Making Sense of Dictatorship: Domination and Everyday Life in East Central Europe after 1945 9789633864289

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Making Sense of Dictatorship

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Making Sense of Dictatorship Domination and Everyday Life in East Central Europe after 1945

Edited by Celia Donert, Ana Kladnik, and Martin Sabrow

Central European University Press Budapest–Vienna–New York

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Copyright © by Celia Donert, Ana Kladnik, and Martin Sabrow 2022 Published in 2022 by Central European University Press Nádor utca 11, H-1051 Budapest, Hungary Tel: +36-1-327-3138 or 327-3000 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.ceupress.com 224 West 57th Street, New York NY 10019, USA All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the permission of the Publisher. ISBN 978-963-386-427-2 (hardback) ISBN 978-963-386-428-9 (ebook) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Donert, Celia, 1975- editor. | Kladnik, Ana, editor. | Sabrow, Martin, editor. Title: Making sense of dictatorship : domination and everyday life in East Central Europe after 1945 / edited by Celia Donert, Ana Kladnik, and Martin Sabrow. Description: Budapest : Central European University Press, 2022. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2021039209 (print) | LCCN 2021039210 (ebook) | ISBN 9789633864272 (hardback) | ISBN 9789633864289 (adobe pdf ) Subjects: LCSH: Europe, Eastern--Politics and government--1945-1989. | Europe, Eastern--Social conditions--20th century. | Dictatorship--Europe, Eastern--History--20th century. | Socialism--Europe, Eastern--History--20th century. Classification: LCC DJK50 .M35 2022 (print) | LCC DJK50 (ebook) | DDC 947.086--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021039209 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021039210

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Figures............................................................................................................................vii List of Acronyms..................................................................................................................... viii Foreword .....................................................................................................................................ix Pavel Kolář and Michal Kopeček Editors’ Note............................................................................................................................ xiii Ana Kladnik and Celia Donert PART ONE: SINNWELT AND EIGEN-SINN Socialism as Sinnwelt: Communist Dictatorship and its World of Meaning in a Cultural-Historical Perspective........................................................................................3 Martin Sabrow Neither Consent nor Opposition: Eigen-Sinn, or How to Make Sense of Compliance and Self-Assertion under Communist Domination................................. 19 Thomas Lindenberger PART TWO: AUTHORITIES AND DOMINATION Policeman Nicolae: The Story of One Man’s Life and Work in the Socialist Republic of Romania (1960–89)......................................................................................... 33 Ciprian Cirniala The East German Reporting System: Normality and Legitimacy Through Bureaucracy............................................................................................................................... 51 Hedwig Richter Late Communist Elites and the Demise of State Socialism in Czechoslovakia (1986–89)................................................................................................................................. 61 Michal Pullmann PART THREE: EVERYDAY SOCIAL PRACTICES AND SINNWELT Local Self-Governance, Voluntary Practices, and the Sinnwelt of Socialist Velenje.................................................................................................................................. 83 Ana Kladnik

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Modern Housekeeping Worlds; or, How Much is Thirty Percent Really? Eigensinnige Consumer Practices and the Hungarian Trade Union’s “Washing Machine Campaign” of 1957–58.................................................................... 111 Annina Gagyiova Single Mothers, Lonely Children: Polish Families, Socialist Modernity, and the Experience of Crisis of the Late 1970s and 1980s.......................................................... 129 Barbara Klich-Kluczewska “Since Makarenko the Time for Experiments has Passed”: Peace, Gender, and Human Rights in East Berlin during the 1980s.............................................................. 153 Celia Donert PART FOUR: INTELLECTUAL AND EXPERT WORLDS AND (DE-)LEGITIMIZATION Problems with Progress in Late Socialist Czechoslovakia: The Example of Most, North Bohemia...................................................................................................... 179 Matĕj Spurný Authentic Community and Autonomous Individual: Making Sense of Socialism in Late Socialist Hungary..................................................................................................... 203 Péter Apor The “Will to Publicity” and its Publicists: Curating the Memory of Czechoslovak Samizdat................................................................................................................................... 221 Jonathan Larson Dissident Legalism: Human Rights, Socialist Legality, and the Birth of Legal Resistance in the 1970s Democratic Opposition in Czechoslovakia and Poland....... 241 Michal Kopeček Contributors........................................................................................................................... 271 Translators............................................................................................................................... 272 Index......................................................................................................................................... 273

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Figures

Figure 6.1. Voluntary work for the river regulation, Velenje, 1956............................... 94 Figure 6.2. Festivity at the end of the voluntary work, Velenje, 1959........................... 95 Figure 6.3. Voting ZA (FOR) on the referendum in one of the local communities in Velenje Municipality, 1980 ..................................................................... 98 Figure 6.4. Referendum in the local community Škale in 1975, held in the fire station.................................................................................................................................. 99 Figure 6.5. Installation of public lighting in Staro Velenje, 1980 ............................... 102 Figure 7.1. “Times are changing” cartoon by Pál Pusztai ............................................. 123 Figure 9.1. Husemannstraße in Berlin, street sign.......................................................... 155 Figure 9.2. Kinderladen, Husemannstraße, Berlin.......................................................... 160 Figure 9.3. Kinderladen, Husemannstraße, Berlin.......................................................... 161 Figure 10.1. The central street of new Most with the building of the National Committee in construction................................................................................ 181 Figure 10.2. The transportation of the Church of the Assumption through the old town towards its new location, October 9, 1975.............................................. 194

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Acronyms

AAN: Archiwum Akt Nowych (Central Archives of Modern Records), Poland ÁBTL: Állambiztonsági Szolgálatok Történeti Levéltára (Historical Archives of the State Security Services), Hungary ACDP: Archiv für Christlich-Demokratische Politik APR: Archiwum Polskiego Radia (Archive of the Polish Radio) BArch: Bundesarchiv, Germany CDU: Christlich Demokratische Union Deutschlands (Christian Democratic Union), East Germany CPCz: Communist Party of Czechoslovakia CSDS: Československé dokumentační středisko (Czechoslovak Documentation Center) ČSSR: Československá Socialistická Republika (Czechoslovak Socialist Republic) GDR: Deutsche Demokratische Republik (German Democratic Republic) HStA Drd: Hauptstaatsarchiv Dresden KISZ: Magyar Kommunista Ifjúsági Szövetség (Hungarian Communist Youth League) KOR: Komitet Obrony Robotników (Workers’ Defense Committee) KSS-KOR: Komitet Samoobrony Społecznej (Committee for Social Self-Defense) LP: Libri prohibiti MfS: Ministerium für Staatssicherheit, Stasi (Ministry for State Security) NA: Národní archiv (National Archives), Prague PCR: Partidul Comunist Român (Romanian Communist Party) PRL: Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa (People’s Republic of Poland) RHG Archive: Robert-Havemann-Gesellschaft, Archiv der DDR-Opposition ROPCiO: Ruch Obrony Praw Człowieka i Obywatela (Movement for Defense of Human and Civil Rights) RSR: Republica Socialistă România (Socialist Republic of Romania) SAPMO: Stiftung Archiv der Parteien und Massenorganisationen der DDR im Bundesarchiv SED: Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (Socialist Unity Party) SZKL: Szakszervezetek Központi Levéltára (Archive of Political History and Trade Unions), Hungary SZOT: Szakszervezetek Országos Tanácsa (National Council of Trade Unions), Hungary VONS: Výbor na obranu nespravedlivě stíhaných (Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Persecuted)

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Foreword

How is one to provide a convincing explanation for the fact that state socialism in East Central Europe existed for more than forty years even though most of the people living under such regimes did not share the basic principles of communist ideology? Why did these societies passively accept socialism for so long even as standards of living were worsening? What was the long-term stability of communist domination based on, and why ultimately did it fall apart in several weeks or, in some cases, merely days? These questions were considered by scholars in the research project “The Socialist Dictatorship as a Sinnwelt,” which was jointly carried out at the Institute of Contemporary History, Prague, and the Centre for Contemporary History, Potsdam, from 2007 to 2010. From a comparative perspective, and from the viewpoints of cultural and social history and the history of everyday life, our research teams—comprised both of PhD students and postdoctoral researchers from several countries of East Central Europe—undertook to explain how the communist dictatorships were established, perpetuated, and ultimately collapsed. We started from the general assumption that in order to understand the survival and then fall of state socialism, we would have to examine what lay behind the power politics and raw ideology. We therefore looked for the sources of communist domination, and support for it, in a space we think useful to call the “prepolitical.”1 This wide sphere comprised nonideological notions, values, and practices, which to most of the people living under these regimes seemed “normal” in everyday life. They included ideals like peace and quiet, security, social progress, welfare, life in consumerism in practice, efficient management, the vision of “self-realization,” and feelings of belonging to the nation. These prepolitical ideals—prepolitical because they were not typical only of the communist dictatorship and its ideology—were, in our opinion, key to state socialism. This is particularly true after 1956 when, with the fall of Stalinism, the formerly unambiguous ideological revolutionary legitimacy of the dictatorships was considerably weakened. We found inspiration chiefly in contemporary German research on the history of society in modern dictatorships. Already in the 1980s, proponents of the school of Alltagsgeschichte focused on society as a whole in order to understand the astonishing success of the Nazi dictatorship. Their motivation was as much 1

  Wilfried Thaa, Die Wiedergeburt des Politischen: Zivilgesellschaft und Legitimitätskonflikt in den Revolutionen von 1989 (Opladen: Leske + Budrich, 1996).

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a matter of ethics as it was one of scholarship. They sought to show that the existence of the Nazi dictatorship was supported not only by reactionary elites, but also, actively or passively, by practically everyone. This raised awkward questions about the behavior of the masses. After the changes of late 1989, German historians of everyday life applied this approach to their research on communist East Germany. They did not see “power” as an independent force affecting society from the outside and they most often used the term “domination” (Herrschaft), understood as the mutual relationship between rulers and ruled; the relationship could not, they argued, be limited simply to obedience and the carrying out of orders. If this relationship was to function over the long term, both the entity giving orders and the entity following them had somehow to understand the power relationship and to accept it as their own. This prepolitical acceptance of the status quo took place largely in the “banality” of everyday life: it was not usually controlled by the conscious acceptance or rejection of communist ideology; rather, it occurred intuitively, on the basis of everyday interests and notions. Thus, historians of everyday life did not question the unequal distribution of power in the socialist dictatorship. They did, however, question the notion that those who got the short end of the stick in this relationship were completely powerless. The power relationships that existed were always the result of interaction between the official ideological lines and the way people adopted them in their living world (Lebenswelt): with their families, at work, in their spare time. In the communist dictatorships, too, domination could only exist if jointly formed with society, from below. Hence, the term Sinnwelt. In our understanding of the term, Sinn denotes not only “meaning” or “sense” as it does in the classic hermeneutic tradition. We were concerned with the broader mental conception and social construction of the world, its “Idea” or “Ideal” as opposed to the narrowly defined world of the material reality of socialism. This Sinnwelt comprised the everyday “little utopia” of a wide variety of actors: rank-and-file communists, dissidents, professional economists, housewives, urban planners, and local policemen. It can therefore be usefully understood as the space of the “prepolitical acceptance” of socialism, a zone in which historical actors daily constructed the meaning of the existing social order and its legitimacy was repeatedly reestablished by everyday transactions. The range of English translations of the term Sinnwelt—from “conceptual world,” a world of reflection and conscious strategies, on the one hand, to “mental world,” an area of unreflected social practices mediating the feeling of “normality,” on the other—illustrates the breadth of the phenomenon, but also suggests the pitfalls of transferring a term from one language environment to another.

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FORE WORD

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The transfer of methods and approaches—in our case chiefly from German to Czech scholarship—emphasized the need to release research on communism from the straitjacket of national history. Even twenty years after its emergence, scholars of contemporary history in practically all of the countries of East Central Europe were still infatuated almost solely with their own national fate. Contemporary history was constituted, among other things, as, to use Hans Rothfels’s words, “the epoch that has been experienced by those still alive.”2 It is this shared experience of the living generations—further supported by the boom in “memory studies” and their growing role in research on the most recent history—that have resulted in the interests of scholars working in the new discipline being primarily oriented to the past of their own national communities. But the situation changed after the optimistic “transformational” story about the irreversible transition from dictatorship to democracy (the dominant topic of the history of communism in the 1990s) fell apart in the purgatory of post-socialist conflicts. Contemporary history ceased to fulfil its predominant role of providing identity and political legitimacy, emphasizing the repulsiveness of the communist dictatorship and the virtues of liberal democracy. In historical research, “communist totalitarianism” is no longer taken out of its historical context as the opposite of democracy, but has instead become a standard historical phenomenon in a particular time and place. This largely natural historicization of socialist dictatorships opens up the possibility of comparative studies: if communism is becoming an historical phenomenon with a clear beginning and end—like, say, the Great Depression—then it is obviously not a national exception, but a general manifestation of European modernity. More than a decade has passed since our group carried out its research. In that time, important changes in topics and concepts have taken place in scholarship on communist dictatorships. A view of state socialist history which emphasizes the interconnectedness of domination and society is no longer a marginal, “supplementary” approach, but is becoming a dominant conception. The history of everyday life is no longer a term of abuse used when speaking of people assumed to be making light of dictatorial regimes. Comparative and transnational approaches are slowly but surely gaining the upper hand over views that are purely national. We are glad that with our project we may contribute to this gradual paradigm shift. This is the first volume to present the international public with comprehensive research from a wide range of the scholars who have rallied round the Sinnwelt flag. We believe that researching and thinking about what was 2

Hans Rothfels, “Zeitgeschichte als Aufgabe,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, no. 1 (1953): 1–8.

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conditioned by the long-term conformist behavior of most of the communist states’ populations, and asking why at the end of the 1980s a considerable number of people decided to reject this authoritarian world, can also provide a thought-provoking intellectual exercise to scholars looking at other sociopolitical conditions—including those we are living in now. Pavel Kolář and Michal Kopeček

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Editors’ Note

By focusing on representations of social order, this collection of essays aims to explain the opposition between rulers and ruled in state socialist regimes in East Central Europe from the perspective of social, cultural, and intellectual history, as well as the history of everyday life. It examines the production of different worlds of meaning (Sinnwelten) of different groups of citizens, how they were experienced, and how they changed over time. In the first, introductory part, Martin Sabrow sets out the fundamental questions of a cultural-historical approach to the history of modern dictatorships and focuses particularly on prepolitical support which conditioned the existence of the Nazi and communist regimes. The ideological infrastructure or Sinnwelt of the state socialist regimes is further discussed in the essay by Thomas Lindenberger. When it comes to the experience and behavior of average people, historical research on communist rule tended to juxtapose the numerous instances of consent in “normal times” to episodes of popular unrest and revolt during “states of exception.” Lindenberger’s paper proposes a view beyond this dichotomy by introducing the concept of Eigen-Sinn, which puts individuals’ strategies of “muddling through” the challenges of real socialism and their need to “get along” with authorities and their social environment at the center of analysis. The second part of the volume deals with the different ways in which citizens experienced the power structures of communist domination (Herrschaft). Ciprian Cirniala concentrates on the life of a Romanian people’s policeman during the late socialist period. Cirniala argues that conformity and resistance coexisted, while regime legitimacy and its loss were not necessarily opposites but two sides of the same coin. The chapter by Hedwig Richter aims to analyze the information reports produced by the bureaucratic apparatus outside the domain of the Ministry of State Security. According to Richter, this reporting system enabled a much tighter surveillance than State Security could supply, while the citizens perceived these information reports as being legitimate. Michal Pullmann addresses the discussions of Czechoslovak economists in the 1980s and shows that their disagreements about practical and political questions paradoxically strengthened the existing political consensus, rather than weakening it. In their “critique” of economic policy, experts used the established ideological lexicon, whereby they were confirming the validity of the existing political order. It was only the onset of perestroika (reconstruction), when the ideological semantics of

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socialism began to disintegrate, which opened the way for the collapse of the late socialist consensus. The next broader set of articles deal with everyday social practices in state socialism as a zone in which the protagonists constructed the meaning of the existing social order, and in which everyday social actions not only reinforced the “legitimacy” of the socialist social order, but also delegitimized it. Drawing on the example of Velenje, a new town in Slovenia, Ana Kladnik shows how the politics of socialist self-management encouraged practices of voluntary work and self-imposed contributions which legitimized the autonomous function of the municipality and its local communities. In the late 1980s, however, new semantics and practices emphasizing individualism undermined this socialist self-managing solidarity. In her contribution on washing machine distribution practices before and after 1956 in Hungary, Annina Gagyiova illustrates how, beyond the actual sphere of politics, an increase in consumption was to help the population become relatively satisfied with the socialist system. Gagyiova also highlights how, in a socialist state, one world of meaning was replaced with another in order for the state to achieve widespread acceptance. The representation of the desired social order and the fear of dangerous pathologies was, according to Barbara Klich-Kluczewska, a key thread of the social discourse in the People’s Republic of Poland. In the era of late socialism, single, mostly young mothers became an important topic in expert debates and popular media. Teenage motherhood created social resentment, and caused loneliness for the mothers who had to cope with everyday life problems during a period of economic shortages and social constraints. Social taboo, Klich-Kluczewska argues, is the key concept for understanding the everyday social practices of marginalized groups during the economic crisis of the 1980s. Celia Donert’s chapter, meanwhile, uses a case study of a Kinderladen (an anti-authoritarian crèche) established in inner-city East Berlin during the 1980s to ask how the gendered experience of everyday life shaped East German dissidents’ engagement with official and unofficial discourses of peace and human rights in the final years of socialist rule. The last set of articles deals with the Sinnwelt of intellectuals and experts. Writing about the destruction of the old mining town of Most and the construction of a new Most in Czechoslovakia, Matĕj Spurný shows the extent to which the state gradually integrated the starting points of critical discourse into the ideological structure of “real socialism.” Péter Apor examines the idea of authentic community among Hungarian intellectuals and activists, which was one of the important cultural themes and social practices of the 1960s and 1970s across the globe. It argues that the use of the concept was an important context for coming to terms with the legacy of Marxism and was also instrumental for interpreting the meanings of socialism and capitalism in both East and

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West. The concept of authentic community helped to formulate powerful criticisms of alienation and the consumer society, which connected the concerns of socialist elites, intellectuals, secular and religious critical thinkers, and activists. The contribution of Jonathan Larson surveys the different pictures we gain of the nature and extent of samizdat periodical publishing in late socialist Czechoslovakia from different archival collections. Larson argues that examining different approaches to collecting and curating late socialist samizdat periodicals offers us a view into the making of contemporary global history and theories for its interpretation. Finally, Michal Kopeček argues in his contribution that communist law, along with the steady rise of the communist normative state, was becoming a part of the systemic form of normality, accepted not only by the ruling party and its apparatus, but also by major parts of the population. Kopeček shows how legal and political theorists in Czechoslovakia and Poland engaged with socialist legality and dissident legalism as a strategy in their contest with the regime. Chronologically the volume covers all stages of the state socialist dictatorships: the Stalinist building of socialism, de-Stalinization, the reform period, late state socialism, and finally its collapse. The volume also reflects the thematic and methodological diversity of historical scholarship on the Sinnwelt of state socialism, ranging from the study of everyday social practices, through the analysis of local adaptations of central ideological guidelines, to the main shifts of socialist semantics. The fundamental question addressed by this collection is how political power worked in state socialism. It asks what conditioned the long-term conformist behavior of the majority of the population in communist states in Europe and why, at the end of the 1980s, people decided to reject this authoritarian world. Acknowledgments We would like to thank all authors for their high level of commitment to preparing their articles. We also want to thank both anonymous reviewers for their criticism and suggestions. We are grateful to Anna Bryson, David Burnett, Derek Paton, and Lucais Sewell for their effort in translating the articles from Czech and German. Last but not least, we want to salute the Central European University Press for its readiness to include the volume in its book series. Ana Kladnik and Celia Donert

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PART ONE

SINNWELT AND EIGEN-SINN

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CHAPTER ONE

Socialism as Sinnwelt: Communist Dictatorship and its World of Meaning in a Cultural-Historical Perspective Martin Sabrow

As the half century of communist rule in East Central Europe recedes further into the past, the practices, convictions, and rituals that determined people’s lives under socialism seem increasingly more bizarre and incomprehensible. We smile, shake our heads or shudder when we think of a lost world where the cult of the “wise leader Stalin” was celebrated in poetry; where people sang “the party, the party is always right.” A 1918 quote from the Bolshevik Grigori Zinoviev, cited at a 2007 Leipzig conference on the 1932–33 Holodomor in Ukraine, evokes the unimaginable and incomprehensible horror of a society that coldly calculated the cost of forced collectivization at between five to seven million deaths: “We must carry along with us 90 million out of the 100 million of Soviet Russia’s population. As for the rest, we have nothing to say to them. They must be annihilated.”1 These terrifying words capture a passion for violence and inhumanity that has become almost inconceivable in our time. They remind us of the notorious sites in Berlin and Potsdam, now memorials, where the East German secret police and the KGB imprisoned and persecuted their victims, or the House of Terror in Budapest. To gain an insight into the alien logic of these self-proclaimed “master builders of socialism” (the title of a 1953 film about Walter Ulbricht),2 today we can turn to thinkers like Arthur Koestler or Lev Kopelev. After coming to their senses, they repeatedly tried to understand how they fell under its spell: “We believed it unconditionally. We believed that it was necessary to accelerate   George Leggett, The Cheka-Lenin’s Political Police: The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage (December 1917 to February 1922) (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981), 114. 2   Ella Ensink and Theo Grandy, Baumeister des Sozialismus Walter Ulbricht (Berlin: DEFA- Studio für Dokumentarfilme, 1953), accessed April 25, 2020, https://www.defa-stiftung.de/en/films/ film-search/baumeister-des-sozialismus-walter-ulbricht/. 1

