Through workers' eyes enced of them informed me. "The workers here don't have much to gain from the reforms; indeed they may lose in all kinds of ways..."
I had been working at my present job for seven years. It was at the old printing works in the centre of Prague, where some 80 people worked and where medical and other specialist publications are printed. It was a week after the general strike, and almost everyone had gone out to demonstrate. For a whole week they
TWO years ago millions of Czechs and Slovaks came out into the streets to demand the end of Gustav Husak's neo-Stalinist regime; abandoned by Moscow, isolated by the fall of the like-minded regime of Erich Honecker in East Germany and deserted by much of the Communist Party apparatus and had gone out each day in the afternoon to Wenceslas Square to shout with relish "Now is the time".
Why are you happy?
I asked some of my colleagues "why are you happy about the revolution? Not much will change as far as your working life is concerned..."
1. Petr Svatek, book printer (29 years old): "I hope that what we have learnt about printing in the world will be applied base, this regime crumbled swiftly, undermined from within. Promising a "return to the West" and market reforms, the Civic Forum (OF) opposition movement and its Slovak counterpart, Public Against Violence (VPN), won a decisive victory in the June 1990 elections.
Since then the OF/VPN have broken up, in the Czech Lands along party political lines, in Slovakia between groups supporting or opposing Slovak nationalism.
Surrounding these political developments are the hopes of Czecho-Slovakia's citizens for a fundamental change in their lives awakened in November 1989. In the following article, taken from the Czech magazine Listy (no. 5, 1991), Olga Sulcová describes how some of her working colleagues saw OLGA SULCOVA here in due course. And that I will get a new and more efficient machine. At the moment, even if I want to do something I can't. We have obsolete, decrepit machinery."
2. Karel Langer, book printer (43): "Even if I have to spend the rest of my life at these machines, there will be a different atmosphere - free elections, more opinions; everyone will choose what appeals to them."
3. Marie Kafková, buyer, (57): "As you possibly know, I am a believer. Until now the state has been very hostile to us. I am glad that my grandson will be able to come to religion as I did. Also, I am pleased that I will be able to go to Vien-
4. Jaroslav Mikolás, book printer (57): "The thing that I like the most is that it will be possible to rehabilitate 1968 and all the hopes connected with it. And I am
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International Viewpoint #218 • December 9, 1991
CZECHO-SLOVAKIA
3. Marie Kafková (59): "This really needs hours. As you can see I am all swelled up with peritonitis. But I have to tell you: These Slovaks make me mad. Why do we put up with them? If they want to go, let them go! Have I gone to Vienna? Not yet. Somehow I don't seem to get round to it. There are other things to worry about..."
4. Jaroslav Mikolás (59): *I stand today on everything I said then. Our children are freer than we were, even if their lives are more complicated. Our son was a shop manager, but the shop was sold in an auction, and now he does not know what will become of him. He does not
I couldnit stay silent! glad that our children will be freer than we were."
5. Marika Drhanová, compositor (42): "We have all been wronged in some way in the past 20 years. And often there has been no way to address this, even if you banged your head on the wall. It could be something faulty that someone bought, bad health care or the schools. Even if not much changes for us, there will be change for our children."
6. Milos Javurek, book printer (42): " I do not see a direct connection between these two things. Freedom will express itself elsewhere and perhaps in time also here. Mainly, I can see that this movement will lead to something."
7. Miroslav Petrzilka, offset printer (25): " It chiefly depends on me. I am quite a lazy person, but that also has something to do with the way things have been. If I do some good work, other will perhaps be able to value it."
Here my private survey from the first days of December 1989 ends. I did not finish the manuscript. I had to go to hospital, and meanwhile the answers of my "private correspondents" became out of date. But after nearly two years I rediscovered these two typed pages. These statements by my fellow workers of the time, with their ingenuous enthusiasm and irrepressible hope for a better tomorrow are almost touching after this so short, but also so long, period of time. Today this has the flavour of history.
Two years later
How would these same people answer the same questions now? Would they even be ready to talk to me again?
