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Czechoslovakia Preserving the Status Quo
In May 1971, party chief Husak announced at the official
Fourteenth Party Congress--the 1968 Fourteenth Party Congress had
been abrogated--that "normalization" had been completed and that
all that remained was for the party to consolidate its gains.
Husak's policy was to maintain a rigid status quo; for the next
fifteen years even key personnel of the party and government
remained the same. In 1975 Husak added the position of president
to his post as party chief. He and other party leaders faced the
task of rebuilding general party membership after the purges of
1969-71. By 1983 membership had returned to 1.6 million, about
the same as in 1960.
In preserving the status quo, the Husak regime required
conformity and obedience in all aspects of life. Culture suffered
greatly from this straitjacket on independent thought, as did the
humanities, social sciences, and ultimately the pure sciences.
Art had to adhere to a rigid socialist realist formula. Soviet
examples were held up for emulation. During the 1970s and 1980s,
many of Czechoslovakia's most creative individuals were silenced,
imprisoned, or sent into exile. Some found expression for their
art through
samizdat (see Glossary;
Dissent and Independent Activity
, this ch.).
Those artists, poets, and writers who were
officially sanctioned were, for the most part, undistinguished.
The award of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1984 to Jaroslav
Seifert--a poet identified with reformism and not favored by the
Husak regime--was a bright spot in an otherwise bleak cultural
scene.
In addition to applying repression, Husak also tried to
obtain acquiescence to his rule by providing an improved standard
of living. He returned Czechoslovakia to an orthodox command
economy with a heavy emphasis on central planning and continued
to extend industrialization. For a while the policy seemed
successful because, despite the lack of investment in new
technologies, there was an increase in industrial output. The
government encouraged consumerism and materialism and took a
tolerant attitude toward a slack work ethic and a growing blackmarket second economy. In the early 1970s, there was a steady
increase in the standard of living; it seemed that the improved
economy might mitigate political and cultural oppression and give
the government a modicum of legitimacy.
By the mid-1970s, consumerism failed as a palliative for
political oppression. The government could not sustain an
indefinite expansion without coming to grips with limitations
inherent in a command economy. The oil crisis of 1973-74 further
exacerbated the economic decline. Materialism, encouraged by a
corrupt regime, also produced cynicism, greed, nepotism,
corruption, and a lack of work discipline. Whatever elements of a
social contract the government tried to establish with
Czechoslovak society crumbled with the decline in living
standards of the mid-1970s. Czechoslovakia was to have neither
freedom nor prosperity.
Another feature of Husak's rule was a continued dependence on
the Soviet Union. As of the mid-1980s, Husak had not yet achieved
a balance between what could be perceived as Czechoslovak
national interest and Soviet dictate. In foreign policy,
Czechoslovakia parroted every utterance of the Soviet position.
Frequent contacts between the Soviet and Czechoslovak communist
parties and governments made certain that the Soviet position on
any issue was both understood and followed. The Soviets continued
to exert control over Czechoslovak internal affairs, including
oversight over the police and security apparatus. Five Soviet
ground divisions and two air divisions had become a permanent
fixture, while the Czechoslovak military was further integrated
into the Warsaw Pact. In the 1980s, approximately 50 percent of
Czechoslovakia's foreign trade was with the Soviet Union, and
almost 80 percent was with communist countries. There were
constant exhortations about further cooperation and integration
between the Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia in industry, science,
technology, consumer goods, and agriculture. Deriving its
legitimacy from Moscow, the Husak regime remained a slavish
imitator of political, cultural, and economic trends emanating
from Moscow.
Data as of August 1987
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