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Martin Sabrow

collectivization . . . to re-educate millions of peasants, to transform these small landowners and potential bourgeois or kulaks into conscious workers. . . . My involvement,” says Kopelev, “is inexcusable and unforgivable. There is no hope of salvation from such a heinous sin. There is no atonement. You can only try to live honestly with it.”3 Communist rule: a Leviathan? With the communist period fading into the past, in the last twenty years public debate has focused on two large groups: perpetrators and victims. At the same time, however, the depiction of these two groups has become increasingly onedimensional. In 2007, a popular German television drama, The Woman from Checkpoint Charlie, followed the long struggle of a mother released from prison into the West to free her children in the GDR. The ARD program director Günter Struve described the film produced by Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk as the “dramatic story of a woman who became a political pawn of the Cold War.” The film showed “a state that held children hostage and relied on spying and surveillance to survive.”4 This view of communism in the twentieth century as synonymous with brutal oppression is popular beyond film as well. In support of national historical policy and civil society initiatives to process the past, after 1989 German scholars also successfully exposed the pervasive use of surveillance, persecution, and terror in the history of communist regimes from 1917 until their collapse.5 To study the fallen SED dictatorship, a special Stasi Documentation Act permitted scholars and millions of those affected to see the files held by the East German secret police. The law helped reveal the Stasi’s destructive history and raise public awareness of it. In an episode of the German political talk show Anne Will titled “Zwischen Unrechtsstaat und Ostalgie—Neuer Streit um das DDR-Erbe” (Between an illegitimate state and Ostalgia—The new dispute over   Lew Kopelew, Und schuf mir einen Götzen: Lehrjahre eines Kommunisten (Göttingen: Steidl, 1996), 340, 369. 4   “Vorpremiere von TV-Flüchtlingsdrama: Veronica Ferres, ‘Die Frau vom Checkpoint Charlie,’” DasErste.de, Internet Archive Wayback Machine, accessed April 25, 2020, https://web.archive.org/web/20071219202536/www.mdr.de/brisant/promi-klatsch/4833942.html. 5   See Stéphane Courtois, Joachim Gauck, and Ehrhart Neubert, eds., Das Schwarzbuch des Kommunismus: Unterdrückung, Verbrechen und Terror (Munich: Piper, 1998); Jens Mecklenburg and Wolfgang Wippermann, eds., Roter Holocaust? Kritik des Schwarzbuchs des Kommunismus (Hamburg: Lit.-Verlag, 1998); Hermann Weber and Ulrich Mählert, “Die Erforschung der DDR-Geschichte in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart,” in Zehn Jahre Deutsche Einheit: Eine Bilanz, ed. Wolfgang Thierse, Ilse Spittmann-Rühle, and Johannes L. Kuppe (Opladen: Springer Link, 2000), 207–18. 3

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the GDR’s legacy) broadcast on April 26, 2009, the question of whether the GDR had been an unjust state emerged as a decisive criterion for analyzing the character of the GDR. One of the show’s highlights came when the question “Was the GDR a totally unjust state?” was posed live in an online survey. Understanding dictatorship by focusing on perpetrators and victims paints a dark picture, but it is neither false nor unjustified. It serves to illustrate the fundamental differences between freedom and oppression, tolerance and coercion, the rule of law and arbitrary justice. It can also partly compensate for the damage done by dictatorship and oppression through drawing attention to its excesses and generating empathy for its victims. From the point of view of the contemporary historian, such distancing and differentiation from the past strengthens political or cultural self-understanding in the present by building an anti-totalitarian consensus. At the same time, however, it cannot help us to better understand the otherness of this past. So the question is: Can a post-dictatorial perspective on communist power as a Leviathan provide an explanation for it? How can that perspective account for everyday life under the dictatorship when it is remembered by so many as far from dark? How can it account for the functional mechanisms of the seventy-five-year rule of communism in East Central Europe? Communist legitimation strategies Today, even the starkest description of the Soviet system in totalitarian terms must take into account associated factors that kept followers in line and maintained “occupation socialism”6 in the satellite states for decades. Supply and surveillance were the two instruments selected for stabilizing the SED state. But “colonizing the minds” of the majority failed, according to a widely read general analysis of the GDR from the 1990s. 7 In his history of Germany, After the Catastrophe, Peter Graf Kielmansegg describes the GDR as a German phenomenon employing four legitimation strategies—socialism, anti-fascism, peace, and welfare—all of which failed.8 Describing the GDR as a Leviathan also does not take into account that, as in all totalitarian regimes of the twentieth century, SED rule was a participatory dictatorship that developed by integrating its citizens as mass subjects who were simultaneously subjugated. As early as 1948, the SED had attracted   Klaus Schroeder, Der SED-Staat: Partei, Staat und Gesellschaft 1949–1990 (Munich: Carl Hanser, 1998), 643. 7   Ibid., 646. 8   See Peter Graf Kielmansegg, Nach der Katastrophe: Eine Geschichte des geteilten Deutschland (Berlin: Siedler Verlag, 2000). 6

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two million supporters. By 1989, one in seven citizens was a member of the party. The exercise of state and party power in the SED state was never subject to law, but at the same time it was also never totally unrestricted: it was always subject to regular decision-making procedures and conformed to the unwritten but assumed norms of party discipline. In extreme cases, these procedures and norms reduced government ministers and central committee members to mere pawns. Even the majority of the members of the “all-powerful” Politburo had only limited participatory powers. The supposed omnipotence of the First Secretary or Secretary General of the SED itself had its limits. Not only was their power subject to the will of Moscow, it was also contained by the enduring party apparatus and by a principle of collective leadership that could never be suspended indefinitely. Both heads of state fell victim to the unpredictable resurgence of these forces at the end of their party careers: Walter Ulbricht in the spring of 1971 and Erich Honecker in the fall of 1989. At the same time, the East German population was by no means powerless. In the GDR dictatorship, perpetrator and victim repeatedly switched roles. Many of its later opponents were previously among its most devoted supporters and a surprising number of political careers were marked by periods of exclusion or intra-party persecution. After 1990, empirical research quickly left behind analytical models that approached the GDR as a totalitarian system propped up by the military and the Wall. Scholars turned instead to analyzing political rule through the relationship between power and powerlessness, or between the state and the individual, viewed not as antithetical forces, but as a complex network of social relationships. Based on Max Weber’s definition of domination as the chance that “certain commands are obeyed by a specifiable group of people,”9 the strength of communism rested on two pillars. The first was the avant-garde party’s claim to political leadership; the second was its commitment to that claim, and to enforcing it both internally and externally. Even in dictatorial systems, the rulers’ actual physical power does not constitute the essence of their rule. They also rely on the belief of the ruled that their power is legitimate. From a moral and political perspective, normative distancing of a free society from an unfree one is, and will remain, important. But it is the task of the contemporary historian to reveal the difference between moral demarcation and historical knowledge. Communist dictatorships owed their long-term stability to violent enforcement, but also to social acceptance as well as political or cultural appeal. The Marxist-Leninist state ideology that constituted the foundation for the SED’s claim to political leadership is an excellent example.   Max Weber, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft: Grundriss der verstehenden Soziologie (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1976), 28.

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Armed with the certainty that they possessed the only “correct” view of the world and had understood the true laws of historical development, the self-proclaimed “workers’ and peasants’ state” never wavered: from land reform, to collectivization, to Honecker’s stubborn statement as late as 1989 that, quoting August Bebel, “neither ox nor donkey can stop the progress of socialism.”10 A belief in the historical superiority of a social order based on social equality and the elimination of private property was not limited to those in power. It also helped the population explain to themselves why their societies lagged so clearly behind the capitalist ones of the West. And as is well known, that belief also shaped the thinking of many in the opposition. In the 1980s, many hoped to save the socialist experiment from the threat posed by those who had been corrupted by power. But the GDR had even more success legitimizing itself by adopting an antifascist posture. Even though it was a top-down movement exploited for political purposes, East German anti-fascism was a deeply rooted social force founded upon something more than a faith in socialism. Convinced of the anti-fascist state’s moral superiority over the Federal Republic of Germany with its unresolved past, Christa Wolf referred to film director Frank Beyer in explaining the obstacles faced by the democratic movement in the GDR. “Because we were young and had grown up under fascism, we were filled with guilt as well as gratitude to those who had liberated us from fascism. Anti-fascists and communists who had been in concentration camps, jails, or exile before their return had a greater influence on political life in the GDR than in West Germany. We did not dare oppose those who had been in concentration camps during the Nazi era.”11 Decisively and utterly rejecting the “monstrous and disastrous crimes that the Germans committed against the world,” they hoped to “finally do it differently and do it better.” As a result, they understood anti-fascism as a break with the old that required total devotion to the new. Historian Fritz Klein wrote in his memoirs: “Part and parcel with the great ‘no!’ was a great ‘yes!’ to a radical,   See, for example, Honecker’s speech at the presentation of the GDR’s first 32bit microchip in August 1989: “Neither ox nor donkey can stop the progress of socialism. This old insight of the German workers’ movement is being confirmed by the great initiative of the laborers of the GDR. . . . Socialism is the only social order in which a human can be a human, in which human labor and initiative are not abused but contribute to the good of all mankind. This is the truth about the values of our life and our struggle. This is what we fought for in the Weimar Republic and in the resistance against Hitler’s fascism. This is how we built a new life in the GDR after the terrible events of the Second World War, and this is how we continue to shape the developed socialist society in the GDR.” Quoted in “Eine neue Etappe der DDR-Mikroelektronik,” Berliner Zeitung, August 15, 1989. 11   Christa Wolf, Was bleibt (Berlin: Aufbau Verlag, 1990), 135ff. 10

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groundbreaking alternative.”12 Therefore, East Germany’s legitimation as an antifascist state permitted the GDR to represent itself as a promoter of peace that had freed itself from the burdens of the past. It could also cast itself as a viable alternative to its hostile western neighbor that had failed to break with both the system and the elites that had dominated during the war. A third narrative legitimizing communist power in the GDR was socialism’s commitment to progress and welfare. Unemployment and business cycles were unknown in the GDR. Its social network was also highly inclusive. The new economic predictability was expected to eliminate the anonymous market forces that had once caused financial crises and runaway inflation. In addition, the GDR’s achievements in building a welfare state showed its promises were more than just stirring words. In the early years, high social mobility also allowed previously disadvantaged segments of society to advance, further legitimizing the state. After 1971, Honecker’s commitment to unifying social and economic policy helped to maintain support for the state. Power and everyday life It is difficult—and, as a result, controversial—to determine to what extent these strategies for legitimizing communist power rooted in ideology and social welfare succeeded among the society in the GDR. Unlike the first, this second German dictatorship apparently was never supported by a majority of the population. But at least between the mid-1950s and mid-1980s, it did not seem to be opposed by a majority either. The regime’s sustained political stability relied on a balance of power as well as a general attitude toward the government that vacillated between enthusiastic identification and passive acceptance. Especially after the Berlin Wall was built in 1961, a kind of rigid tolerance termed “discontented loyalty” or “loyal reluctance” was broadly accepted. It was an attitude that took for granted existing power structures and looked for personal gain within those structures, instead of in opposition to them. Following Alf Lüdtke’s and Thomas Lindenberger’s concept of individual perception, the social history of the GDR focuses on the “ability and need” of the ruled to “act on their own authority and with their own goals within the structure of power.”13 But a closer look reveals that these effects of totalitarianism in a society defined by dictatorship are actually part of an everyday negotiation process. Subjects of the SED state did not simply react passively to the government’s demands; they Fritz Klein, Drinnen und draußen: Ein Historiker in der DDR, Erinnerungen (Frankfurt/ Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 2000), 8ff. 13   Thomas Lindenberger, “SED-Herrschaft als soziale Praxis, Herrschaft und ‘Eigen-Sinn’: Problemstellung und Begriffe” (unpublished manuscript, March 2006). 12

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also gave their subjectivity meaning by interpreting and appropriating it in their own way. As actors, they translated their subjectivity into social practice. This kind of self-affirming behavior ranged “from the overzealous devotion of idealists, to self-serving active cooperation, to outwardly loyal but inwardly distanced behavior, to passive forms of refusal, to open opposition and resistance.”14 Behind the apparently diametrical opposition between the government and society in state socialism, everyday life was characterized by a diverse mix of contentious power constellations. These constellations were reinvented each day and covered a wide array of compensation strategies ranging from willing adaptation to categorical rejection. But the scope of such compensation strategies in the SED dictatorship was fundamentally limited. Social historians of the GDR have identified these limitations as an essential organizational principle of state socialist rule. Everyday life in the GDR was limited not only in the physical sense of a society within walls; other barriers—some invisible, some explicit—separated common social experience from the sources of authority. These barriers distinguished the permitted from the forbidden, the initiated from the uninitiated, the comrade from the non-comrade, those with real capital from the ordinary citizen. As Thomas Lindenberger has shown, the connection between authority and everyday life in the GDR is most evident in its specific “dictatorship of borders” and less in the supposedly autonomous niches or at the borders of the dictatorship.15 In current historical and cultural research, scholars have discarded the view of everyday life in societies and groups as primarily a special or autonomous cultural zone that develops independently from the political circumstances of the time. According to current sociology of knowledge theory, the everyday world is rather an area of reality “which for conscious, normal adults is simply given and part of common sense. By simply given, we mean everything that we experience as unquestioned, any situation that is currently unproblematic.”16 So if it is not perceived as an external demand but as a self-evident interiority, everyday life is the space where domination becomes stabilized. Alternatively, it remains unstable and insecure because it is perceived as an outside constraint conflicting with inner attitudes and norms. Michel Foucault has also analyzed the everyday habits and practices of self-discipline using the concept of “governmentality.” The practice of governmentality generates obedience while eliding the experience   Thomas Lindenberger, “Die Diktatur der Grenzen: Zur Einleitung,” in Herrschaft und EigenSinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger (Cologne: Böhlau, 1999), 13–44; here 30. 15   Ibid., 30 ff. 16   Alfred Schütz and Thomas Luckmann, Strukturen der Lebenswelt (Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1979), 25. 14

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of it at the same time. In this view, everyday life is not opposed to domination but its complementary reverse—and that goes for both democracies and dictatorships. Daily socialization entrenches our habits and affirms them. As Max Weber wrote, habits determine discipline as “the habituation characteristic of uncritical and unresisting mass obedience,”17 or, as Edmund Husserl argues, form a finite province of meaning defined by self-evident norms and concepts of order. The everyday world is a space where external political rule is internalized as social practice and where authority is given independent meaning by those who are subject to it. However, it is also the space where authority is regenerated and reapplied again and again each day. In everyday life, authority becomes social practice and social practice becomes authority. Normality as a meaningful central category Political claims to legitimacy at the top and social self-assertion through self-affirming appropriation below are only parts of the socialist power structure. The social relationships between authority and obedience, between the use of power and the acceptance of power, were defined by a common cultural horizon that neither the rulers nor the ruled could completely control. Traditional habits, learned practices, common values, and language conventions determined that cultural horizon. The history of political culture focuses on how power is invisibly established in this area. That includes understanding representations of power, political remembrance and celebration culture, the profusion of role models or images of the enemy, dominant ways of thinking, trends in semantics, and limits on speech.18 This elusive intermediary zone where behavior and attitudes determine practice can be defined as a space of preconscious acceptance and involuntary commonalities.19 Perhaps the secret of the SED dictatorship’s stability was that by using violence, persuasion, conviction, and habit, the state fostered and maintained a homogenized world of lived inner meaning that was simultaneously sealed off from the outside. Individual uncertainties were practically excluded from this world, and so it was here that Marxist state ideology could first exercise its persuasive power. Although this world of meaning was an artificial   Weber, Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft, 29.   Achim Landwehr, Geschichte des Sagbaren: Einführung in die historische Diskursanalyse (Tübingen: Tübinger Verlag, 2004). 19   Wilfried Thaa, Die Wiedergeburt des Politischen: Zivilgesellschaft und Legitimitätskonflikt in den Revolutionen von 1989 (Opladen: Leske + Budrich, 1996), 67, 148 ff. On the (forced) consensual legitimatory character of communist dictatorships, see Martin Sabrow, “Der künstliche Konsens: Überlegungen zum Legitimationscharakter sozialistischer Herrschaftssysteme,” in Jahrbuch für historische Kommunismusforschung 1999, ed. Hermann Weber et al. (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1999), 191–224.

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creation and its existence depended on political forces, it had a powerful effect by ensuring that—together with the transition from exceptionally acute violence to normalized structural violence—it became a part of daily life. This intermediate zone is particularly important for understanding dictatorship from the perspective of cultural history. Here the goal is not to reveal the obvious abnormalities of communist rule. Instead, the idea is to analyze contemporary normality to understand how a world that now appears so strange or even unimaginable could have been viewed as normal then. Normality here does not mean external consolidation, superficial adaptation, or helpless resignation, such as in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic under Gustáv Husák; nor does it mean the conscious approval of political partisanship. Instead, normality stands for internalized acceptance based on inconspicuousness or inoffensiveness. This kind of compliance embedded in a world of meaning is also discussed in scholarship on the Nazis, for example to explain how ordinary Germans became anti-Semites, or ordinary men mass murderers. The authority of twentieth-century dictatorships did not rely on fear and subjugation alone. It also relied on a frighteningly successful effort to ensure that their ways of thinking, their values, their worlds of meaning, and their political cultures became normal and valid. These regimes developed and inculcated their own definitions of good and evil. Communist rule in Europe did not assert its power through lawlessness, as, for example, many who view the GDR dictatorship as a lawless system may believe. Instead, these regimes relied on an emphatic model of social justice that fundamentally and radically devalued individual rights. When dictatorships are overthrown and a new normality replaces the old one, people often demonize the actions of those who were in power to explain how they could have violated the norms of today. This enigmatic tension between normality and abnormality is reflected in Hannah Arendt’s description of Adolf Eichmann as the “banality of evil,” or in Christopher Browning’s description of the Einsatzgruppen as “quite normal men.” The secret weapon of modern dictatorship is the seductive power of the normal, defined as a collective way of thinking and as a social practice. This applies to both totalitarian and simply authoritarian states, because it makes what is questionable an undisputed norm that is beyond question. Defining the link between everyday actions and the legitimation of power requires examining the implementation of system-specific normality in what Hobsbawm termed the “age of extremes.” That means analyzing the relationship of superficially non-political ideas of social order to the stability or instability of state-socialist party dictatorships. Here the focus is on an elusive acceptance embedded in a world of meaning, an acceptance that relies on inexplicit ideological concepts that are quite separate from the open legitimation strategies of the ruling elites.

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Authority always depends, in part, on this zone that Winfried Thaa terms “prepolitical support.” Contours of the socialist world of meaning The socialist world of meaning has many facets. Here I would like to focus on just a few disparate aspects that have often come to my attention in my research on communist regimes. I believe that socialist dictatorships relied on artificial consensus primarily because of their emphasis on collectivity and their obsession with consensus. The political representation of power was a blunt image of unity defined as collective leadership that condemned dissenting views as partisan heresy. In the rebuilding of the cities after the Second World War, priority was given to defining spaces for demonstrating political unity. The history of socialist power is a history of mass marches and demonstrations that were repeated performances of the power of unity and the unity of power. Even at the end, the SED leadership in the municipal elections of May 7, 1989 favored a fictional 98.85 percent approval rating over the potential gain in legitimacy and credibility that an honest vote could have earned them. Just as Walter Ulbricht’s resignation had been staged as consensus in 1971, in the Politburo vote on October 17, 1989, Erich Honecker himself voted for his own dismissal. This “passion for unanimity” described by the first scholars of totalitarianism permeated the GDR population’s understanding of the law as well as their everyday working or private lives. Even long after 1990, East Germans still placed far greater emphasis on consensus and harmony in their world of meaning than West Germans. After reunification, studies of GDR civil law demonstrated that socialism was structurally almost incapable of accommodating disputes or handling controversy productively. Rates of civil and employment law cases in the GDR were in permanent decline: at the District Court of Wismar, for example, in 1963 less than an eighth of the number of civil cases pending in 1950 were still headed for trial; in 1985 nearly 50 percent of all civil cases at the same court ended by settlement.20 The power of egalitarianism determined norms in all areas including political ideology, the principles of socialist leadership, living design, and even funeral styles: urn burials were much more popular in the East. This ideal of equality defined how the political class represented its lifestyle and   Inga Markovits, “Der Handel mit der sozialistischen Gerechtigkeit: Zum Verhältnis zwischen Bürger und Gericht in der DDR,” in Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger (Cologne: Böhlau, 1999), 315–47, here 319; Inga Markovits, Gerechtigkeit in Lüritz: Eine ostdeutsche Rechtsgeschichte (Munich: C. H. Beck, 2006), 244f.