1. Petr Svatek (31): "It makes me laugh to recall what I said two years ago.I hope that you did not take my answer too seriously. I have quite other concerns now than I had then. Far more serious. We are expecting our second child, and my wife has been at home since last year's promotion — her job no longer exists. My pay - at 2,500 crowns a month - has not changed, but prices have. I pay 1,500 crowns for our apartment. Shoes for our three-year old cost 80 crowns, small boots, which were 30 crowns, now cost 250.... If I did not have a second job in the private sector I don't know how we would survive. After November President those of people who have inherited nothing and have no capital, would not drop. It seems that this was not true. But would I want things to return to as they were before? Not in any circumstances."
2. Karel Langer (45): "What I talked about then - free elections, more points of view, each choosing what appealed to them — has come about. But today I am wiser than I was then. I have lost my illusions. I see that the people who are doing well now are the same who were doing well before November 1989. Such people retain their connections and knowledge from the former time; they are linked together by mutual back-scratching. Thus "they" are the victors. And what still annoys me is that those who are most to blame have not been called to answer for their actions. Nothing has happened to any of them. They live in peace and quiet. It is only the small fry who have been hunted, while the big fish are still swimming along. Furthermore, foreign capital was involved even in the small privatization [of shops, restaurants etc]. From the start everyone should have had to show how they came by such big sums of money. Nobody here was in a position to come up with 82 million crowns and buy a leisure steamer. These people are only puppets. This makes my blood boil. Why do we have to behave like idiots? Let things be said exactly as they are. That would be easier for everyone to take."
have the money to buy something in an auction himself Before everything here was more comfortable, but it wasn't working It would have ended in a big crash."
And what about 1968 — do you really think that it will be rehabilitated?
"In my opinion, yes. Fully."
But reading the newspapers or listening to some politicians, you would think that the opposite was true...
"That is just some political game. People with no achievements to their name are belittling anyone who did something useful in 1968. In my opinion, what people did and attempted to do then was night and in tune with the needs of the time. What is happening today grew out of 1968. Without the "Spring' of that year there would have been no "November" in
5. Marika Drahanová (44): "I continue to hold to everything I said and hoped for then. If it had not happened, then things would have been much worse now. That may still happen. My fear is that in a year or two there will not be enough food. I cannot make head nor tail of our agricultural policies. I do not know if our politicians are up to it. Certainly, if the farmers leave the land owing to the unforeseen and bad situation, we will go hungry. Also, I do not think it is just that present or former Communists remain in so many positions. Communists will always be Communists! Prices have doubled and re doubled, but our wages are the same. We have two daughters at school — one is studying agriculture and the other is at technical college. I buy most of their books with our savings, but there is not much left of these. I live in fear that the fridge or the washing machine will break down. And where would I find ten or twelve thousand crowns today? Then I swear, but when someone starts swearing in front of me and says that it was not like this under the Communists then I go for them. If things had simply gone on as they were, there would have been a catas
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CZECHO-SLOVAKIA им
Havel manoeuvres to meet Slovak
December 9, 1991 • #218 International Viewpoint trophe. As long as you have work things are alright. Both me and my husband are working. And I hope that if you ask again after another two years, I will answer more cheerfully."
6. Milos Javurek (44): *I maintain what I said two years ago. But now I am in the minority. People are discontented and grumble. They say: everything is bad and nothing and nobody is in their rightful place. They would do better. The education of the previous forty years is showing through in people. There is hate and envy. We should all have the same. The theory about all stomachs being the same has taken root. As a people we are like this: we get roused up to do something but in a few days we lose interest and go for a beer. It is the same with the tightening of the belt — when it really happens, we don't want to know about it any more. The worst grumblers have the least reasons. Recently it seems to me that people have calmed down a bit - inflation has stopped. I believe that in time everything will turn out fine. Time is needed. In my opinion it is all a matter of time. We must not be too impatient. Problems that no one expected have arisen. It is not easy to solve them. But things will slowly get better. I am an optimist. And I am calm. I am annoyed by the petrol issue. I used to
"IN THE interests of protecting our state from chaos"
go to my cottage each week, but now I
Czecho-Slovakia's president Vaclav Havel announced on the simply cannot get there. But otherwise I country's TV on November 17 that he would be seeking a am at peace; no more nonsense about
May 1 demonstrations, meetings, political series of new constitutional measures. These included the education or pressure to join the party.
right of the president to call referenda under certain
And if I want to pick up my passport and circumstances; the rapid coming into effect of the new law on go, I can go where I want."
