelled from the party after 1968 he is suspected of co-operating with state forces in
further years (documents that could either support or deny such claim were destroyed after
1989).
Shortly after 1989, Mečiar became Ministry of Interior by winning a contest due to lack of
available candidates. This was his first and only experience as a member of the government
without being the Prime Minister. In later years he became Prime Minister for three times –
in 1990 after the first free election, after 1992 election and finally after 1994 election. Out of
his three periods, he managed to stay in the office until the regular election only once
(between 1994 and 1998).
Despite a gradual decline of its support, his party HZDS was able to win the 1998 election, but
it went to the opposition where it stayed for eight years. Its final appearance in government
was between 2006 and 2010 however now only as a junior coalition partner. Finally, in the
2010 election, the party dropped out of parliament, and in the 2012 election, it scored less
than one per cent of votes. Mečiar personally attempted to return to Slovak politics in 2020
however he stepped down from running in the election.
Most important issues on which you should focus:
1. Personal features of Vladimír Mečiar
In the presentation and the readings, you can find indications about the problematic features
of Mečiar’s person. From the beginning of his career in politics, he was continually making
both external and internal enemies regardless they were real or fictional. As a party leader,
he never allowed any fractionalization of his party and any members who challenged his
leadership or his style of politics were forced to leave the party.
In case of no real enemies, he invented fictional ghosts to increase his electoral gains. During
his career, Mečiar announced several attempts of his assassination although in none of the
cases anyone was accused and Mečiar was always the only person to possess such
information. In 1994 election Mečiar attempted to vote, but his name was not in the registry.
The media made a sensational story that probably increased the vote gain of HZDS. In that
time, the elections were held on Friday and Saturday, and Mečiar released this story during
Friday.
The most vigorous personal conflict Mečiar ever had was with that time president Kováč.
Before 1999, the president was elected in parliament, and Kováč was a nominee and close
friend of Mečiar. However, shortly after his election in 1993, Kováč distanced from HZDS and
its problematic style of politics (see government 1994-1998). This led to a substantial onesided
conflict between the Prime Minister and the president. In contrary to any other disputes
Mečiar experienced, this was a different case as Mečiar, and his government had no
constitutional authority to get Kováč out of his seat. The conflict gradually increased and went
to an extreme extent. In its final stages, the son of the president was kidnapped to Austria,
and this crime was the alleged action of the state secret service chaired by a nominee of HZDS.
2. Polarizing effect of Vladimír Mečiar
Based on the previous point, it is easy to observe that Mečiar had a strong polarizing effect on
both politics and society. In politics, besides their ideology, each political party could be
defined either as standing with Mečiar or against him. In 1998 the Party of Civic Understanding
(SOP) of ex-communist official Rudolf Schuster emerged, and it aimed to stand aside from this
partisan conflict as some kind of an alternative to both pro-Mečiar and anti-Mečiar blocs.
However, the atmosphere before the 1998 election in Slovakia was so tense that the new
party was forced to declare allegiance to one of the blocs openly and it chose the latter one.
The polarization of the party system in the half of 90s was so intense that after Kováč ended
his mandate as president in 1998 for more than a year the country had no president since
there was no way the two party blocs could find the agreement on the same candidate. Note
that each of the blocs had less than 90 MPs (out of 150) which was the number necessary to
elect the president. The situation was later resolved by the adoption of direct presidential
elections in 1999.
The level of polarization in the second half of the 90s was also present in society. As the
journalist Marián Leško stated whenever and wherever people in Slovakia had a discussion,
sooner or later they talked about Mečiar. The country and the society were completely divided
on this issue, and several commentators even spoke about ‘two Slovakias’ in the same
country.
3. The government between 1994 and 1998
The presentation contains the most essential features of the government that was in office
between 1994 and 1998. You should check these points to get an overall image. Most
importantly and taken together, these points show why Slovakia in the half of 90s lost the
status of entirely free democracy and shifted toward some kind of hybrid regime. The control
over state media, usage of state resources, level of partisan clientelism etc. showed a
substantial decline of quality of democracy. As external evidence, you should note that both
EU and NATO delayed or even suspended the integration process of Slovakia. In general, it is
primarily the results of this government why Slovakia did not become a member of NATO in
1999 (as the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland did) and why it was invited to begin the
entry negotiations with the EU only in the second wave of the invited countries.
4. Legacy of Vladimír Mečiar
Finally, some remarks are needed concerning the legacy of Vladimír Mečiar. First, his rule
showed how fragile newly established CEE democracies could be. The long parliamentary
night in 1994 showed that political parties with low respect to democratic features in these
countries can maintain enormous power instantly and can rule with only limited control from
both the media and opposition. Second, Mečiar divided the party system into two blocs, and
this division continued even after his demise from the office of Prime Minister. This personal
cleavage was later reincarnated by Robert Fico, who also became a polarizing personality
although not to such extent than Mečiar. Third and finally, the government that ruled between
1994 and 1998 also created an unwilling test for the independent media and the nongovernmental
organizations. These institutions had to operate in a hostile atmosphere what
forced them to become more resistant to external pressures.
Some notes for discussion or reflection:
- To gain and overall evaluation of the Slovak government between 1994 and 1998 and its
PM Mečiar, compare it with the recent development in Hungary or Poland
- To check whether the ‘hostility test’ for Slovak private media in the 90s had any effect on
their ability to keep their independence, compare the situation of main public and private
media in all V4 countries.
- Think about other top political representatives in contemporary V4 states to see whether
they have a similar polarizing character that once Mečiar had