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ensured that enjoying the privileges of power was always hidden (or in case of the Diplomatenjagd, was excused as an unavoidable adaptation to the decadent West). Unsurprisingly, protests in East Germany against the SED regime were in part driven by the revelation of how well Politburo members lived at their headquarters in Wandlitz. West Germans, on the other hand, were generally perplexed by the tremendous outrage sparked by the party leadership’s modestly luxurious housing. Placed at the top of the hierarchy of social values, the veneration of knowledge and truth in the socialist world of meaning also played a central role in justifying socialist rule. Knowledge was a crucial tool for legitimizing the socialist dictatorship. It justified placing an advanced, enlightened group, possessing knowledge of the true laws of history, in power over the unenlightened. As a result, among the party elite the power of the secret separated the initiated from the ignorant. To a great extent, it also determined social position under socialism. In the socialist world of meaning, the bearer of the secret and the traitor were two opposed archetypical figures. The thirst for knowledge also shaped the world of socialism’s attitude to literature in the GDR. At the same time a fanatical belief in the truth of confessions was the hallmark of Stalinist persecution, even if those confessions were always made under duress. The term “struggle” as a central metaphor of authority and everyday life under socialism is also significant. It reflects a belief that the world is divided between friends and enemies locked in permanent struggle, and that the socialist order is in a perpetual state of war. It also reflects a political and linguistic tendency toward violence, harshness, and forcefulness that characterized the Stalinist phase of communist rule in particular. The word evokes the communist project’s permanent stress and challenge, how it placed every aspect of daily life on a war footing. But it also reveals its profound artificiality, an inner fragility that was even stronger than it appeared from outside. A fundamental factor in the socialist order and its general cultural legitimation was its particular understanding of time. Time in socialism influenced the political culture of communist authority, as well as the daily thoughts and actions of its subjects. The belief in progress was the communist project’s most stirring conviction, a ubiquitous force whose inspiring power extended far beyond policy. The distinction between progressive and regressive was also a key social reference in many other areas. In culture and in the world of meaning, it resulted in a love of the new and a disdain for the old. Castles, churches, and manor houses were senselessly destroyed in its name, a loss we still feel today. It is also reflected in the ambiguous meaning of the word reconstruction, which does not distinguish between preserving an original and constructing a new imitation. Socialism’s concept of time was based on a particular concept of progress. Communism’s vision of the future was not utopian; on the contrary, it was based

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on a total certainty about the future. The communist future was not an imaginary non-place, a dream world opposite to ours. Instead, socialism used figures and data to measure how close we supposedly were to the world of tomorrow.21 A combination of progress and planning backed up this strictly rational vision of the future. Neither the ubiquitous discrepancy between what was planned and what was actually achieved nor the permanent need to correct plans significantly weakened that vision. The communist discourse on the future intertwined vision and plannability. Even in fiction and in the boldest descriptions of the future, the language of that discourse never lost its calm rationality, making it even more persuasive.22 Certain of progress achieved over time—a progress that was as straight and unstoppable as time’s arrow itself—in socialism, consciousness of time and temporal aesthetics were also rooted in everyday life. In the socialist society’s conception, time was a rational force instead of an autonomous external quantity. It was an internal power that could be effectively controlled. Therefore, work tasks were often recorded in “time-expenditure values,” “time-normative systems,” or “time-normative catalogs.” That is why the clocks ticked differently in socialism. It is also why the contrast between the rocket speed of Soviet space travel and the snail’s pace of queues in department stores was not experienced as an absurd contradiction, as it would have been in Western society.

  On the timelessness of the concept of utopia, see Rolf Schwendter, Utopie: Überlegungen zu einem zeitlosen Begriff (Berlin: ID Verlag, 1994); on the solely ostensible character of the Communist concept of the future, see Stefan Plaggenborg, “Die Bolschewiki waren keine Utopisten, sondern Praktiker!” in Experiment Moderne: Der sowjetische Weg (Frankfurt/ Main: Campus Verlag, 2006), 95. 22   Stefan Heym’s hymn to the 1957 Sputnik launch, “Das kosmische Zeitalter,” thus begins: “Kurz nach dem Mittagessen, da mein von keinerlei Gedanken an Literaturdiskussionen gestörtes gutes Gewissen mich gerade einzuschläfern begann, klingelte das Telefon in die Feiertagsruhe hinein. Am Apparat war einer meiner Lieblingsredakteure. ‘Wissen Sie schon das Neueste?’ – ‘Nein.’ – ‘Hören Sie denn kein Radio?’ – ‘Nur wenn ich unbedingt muss.’ – ‘Sputnik drei kreist um die Erde.’ Der Mann am Apparat legte eine Pause ein. Er erwartete irgendein ‘Oh’ oder wenigstens einen beschleunigten Atemzug der Überraschung. Aber ich hielt mich zurück. Ich hatte in der Sowjetunion gelernt, wie man sich wissenschaftlich und leidenschaftslos verhält.” (“Shortly after lunch, as my good conscience, disturbed by no thoughts of literature discussions, was just beginning to put me to sleep, the telephone rang into the holiday calm. On the phone was one of my favorite editors. ‘Have you heard the latest news?’ – ‘No.’ – ‘Don’t you listen to the radio?’ – ‘Only if I absolutely have to.’ – ‘Sputnik Three circles the Earth.’ The man on the phone took a break. He was expecting some kind of ‘oh’ or at least an accelerated breath of surprise. But I held back. I had learned in the Soviet Union to be scientific and dispassionate.”) Stefan Heym, Das kosmische Zeitalter: Ein Bericht (Berlin [East]: Tribüne Verlag, 1959), 38. 21

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The collapse of the prepolitical acceptance framework But the Sinnwelt approach is perhaps most useful for analyzing and understanding the fall of communist rule at the end of the 1980s. Focusing on the GDR, there was an erosion of consensus structures at all levels of society. One example is the flood of outraged letters sent to the ideology secretary Kurt Hager after the rejection of glasnost and perestroika in April 1987. Another example is the increasing disregard for the rules of the SED state and its artificial world of thought; in the context of the emerging Soviet reforms, they seemed more and more absurd. A third example is how individuals adapted their public behavior while internally indulging in cynicism. In a society that had become accustomed to censorship over sixty years, the ban on the Soviet magazine Sputnik in November 1988 unexpectedly led to mass protests. The fraud in the May 1989 municipal elections suddenly exposed a system that had never even paid lip service to the idea of actually reflecting the will of the voters. These last local elections turned out to be the moment that marked a rupture between the public and private realities that had lived for many years in harmony. In the days and weeks following May 7, as evidence of electoral fraud piled up, the rulers’ cherished faith that the general will was also the will of all—that mass support of their regime was as factual as it was legislated—was shattered. This change in mentality began with the SED leadership, which in the run-up to the local elections acquiesced to a “bourgeois” understanding of the vote by insisting “that the election regulations . . . governing the determination of results must be strictly adhered to.”23 But unwilling to let go of their power and its familiar standards, they simultaneously demanded that the number of yes votes be no fewer than in previous elections. At that time, with some individual exceptions, the SED leadership’s dual mentality was still largely intact. That explains why, even though they expressed “a touch of embarrassment at the election results,” Honecker’s opponents at the Politburo meeting on May 9, 1989, still never questioned sticking to the traditional system of values. “We were blind to the fact that we, the SED—and Egon Krenz himself—had been discredited by electoral fraud,” Günter Schabowski admitted in retrospect.24 With the system in crisis and protests continuing on every seventh day   Egon Krenz to Erich Honecker, April 15, 1989, quoted in Walter Süß, Staatssicherheit am Ende: Warum es den Mächtigen nicht gelang, 1989 eine Revolution zu verhindern (Berlin: Ch. Links, 1999), 122. 24   Günter Schabowski, Der Absturz (Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag, 1992), 172. An analogous assessment was made by Süß, who speaks of a “peculiar schizophrenia” in the diction of the evaluation report on the local elections produced by the Central Committee apparatus for Krenz, a report that repeatedly hints at the facts of the election fraud; see Süß, Staatssicherheit am Ende, 125. 23

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of the month, it became clear that the election result of 98.85 percent yes votes was hopelessly implausible. But the total collapse of their credibility meant that at this decisive moment, those in power were helpless. The collapse revealed the true significance of the artificially created world of meaning that had supported the SED state for decades. When the young Leipzig academic Walter Friedrich visited Egon Krenz on the morning of October 9, 1989, to persuade the party leadership to adopt a more flexible attitude, he brought a document with him stating that “in recent weeks, identification with the state has rapidly and unexpectedly deteriorated.” Friedrich recognized that the “growing loss of GDR identity” indicated a “process of change in mass consciousness” that would lead “in a very short time to the emergence . . . of a radically new mentality.”25 Friedrich’s prediction was confirmed by Infratest surveys on the political attitudes of East Germans that were based on interviews with West German visitors to the GDR. Setting aside for the moment the question of whether such representative surveys may have fundamentally underestimated system acceptance in the GDR, the results show that “until 1988, only relatively minor changes were observed in the basic political attitudes among citizens of the GDR. The results indicate that opposition suddenly increased in the spring or summer of 1989.”26 However, mere political or economic factors linked to the growing systemic crisis in the first half of 1989 cannot adequately explain this sudden increase. Instead, it indicates the decline of a sociocultural world order. It shows that the communist project gradually lost its unquestioned acceptance and then all at once revealed its imposed artificiality. In these basic patterns of social orientation that were internalized over decades before they finally broke down, the boundary between authority and everyday life, between the spheres of politics and personal life outside of work, were blurred. But the systems of authority that competed in the twentieth century based their power on the hidden fact that the political is always more than politics. They enforced their authority using violence and persuasion, but they also owed their power and appeal to apparently apolitical gender hierarchies, or the thinking of efficiency-oriented economic experts. This is perhaps the only approach that can answer the stunned question of Erich Mielke and his Stasi officers when they asked why they “simply gave up our GDR,”27 surrendering to   Walter Friedrich to Egon Krenz, October 9, 1989, quoted in Ekkehard Kuhn, Der Tag der Entscheidung: Leipzig, 9. Oktober 1989 (Berlin: Ullstein, 1992), 92. 26   Anne Köhler, “Nationalbewußtsein und Identitätsgefühl der Bürger der DDR unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der deutschen Frage,” in Enquete-Kommission “Aufarbeitung von Geschichte und Folgen der SED-Diktatur in Deutschland” (Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 1995), 1636–75, here 1664. 27   Georg Mascolo, Norbert Pötzl, and Ulrich Schwarz, interview with Erich Mielke: “‘Ich sterbe in diesem Kasten’: Der frühere Stasi-Chef Erich Mielke über Erich Honecker und den Untergang des SED-Regimes,” Der Spiegel, August 31, 1992, 38–53. 25

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“peace movement milquetoasts” who “would have turned tail at the first shot.”28 In the end it was not the material power of weapons, but rather the mental weakness of their owners that led to the end of the communist project in Europe. This also explains why debate in Germany continues to rage about whether the upheaval of 1989–90 should be termed a “turning point” or “revolution.” The collapse of the SED regime was essentially a revolution without revolutionaries.

  Quoted in Stefan Wolle, Die heile Welt der Diktatur: Alltag und Herrschaft in der DDR 1971–1989 (Berlin: Christoph Links Verlag, 1998), 342.

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Selected bibliography Courtois, Stéphane, Joachim Gauck, and Ehrhart Neubert, eds. Das Schwarzbuch des Kommunismus: Unterdrückung, Verbrechen und Terror. Munich: Piper, 1998. Kielmansegg, Peter Graf. Nach der Katastrophe: Eine Geschichte des geteilten Deutschland. Berlin: Siedler Verlag, 2000. Klein, Fritz. Drinnen und draußen: Ein Historiker in der DDR, Erinnerungen. Frankfurt/ Main: S. Fischer Verlag, 2000. Kopelew, Lew. Und schuf mir einen Götzen: Lehrjahre eines Kommunisten. Göttingen: Steidl, 1996. Kuhn, Ekkehard. Der Tag der Entscheidung: Leipzig, 9. Oktober 1989. Berlin: Ullstein, 1992. Landwehr, Achim. Geschichte des Sagbaren: Einführung in die historische Diskursanalyse. Tübingen: Tübinger Verlag, 2004. Leggett, George. The Cheka—Lenin‘s Political Police: The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage (December 1917 to February 1922). Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1981. Lindenberger, Thomas. “Die Diktatur der Grenzen: Zur Einleitung.” In Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger, 13–44. Cologne: Böhlau, 1999. ———. “SED-Herrschaft als soziale Praxis, Herrschaft und ‘Eigen-Sinn’: Problemstellung und Begriffe.” Unpublished manuscript, March 2006. Markovits, Inga. “Der Handel mit der sozialistischen Gerechtigkeit. Zum Verhältnis zwischen Bürger und Gericht in der DDR.” In: Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur. Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger, 315–47. Köln: Böhlau, 1999. ———. Gerechtigkeit in Lüritz: Eine ostdeutsche Rechtsgeschichte. München: C. H. Beck, 2006. Mecklenburg, Jens, and Wolfgang Wippermann, eds. Roter Holocaust? Kritik des Schwarzbuchs des Kommunismus. Hamburg: Lit.-Verlag, 1998. Plaggenborg, Stefan. Experiment Moderne: Der sowjetische Weg. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 2006. Schabowski, Günter. Der Absturz. Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag, 1992. Schroeder, Klaus. Der SED-Staat: Partei, Staat und Gesellschaft 1949–1990. Munich: Carl Hanser, 1998. Schütz, Alfred, and Thomas Luckmann. Strukturen der Lebenswelt. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1979. Süß, Walter. Staatssicherheit am Ende: Warum es den Mächtigen nicht gelang, 1989 eine Revolution zu verhindern. Berlin: Ch. Links, 1999. Thaa, Wilfried. Die Wiedergeburt des Politischen: Zivilgesellschaft und Legitimitätskonflikt in den Revolutionen von 1989. Opladen: Leske + Budrich, 1996. Thierse, Wolfgang, Ilse Spittmann-Rühle, and Johannes L. Kuppe, eds. Zehn Jahre Deutsche Einheit: Eine Bilanz. Opladen: Springer Link, 2000. Weber, Max. Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft: Grundriss der verstehenden Soziologie. Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1976. Wolf, Christa. Was bleibt. Berlin: Aufbau Verlag, 1990. Wolle, Stefan. Die heile Welt der Diktatur: Alltag und Herrschaft in der DDR 1971–1989. Berlin: Christoph Links Verlag, 1998.

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CHAPTER TWO

Neither Consent nor Opposition: Eigen-Sinn, or How to Make Sense of Compliance and Self-Assertion under Communist Domination Thomas Lindenberger

When it comes to the experience and behavior of average people, historical research on communist rule for a long time tended to juxtapose periods of consent, or at least silent submissiveness, during “normal times” against episodes of popular unrest and revolt during “states of exception.” Both modes of existence of the state socialist regimes are intrinsically linked to their ideological infrastructure, or Sinnwelt: the periods of domestic stability and quietness during which authority remains (seemingly) unchallenged are claimed by communism as a proof of the ongoing triumph of irresistible historic progress under the guidance of its omniscient party elite. In this mode, dynamic slogans of mobilization such as “reconstruction,” “progress,” and—later on—“scientific-technological revolution” are articulated with a vocabulary suggesting rest, stability, and predictability. The regime mode during times of unrest and open confrontation between communist rulers and their opponents, by contrast, brings out the militant and essentially violence-prone core of communist Sinnwelt. Thereby defending positions of domination, once they have been conquered, with all means and at all costs is legitimate, even when against the majority will of society, and defending the party’s monopoly of power is equivalent to saving the existence of the communist project as such. There were considerable differences from country to country in the frequency of shifting between these modes: obviously Poland stands out for its numerous cycles of domestic crisis and pacification, while other countries were marked by one primordial experience of revolt (1953 in the GDR, 1956 in Hungary, 1968 in CSSR) which then defined the terms of quiet regime-society relations for the remaining lifespan of the state socialist order. It is relatively easy to reconstruct how the transitions from one mode to the other could come about: that is, how frustrated expectations and popular claims would eventually lead to a challenge of established power holders and to open revolt, and how the ensuing violent crack-down on mass protests and opponents

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would be followed by phases of repressive restoration of the party’s supreme authority. Understanding what comes next, namely the different states of relative peace and “normality,” constitutes another, essentially different challenge.1 The viability of such a restored order of communist domination rested on more than the ideological claims and offers emanating from its Sinnwelt. It is certainly not possible to write a history of societies under communist rule without referring to this world of meaning it implemented. But this cannot replace looking at how it was actually received, appropriated, and practiced by those large segments of society who, for a variety of reasons, maintained attitudes of distance, indifference, or selective loyalty toward the regime: in short, how socialism as Sinnwelt interacted with the Sinnwelten of concrete individuals. In German scholarship on the social history of dictatorships, the concept of Eigen-Sinn (German for stubbornness, obstinate self-awareness), introduced by Alf Lüdtke and expanded by a research group at the Potsdam Centre for Contemporary History in projects about the everyday history of the GDR, has been used to devise a research perspective which focuses on individual attempts at “making sense” of life under state socialism. Initial questions included: What were the strategies of “muddling through” an everyday life permeated by the pressure to behave in a “politically correct” manner, where people had to “get along” with all sorts of representatives of the powers that be in order to live their own lives? Eigen-Sinn puts such questions in the center of analysis. It helps to conceptualize both compliant and self-assertive behaviors, and thereby the strategies through which individuals could preserve spaces and time for themselves without challenging the socialist Sinnwelt altogether. Eigen-Sinn and domination2 Originally the concept of Eigen-Sinn was developed by Alf Lüdtke to study the behavior of industrial workers in Germany during the high period of industrialization, and that of workers in Nazi Germany. 3 The end of communist   See Thomas Lindenberger, “Normalization between Experience, Expectation and Ostalgie: Observations on the East German Case,” in After Utopia: Czechoslovak Normalization Between Experiment and Experience, 1968–1989, Bad Wiesseer Tagungen des Collegium Carolinum 41, ed. Christiane Brenner, Michal Pullmann, and Anja Tippner (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2022), 17–36. 2   The following passages are a slightly modified excerpt from Thomas Lindenberger, “EigenSinn, Domination and No Resistance, Version: 1.0,” Docupedia-Zeitgeschichte, August 3, 2015, accessed April 20, 2020, http://docupedia.de/zg/Eigensinn_.28english_version.29?oldid=107133. 3   Alf Lüdtke, “Cash, Coffee-Breaks, Horseplay: Eigensinn and Politics among Factory Workers in Germany circa 1900,” in Confrontation, Class Consciousness, and the Labor Process: Studies in Proletarian Class Formation, ed. Michael Hanagan and Charles Stephenson (New York: 1

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dictatorships, the rapid opening of their archives, and the broad public consensus in reunified Germany that a thorough and comprehensive historical reappraisal of the GDR was necessary were all factors that prompted a group of East and West German historians at the Centre for Contemporary History in Potsdam to incorporate it into a research program whose theoretical approach was explicitly focused on domination and dictatorship. This prompting was more of a provocation given the sudden return of totalitarianism theory in the dayto-day language of politics. The highly official linkage of parliamentary debate, Vergangenheitsbewältigung (mastering the past), and scholarly expertise had an immediate impact on academic discourse, effectively curtailing its freedom of expression.4 Practitioners of social history, not to mention the history of everyday life, suddenly found themselves on the defensive again when faced with the unquestioned top-down perspective inherent to totalitarianism theory, with its focus on institutions and political elites. Any attempt to make “East German society” the center of attention in the early to mid-1990s would inevitably arouse suspicions of wanting to downplay or disguise the dictatorial character of the SED-Unrechtsstaat: the “unlawful state” of a one-party system.5 Of course, a blindness toward domination and a lack of interest in critiquing it were basically the last thing a nascent history of everyday life wanted to be accused of, or indeed had any need to be accused of, even though the communist dictatorship in Germany was completely new ground for these historians. As early as 1994, in his essay on the “disgruntled loyalty of industrial workers in the GDR,” Alf Lüdtke had formulated the central tenets of an approach to East German reality that was saturated with the history of experience. This approach Praeger Pub Text, 1986), 65–95; Alf Lüdtke, “What Happened to the ‘Fiery Red Glow’? Workers’ Experiences and German Fascism,” in The History of Everyday Life: Reconstructing Historical Experiences and Ways of Life, ed. Alf Lüdtke (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), 198–251; Alf Lüdtke, Eigen-Sinn: Fabrikalltag, Arbeitererfahrungen und Politik vom Kaiserreich bis in den Faschismus (Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot, 2015). The concept is meanwhile applied in a variety of historical subdisciplines, especially those defining themselves as “historical anthropology.” It is now considered a standard tool in social histories of the Early Modern period. See for instance Eric Piltz/Gerd Schwerhoff, Gottlosigkeit und Eigensinn: Religiöse Devianz im konfessionellen Zeitalter (Duncker & Humblot: Berlin, 2015); Beatrix Bastl, Tugend, Liebe, Ehre: Die adelige Frau in der Frühen Neuzeit (Vienna et al.: Böhlau Verlag, 2000); Richard van Dülmen, Kultur und Alltag in der Frühen Neuzeit, vol. 2: Dorf und Stadt, 16.-18. Jahrhundert (Munich: CH Beck Verlag, 2005), as well as the history of historiography of Jaana Eichhorn, Geschichtswissenschaft zwischen Tradition und Innovation: Diskurse, Institutionen und Machtstrukturen der bundesdeutschen Frühneuzeitforschung (Göttingen: V&R unipress GmbH, 2006). 4   See Andrew Beattie, Playing Politics with History: The Bundestag Inquiries into East Germany (New York: V&R unipress GmbH, 2008). 5   See Klaus Schroeder and Jochen Staadt, “Zeitgeschichte in Deutschland vor und nach 1989,” Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, no. 26 ( June 20, 1997): 28.