The seventh respondent to my private the federal structure of the state; and a law facilitating the survey, Miroslav Petrzilka, had in the calling of new legislative elections and permitting the meantime got married, moved and president to rule by decree when no legitimate Federal changed his job. Thus he was the only one of the seven who I did not talk to again.
Also I am annoyed with myself now for not including in the survey J.D. who had newly joined our firm as a paper cutter.
He arrived at the start of 1989 straight from prison. He had spent quite a lot of time in jail, but he was no big criminal — rather a banal recidivist, sentenced for receiving stolen goods, disturbing the peace and the like. Otherwise he was quite a nice lad, and by no means stupid.
He had a criminal record, no qualifications, no means and nowhere to live. He was on the run from his second wife. By chance I ran into him this May in the what used to be the National Committee building. I was there to deal with my pension and he was after a trading licence. He was preparing some kind of business. We looked at each other with suppressed sympathy. In fact, however, my sympathy was out of place. As I have recently learned, our former paper cutter J. D., the man without a home, a wife, means and with a criminal record, already has two cars and shops in Prague's prestige stores.
His fingers glitter with rings and he has a lot of money in the bank... *
Assembly exists. COLIN MEADE
HE reason for this dramatic announcement was the continuing constitutional stalemate in the country resulting from efforts by the Slovak government to wrest sovereignty away from the Federal institutions.
Slovakia, the eastern part of the Czecho-Slovak state, containing about a third of the country's population, has always been an unhappy and unequal partner in the various Czecho-Slovak state formations that have existed since 1918. After the "Velvet Revolution" of November 1989 a powerful mood developed in Slovakia for a complete re-definition of the terms of the joint state with the Czech Lands, with a significant minority supporting complete independence.
Over the past year the major parties in the Slovak parliament and government have increasingly attempted to exercise self-determination in practice, taking initiatives without reference to federal authorities in Prague, and calling for a new constitution to be ratified first by the two national parliaments and only then by the Federal Assembly, thus giving constitutional primacy to the former.
The Slovak National Council (parliament) has discussed the setting up of a Slovak defence force, independent Slovak delegations have set off on diplomatic missions abroad and, "when Federal and Czech politicians called for a quick application for membership in the NATO following the coup attempt in Moscow, [Slovak premier] Carnogursky publicly voiced his reluctance."?
Repeated negotiations between Slovak and Czech/Federal representatives have 1. Lidové noviny, November 18, 1991. 2. Rudé právo, September 4, 1991.
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challenge REFER
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What the polls reveal
IN November the Prague Institute for the Investigation of Public Opinion
International Viewpoint #218 • December 9, 1991
CZECHO-SLOVAKIA would be willing to recognize Slovakia if it gained its independence through unconstitutional means."4. At the same time he has talked of the coming into being of an independent Slovakia within Europe by
(IVVM) conducted a poll into, among other things, Czech and Slovak views on the future of the common state. According to the summary of the poll published in Lidové noviny (November 22, 1991). "Czechs mostly preter a unitary state, with a federal arrangement in second place, as do a majority of
Moravians and Silesians... Slovaks mostly support a federation or a confederation, while slightly more Slovaks are in favour of a unitary state with the
Czechs than a fully independent Slovakia... 23% of Slovak citizens wish to live in an independent state, while 52% are against it."
The Czech weekly, Respekt (November 18-24, 1991), meanwhile published the results of an American poll of East European preferences for socio-economic models. Apparently "Slovaks are far more attached to
Socialism, and in many cases would have preferred the maintenance of a
Socialist state. The majority think that the progress to a market economy is going too fast. Czechs have a far less critical appreciation of capitalism than
Slovaks. The view of the USSR is much less negative in Slovakia than in the
Czech Lands, while in the former far more hostility to Jews and Gypsies is expressed." Slovaks are far more worried than Czechs about unemployment.
According to this survey, two thirds of Slovaks consider the present constitutional arrangements unjust and 59% are opposed to the existing government.