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started from the assumption of a basic continuity from Nazi Germany to communist East Germany in the way workers dealt with the demands, both reasonable and unreasonable, placed on them by their social environment and their rulers. “Interpretations in which obligations toward coworkers, neighbors, and relatives, but also toward the ‘big picture,’ were balanced out with individual distance toward everyone and everything, i.e., with Eigensinn, did not disappear with the defeat of the fascist regime in 1945. On the contrary, they enabled these individuals to ‘get by’ on a day-to-day basis, especially in the first months and years of the new social and political order.”6 Following this lead, the Potsdam project group investigated the notion of “domination and Eigen-Sinn in dictatorship.” It combined Lüdtke’s concept of Eigen-Sinn with Max Weber’s sociology of domination and Pierre Bourdieu’s praxeology, with the aim of researching various aspects of everyday life in the history of the GDR.7 Lüdtke’s pathbreaking essay “Domination as a Social Practice” had laid the groundwork for the project’s basic understanding of domination.8 The focus was now on taking the shift in perspective demanded by the concept of Eigen-Sinn and making it the starting point of a new research strategy that allowed for investigating the social space of communist dictatorship left unexplored by totalitarianism theory, especially its static, politics-centered variant with its tendency to catalog distinctive features. The starting point here was Sigrid Meuschel’s theory —hotly debated by social historians—of society under state socialism having been “shut down” (stillgelegt) or “died off ” (abgestorben) as a result of the forceful repression of processes of social self-organization through politically mandated transformation and construction processes.9 Thus, the communist promise of utopia pursued a specific “design” that entailed the “homogenization” (Entdifferenzierung) of relatively independent subsystems and the fusion of collective protagonists in the identitarian constructions of party, state, and society. The “Domination and Eigen-Sinn in Dictatorship” project, by contrast, demanded first of all that historians take into account the interactive character of every practice of domination as a permanent asymmetrical power relationship,   Alf Lüdtke, “‘Helden der Arbeit’—Mühen beim Arbeiten: Zur missmutigen Loyalität von Industriearbeitern in der DDR,” in Sozialgeschichte der DDR, ed. Hartmut Kaelble, Jürgen Kocka, and Hartmut Zwahr (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1994), 189. 7   Thomas Lindenberger, “Projektskizze: Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur; Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte in Berlin-Brandenburg, 1945–1990,” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, no. 5 (1995): 37–52. 8   Alf Lüdtke, “Einleitung: Herrschaft als soziale Praxis,” in Herrschaft als soziale Praxis: Historische und sozial-anthropologische Studien, ed. Alf Lüdtke (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1991), 9–63. 9   Sigrid Meuschel, Legitimation und Parteiherrschaft: Zum Paradox von Stabilität und Revolution in der DDR 1945–1989 (Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1992). 6

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thus preventing them from reducing dictatorial rule under state socialism to the mere giving and following of orders. Eigen-Sinn seemed like the ideal concept to explore the social practice of concrete relationships of domination under East German socialism in terms of their meaning and meaningfulness to individuals. According to the underlying theory, this concept enabled historians to imagine the parallel, cooperative, and interlocking nature of conformity with regime expectations and individually practiced detachment from system expectations as the norm of daily life under really existing socialism. The introduction to the 1999 project volume Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur contained a description of the concept underlying the various “studies of social history in the GDR” collected in the volume, which can be summarized here as follows: Eigen-Sinn designates the ability and the need of an individual in a relationship of domination to perceive and appropriate reality, as well as to act. The term thus points to the interpretive and meaning-producing effect of this ability of individuals. Accordingly, the term Eigen-Sinn includes potentially varied attitudes and behaviors. The spectrum of behaviors motivated by Eigen-Sinn is hence quite broad and self-contradictory. It ranges from the zeal of glowing idealists or the egoistic exploitation of the possibilities of active participation, to outwardly loyal but inwardly distant behaviors, to passive forms of noncompliance or open dissidence and resistance to the claims made by higher authorities. Eigen-Sinn enables the following distinction to be made. Systems of order, forced behaviors, and prohibitions—intended as such by those in authority and usually expressed ideologically—are one thing. The actual and specific meaning that individuals invest in them by virtue of their collaborating in these orders and behaviors is another, one that exists in parallel. Even though external appearances might initially suggest the congruence of ideological meaning and the individual attribution of meaning, they are not identical. A constant process of mediation is taking place between them, the result of which can never be final. Eigen-Sinn can indeed result in resistance to cooptation and attempted activation “from above” both in daily affairs and in high politics. But Eigen-Sinn can also be observed in the targeted use and resulting reproduction of conformist behaviors, because certain individuals might see a different—perhaps additional —“meaning” in them than that of official ideology.10   See identical formulations in earlier publications: Thomas Lindenberger, “Die Diktatur der Grenzen. Zur Einleitung,” in Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger (Cologne: Böhlau, 1999), 23f.; and in a revised version, Thomas Lindenberger, “SED-Herrschaft als soziale Praxis, Herrschaft und ‘Eigen-Sinn’: Problemstellung und Begriffe,” in Staatssicherheit und Gesellschaft: Studien zum Herrschaftsalltag in der DDR, ed. Jens Gieseke (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007), 32f.

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Translated into empirical terms, this means focusing on microhistorical reconstructions of day-to-day collusion and conflict, but also of alienation and dissent between party rule and the working people. Using archives and autobiographical narrative interviews, historians have shown how workers refunctioned the forced community of a “socialist work brigade” into decidedly “unpolitical” leisure activities; how individual farmers in Lower Lusatia bowed to forced collectivization of their lands in 1960 yet retained a say in the new agricultural cooperatives; how a village policeman in the Mark Brandenburg engaging in farming on the side conformed to his rural clientele so much that his superiors in the district capital seriously questioned his class reliability; how female poultry farmers and textile spinners working at large, state-owned enterprises mastered the multiple burden of shift work, plan fulfilment pressures, and childcare; but also how the editor at a nationwide satirical magazine subject to state censorship used literary-documentary facts and fiction to tackle the subject of notoriously shoddy work on prefab apartment blocks.11 The conceptual foundations and results of this project have added to the existing literature on Eigen-Sinn in other areas and given it a place in the historical literature on the GDR.12 Meanwhile, it is hard even to keep track—let alone offer an overall assessment—of the number of studies and dissertations that refer to this concept in their titles or introductions. An in-depth appreciation of this primarily German reception would go beyond the scope of this essay. Suffice it to say, the adoption of the Eigen-Sinn concept by the international scholarly community since Lüdtke’s publications of the 1980s has been a success in qualitative terms. A renewed French interest in the GDR as of 1990 with its critique-of-power perspective—presented in 1999 in French in a special issue of Annales13—led the way in adopting Lüdtke and Lindenberger’s concept. Studies   See the contributions of Thomas Reichel, Dagmar Langenhan, Thomas Lindenberger, Patrice Poutrus, Leonore Ansorg, and Sylvia Klötzer in Lindenberger, Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur. 12   In the German-language literature, see for instance Andreas Ludwig, Fortschritt, Norm und Eigensinn: Erkundungen im Alltag der DDR (Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 1999); Marc-Dietrich Ohse, Jugend nach dem Mauerbau: Anpassung, Protest und Eigensinn (DDR 1961–1974) (Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 2003); Sebastian Richter, Norm und Eigensinn: Die Selbstlegitimation politischen Protests in der DDR 1985–1989 (Berlin: Metropol 2007); Annegret Schüle, “Die Spinne”: Die Erfahrungsgeschichte weiblicher Industriearbeit im VEB Leipziger Baumwollspinnerei (Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2001); Hans Joachim Teichler, ed., Sport in der DDR: Eigensinn, Konflikte, Trends (Cologne: Sport und Buch Strauß, 2003); Margarete Meggle, “Zwischen Altbau und Platte: Erfahrungsgeschichte(n) vom Wohnen. Alltagskonstruktion in der Spätzeit der DDR, am Beispiel der sächsischen Kleinstadt Reichenbach im Vogtland” (PhD diss., Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, 2004). 13   “Histoire sociale de la RDA,” Annales: Histoire, Sciences Sociales 53, no. 1 (1998). 11

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on everyday life in state-owned enterprises,14 the state allocation of housing,15 the educational system,16 or on the inner life of the ruling state party, the SED,17 have shown that this praxeological approach at the microlevel is fruitful for socio-histoire du politique.18 In the extensive English-language literature on the GDR too the terms “domination as a social practice” and Eigen-Sinn have been frequently used and discussed in overviews.19 Independent elaborations of the concept worthy of particular note include Jan Palmowski’s study of the socialist Heimat culture of the GDR20 and Andrew Port’s discussion of the “dark sides” of Eigen-Sinn in East German working-class culture.21 Moreover, Eigen-Sinn is repeatedly mentioned in the forewords and introductory chapters of German and international publications; so much so, in fact, that citing the word EigenSinn has sometimes become a mere convention before going on to describe domination and daily life from a rather conventional perspective. This might also be attributed to its popularity in university teaching. It has not (yet?) really gained a foothold, though, in research on other communist dictatorships.

Eigen-Sinn and Sinnwelt The elements and logics of a given Sinnwelt might be reconstructed through close examination of widely distributed and consumed symbolic representations such as media, literature, philosophy, and ideology. This allows the scholar to identify the limits of the sayable and to explicate prepolitical and implicit pre-assumptions governing the Sinnwelt of a given society. In a similar vein, it is   Sandrine Kott, Le communisme au quotidien: Les entreprises d’État dans la société est-allemande (Paris: Belin, 2001); English translation: Sandrine Kott, Communism Day-to-Day: State Enterprises in East German Society (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2014). 15   Jay Rowell, Le totalitarisme au concret: les politiques du logement en RDA (Paris: Economica 2006). 16   Emmanuel Droit, Vers un homme nouveau? L’éducation socialiste en RDA (1949–1989) (Rennes: Presses univ. de Rennes, 2009); German translation: Emmanuel Droit, Vorwärts zum neuen Menschen? Die sozialistische Erziehung in der DDR (1949–1989), Zeithistorische Studien 54 (Cologne: Böhlau, 2014). 17   Michel Christian, Camarades ou apparatchiks? Les communistes en RDA et en Tchécoslovaquie (1945-1989) (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 2016). 18   Yves Déloye and Bernard Voutat, eds., Faire de la science politique: Pour une analyse socio-histoire du politique (Paris: Belin, 2002). 19   See Corey Ross, The East German Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives in the Interpretation of the GDR (London: Arnold, 2002). 20   Jan Palmowski, Inventing a Socialist Nation: Heimat and the Politics of Everyday Life in the GDR, 1945–1990 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009). 21   Andrew Port, “The Dark Side of Eigensinn: East German Workers and Destructive Shopfloor Practices,” in The East German Economy, 1945–2010: Falling Behind or Catching Up?, ed. Hartmut Berghoff and Uta Balbier (Washington, DC: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 111–28. 14

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possible to infer the parameters of the doxa (to use Bourdieu’s equivalent)22 of a society from the aggregate and anonymized effects of the behaviors of its members. This might lead us to inspect demographic data on reproduction, family systems, generational and sexual behavior, religious practice, spatial mobility, (un)healthy lifestyles, morbidity and mortality, suicide rates, and so forth. In both fields we can presuppose the effects of Eigen-Sinn as a factor of individual motivation, though without observing it itself. It is when deconstructing a past world of meaning on the micro-level of specific individuals that Eigen-Sinn acquires its salience: human beings making their choices, following their inner impulses, realizing their needs with regard to themselves and their relation to their environment, projecting their selves into the near and more remote future. In most cases they do so trying to live in harmony with the Sinnwelt “in power,” because it connects them to material and symbolic resources to make their living. This is why Eigen-Sinn per se is not to be considered as synonymous with resistance to the Sinnwelt; on the contrary. But the GDR in its final years provided a unique scenario in which tens of thousands of innocuous Eigen-Sinn-driven decisions crystallized into a social fact that spelled the fate of the GDR as a body politic dragging its Sinnwelt into the abyss as well. In a seminal study on GDR citizens applying for permanent emigration to West Germany, Renate Hürtgen has shown convincingly that in the provincial county of Halberstadt, most of these applicants at the start of their protracted (and often painful) fight with the authorities were motivated by a basically biographical decision: they simply wanted to change their life, looking for a new start, joining their relatives in the West, getting away from where they had grown up. They considered this a very personal and private choice, far removed from political considerations.23 It is only through the inevitable confrontation with the authorities, and the measures of discrimination and repression they had to face once they insisted on their wish to leave the country, that they eventually became outsiders with a more or less politicized cause. There is no doubt that the regime’s inability to contain this pressure of emigration during the 1980s also eroded the very Sinnwelt of the GDR in the view of all its citizens, including the vast majority who did not apply for emigration. This became obvious during the summer of 1989 when tens of thousands escaped via the open border between Hungary and Austria. Now the unrestricted right to travel (to the West) moved into the center of the conflict between the regime and the masses protesting in Dresden, Plauen, Leipzig, Berlin, and   See Cécile Deer, “Doxa,” in Pierre Bourdieu: Key Concepts, ed. Michael James Grenfell (London: Routledge, 2012), 114–25. 23   Renate Hürtgen, Ausreise per Antrag: Der lange Weg nach drüben; Eine Studie über Herrschaft und Alltag in der DDR-Provinz (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014). 22

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elsewhere. Without much ado, GDR citizens opted to become West Germans, leaving the socialist world of meaning and embracing the Western one, or what they took it to be.

The “stubbornness” of Eigen-Sinn A final remark—or warning—is in order about the epistemological quality of Eigen-Sinn as a concept for research. Eigen-Sinn does not contain a definition of a fixed object of study with specific characteristics which then can be verified by confronting it with empirical evidence. Strictly speaking, it is not a theory describing ideal types of behavior and needs and their sociocultural conditioning. It is a concept inspired by research techniques in social anthropology. Eigen-Sinn describes a reflective approach to observe the experiences and behaviors of concrete individuals. Understanding Eigen-Sinn as the result of a certain method of observation does have two consequences, however. First, establishing the existence of Eigen-Sinn in an empirical field of research is not the end, but only the beginning of explanation. Observing eigensinnig behaviors in certain protagonists is just the first step in the historian’s work, leaving many questions to ask. Which function does this Eigen-Sinn have in the specific configuration of individuals and institutions with respect to the maintenance or erosion of power, to the belief in the legitimacy of existing orders, to the coexistence of “higher” and “lower”? The concept itself does not provide the answer. It has therefore been particularly fruitful in combination with other concepts, especially those of social anthropology, such as the “hidden transcripts” of James Scott or Victor Turner’s performance theory.24 Jan Palmowski’s study of the emergence and transformation of a national identity in the GDR is one exemplary case. Second, the development of the concept described here, arising as it did in a very specific historical period and situation, means that transferring the concept to other areas of investigation and other research settings requires redefining the phenomena to be isolated and described by it. Hence, there will always be something provisional and cumbersome about the concept. Eigen-Sinn is the opposite of a universal key, and hardly a patent recipe for “solving” the riddles that remain after analyzing attitudes and behaviors. On the contrary, the discreet undermining of a priori definitions and terms, particularly the self-certainties of researchers that are manifest in them, is an essential part of this concept.   See James C. Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990); Victor Witter Turner, The Anthropology of Performance (New York: PAJ Publications, 1986).

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Eigen-Sinn always demands from those wanting to “work” with it the effort of a constant and independent—if not to say “stubborn”—reworking in terms of the concrete field of investigation and the historical protagonists involved. This is also to say that it is fundamentally applicable to every object of investigation that includes a social component. The fact that it was primarily developed to study the workers and “working people” in dictatorships in twentieth-century Germany is by no means an obstacle to its being applied to other classes, political systems, countries, or eras.25 And it is worth pointing out explicitly that even when it comes to reconstructing and understanding the behaviors and attitudes of individuals in democratic, constitutional polities, the concept of Eigen-Sinn opens up the possibility of developing new questions and sharpening our perception of the unknown.

  See the contributions in Belinda Davis, Thomas Lindenberger, and Michael Wildt, eds., Alltag, Erfahrung, Eigensinn: Historisch-anthropologische Erkundungen (Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 2008).

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Selected bibliography

Bastl, Beatrix. Tugend, Liebe, Ehre: Die adelige Frau in der Frühen Neuzeit. Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2000. Beattie, Andrew. Playing Politics with History: The Bundestag Inquiries into East Germany. New York: V&R unipress GmbH, 2008. Christian, Michel. Camarades ou apparatchiks? Les communistes en RDA et en Tchécoslovaquie (1945-1989). Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 2016. Davis, Belinda, Thomas Lindenberger, and Michael Wildt, eds. Alltag, Erfahrung, Eigensinn: Historisch-anthropologische Erkundungen. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 2008. Deer, Cécile. “Doxa.” In Pierre Bourdieu: Key Concepts, edited by Michael James Grenfell, 114–25. London: Routledge, 2012. Déloye, Yves, and Bernard Voutat, eds. Faire de la science politique: Pour une analyse sociohistoire du politique. Paris: Belin, 2002. Droit, Emmanuel. Vers un homme nouveau? L’éducation socialiste en RDA (1949–1989). Rennes: Presses univ. de Rennes, 2009. Dülmen, Richard van. Kultur und Alltag in der Frühen Neuzeit. Vol. 2, Dorf und Stadt, 16.–18. Jahrhundert. Munich: CH Beck Verlag, 2005. Eichhorn, Jaana. Geschichtswissenschaft zwischen Tradition und Innovation: Diskurse, Institutionen und Machtstrukturen der bundesdeutschen Frühneuzeitforschung. Göttingen: V&R unipress GmbH, 2006. Hürtgen, Renate. Ausreise per Antrag: Der lange Weg nach drüben; Eine Studie über Herrschaft und Alltag in der DDR-Provinz. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2014. Kott, Sandrine. Communism Day-to-Day: State Enterprises in East German Society. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2014. ———. Le communisme au quotidien: Les entreprises d’État dans la société est-allemande. Paris: Belin, 2001. Lindenberger, Thomas. “Die Diktatur der Grenzen: Zur Einleitung.” In Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger, 13–44. Cologne: Böhlau, 1999. ———. “Normalization between Experience, Expectation and Ostalgie: Observations on the East German Case.” In After Utopia: Czechoslovak Normalization Between Experiment and Experience, 1968–1989, Bad Wiesseer Tagungen des Collegium Carolinum 41, edited by Christiane Brenner, Michal Pullmann, and Anja Tippner, 17–36. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2022. ———. “Projektskizze: Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur; Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte in Berlin-Brandenburg, 1945–1990.” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, no. 5 (1995): 37–52. ———. “SED-Herrschaft als soziale Praxis, Herrschaft und ‘Eigen-Sinn’: Problemstellung und Begriffe.” In Staatssicherheit und Gesellschaft: Studien zum Herrschaftsalltag in der DDR, edited by Jens Gieseke, 23–47. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2007. Lüdtke, Alf. “Cash, Coffee-Breaks, Horseplay: Eigensinn and Politics among Factory Workers in Germany circa 1900.” In Confrontation, Class Consciousness, and the Labor Process: Studies in Proletarian Class Formation, edited by Michael Hanagan and Charles Stephenson, 65–95. New York: Praeger Pub Text, 1986. ———. Eigen-Sinn: Fabrikalltag, Arbeitererfahrungen und Politik vom Kaiserreich bis in den Faschismus. Münster: Westfälisches Dampfboot, 2015.

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Thomas Lindenberger

———. “Einleitung: Herrschaft als soziale Praxis.” In Herrschaft als soziale Praxis: Historische und sozial-anthropologische Studien, edited by Alf Lüdtke, 9–63. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1991. ———. “‘Helden der Arbeit’—Mühen beim Arbeiten: Zur missmutigen Loyalität von Industriearbeitern in der DDR.” In Sozialgeschichte der DDR, edited by Hartmut Kaelble, Jürgen Kocka, and Hartmut Zwahr, 188–216. Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1994. ———. “What Happened to the ‘Fiery Red Glow’? Workers’ Experiences and German Fascism.” In The History of Everyday Life: Reconstructing Historical Experiences and Ways of Life, edited by Alf Lüdtke, 198–251. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995. Ludwig, Andreas. Fortschritt, Norm und Eigensinn: Erkundungen im Alltag der DDR. Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 1999. Meggle, Margarete. “Zwischen Altbau und Platte: Erfahrungsgeschichte(n) vom Wohnen. Alltagskonstruktion in der Spätzeit der DDR, am Beispiel der sächsischen Kleinstadt Reichenbach im Vogtland.” PhD diss., Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, 2004. Meuschel, Sigrid. Legitimation und Parteiherrschaft: Zum Paradox von Stabilität und Revolution in der DDR 1945–1989. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1992. Ohse, Marc-Dietrich. Jugend nach dem Mauerbau: Anpassung, Protest und Eigensinn (DDR 1961–1974). Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 2003. Palmowski, Jan. Inventing a Socialist Nation: Heimat and the Politics of Everyday Life in the GDR, 1945–1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Piltz, Eric, and Gerd Schwerhoff. Gottlosigkeit und Eigensinn: Religiöse Devianz im konfessionellen Zeitalter. Duncker & Humblot: Berlin, 2015. Port, Andrew. “The Dark Side of Eigensinn: East German Workers and Destructive Shopfloor Practices.” In The East German Economy, 1945–2010: Falling Behind or Catching Up?, edited by Hartmut Berghoff and Uta Balbier, 111–28. Washington, DC: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Richter, Sebastian. Norm und Eigensinn: Die Selbstlegitimation politischen Protests in der DDR 1985–1989. Berlin: Metropol, 2007. Ross, Corey. The East German Dictatorship: Problems and Perspectives in the Interpretation of the GDR. London: Arnold, 2002. Rowell, Jay. Le totalitarisme au concret: les politiques du logement en RDA. Paris: Economica, 2006. ———. Vorwärts zum neuen Menschen? Die sozialistische Erziehung in der DDR (1949–1989). Zeithistorische Studien 54. Cologne: Böhlau, 2014. Schüle, Annegret. “Die Spinne”: Die Erfahrungsgeschichte weiblicher Industriearbeit im VEB Leipziger Baumwollspinnerei. Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2001. Scott, C. James. Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990. Teichler, Hans Joachim, ed. Sport in der DDR: Eigensinn, Konflikte, Trends. Cologne: Sport und Buch Strauß, 2003.

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PART TWO

AUTHORITIES AND DOMINATION

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CHAPTER THREE

Policeman Nicolae: The Story of One Man’s Life and Work in the Socialist Republic of Romania (1960–89) Ciprian Cirniala

The police and regime legitimization The present case study focuses on the professional life of a policeman (miliţian) in state-socialist Romania. Apart from serving as a historical source, this career biography allows us to introduce three central themes. First, this is a study about public security. This will be the framework of the following analysis, while providing a reference point to the significance it was accorded under state socialism and the intensity with which it was functionalized in the propaganda of that period. Second, it will reconstruct a critical sampling of working practices and representations of the day-to-day work of a socialist policeman. His personal perspective finds expression in the form of narrative interviews. These individual recollections will allow us to establish a tendency to construct his identity and establish a private discourse of memory. Third, the representations of a policeman gathered in this manner will be critically commented upon with respect to their power-legitimizing or delegitimizing character. The relationship between individual and political power in all of its variability is presented here as a snapshot and is ultimately an indicator of the cohesion—and, hence, the continued existence—of the state-socialist regime in Romania. As the three abovementioned themes suggest, the following analysis is located at the fertile interface between police history and the history of communism. Given the development of these respective specialist histories, both English-language and German sources played a role in the research underlying this case study. Some important authors worth mentioning here are Clive Emsley1 with his work predominantly focused on the English police force, as well 1

  See Clive Emsley and Haia Shpayer-Makov, Police Detectives in History, 1750–1950 (Farnham: Ashgate, 2006); Clive Emsley, The Great British Bobby: A History of British Policing from 1829 to the Present (London: Quercus Books, 2009); Emsley, Crime and Society in England 1750–1900 (Harlow: Longman, 2010); Emsley, Crime and Society in Twentieth-Century England (Harlow: Longman, 2011).

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as Thomas Lindenberger2 and Alf Lüdtke,3 all of whom have contributed to a theoretical and empirical understanding of police and power. This is the basis of the following case study, which will go into detail regarding its own object of investigation: the Romanian civilian police under socialism. An analysis of authors such as Florian Banu,4 Dumitru Ceacanica,5 Dumitru Lăcătuşu,6 and Florin Şinca7 facilitates the investigation of a topic that has been neglected in comparison with the numerous studies focused on the Romanian state security service, the “Securitate.” On the other hand, the unsystematic character of these studies—to the point of the topic’s invisibility in scholarship focusing on the last decades of the socialist regime—was the reason for this case study.   See Thomas Lindenberger, Straßenpolitik: Zur Sozialgeschichte der öffentlichen Ordnung in Berlin 1900 bis 1914 (Bonn: J. H. W. Dietz Nachfolger, 1995), 35–49; Lindenberger, “Die Diktatur der Grenzen: Zur Einleitung,” in Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 1999); Lindenberger, “From the chopped-off hand to the twisted foot: Citizenship and police violence in 20th century Germany,” in Citizenship and National Identity in Twentieth-Century Germany, ed. Geoff Eley and Jan Palmowski (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008), 108–28; Thomas Lindenbeger, Belinda Davies, and Michael Wildt, eds., Alltag, Erfahrung, Eigensinn: Historisch-anthropologische Erkundungen (Frankfurt/M: Campus Verlag, 2008); Thomas Lindenberger, “Vaters kleine Helfer: Die Volkspolizei und ihre enge Verbindung zur Bevölkerung 1952–1965,” in Nachkriegspolizei: Sicherheit und Ordnung in Ost- und Westdeutschland 1945– 1989, ed. Gerhard Fürmetz, Herbert Reinke, and Klaus Weinhauer (Hamburg: Ergebnisse Verlag, 2001), 229–53; Lindenberger, “Ruhe und Ordnung,” in Deutsche Erinnerungsorte, vol. 2, ed. Etienne François and Hagen Schulze (Munich: Verlag C. H. Beck, 2001), 469–84; Lindenberger, Herrschaftspraxis und öffentliche Ordnung im SED-Staat 1952–1968 (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 2003). 3   Alf Lüdtke, Eigen-Sinn: Fabrikalltag, Arbeitererfahrungen und Politik vom Kaiserreich bis in den Faschismus (Hamburg: Ergebnisse Verlag, 1993); Alf Lüdtke and Herbert Reinke, “Crime, Police and the ‘Good Order’: Germany,” in Crime History and the History of Crimes: Studies in the Historiography of Crime and Criminal Justice in Modern History, ed. Clive Emsley and Louis A. Knafla (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1996), 109–37; Alf Lüdtke, Herbert Reinke, and Michael Sturm, eds., Polizei, Gewalt und Staat im 20. Jahrhundert (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2011). 4   Florian Banu, “Miliţia din RPR şi ‘instaurarea dictaturii proletariatului’ 1949–1956,” Arhivele Totalitarismului, nos. 42–43 (2004): 77–94; Florian Banu and Liviu Ţăranu, “‘Securitatea’ şi Miliţia la frontiera cu Iugoslavia (1949),” in C.N.S.A.S., Arhivele Securităţii vol. 2 (Bucharest: Nemira, 2006), 287–315. 5   Dumitru Ceacanica, În serviciul legalităţii: Cazuistică şi studii de criminalistică (Bucharest: Serviciul Editorial si Cinematografic, 1979); Ceacanica, Însemnările unui criminalist (Bucharest: Editura Militară, 1980). 6   Dumitru Lăcătuşu, “People’s Police in the Popular Republic of Romania 1949–1960,” in Party  and State Structures during the Communist Regime, IICCMER Yearbook, vol. 3 (Iaşi: Polirom,  2008), 185–215. 7   Florin Şinca, Din istoria Poliţiei Române, vol. 1: Între onoare şi obedienţă (Bucharest: Tipografia RCR Print 2006); Florin Şinca, Din istoria Poliţiei Române, vol 2: În anul integrării europene Album istoric (Bucharest: Tipografia RCR Print 2007); Florin Şinca, Din istoria Poliţiei Române, vol. 3: Pregătind întregirea ţării (Bucharest: Tipografia RCR Print, 2009). 2

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Interviews with policemen Interviews with policemen are a common historical practice, but this relatively new type of source and method has only recently attracted the interest of historians working on state socialism.8 Whereas interviews must be treated critically with regard to structures and overarching processes, they are normally accorded an ancillary function in analyzing archival sources.9 Interviews with contemporary witnesses give us a grasp of day-to-day realities and are especially productive in combination with written sources. The issue at hand, in other words, is the phenomenological value of such interviews in historiographical analysis. It is not true for the Socialist Republic of Romania (RSR), or at least not for the approach taken here, that exhaustive, systematic, and accessible archival holdings have made it unnecessary for historians to work with problematic oral sources.10 Interviews with contemporary witnesses are essential. It is not a matter of using interviews to replace sources historians consider reliable; rather, the aim is to supplement these written sources, with archival material on the Romanian police being patchy at best. The arbitrary production of evaluation reports at the police and ministerial level in the RSR is one example of why these materials are not always reliable.11 A closer look at the daily life and practices of a socialist policeman does not always give the impression that the police were a “legitimizing agency.” Some policemen were not very motivated to constantly expand and improve their network of   Louise I. Shelley, Policing Soviet Society: The Evolution of State Control (New York: Routledge, 1996), 204; cf. Elizabeth Reuss-Ianni, Two Cultures of Policing: Street Cops and Management Cops (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1999); cf. Wesley G. Skogan et al., On the Beat: Police and Community Problem Solving (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1999). 9   Lutz Niethammer, “Zeroing in on Change: In Search of Popular Experience in the Industrial Province in the German Democratic Republic,” in The History of Everyday Life: Reconstructing Historical Experiences and Ways of Life, ed. Alf Lüdtke (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), 256, 252–311; cf. Ralph Jessen, “Historiographie als soziale Praxis,” talk delivered at the H-Soz-u-Kult review symposium “Versäumte Fragen: Deutsche Historiker im Schatten des Nationalsozialismus,” accessed April 20, 2020, http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/ Rezensio/symposiu/versfrag/jessen.htm; cf. Rüdiger Hohls and Konrad H. Jarausch, eds., Versäumte Fragen: Deutsche Historiker im Schatten des Nationalsozialismus (Munich: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 2000). 10   On the argument of exhaustive archive holdings, see Niethammer, “Zeroing in on Change,” 256; cf. Jessen, Historiographie als soziale Praxis. The present article advocates an intense and critical examination of “ego documents and personal testimonies.” While Romanian historians have certainly profited from the opening of archives, these materials are incomplete (due to willful destruction, losses, etc.) and collected in an unsystematic manner. 11   See Ciprian Cirniala, “Volkspolizei und Herrschaftslegitimierung im Sozialistischen Rumänien 1960–1989” (PhD diss., University of Potsdam, 2015), 108 (see “die Methode des Approximierens”); cf. Ciprian Cirniala, Ceaușescus Polizei: Herrschaft, Ruhe und Ordnung in Rumänien (1960–1989) (Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenburg, 2018). 8

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informers and preferred to make their own lists with fictitious short biographies of informers. Their cooperation with informers often developed into friendship or even complicity in crimes and corruption. Instead of checking their informer networks, policemen often wrote well-meaning reports in which cooperation was described in a positive way with a few token points of criticism. There were also high-ranking policemen who stepped down from their positions, refused to carry out orders, fled the country, teamed up with criminals, or were spied upon themselves in their private lives. Thus, instead of universal submission, the picture we get is of a discrepancy between clichéd notions of rule and reality: law enforcers often acted contrary to the law they symbolized. The following case study based on interviews with officer Nicolae shows that the police force of socialist Romania served not only to legitimize the regime, but also to delegitimize it.12 The interviews clearly illustrate the connection between the day-to-day work of a policeman and the legitimacy of rule. This essay also inquires into the continuity of rule when its legitimacy is eroded. Two aspects emerge from this perspective: first, the simultaneity of repression and spaces of willful, eigensinnig resistance; and second, the “aftereffects” of police practices in times of dwindling legitimacy. The biographical interviews underlying this study provide insight into the practical work of policeman Nicolae.13 The aim is to determine if and to what extent during his career the interviewee supported the new power structures or if he acted in a “delegitimizing” way, and whether or not he maintained his belief in the existing order until the end of his career. Apart from being an “archetypal narrative,” the interview presented here also has a practical function: making a contribution to the historicization of the socialist policeman.147 Interviews can relativize the general vilification of policemen or prevailing platitudes. They also allow the historian to critically examine his or her own research priorities. At the same time, the subjective perceptions and experiences expressed in the interview should not be confused with the “representation of the interiors of subjects or the exteriors of the social worlds they participate in.”15 Representations feed on the “world of meaning” (Sinnwelt)   Honoring his wish to remain anonymous, this contemporary witness will be referred to in this chapter as “Nicolae.” 13   Two lengthy interviews were conducted by the author on June 7, 2009, and February 5, 2010, outside the apartment building and inside the apartment of “Nicolae” in Bucharest. The digital recordings and the transcripts of them are in the possession of the author and have not been published to date. Subsequent interviews enabled some things to be verified and expanded upon. 14   Barbara Caine, Biography and History (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), 2. 15   See Mats Alvesson, Interpreting Interviews (London: Sage Publications, 2010), 41. In his criticism of neopositivist and romantic approaches to the interview, Alvesson argues from a localist perspective, even though he is also critical of localism when he tries to “save some version of a ‘tool’ view on interviews and also on using the interview as a site for exploring broader issues than merely talk in an interview situation.” 12

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of an individual; they are ultimately his aesthetic product, but they are not equivalent to his experience. In this respect, my approach follows the idea that interviews have a minimal but worthwhile historiographical content in the context of a “philosophically up-dated interpretive social science that favours a careful interpretation in which ambiguity and the impossibility of finding an ultimate truth or a best interpretation are acknowledged.”16 For this reason, my analysis of the interviews is limited to their essential features.

Policeman Nicolae (1924–) Nicolae was born in Bucharest on June 2, 1924. His mother, a housewife, died when he was five years old. His father was a post office clerk who took care of him and his three siblings. After completing elementary school, he went to the “King Carol” economic lyceum and then attended a two-year military school. After a year (1946–47) serving as a second lieutenant in the IX Guard Regiment near Bragadiru, he found a job with the criminal police in the capital city of Bucharest, in the dactyloscopic section of the technical-scientific department. At the same time, he completed a correspondence course at the Institute of Economic Studies and Planning (ISEP). From 1958 to 1965 he was head of the criminal investigation department at the eighth precinct on Dudeşti Street, then he worked in criminal investigation at the general headquarters of the RSR police (1965–68), and was finally promoted to head of the criminal investigation department on Cazărmii Street (1968–74). He retired in 1974, though he continued to work a further three years with the economic police. From 1977 on, his two daughters became the focus of his life. The career path of policeman Nicolae is, in many respects, typical for a career officer of his generation, though it also exhibits a number of details that make it particularly interesting to historians. Nicolai was allowed to study economics but was refused Party membership.17 His biography and his Bucharest origins allowed him contact with influential people whose support he enjoyed. His career ascent was slow but steady. He worked with famous criminologists such as Dumitru Ceacanica and—less typical of a policeman’s biography—wrote a “letter against Ceauşescu.” Two instances in Nicolae’s life are worth noting before addressing the actual interviews. The first, a “turkey incident,” illustrates the practice of establishing peace and order, not so much through rules and reason as through spontaneous actions, feelings, and false pretenses. The second is Nicolae’s speaking out against the economic woes of his country in 1976 and his   Ibid., 40. I have applied his ideas to historiography here.

16

  Nicolae did not explain during the interviews why he was not allowed to join the PCR. Possible

17

reasons included his father’s work as a civil servant and his above-average education.

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placing the blame on Ceauşescu. His “letter against Ceauşescu” reveals a clear break in Nicolae’s loyalty to the regime he served. From that point on, his conduct as a policeman can no longer be described as legitimizing.

The turkey incident This incident involved a retired army general and a missing turkey. The case remained unsolved. Despite its burlesque dimension, the incident typifies the working methods of a socialist policeman. The latter “found” the supposedly stolen turkey at the Vitan market in Bucharest and confiscated the bird from a Roma. This turkey was white, however, whereas the one the general had lost was black. This display of solidarity toward an old, disgruntled general is a sui generis form of being “citizen-oriented.” In the formative decades of socialist Romania’s police force after its founding in 1949, such quick-fix answers to harmless problems were an important way for the socialist police to legitimize the new order. The theft of gas cylinders was often “handled” in a similar manner. Whether gas cylinders, turkeys, or dogs, anything could serve as an opportunity for a policeman to rectify the day-to-day affairs of a citizen. But it was exactly cases like this one with the black turkey—where everything was right except the color—that were inimical to restoring the balance of day-to-day life as a means to legitimizing power. The turkey incident ended as follows. The general turned down the bird that did not belong to him and it was given to a neighborhood family instead. The Roma was left without a turkey and thus became a victim of an abuse of police power, in a case indicative of how frequently policemen on patrol behaved in a haphazard manner. One might come away with the impression that the strategy of the police in the RSR was a contradictory one. In reality, the evidence in the years leading up to 1989 shows no discernible strategy at all. Such instances of a failed “citizen-oriented” approach illustrate that legitimation is a dynamic process marked by discontinuities and one that collides with police subjectivity (for instance, poor decision-making while on patrol). The next example serves to confirm this.

A letter against Ceauşescu Nicolae experienced the extent of spying in socialist Romania firsthand when he wrote a “letter against Ceauşescu” in 1976. He was reluctant to bring up the incident during the interviews. A Roma had pushed him on the stairs of the subway that day, causing Nicolae to fall and hurt himself. He was feeling tired that day anyway and was sick of looking for food in stores with empty shelves.

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Maybe he was feeling disappointed because he had had to give up his work with the economic police on account of his failing eyesight. At any rate, it was from this sense of frustration that he had written a letter calling for a change of leadership in the Romanian Communist Party (PCR). The letter was addressed to his former professor who held the position of foreign minister. The minister, Nicolae suggested in his letter, should take the reins from Ceauşescu. Securitate officers used graphological analysis to uncover the letter’s author. Nicolae was summoned to the office of the Securitate, on the sixth floor of the main police station in the capital. The Securitate officers had paid him a visit at home first, explaining the facts of the case in front of his crying daughter, whom they told in an intimidating tone: “Well, young lady, your father has made a mistake this time, but he won’t be doing it again.” According to Nicolae, the Securitate showed understanding for his situation and did not launch an investigation: he was an older, respectful man, and was thought only to be embittered as a result of his fall at the subway station. Nicolae had to sign a paper saying that he would refrain from writing such letters in the future, which were punishable by five years in prison. Nonetheless, his summoning to the Securitate office gave him quite a scare. He went to church with his daughter afterwards and paid the priest for a prayer, thanking God that he had managed to get off so lightly. “I took Diana along and we went to church . . . and the priest said a prayer for us. We prayed that something like this never happened to me again in my lifetime.” This glimpse on Nicolae’s religiosity is a furtive but meaningful note to the series of discrepancies along the divide between official policies and private lives. Like many other institutions of the bourgeois regime, the Church was not only physically cut out from the public landscape to a large extent, but also reformed as an undercover infrastructure for retrieving intelligence information. Nicolae’s behavior displays a mixture of political activism, dissatisfaction about the scarcity of goods, and psychological depression, combined with a latent frustration over his professional life. The disenchantment of this socialist policeman at the end of his career was similar to that shared by many Romanian citizens who were increasingly disaffected with living conditions in the late 1970s and early 1980s; indeed, other Romanian policemen are known to have reacted in a similar way.18 Upon retiring in 1976, Nicolae devoted himself to his domestic life. Only then did he have a genuine sense of freedom, tending to his role as a father and taking his annual family vacation in the socialist ideal of the Romanian countryside. The young retiree Nicolae watched his two pretty daughters grow up, and evidently enjoyed being a model father.19   See Cirniala, “Volkspolizei und Herrschaftslegitimierung.”   Nicolae consistently avoided talking about his wife during the interviews, whether out of a need for privacy and his fear of publicizing untoward details concerning his image as a socialist policeman

18 19

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In lieu of an exhaustive presentation of the many details of Nicolae’s professional life, the following section will offer a thematic analysis of his interview narrative. This is appropriate inasmuch as we are not really interested in recreating the life of a policeman, but in his own “reconstruction of the police force” as a representation in the course of the narrative. The manner of telling, the recurrence of certain topoi, including those with a temporal dimension, yield a comprehensive overall picture of representations of peace, order, and security from the perspective of a former socialist policeman. The dynamics of Nicolae’s narrative reveal elements of regime legitimation: their production, consolidation, or gradual disintegration in daily life and professional practice.