The survey showed a strong preference throughout the East European region for a "social democratic form of capitalism rather than capitalism as found in the USA or Japan". For Czechoslovakia 68% of respondents were in favour of the former and 14% in favour of a "purely capitalist" option. * foundered on the issue of whether Federal or Slovak law should take precedence in
The conflict between the Slovak leadership and the Federal/Czech counterparts go beyond constitutional questions, however. As Carnogursky's reservations on the question of NATO show, official Slovak thinking is out of line with the firmly pro-Western and pro-market orientation favoured in Prague.
In June this year the then Slovak premier Vladimir Meciar was ousted for his support drastic privatization plans. However his compromise replacement, Carnogursky, has also bent to popular pressures on the national and economic issues. As a Slovak supporter of the maintenance of the existing federation has explained: "It is not inevitable that a fascist or some other kind of totalitarian state would arise in an independent Slovakia] but what is absolutely certain is that there would be an economic
Slovakia has to be brought into step.
The means chosen to do this is the proposal for a referendum, or new elections, to be polarized dramatically around the question of separation or not. Efforts to get a referendum launched by the Federal
Assembly, however, have failed owing to a boycott by the main Slovak parties.
Thus the president's attempt to go over the head of the Assembly.
The president's ploy plays intelligently on the confusion within the Slovak camp.
Here there are three main currents: one
10 resolutely aro-federalist Public
Against Violence), another resolutely pro-separation (the Slovak National Party); but these two are very much in the minority. The third, mainstream, current some form of confederation through self-determination. This point of view is shared, more or less by the supporters of the former premier Meciar, the Christian Democratic Movement of the present premier Carnogursky, and the former Communist Party (SDL).
However this current is ridden with personality conflicts and power struggles. Behind these stand important social and political differences; thus both the Christian Democrats and the former Communist party find themselves de facto in the same camp on this one issue. The result is constant vacillation in the conduct of the struggle for sovereignty and in negotiations with the federal and
Efforts to get a sovereignty declaration through the SNC have more than once failed, even though if you add up the deputies of the parties who appear on paper to be in favour of such a declaration it should pass without difficulty.
The spirit of vacillation
The Slovak premier, the Christian democrat Jan Carnogursky — constantly looking over his shoulder at Meciar — is a living incarnation of these vacillations; he has been sharply critical of the Declaration of Slovak Sovereignty on the grounds that it would violate the existing Czecho-Slovak constitution. "No state the year 2000 (not so far away any more...).
Another chronic weakness of the Slovak leadership is their identification with hos tility to the country's more than 500,000 strong Hungarian minority, with the result that representatives of this minority are now firmly in the pro-federalist camp.
Slovak public opinion, though largely supportive of the mainstream current, is also on the whole in favour of some kind of common state with the Czechs. Thus, given the in-fighting among the Slovak leaders and their evident lack of relish for a real confrontation over the issue, a referendum which sharply poses the question of separation could see a majority even in Slovakia for a continuing federation (as people vote for some sort of association) — to be interpreted as a green light for Prague's plans for the economic and political future of the country as a whole.
However, even a referendum victory for Havel and the federal government will not bury the Slovak question. The further progress of the economic reforms will hit Slovakia especially hard and the Slovak national institutions will be seen as one buffer against the onslaught. Havel has consistently ruled out the use of force to deal with the Slovak issue, but others may think differently. The Slovak question in any event will continue to loom large in the country's political life.
Without wishing to apologize for the existing Slovak leaders, furthermore, the case on self-determination seems clear enough. Slovakia has never formally agreed to any of the "Czechoslovakia's" of the past. If there is to be a new joint state, it has to be agreed to by equal partners exercising full sovereignty.
The shadow of the clerico-fascist state
Additionally, whatever idiocies may have been uttered by this or that Slovak politician on the subject of the pro-Nazi puppet Slovak state of 1939-45, the situation today is not the same. Then elements in the Slovak nationalist movement put themselves at the service of the expansionist Nazi dictatorship. This time the issue of Slovak self-determination is being posed by Slovaks independently of, and even in conflict with, the will of other powers great or small.
And self-determination of this kind can only be won by massive, freely given, internal popular support and a policy of alliances based on friendship between peoples.* 3. Vladimir Savinsky in Lidové noviny, November 15, 1991. 4. CT, September 16, 1991. 5. Libération, July 20, 1991.