Themes and structures of Nicolae’s narrative The topics that Nicolae directly addresses can be put into three categories: his profession in general, his practical work more specifically, and his private life. The category of profession includes the practical work of a policeman, his professionality and positive role, as well as working relationships and promotions. The practical work of a policeman includes topics such as crime, investigation procedures, conduct toward criminals and spies, as well as examples of famous criminal cases and even the police uniform. Finally, the third category, his private life, includes topics such as family, leisure time, and the desire for recognition both before and after 1989. The “positive role of the policeman” is clearly evident in all three areas. It becomes the argumentative leitmotif of his narrative, mixed with Nicolae’s need for recognition and his concern about his image. His constant references to “the bad, but also the good things” the police force “did” emphasize his willingness to find the middle ground in his assessment of the institution, while expressing his firm belief in the force even decades after the fact. Aforementioned themes such as family, profession, and career or family stability are not addressed directly but become discernible through intertextual reading. Nicolae also speaks of paternal and conjugal love. Health, religious beliefs, and friendship are likewise topics he touches upon in the area of his private life. Coping with difficult situations thanks to his adaptability, the tough life of a cop in general, and speculations on death—that of former colleagues as well as his own—are always accompanied in Nicolae’s narrative by a recurrent sense of optimism. His gratitude to the force, his general satisfaction, and his sense of freedom also figure prominently in his narrative. or a lazy habit from his professional life. A separate interview with his wife did not succeed in filling any gaps. See interview with C., Nicolae’s wife, of February 5, 2010. The recording and the transcript are in the possession of the author and have not been published to date.

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The most remarkable thing in these interviews, however, is the constant emphasis on love, family, and liberty. The question of course arises as to what extent these ideas are merely narrative by-products, and if not, whether they influenced the actual behavior of policeman Nicolae. It is certainly hard to view Nicolae as dependent on professional structures at the same time as being a free individual. The example of his being spied on, however, shows that the boundaries are often fuzzy between these two conditions. Private life in the RSR was severely restricted by widespread public surveillance; at the same time, however, public spaces could acquire a “private” dimension through the corruptability of a policeman, in connection with a “cop culture.” Hence, public contexts such as traffic checks could easily shift to a more personal mode of understanding and the circumventing of rules. In such moments the traffic policeman would reach a compromise with the driver of the vehicle. Each act of corruption by a policeman was a limited temporal or spatial nullification of the public order. In a similar vein, “cop culture” and the concomitant mutual support among policemen resulted in their withdrawal from the “public eye.” Such contradictions can also be inferred from the self-presentation of policeman Nicolae. They embed his narrative in a discourse of ambiguity, which in turn exacerbates the interpretation of his statements. One way of tackling this problem is to focus on recurrent motifs in Nicolae’s narrative. The following analysis thus reveals how concepts such as “time” and “space” structure the interview.

From spatial references in biographies to a topography of criminality Unsurprisingly, the geographical structure of a policeman’s life is firmly linked to his work. In Nicolae’s narrative, it is manifest as a labyrinth of crime scenes, topographies of criminal acts and their reconstruction. These places are associated with the narrator’s memories and emotions. A certain place, for example, reminds Nicolae of the leadership role he exercised at that time; a Bucharest neighborhood is the scene of a gruesome crime; streets and vegetable markets come to life in his memory and conjure up a certain atmosphere. He does not always indicate the exact places but localizes them through the topography of an investigation: “The thieves went around to the back of the apartment block.” Nicolae describes the places of his routine work in connection with his working practices: “We were in the main auditorium and the thief was on stage, his face illuminated by a bright light.” In another instance, his being laid off provides an opportunity to describe the office. While the reconstruction of a case usually includes some indication of where it took place, the narrator is generally sparing with topographic details, the actions themselves being valued more than the place, which merely serves as

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an aid to understanding what happened. Actions can serve as the framework of a story, so that a detailed description of the scene of the crime is rarely deemed necessary; a mere reference often suffices, pointing out, for example, where the body was found. The geographical widening of investigations due to the spread of criminality on Romanian territory allows new spaces to emerge in the narrative. Thus, investigations take place not only in the police station courtyard but occasionally on the Black Sea coast and in other unknown places in the provinces. Some investigations lead the narrator all the way to Târgu-Neamţ in the northern part of the country. But the hotels, especially the big hotels in Bucharest, remain important contact points where top politicians, Securitate men and police officers, spies, prostitutes, and bişniţari meet.20 The hierarchy between politicians, Securitate men, and police officers is not always respected. His work could even follow him home, to the apartment building he lived in. People know he is a policeman, and they respect him or identify him with the secret police, the Securitate. Factories, butcher shops, meat factories, wine cellars, and grocery stores played an important role in maintaining the standard of living of many policemen. A stroll outside a store was often all it took for the director or boss to invite a policeman in and shower him with gifts. Other places he mentions are the subway, a Securitate office, well-known streets and neighborhoods, as well as a moving vehicle in which the narrator sits with Gogu, the brother of Elena Ceauşescu. Churches are not only the scene of crimes or places of police surveillance but also refuges for Nicolae. He went to one with his daughter, as mentioned above. Restaurants and beer gardens are usually mentioned in relation to scandals, while cafeterias are reminders of cheap meals, company dinners, concerts, as well as evenings with informer friends. Famous markets such as the Vitan or Unirii are mentioned as the preferred haunts of pickpockets. Finally, factories and flea markets are not only scenes of crimes but also important recruiting grounds for new informers. Recreational areas only featured prominently after Nicolae’s retirement; he goes for walks with his daughters and other children in the field next to the apartment building, he participates in parent-teacher conferences at school, and above all he takes vacations. He is very enthusiastic about his vacations, and describes the places he visits, usually the mountains, with a great deal of emotion. The joys and liberties he felt upon retiring are mingled now with the present need for atonement and satisfaction. Only his memories of childhood are comparable in intensity to those of his vacation spots.   Bişniţari (Romanian slang) is derived from the English word “business” and refers to the rather heterogeneous and ever-changing category of speculators, especially to black-marketeers before and after 1989, but also retailers dealing in illegal goods. The noun referring to the corresponding activity is bişniţă.

20

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Time and family There are several time planes in Nicolae’s narrative. They are usually ordered in binomials—childhood and school, career and retirement, wartime and the postwar era, monarchy and communism, police and communist police, workweek and weekend—that repeat themselves, overlap, or complement each other. But the two most important phases in his life are his career and his retirement. Nicolae strongly identifies the latter period with his two daughters, with whom he could finally spend more time now that he no longer had to work. Freedom plays an important role in Nicolae’s understanding of time. He always perceives time as something two-dimensional, as work and leisure. Work had become a burden to him because of constant control and surveillance, and it was only retirement that gave him more freedom. Impressively, freedom for Nicolae is the most important frame of reference in terms of both time and space: the more private they are, the more significant a place and a given moment. Places of work were not only memorable to him because of a promotion he received there, but because the promotion was an important step on the path to “freedom,” that is, his life after retirement. In a similar way, Nicolae uses the ages of his daughters—“when Diana was thirteen and Mirela eleven”—to recall a certain point in his career. In essence, he uses aspects of his private life to structure the narrative of his career. When his narrative touches on the network of informers, it is clear how both aspects of Nicolae, the professional and the private, complement each other. His dinners at a restaurant with Guţă and Călaie, his two favorite informers, are a combination of business and pleasure. These meetings also reinforce the cooperation between colleagues and are a subsequent guarantee of mutual assistance in the private sphere. The private and professional are also intertwined when Nicolae mentions his profession at the butcher’s or confronts an insolent patron at a restaurant who makes fun of his wife’s style of dressing. Nicolae is certain of his power as a policeman and acts accordingly in public.

Awareness of his power and concern about his reputation Nicolae’s sense of power as a policeman was quite pronounced and often found expression in the interviews. He frequently referred to the famed criminologist Ceacanica, mentioned his various leadership positions, identified himself in synecdochic fashion with the entire criminal police (“me, the criminal police . . .”) or proudly mentioned his uniform and the gifts he received from the butcher and others because he was a policeman. At the same time, he distanced himself from the Securitate and emphasized his close ties to the people as a civilian policeman.

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His being citizen-oriented was part of his workaday routine. This explains the concern for his reputation and his integrity as a policeman, characteristics which remain important to him today. The constant emphasis on his “helpful attitude” toward fellow citizens indicates the pervasiveness of this official idea as well as, presumably, its lack of substance. Relying on the memories of a former policeman born in 1924 requires a number of precautionary measures. The narrator has the “advantage” over the historian that he can simply leave out certain memories (either intentionally or because of the forgetfulness of old age) and is able to control the narrative at all times, while the historian is bound to the rules of the qualitative interview giving him very little room for maneuver. The scholar must therefore avoid the epistemological pitfall of taking the policeman’s narrative at face value.21 The oral history method and its guidelines for conducting qualitative interviews are helpful in deciphering latent meanings in a narrative.22 A number of these aspects are briefly elucidated below. Subjective memories are marked by fallibility, selectivity, imprecision, and generalizations.23 Hence Nicolae’s narrative is uncertain semantic terrain upon which the historian must tread with caution. He should also not be fooled by the narrator’s cheerful and conciliatory attitude regarding his past frustrations. Nor must he forget that Nicolae worked in a ministry in which internal regulations on guarding official secrets, as well as an unwritten code of solidarity and slogans from political education, informed the daily life and conduct of a policeman. Nicolae also took part in many official police events after 1989, and his experiences with journalists—or at least his having internalized the new mass media’s way of portraying the old socialist police force—were clearly evident in his manner of speech. For the same reason, it is fair to assume that his “childlike delight” in being interviewed was at least in part a practiced gesture. It is important here to give Nicolae’s narrative an intertextual reading, especially in those instances where repetitions, emphases, or contradictions point to a “dramaturgical” break in the narrative. The narrative coherence of the interviews as well as comparisons with other interviews and published articles were helpful here. A brief interview with C., Nicolae’s wife, was also taken into account.24   This naïve approach is often found among beginners who are fixated on the authenticity of a narrative and lack the experience of evaluating such personal testimonies. See Carl Rollyson, “Biography Theory and Method: The Case of Samuel Johnson,” Biography 25, no. 2 (2002): 363–68. 22   Niethammer, “Zeroing in on Change,” 266. 23   Donald A. Ritchie, Doing Oral History: A Practical Guide (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003), 30. 24   Interview with C., Nicolae’s wife, February 5, 2010. The recording and the transcript are in the possession of the author and have not been published to date. The interview merely served to provide some additional perspective. 21

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Nicolae did not choose his military or police career from a sense of vocation. Compared to his colleagues, he received an above-average education at the military school and the ISEP. This would have secured him a better career if he had been allowed to become a Party member. Several times Nicolae mentioned that Party membership was the ticket to career advancement. This would suggest why he was dissatisfied as a young officer, as well as explaining his sense of resignation later in his career. His career path shows that Nicolae endeavored to be promoted, which he only managed indirectly. Being appointed director of the Office for Arms, Technology and Radio (AGT) by a former classmate, he found the working environment oppressive and gave up the position a few months later with the help of the same contact. During the interviews Nicolae also repeatedly talked about the atmosphere in the criminal investigation department. He rarely had to wear his uniform—for parades, exercises, or special operations—and was therefore less inclined to intervene if the situation called for it. Even when trying to downplay his dereliction of duty during police operations in Constanța, he frequently talks about the difficulties of being a criminal investigator. The notion of the police as an aid-giving organization in the service of the people is ever-present. He often says things like, “We created the conditions to keep things from being stolen” or “in order for us to create the best possible conditions for the population.” This kind of argument seems deeply embedded in his memories. But it tends to point to a gulf between the needs of citizens and the conduct of policemen. If police conduct went against the law or the expectations of citizens, an apt slogan could always be found to justify the situation. Most of these slogans referred to the “people” or the “population” as a source of legitimacy. Nicolae indicated that dealing with criminals in a welfare dictatorship was not done “for the sake of human beings” but because the law and the corresponding directives from the ministry demanded it.25 However, articles in Pentru Patrie—a magazine published by the Ministry of Interior since 1949 with the goal of promoting the public image of the army, the Securitate, and the police— presented a different discourse. According to this magazine, the police always had the happiness of individuals in mind, including the reeducation of former criminals at the workplace. Nicolae mentioned numerous persons who were satisfied with the work of the police and thanked them for it. Of course, this is possible in purely theoretical terms, but the routine falsification or circumvention of work reports, files, and complaints talked about in another interview   Nicolae is referring here to Law 25/1976 “regarding the meaningful employment of able-bodied individuals,” BORSR 98/11, November 1976. See Ciprian Cirniala, Interview, June 7, 2009.

25

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would suggest a different degree of popular satisfaction.26 Added to this is the fact that the quality control of police reports was an almost impossible task. Keeping corruption under control was difficult with a “see-no-evil cop culture.”27 Even Nicolae himself declared on multiple occasions that not spoiling relations with others (“a lasa loc de bună ziua”) was more important than control. A 1970 article in Pentru Patrie illustrates such a case. The article describes a boy who complains about the delayed investigation into the death of his father when the latter is killed by a village policeman.28 Though the article endeavors to show that the boy’s position is untenable given the efforts of the police to shed light on the case, the author does not entirely succeed in covering up police misconduct. Conversations with Nicolae suggest that the “assistance offered” to pickpockets or relapsed criminals had a highly motivating effect. Thus, Nicolae was able to help a young worker from the “Anticoroziv” factory get a job at the “Stăruinţa” factory, hushing up the theft he had committed at his former workplace in order to recruit him as a spy. Years later the worker paid him a visit at his office and thanked him for his support. The police force was concerned about the welfare of its employees, organizing festive dinners and parties with live music and prizes. The latter, like promotions in general, were coupled with membership in the PCR. Further employee benefits included paid vacations (often for the whole family in the case of cadre members), free use of public transportation, clothing, and shoes. Compensation for occupational hazards was also included, such as early retirement (an additional six months of “work experience” was added to each year of employment as a policeman). There were also informal benefits: each policeman had “connections” in the economy and carried considerable weight, at least in his own precinct. Nicolae and his wife were invited to lavish dinners at restaurants by certain informers in his network. Based on the interviews with Nicolae, the culture of the Romanian people’s police can be summarized as follows for the years 1948 to 1977. Personal connections played an inflated role among police colleagues; there was an asymmetric relationship between urban areas and the countryside; and officers of the law were extremely proud of their uniform, using it and their status to secure material benefits. Early in their careers, many policemen believed in their role as saviors of society but deviated from this ideal when they were on patrol and   See the interview with former policeman Grigore Dominte of March 3, 2009, transcript in possession of the author. Cf. Grigore Dominte, “În faţa destinului: De la Dachau la Erfurt, director la corecţie şi apoi ofiţer de poliţie” (Târgoviṣte: Marcona, 2008). 27   Eric Pooley, “Why Rudy Can’t Cop Out,” New York Magazine 27, no. 30 (August 1, 1994), 14. 28   Ion Dinu, “Reporterul a călătorit pentru liniştea unui tînăr,” Pentru Patrie, no. 5 (1970), 8–9. 26

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often neglected to follow up on cases.29 Violence and blackmail, human rights violations, and torture-like practices seemed to have been a part of day-to-day police work.30 Beating people up (if they were not too brawny or armed, in which case policemen were much more timid) and abstaining from policing “friends” were also common practice. Subordination to the Securitate, the use of the latter’s working methods when recruiting informers and working with them, and collaboration with the Securitate were all part of cop culture under socialism. That policemen often used their identity to enjoy certain privileges shows how easy this was for them, but also how well this informal role and behavior were acknowledged by the population. Upon closer inspection it is apparent that the popularity and sympathy Nicolae enjoyed were due to his being an approachable officer with a shared interest and not to the “power” vested in his role as a policeman. When a grocer offered him something “under the counter,” he did so in the hope that Nicolae would turn a blind eye to other misdemeanors in return.31 This shows that it was common knowledge that socialist policemen were amenable to corruption. In his memoir Confesiunile unui cafegiu (Confessions of a Coffee Maker), Gheorghe Florescu shows that many policemen who came to his business engaged in such abuses of power. The subservience of policemen to the Securitate or high-ranking politicians and their protégés is understandable given the lack of formal alternatives. Fear of the Securitate is exemplified by Nicolae’s behavior when his “letter against Ceauşescu” comes to light. His behavior and the content of the letter are understandable in the context of a “rough day,” but his frequent references to the lack of freedom in the country are an indication of professional and political fatigue. On the one hand, Nicolae appears to be upbeat. Brotherly love and optimism are the prevailing themes of his memories about working with his former colleagues. On the other hand, the feeling of being constantly watched led to an aversion to police work. As a policeman in socialist Romania, Nicolae was called upon to believe in and defend the existing order. He did this prior to 1976 and afterwards as well, when he rapidly conformed to the new situation following his confrontation with the Securitate. But a careful look at his overall career reveals that his behaviors were more complex. His conduct was nuanced, and his everyday activities were marked not only by a belief in the existing order but also by the conviction that humanity is more important than formal correctness, more important than efficient government. His letter to Ceauşescu in 1976— but also his rapid retreat back into line and adopting the role of “upstanding   Dominte, in Cirniala, Interview, March 3, 2009.   Nicolae mentioned a Roma whom a colleague had forced to do squats, even though he had a wooden leg. See Cirniala, Interview, June 7, 2009. 31   Most store owners put aside a share of their goods for their own private distribution network. 29 30

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citizen”—are characteristic of the general mood in large parts of the population. This mood in turn explains the tremendous loss of legitimacy suffered by the PCR.

Conclusion The answer to the opening questions on the significance of police practices as representations of state rule can be formulated as follows. Nicolae’s behaviors, in particular his letter of 1976, are a break with his belief in the existing order he was supposed to protect as a police officer. In general, the practices of the socialist police give the impression that the loyalty of some of his colleagues began to wane even earlier than his, if it ever really existed in the first place. All the same, the behavior of policeman Nicolae cannot simply be categorized as legitimizing or delegitimizing. Conformity and resistance coexisted in him until the very end. Even his letter of 1976, intended as a clear signal of his opposition to the existing order, was followed by immediate blackmail, threats, and ultimately by his reintegration into “normality.” That said, the socialist police force had generally lost its credibility in the eyes of the people due to its incriminating ties to the Securitate. Nicolae must have felt this too, even though he frequently mentions people who were grateful for the assistance he provided them. There are thus multiple levels of delegitimization: an individual level, evident in Nicolae’s behavior; a second, subordinate one arising from police practices in general and reflected in internal statistics from the Ministry of the Interior or in the collective perceptions of citizens; and a third one proceeding from Nicolae’s observations about his colleagues. The example of Nicolae offers insight into a “state apparatus” that was all too familiar on the surface to most people but essentially remained anonymous to them. The “aesthetic laboratory” of individual experience, the “world of meaning” of policeman Nicolae referred to above, shows that even after 1976, when “gradual regime decay” had long since become apparent, the police force was used as an effective means of regime legitimization. The emphasis on “gradual” illustrates that regime legitimacy and the loss of legitimacy were not necessarily opposites, but rather comprised two sides of the same coin in the Socialist Republic of Romania.

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Selected bibliography

Alvesson, Mats. Interpreting Interviews. London: Sage Publications, 2010. Banu, Florian and Liviu Ţăranu. “‘Securitatea’ şi Miliţia la frontiera cu Iugoslavia (1949).” In C.N.S.A.S., Arhivele Securităţii, vol. 2, 287–315. Bucureşti: Nemira, 2006. Caine, Barbara. Biography and History. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. Cirniala, Ciprian. Ceaușescus Polizei: Herrschaft, Ruhe und Ordnung in Rumänien (1960– 1989). Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenburg, 2018. Emsley, Clive. Crime and Society in England 1750–1900. Harlow: Longman, 2010. ———. Crime and Society in Twentieth-Century England. Harlow: Longman, 2011. ———. The Great British Bobby: A History of British Policing from 1829 to the Present. London: Quercus Books, 2009. Emsley, Clive, and Haia Shpayer-Makov. Police Detectives in History, 1750–1950. Farnham: Ashgate, 2006. Hohls, Rüdiger, and Konrad H. Jarausch, eds. Versäumte Fragen: Deutsche Historiker im Schatten des Nationalsozialismus. Munich: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 2000. Lăcătuşu, Dumitru. “People’s Police in the Popular Republic of Romania 1949–1960.” In  Party  and  State Structures  during the  Communist Regime,  IICCMER  Yearbook, vol. 3, 185–215. Iaşi: Polirom, 2008. Lindenberger, Thomas. “Die Diktatur der Grenzen: Zur Einleitung.” In Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger, 13–44. Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 1999. ———. “From the chopped-off hand to the twisted foot: Citizenship and police violence in 20th century Germany.” In Citizenship and National Identity in Twentieth-Century Germany, ed. Geoff Eley and Jan Palmowski, 108–28. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2008. ———. Herrschaftspraxis und öffentliche Ordnung im SED-Staat 1952–1968. Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 2003. ———. “Ruhe und Ordnung.” In Deutsche Erinnerungsorte, vol. 2, ed. Etienne François and Hagen Schulze, 469–84. Munich: Verlag C. H. Beck, 2001. ———. Straßenpolitik: Zur Sozialgeschichte der öffentlichen Ordnung in Berlin 1900 bis 1914. Bonn: J. H. W. Dietz Nachfolger, 1995. ———. “Vaters kleine Helfer: Die Volkspolizei und ihre enge Verbindung zur Bevölkerung 1952–1965.” In Nachkriegspolizei: Sicherheit und Ordnung in Ost- und Westdeutschland 1945–1989, ed. Gerhard Fürmetz, Herbert Reinke, and Klaus Weinhauer, 229–53. Hamburg: Ergebnisse Verlag, 2001. Lindenbeger, Thomas, Belinda Davies, and Michael Wildt, eds. Alltag, Erfahrung, Eigensinn: Historisch-anthropologische Erkundungen. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 2008. Lüdtke, Alf. Eigen-Sinn: Fabrikalltag, Arbeitererfahrungen und Politik vom Kaiserreich bis in den Faschismus. Hamburg: Ergebnisse Verlag, 1993. Lüdtke, Alf, and Herbert Reinke. “Crime, Police and the ‘Good Order’: Germany.” In Crime History and the History of Crimes: Studies in the Historiography of Crime and Criminal Justice in Modern History, ed. Clive Emsley and Louis A. Knafla, 109–37. Westport: Greenwood Press, 1996. Lüdtke, Alf, Herbert Reinke, and Michael Sturm, eds. Polizei, Gewalt und Staat im 20. Jahrhundert. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag, 2011. Niethammer, Lutz. “Zeroing in on Change: In Search of Popular Experience in the In-

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dustrial Province in the German Democratic Republic.” In The History of Everyday Life: Reconstructing Historical Experiences and Ways of Life, ed. Alf Lüdtke, 252–311. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995. Reuss-Ianni, Elizabeth. Two Cultures of Policing: Street Cops and Management Cops. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books, 1999. Ritchie, A. Donald. Doing Oral History: A Practical Guide. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Rollyson, Carl. “Biography Theory and Method: The Case of Samuel Johnson.” Biography 25, no. 2 (2002): 363–68. Shelley, I. Louise. Policing Soviet Society: The Evolution of State Control. New York: Routledge, 1996. Şinca, Florin. Din istoria Poliţiei Române. Vol. 1, Între onoare şi obedienţă. Bucharest: Tipografia RCR Print, 2006. ———. Din istoria Poliţiei Române. Vol. 2, În anul integrării europene Album istoric. Bucharest: Tipografia RCR Print, 2007. ———. Din istoria Poliţiei Române. Vol. 3, Pregătind întregirea ţării. Bucharest: Tipografia RCR Print, 2009. Skogan, G. Wesley, Susan M. Hartnett, Jennifer T. Comey, Jill Dubois, and Marianne Kaiser. On the Beat: Police and Community Problem Solving. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1999.

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CHAPTER FOUR

The East German Reporting System: Normality and Legitimacy Through Bureaucracy Hedwig Richter

New findings—whether supposed or real—about the State Security are a regular source of commotion in GDR studies and among the general public. Ilko-Sascha Kowalczuk recently corrected the number of unofficial informers (Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter, IM) who offered leads and delivered reports to the Ministry for State Security (MfS) with its 90,000 full-time employees:1 it was not 200,000, the generally accepted figure among scholars, after all, but only 110,000, he asserted. In no time the uneasy question resurfaced: who was among the ominous IMs; who is contaminated by having been a collaborator? My essay makes the case for abandoning the narrow focus on the MfS and taking a wider view to include the structures that dominated people’s daily life in the workers’ and peasants’ state. These structures produced a daily flow of information that was not directly linked to State Security. In public authorities and political parties, in associations, universities, and cultural institutions, East German citizens wrote thousands of daily reports. It is my hypothesis that this form of surveillance permeated everyday life in the GDR with an inconspicuous power. Viewed as a legitimate bureaucratic practice by citizens, it was therefore all the more productive and effective.2 The willingness of a majority of citizens to write these reports, as well as the subtle pressure exerted by this ever-present, humdrum bureaucratic surveillance apparatus, bear eloquent testimony to the interplay of “consent and coercion,”3 both of which are indispensable for a dictatorship to work.   See Ilko-Sascha Kowalczuk, Stasi konkret: Überwachung und Repression in der DDR (Munich: Beck Verlag, 2013); Helmut Müller-Enbergs, IM Statistik 1985–1989 (Berlin: Der Bundesbeauftragte für die Unterlagen des Staatssicherheitsdienstes der ehemaligen Deutschen Demokratischen Republik, Abteilung Bildung und Forschung, 1993); Helmut MüllerEnbergs, Die inoffiziellen Mitarbeiter (Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 2008), 35–38. 2   On the role of bureaucracies in dictatorships, see Wolfgang-Uwe Friedrich, “Bürokratischer Totalitarismus—Zur Typologie des SED-Regimes,” in “Totalitäre Herrschaft—totalitäres Erbe,” special issue, German Studies Review 17 (1994): 1–21. 3   Robert Gellately, Backing Hitler: Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). 1

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Hedwig Richter

Despite the fact that this reporting system had a profound influence on life in the GDR, and despite the fact that the information gathered was capable of doing considerable damage, GDR studies and the institutes of historical reappraisal have devoted scant attention to it. The influence and terrorist potential of the Ministry for State Security were undoubtedly enormous, which likely explains why the field of GDR studies has focused so intensely on the history of the MfS. And yet, in doing so, it has overlooked a core dimension of surveillance beyond the sphere of State Security, one that made a key contribution to disciplining people in the GDR. In his commendable essay on this reporting system, Jens Gieseke still concentrated on MfS sources, but his comments on the public sphere under dictatorship and the value of intelligence reports could be applied to the reports of other institutions as well.4 Following methodological analyses of source types in reporting systems during the Nazi period, Gieseke points out that ideological distortions are inevitable in such reports. Just as important as the discursive performance of “social class theater”5 are the opportunistic reasons that induced informers to intensify or moderate their statements. On the whole, however, the evaluation of these reports (whether from the MfS or other authorities) is subject to the same rules of source interpretation as other sources. There is no methodological justification to dismiss them as “inferior.”

Surveillance reports as a form of communication The extremely productive bureaucratic form of surveillance outside the Stasi network was constantly at work, from the 1950s to the end of the GDR, and was thus one of the longest-enduring and most important communication channels of the SED regime.6 This is significant, because communication between rulers and ruled was a key means of domination in the GDR. The regime for the most part determined content and form. Communication with those in power was sometimes denied entirely to individuals who had run afoul of the regime, such as certain church representatives. The deformation of communication under conditions of dictatorship prevented the emergence of a public sphere independent of the state. This, in turn, led to a problem of rule: the lack of authentic information from below. As in other dictatorships, the SED regime felt the need   Jens Gieseke, “Bevölkerungsstimmungen in der geschlossenen Gesellschaft: MfS-Berichte an die DDR-Führung in den 1960er- und 1970er-Jahren,” Zeithistorische Forschungen/Studies in Contemporary History, online edition 5, no. 2 (2008), accessed April 20, 2020, http://www. zeithistorische-forschungen.de/16126041-Gieseke-2-2008. 5   Uta Stolle, “Traumhafte Quellen: Vom Nutzen der Stasi-Akten für die Geschichtsschreibung,” Deutschland Archiv 30, no. 2 (1997): 209–21; Gieseke: “Bevölkerungsstimmungen,” 2. 6   The surveillance reports are kept in the historical archives responsible for the records of these authorities, i.e., in party archives, business archives, and regional and federal archives. 4

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to compensate for this deficit with an elaborate information system. The centerpiece of this system was the MfS, but other channels of reporting also made a key contribution to keeping the rulers informed about what the ruled were doing and thinking. These surveillance reports are of particular interest because they allow us to identify strategies for stabilizing power. This confirms the hypothesis that rule by force, as practiced by the SED regime—which owed its continued existence primarily to Soviet tanks and a repressive state apparatus—relied on participation from below and, to use the terminology of Max Weber, the “belief in the legitimacy” of rule on the part of those being ruled.7 After all, surveillance as a form of communication was dependent on the involvement of many ordinary citizens. Large segments of the population took part as “reporters” or information suppliers. Anyone holding a position with a minimum of responsibility—as a party functionary, in a public authority, on the police force, as the representative of a mass organization, or even in positions that were not explicitly political, such as the managers of a steel mill, a hospital, or a collective farm—all of these individuals had to compose reports for the state. And anyone these reporters had contact with could potentially serve as sources of information. The surveillance reports reveal how every area of life could become political in one way or another. Reports consistently focused on power relations, rules of coexistence, and the limits of what could be said and done.8 Whether it concerned a person’s car, the hobbies of an opposition member, or a pastor’s daughter saying grace at the dinner table, all information was relevant for the technology of rule. Even attempts to placate the authorities by filling up the pages of a report with empty phrases was political in nature. The basis of bureaucratic surveillance was the weekly, monthly, and yearly reports that were written at all levels of all authorities and institutions and forwarded up the chain of command.9 The parties, mass organizations, state-owned   See Gellately, Backing Hitler; Thomas Lindenberger, “Die Diktatur der Grenzen: Zur Einleitung,” in Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 1999), 13–44; Richard Bessel and Ralph Jessen, eds., Grenzen der Diktatur: Staat und Gesellschaft in der DDR (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996); Hedwig Richter, Die DDR (Paderborn: Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, 2009), 11–26; see also Steven E. Finkel, Stan Humphries, and Karl-Dieter Opp, “Socialist Values and the Development of Democratic Support in the Former East Germany,” International Political Science Review 22, no. 4 (2001): 339–61. 8   On the definition of the political, see the deliberations of CRC 584 “Das Politische als Kommunikationsraum in der Geschichte” in Bielefeld, accessed April 20, 2020, https://web.archive.org/ web/20150322215853/http://www.uni-bielefeld.de/geschichte/forschung/sfb584/. 9   On this scarcely researched reporting system, see Mary Fulbrook, “Methodologische Überlegungen zu einer Gesellschaftsgeschichte,” in Grenzen der Diktatur, ed. Bassel and Jessen, 274–97, here 276–80; also Alf Lüdtke, “’... den Menschen vergessen?’—oder: Das Maß der Sicherheit; Arbeiterverhalten der 1950er Jahre im Blick von MfS, SED, FDGB und staatlichen Leitungen,” 7

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enterprises, and trade unions all produced a glut of reports, as did administrative authorities at the communal, district, regional, and state levels. These reports contained an abundance of socialist platitudes. But they also conveyed important information that was reported to the next highest authority and, if necessary, to any number of other offices (including, in sticky situations, State Security).10 Moreover, observation reports communicated the specific complaints and grievances of individuals and hence offered those in power the additional function (aside from pure surveillance) of learning about particular problems they would otherwise have remained unaware of due to the lack of a public sphere. Reports on conversations with clergymen, for example, often contained opinions that were strictly taboo in the socialist state: that the GDR was not governed by the rule of law, that elections were bogus, that the economy was in dire straits, or that the socialist educational system raised its children in a spirit of violence and hatred while discriminating against young Christians.11 In 1970, a number of pastors explained to the state representative for church affairs in the region of Dresden why communicating with the authorities was so important, “because otherwise no one would tell the state apparatus the real opinions of the people.”12 The observations in information reports were generally much more comprehensive than those of State Security. Whereas State Security had the upper hand when it came to fighting opposition forces, the administrative reporting system had a number of other strategic advantages that made it more effective in some cases and provided the party with more information.13 This was due not only to the potential participation of the entire population; the sheer mass of reports made the difference, spilling over from factories, collective farms, and universities on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly basis, effectively flooding public authorities with data. Of course, the quantity of reports could also pose in Akten, Eingaben, Schaufenster: Die DDR und ihre Texte; Erkundungen zu Herrschaft und Alltag, ed. Alf Lüdtke and Peter Becker (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1997), 189–92; Ralph Jessen, “Diktatorische Herrschaft als kommunikative Praxis: Überlegungen zum Zusammenhang von ‘Bürokratie’ und Sprachnormierung in der DDR-Geschichte,” in Akten, Eingaben, Schaufenster, ed. Lüdtke and Becker, 57–86. 10   See, for instance, documents in Hauptstaatsarchiv Dresden (hereafter HStA Drd.) 11430, Nr. 454 and in BArch DO 4/48b. 11   See, for instance, Kurzbericht über Dienstreise, Arbeitsgebiet Ev. Kirche v. 14.9.1963. BArch DO 4/2979. 12   Informationsbericht Februar 1970 von H. Dohle v. 6.3.1970. BArch DO 4/2968; Monthly report RdK Löbau to RdB Dresden, Oct. 26, 1973, HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10926, and other material in HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10926 and 10815. 13   For example, in the case of the Herrnhuter Brüdergemeine (Moravian Church), see Hedwig Richter, Pietismus im Sozialismus: Die Herrnhuter Brüdergemeine in der DDR (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009), 153–64.

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a problem. Yet, the form this institutionalized reporting took had another key advantage: informers were not forced to deal with the ominous and dreaded Ministry for State Security. There was no need to justify a discussion with a friendly district councilor or a candid factory manager, and critical information concerning fellow citizens was shared much more readily in these contexts. Those wanting to appear in a positive light or keen to disparage others could turn to just about any party, factory, or administrative authority and were sure to find an eager listener who would evaluate this information for political purposes.14 Thus, regime-loyal theologians or functionaries from bloc parties like the CDU could wholeheartedly denounce their colleagues without burdening their conscience by having to collaborate with the MfS.15 Citizens regularly supplied detailed reports to the district authorities about individuals with contacts in the West, about presents received from the West, about unauthorized events, and about critical comments toward the state made by their colleagues.16 The image of being harmless, which this surveillance apparatus managed to preserve until the very end, is all the more surprising considering that many of these reports were coupled with a blatant and shameless will to investigate no less pronounced than that of the MfS. To be sure, administrative clerks did not have the same tools at their disposal that the Ministry for State Security did. If they deemed it appropriate, however, many of the authors of these information reports rivalled employees of the MfS in their lack of respect for privacy. District authorities passed on information about the personal libraries of nonconformist individuals, shared intimate details about their children, or detailed who made critical statements and who displayed loyal behavior. Teenage flirting and schoolyard chats were just as liable to be recorded.17 Added to this were   See Mitteilung über geplante “Wahlkabinenbenutzung” eines Direktionsmitglieds und der Gang durch die Institutionen dieser Information CDU, KV Löbau, an 1. Stellv. Vorsitzenden des RdK v. 13.9.65. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10849; Dreßler, RdK Löbau, an Verteiler v. 4.9.65, HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10872. 15   Thus, for example, Carl Ordnung denounced theology professor Heinrich Vogel for making critical comments about the GDR’s church policy in a conversation with Josef Hromádka in Prague. See Aktenvermerk von C. Ordnung v. 30.1.1961. SAPMO-BArch DY 30/IV 2/14/94; vgl. auch Aktenvermerk von C. Ordnung v. 18.2.1974. SAPMO-BArch DY 30/IV B 2/14/195; Bericht C. Ordnung v. 5.11.1975, BA DO 4/4746; vgl. zu G. Wirth Aktenvermerk, o.D., G. Wirth. SAPMO-BArch DY 30/IV B 2/14/195; vgl. zu Bassarak Unterlagen in BArch DO 4 / 491; vgl. auch LArch Berlin C Rep 101/04, Nr. 95, Bd. 1. 16   Monatsbericht RdK Löbau an RdB Drd. v. 25.9.73, 25.7.73 u. 28.12.1973. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10926; Staatssekretär Girnus, Hochschulwesen, an P. Verner, ZK der SED v. 26.2.1958. SAPMO-BArch DY 30/IV 2/14/187; W. Caffier an Lewerenz, v. 19.5.1981, RdB Drd., HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10948. 17   See, for instance, Monatsberichte des RdK Löbau an RdB Drd., HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 903, 10866, 6286, 10907-10909, 10926, 11091, 33094/1 etc.; Kreisarchiv Löbau-Zittau, RdK Löbau 224; see also Theodor Gill, Ost-West-Erfahrungen (typescript, Herrnhut, 1994), 8; excerpt 14

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annual reports on priority issues such as the “development of the relationship between church and state,” with statistics on the decrease in baptisms or the increase in individuals opting to leave the church.18 Denunciations made to the police rounded off this system of surveillance.19 As in the case of the Stasi, these reports were not devoid of the most absurd details. Thus, one information report said that in Upper Lusatia a flyer had been distributed which read “Pretty girls can be seen on Hutberg hill.”20 Those parts of the reports that were useful for surveillance or blackmailing purposes—notes on conversations, personal information, denunciations by the district authorities, information about rebellious schoolchildren, copies of letters, and frequently data on the voting behavior of individuals—were eventually delivered to high-level authorities with influence and decision-making power.21 The awareness of surveillance and the ever-present possibility of being denounced prompted the most important mechanism of disciplining: self-censorship. This included citizens, but also institutions such as churches, voluntarily reporting to the authorities any incidents they deemed relevant22—visits, trips, applications to import books from abroad, staff issues, or an upcoming press interview23—even though they had no legal obligation to do so. This self-sacrifice seemed to many individuals a normal and reasonable bureaucratic act. Such prophylactic measures were intended to obviate potential problems and misunderstandings before they even arose. At the same time, this bureaucratic hypercorrectness was a demonstration of loyalty. An important side effect of this proactive loyalty toward the authorities was to lend legitimacy to the regime’s need for surveillance. Preemptive obedience kept the gears of the surveillance state well-oiled. Thus, East German citizens were themselves responsible for creating and abetting a situation of pervasive surveillance.

from Bericht des RdK Löbau an RdB Drd. v. 25.1.1955. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10803. Church services, for example, were official objects of administrative surveillance, the information reports of the district or regional council or regularly reporting on them. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 6280, 6283 u. 6286. 18   Documents HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 385, 10815 u. 10831. 19   Bezirksbehörde der Dt. Volkspolizei an RdB, Abteilung Inneres v. 24.2.56. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 6286; see the reports in LArch Berlin C Rep 101/04, Nr. 66 u. 107, in BArch DO 1/183/2 u. in Thüringisches StA Rudolstadt, Volkspolizeikreisamt Lobenstein 50, BArch DO 4/ 83913 (1963); Kreisarchiv Löbau-Zittau, RdK Löbau 230. 20   Bericht BDVP Dresden, Operativstab v. 8.11.1954. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 385. 21   For instance, documents in HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 6421, 10798, 10799, 10844, 10847, 10849 and 10873. 22   See, for instance, Aktenvermerk für den Staatssekretär von H. Dohle v. 8.7.1981. DO 4/ 4814. 23   Aktenvermerk für den Staatssekretär von Dr. Dohle, Leiter des Büros v. 8.7.1981. BArch DO 4/83717 (448).

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The example of elections Intense surveillance of the population is indispensable for any dictatorship. The precarious legitimacy of a dictatorship makes it necessary to nip critical voices in the bud and relegate them to the sidelines. This was especially evident during elections, a particularly interesting case in terms of reporting. Socialist elections could only work with strict and careful surveillance, essentially forcing high rates of approval. Elections also served to exact a gesture of submissiveness from everyone and thereby register deviant behavior.24 A reliable system of surveillance was required for those in power to know who was conformist and who was not, who was to be punished and who rewarded. This meant that electoral freedom and, hence, the secret ballot had to be circumvented and overridden. Interestingly enough, the state-socialist regime of the GDR had adopted the Western voting procedure, the highly complex rules and regulations of which aimed to guarantee freedom of the ballot. The ballot box, voting with standardized ballot cards (as opposed to viva-voce voting), provision of an official ballot and a voting booth: all of these procedural components served to ensure that the voter had an independent vote, free of external influences.25 With the introduction of the unified list of candidates—a ballot with nothing to check and which basically gave the voter no choice in the matter—state socialists had effectively managed to cancel out the secret ballot. Wanting to play it safe, however, the regime abolished the principle of secrecy. Voters were urged not to use the voting booth and to cast their ballot without crossing out any names, a procedure the overwhelming majority complied with. The authors of surveillance reports therefore had the decisive task of observing and documenting anyone who happened to step out of line. Voting was monitored not only by employees of the Ministry for State Security, but also by administrative bodies at the communal and regional level, as well as by party organizations and electoral commissions.26 They were called upon on election day to pass on detailed information to the next highest authority. The leadership of the CDU bloc party specifically requested its district organization to report to it which clergymen and members of the church council had voted and how they behaved   On elections in dictatorships, see Ralph Jessen and Hedwig Richter, “Non-Competitive Elections in 20th Century Dictatorships: Some Questions and General Considerations,” in Voting for Hitler and Stalin: Elections under 20th Century Dictatorships, ed. Ralph Jessen and Hedwig Richter (Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 2011), 9–36. 25   Hedwig Richter, “Mass Obedience. Practices and Functions of Elections in the German Democratic Republic,” in Jessen and Richter, Voting for Hitler and Stalin, 103–25. 26   See, for instance, Wahlberichte in Archiv für Christlich-Demokratische Politik (ACDP) III-50-002/1 u. II-209-030/1; Unterlagen Thüringisches StA Rudolstadt, Bezirksleitung der SED Gera IV/A-2/14/696 u. IV 2/14/ 1195. 24

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while doing so.27 Already in the early hours of the morning, the first telegrams would arrive in Berlin with information about the elections. Voting early was considered a sign of loyalty. Election information was updated by the hour throughout the course of the day and forwarded up the chain of command.28 Observers reported not only on voter participation or the abstention of clergymen—a particularly dubious group—but also on their exact behaviors: whether or not they used the voting booths, if they made comments on the ballot, and what time of day their ballot was cast. Some reports even noted the voting behavior of the family members of certain suspects.29 When voting was over, the representatives of various institutions had to prepare an exact analysis with precise statistics to be forwarded to their superiors. This included mentioning by name any delinquents who refused to vote or evinced undesirable voting behavior (use of voting booths, crossing out candidates on the ballot, and so forth). Possible motives for refusing to vote might also be noted in the reports. To round off the procedure, functionaries at all levels collected and evaluated the information gathered.30 Voting reports reveal how dictatorial surveillance could be practiced as a regular administrative act and, unlike surveillance by the MfS, was perceived as legitimate by the majority of the population. When the CDU called on its members to be vigilant and report accurately what they had seen, they seemed to be appealing to the conscience of loyal citizens. Likely very few people felt that voting reports at the communal, district, and regional levels were unlawful; rather, they were a normal and virtually indispensable bureaucratic act.

  Dienstanweisung “Bis 21 Uhr ist Folgendes zu melden,” an Kreisvorstände, o.D. ACDP II209, 044/10. 28   See, for instance, Bericht Beteiligung der Pfarrer an den Wahlen, RdK Löbau an RdB Drd., Kollegen Opitz sofort auf den Tisch v. 12.10.65, HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10849; SED-Informationsbericht Kreis Löbau v. 18.10.1954, HStA Drd. 11864, Nr. IV/4/09.085; Protokoll Sitzung des RdS Herrnhut v. 21.10.1954, Stadtarchiv Herrnhut, Ordner Stadtrat; Unterlagen Thüringisches StA Rudolstadt, Bezirksleitung der SED Gera IV/A-2/14/696. 29   See, for instance, the files in SAPMO DY 30/IV 2/14/16–17 and 21; Unterlagen Kreisarchiv Löbau-Zittau, RdK Löbau 230. 30   See, for instance, 1. Stellv. des Vorsitzenden, RdK Löbau, an 1. Stellv., Gen. Opitz, RdB Drd. v. 12.10.1965. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10849; RdK Löbau, Stellv. des Vorsitzenden für Innere Angelegenheiten an RdB Drd., Stellv. des Vorsitzenden für Innere Angelegenheiten v. 25.4.1966, Anhang, u. Akte Wahlbeteiligung evangelischer Pfarrer [für Volkswahlen 1958]. HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10809; Unterlagen in HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10701, HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10994; Unterlagen in HStA Drd. 11430, Nr. 10847, 10849 u. 10994; SED-Unterlagen in HStA Drd. 11857, Nr. IV C-2/14/675; Unterlagen in SAPMO DY 30/IV 2/14/17; CDU-BV Magdeburg an Carl Ordnung v. 13.4.1959. ACDP VII–013-0177. 27

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Conclusion The reporting machinery described above only functioned thanks to the commitment of individuals at the grassroots level, as well as the population becoming increasingly accustomed to dictatorial practices of domination. The administrative apparatus turned out to be a particularly efficient source of legitimacy. Bureaucratic rule was perceived by many citizens as legitimate, pure and simple. As such, there were numerous dictatorial practices of domination disguised as bureaucratic procedures which, from the 1960s on, were increasingly felt to be “normal,” but which the people would have found scandalous in the early years of the republic. The majority no longer perceived it as unlawful when state functionaries engaged in censorship, when apartments were refused or preferentially allocated, when travel was forbidden, or when the opportunity to attend an academic high school or a university depended on one’s political views. The legitimizing power of bureaucracy worked the same way in the case of surveillance reports.31 Curiously, this form of denunciation has attracted scant attention in the landscape of historical reappraisal and the culture of remembrance. Whereas erstwhile Stasi informers, many of whom were perpetrators and victims at the same time, were harshly judged and publicly reviled—indeed often deprived of their civic existence—in the first years after the Peaceful Revolution, the informers supplying treacherous information through the bureaucratic apparatus have barely been acknowledged. This moral indifference points to the high level of acceptance that bureaucratic surveillance reports as a means of communication had found among the broad mass of the population. The internalization and acceptance of power, and the collaboration of ordinary citizens in its execution, are among the most surprising aspects of GDR rule, helping to explain why the workers’ and peasants’ state managed to exist for forty years. The comprehensive system of surveillance, spying, and denunciation ultimately worked so well, however, because of its ubiquitousness, extending as it did across all walks of society. The legitimizing force of this broad basis of participation still holds today in the culture of remembrance.

  See Hedwig Richter, “Rechtsunsicherheit als Prinzip: Die Herrnhuter Brüdergemeine und wie der SED-Staat seine Untertanen in Schach hielt,” in Die DDR im Blick: Ein zeithistorisches Lesebuch, ed. Susanne Muhle et al. (Berlin: Metropol, 2008), 77–85.

31

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Selected bibliography

Bessel, Richard, and Ralph Jessen, eds. Grenzen der Diktatur: Staat und Gesellschaft in der DDR. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996. Finkel, Steven E., Stan Humphries, and Karl-Dieter Opp. “Socialist Values and the Development of Democratic Support in the Former East Germany.” International Political Science Review 22, no. 4 (2001): 339–61. Friedrich, Wolfgang-Uwe. “Bürokratischer Totalitarismus—Zur Typologie des SED-Regimes.” In “Totalitäre Herrschaft—totalitäres Erbe,” special issue, German Studies Review 17 (1994): 1–21. Fulbrook, Mary. “Methodologische Überlegungen zu einer Gesellschaftsgeschichte.” In Grenzen der Diktatur: Staat und Gesellschaft in der DDR, ed. Richard Bessel and Ralph Jessen, 276–80. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996. Gellately, Robert. Backing Hitler: Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001. Gieseke, Jens. “Bevölkerungsstimmungen in der geschlossenen Gesellschaft: MfS-Berichte an die DDR-Führung in den 1960er- und 1970er-Jahren.” Zeithistorische Forschungen/ Studies in Contemporary History, online edition 5, no. 2 (2008): 2. Jessen, Ralph. “Diktatorische Herrschaft als kommunikative Praxis: Überlegungen zum Zusammenhang von ‘Bürokratie’ und Sprachnormierung in der DDR-Geschichte.” In Akten, Eingaben, Schaufenster, ed. Alf Lüdtke and Peter Becker, 57–86. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1997. Jessen, Ralph and Hedwig Richter. “Non-Competitive Elections in 20th Century Dictatorships: Some Questions and General Considerations.” In Voting for Hitler and Stalin: Elections under 20th Century Dictatorships, ed. Ralph Jessen and Hedwig Richter, 9–36. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 2011. Kowalczuk, Ilko-Sascha. Stasi konkret: Überwachung und Repression in der DDR. Munich: Beck Verlag, 2013. Lindenberger, Thomas. “Die Diktatur der Grenzen: Zur Einleitung.” In Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur: Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte der DDR, ed. Thomas Lindenberger, 13–44. Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 1999. Lüdtke, Alf. “‘... den Menschen vergessen?’—oder: Das Maß der Sicherheit; Arbeiterverhalten der 1950er Jahre im Blick von MfS, SED, FDGB und staatlichen Leitungen.” In Akten, Eingaben, Schaufenster: Die DDR und ihre Texte; Erkundungen zu Herrschaft und Alltag, ed. Alf Lüdtke and Peter Becker, 189–92. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1997. Müller-Enbergs, Helmut. Die inoffiziellen Mitarbeiter. Berlin: Ch. Links Verlag, 2008. ———. IM Statistik 1985–1989. Berlin: Der Bundesbeauftragte für die Unterlagen des Staatssicherheitsdienstes der ehemaligen Deutschen Demokratischen Republik, Abteilung Bildung und Forschung, 1993. Richter, Hedwig. Die DDR. Paderborn: Verlag Ferdinand Schöningh, 2009. ———. “Mass Obedience. Practices and Functions of Elections in the German Democratic Republic.” In Voting for Hitler and Stalin: Elections under 20th Century Dictatorships, ed. Ralph Jessen and Hedwig Richter, 103–25. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 2011. ———. Pietismus im Sozialismus: Die Herrnhuter Brüdergemeine in der DDR. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2009. ———. “Rechtsunsicherheit als Prinzip: Die Herrnhuter Brüdergemeine und wie der SEDStaat seine Untertanen in Schach hielt.” In Die DDR im Blick: Ein zeithistorisches Lesebuch, ed. Susanne Muhle et al., 77–85. Berlin: Metropol, 2008. Stolle, Uta. “Traumhafte Quellen: Vom Nutzen der Stasi-Akten für die Geschichtsschreibung.” Deutschland Archiv 30, no. 2 (1997): 209–21.

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CHAPTER FIVE

Late Communist Elites and the Demise of State Socialism in Czechoslovakia (1986–89) Michal Pullmann

The attempt at reform and the consequent collapse of state socialism in Czechoslovakia at the end of the 1980s may be interpreted from various perspectives. One particularly important angle is that of the interaction between the interests of different groupings in the ruling elite and their (in)ability to take effective decisions on a wide range of questions. Analysis of elite claims, strategies for the pursuit of common goals, and rules of negotiation in late communist Czechoslovakia may help us to understand how the crises among communist elites at the end of the 1980s conditioned the demise of state socialism in Czechoslovakia. The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (CPCz) insisted on an order resting on the administrative control of the economy and the rejection of any forms of legal opposition.1 Yet, by 1989, it was clear that its claims to a monopoly on power were deeply corroded. Leading communists were largely unable to face profound challenges and deal with unforeseen situations. Often apparently helpless, they were missing not just the ability to negotiate and look for possible solutions outside a rigid ideological scheme, but even the capacity to identify and name the situation. It is thus worth posing questions about the solidarity and self-image of governing elites in late socialist Czechoslovakia. What types of strategy did these groups have for maintaining hegemony in society? Upon what ideas and intuitions were their claims on conformity and obedience based? What values and ideas about the desirable order were communicated here? We cannot answer all these questions in an exhaustive way in this article, but we can take an analytical look at the self-confidence of the late communist establishment and trace its disintegration.   Martin Myant, The Czechoslovak Economy 1948–1988: The Battle for Economic Reform (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989); Kevin McDermott, Communist Czechoslovakia, 1945–1989: A Political and Social History (London: Palgrave, 2015).

1

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“Normalization” and perestroika The Czechoslovak party leadership initially hoped that Soviet perestroika would be just another in a series of ideological campaigns aimed at stimulating greater work productivity and better overall running of the economy while retaining the established system of decision-making. Mikhail Gorbachev was evidently encountering plenty of difficulties and troubles as he tried to push through his reforms,2 and so it seemed a fair bet that nothing fundamental would change, that the existing system of economic management might be modified here and there but that the political hierarchy would remain unaffected. Although most of the “normalization” nomenklatura shared this kind of general expectation, from the beginning there were clear differences among them with regard to perestroika in Czechoslovakia. When the Czechoslovak prime-minister Lubomír Štrougal first took up the term “perestroika” and, as early as the spring of 1985, predicted that the future reassessment of opinions and conceptions would be deeper “than we ourselves can yet imagine,”3 his words reflected less a diagnostic precision or clairvoyance and more an effort to place himself at the head of the reform process on the assumption that its realization opened up favorable prospects. After the unimpressive results of the “Set of Measures” (known as Štrougal’s Packages) of 1980, government leaders had been waiting for an opportunity to try to bring reform proposals to life and so lift the Czechoslovak economy out of its long-term stagnation.4 To this end they could rely on support from teams of experts (the Government Committee for the Planned Conduct of the National Economy, later the Forecasting Institute of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences, and other expert institutions) and together demand an increase in “profitability,” “efficiency,” “balanced growth,” “optimal” approaches, or “increasing the pressure” for frugality.5 In a centrally directed economy, however, the room for reform available to government was paradoxically quite limited. Maintaining the fragile stability See Archie Brown, Seven Years that Changed the World: Perestroika in Perspective (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 63–66; Stephen White, After Gorbachev (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 19 ff. 3   “In the name of the legacy of Spring 1945 let us work better tomorrow than we do today: Speech of Lubomír Štrougal at an assembly to mark the fortieth anniversary of the Košice Government Programme,” Rudé pravo, April 5, 1985, 2 ff. 4   These measures were known in full as the “Set of measures for improving the system of planned direction of the national economy.” They are detailed in Anna Sedlářová, ed., Ke zdokonalení soustavy plánovitého řízení národního hospodářství: Sborník dokumentů a materiálů ke zdokonalení soustavy plánovitého hospodářství po r. 1980 (Prague: Práce, 1980). See also Myant, The Czechoslovak Economy, 209–13; Sharon Wolchik, Czechoslovakia in Transition: Politics, Economics, and Society (London: Pinter, 1991), 242 ff. 5   These terms were from the established vocabulary of criticism of the economy in the 1980s; see the journal Finance a úvěr 30–36 (1980–1986). 2 

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of the administratively conducted economy depended on negotiations between the management of the state enterprises and the middling ministerial cadres responsible for putting together the economic plan. In the administratively managed economy, every state firm would strive to maximize the resources (raw materials or other products) which it was supplied by the state, and to minimize the required outputs (products stipulated by the plan). The range or quality of production was not established by the market, but administratively, on the basis of an agreement between the huge state enterprises and ministerial officials on the amount and structure of production and its incorporation into the production plan. So long as this level of negotiation was maintained as the main support for the stability of the economy, all the government experts’ reform plans were rather empty, lacking a real subject. This was why, up to the end of 1986, no one in the party leadership was willing to concede that this form of “real existing socialism” could be changed in any serious way. Although there was a spectrum of opinion in the party, perestroika initially generated no pressure to change direction. Even the official domestic media reported on perestroika as if it were exclusively a Soviet project; for a relatively long time it seemed that Czechoslovakia would remain unaffected.6 All this changed only toward the end of 1986, when unofficial reports reached Czechoslovakia that Gorbachev was planning to complete changes of leadership personnel in his own favor at the planned January 1987 plenum of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, thereby opening the way to the vigorous implementation of perestroika reforms.7 In this new situation it seemed strategically unwise to hang back and risk a scenario in which any later action would look purely reactive and opportunistic. At the turn of the year 1986–87, a document was therefore drawn up with the supposed aim   For example, the materials of the Seventeenth Congress of the CPCz still used the established terminology, such as “zdokonalení” (“improving”; literally “making more perfect”), “podněcování tvořivé aktivity lidí” (“stimulating the creative activity of the people”) and so on. The vocabulary of perestroika made only very slow progress in Czechoslovakia (and, moreover, almost exclusively in texts by Lubomír Štrougal). See XVII. sjezd Komunistické strany Československa, 24.–28. března 1986 (Prague: Svoboda, 1986). 7   In Soviet history, the January plenum of 1987 is interpreted as the event that made possible the legal grounding of perestroika and so opened the way to transformations of the state enterprises, cooperatives, internal and international trade, and so on; see White, After Gorbachev, 19 ff. Unofficial reports that perestroika was going to be more than just another ideological campaign apparently reached Czechoslovakia in November and December 1986 and were the reason why the Czechoslovak party leadership rapidly prepared a document on perestroika, to ensure that it would be ready before the January plenum in Moscow and would thus look like the result of independent activity. See Zdislav Šulc, Psáno inkognito: Doba v zrcadle samizdatu 1968–1989 (Prague: Ústav pro soudobé dějiny AV ČR, 2000), 106.

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of initiating perestroika in Czechoslovakia as well.8 Although all the reformism was explicitly directed to the economic sphere, it was already obvious that some political hierarchies would have to be renegotiated.

The state enterprise law Since a law on state enterprise was the central feature of the Soviet economic reform, work started at the beginning of 1987 on a similar project in Czechoslovakia. For government circles, this was a welcome chance to generate reforms that might overcome stagnation and revive economic growth. The main purpose of the law was to transform the forms of cooperation between the large state enterprises/concerns: the principle of “self-financing” was supposed to give them greater independence in decision-making, while also making them more responsible for their own performance. The idea was to introduce market elements into the world of administrative decision-making: state concerns were intended not only to compete more with each other, but to have enough room to make mutual contracts without the ministry having the decisive voice. The official apparatus would thus be relieved of the burden of so much supervisory activity and the enterprises would become more economically effective, not just negotiating favorable conditions in the ministries, but also developing their own initiatives and improving production quality.9 The draft law was drawn up during the spring of 1987 in the Government Committee for the Planned Conduct of the National Economy. It was originally based on the Soviet example, but when that turned out not to fit Czech conditions, the government experts decided to use the concept of a law on enterprises drawn up in Czechoslovakia back in 1968 but never passed at the time for political reasons.10 As a result, the Czechoslovak proposal in some respects went even further than the Soviet model, opening up space for the kind of transformation in which the principle of planning would be changed into “economic management” and the administrative system of decisionmaking would be progressively eliminated. It is true that in the final draft of the law, published in the middle of July 1987, the boldest passages had been cut (for example, the notion of a “participatory enterprise,” a kind of socialist   Principy přebudování hospodářského mechanismu ČSSR (Prague: Svoboda, 1987); see also Rudé pravo, January 9, 1987. 9   The law on the state enterprise in the Soviet Union was the subject of public discussion in the first half of 1987 and was approved in the latter part of that year. The phasing of the process in Czechoslovakia was roughly a year later: “All-people discussion” went on until the end of October, and then the law came into force from mid-1988. 10   See Šulc, Psáno inkognito, 258 ff. 8

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equivalent to the joint-stock company, was unacceptable in party circles), which shows that the law was the object of restrictions even at this early stage. Nonetheless, the draft attracted a series of reactions no one had expected in the fossilized conditions of late state socialism. In what was called the “society-wide discussion” that took place in the summer and autumn of 1987, two interested groups spoke up vigorously. These were economic experts (expert circles) and people from the management of the enterprises (managerial circles). For experts from the Government Committee for the Planned Conduct of the National Economy and other expert specialist institutions,11 the discussion on the draft law was a welcome chance to present and popularize new reform ideas. The main locus of criticism was the administrative management of the economy; in other words, the official setting of goals and supervision of the distribution of raw materials and goods without sufficient regard for the needs of firms and final customers. Now the experts could publicly formulate what had already been engaging them for some time, and stipulate the introduction of balance between supply and demand (instead of the existing “demand”-based economy), the satisfaction of the wishes of customers (rather than sticking to the state plan, which often just reflected bureaucratic interests), and a change of subsidy and redistribution in practice (to ensure that efficient firms did not pay for the sins of the poorly managed). From here it was just a short step to the demand for the “objectivization of evaluation tools” (the introduction of movable prices, not controlled by the state), which would prompt different economic choices and bring them into harmony.12 Neither the principle of the administrative distribution of raw materials, nor state supervision of the means of production, nor state control of prices, were taken any longer as axioms defining an irreversible orientation toward communism. Here the experts clearly expressed the view that the administrative system of management was the main cause of the problems and that it was unsustainable in its existing form. Apart from general theories and demands, the discussion generated a range of concrete proposals marking out other directions for economic reform. What seemed most important was to cut back on the sectors that formed the basis   Specifically the Vysoká škola ekonomická (Economics University), Ústřední ústav národohospodářského výzkumu (při ministerstvu financí) (The Central Institute of Research in National Economy [attached to the Ministry of Finance]), and later also the famous Prognostický ústav ČSAV (Forecasting Institute of the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences). 12   See Ladislav Rusmich, “Zbožně-peněžní vztahy,” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 19 (1987): 3; Zdeněk Mošna:” Zásady činnosti: K návrhu zákona o státním podniku,” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 30 (1987): 3. At the time, the vocabulary was quite cautious (relying on tried and tested phrases like “to the benefit of socialism,” “Soviet economic science,” “value of Marxist theory,” and so on), but in terms of content the texts clearly breached the ideological purity stipulated by the doctrines of scientific communism. 11

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of “extensive” economic growth (the steel industry) and in future to support the growth of sectors relying on skilled production (processing industries such as textiles, footwear, glass, and printing).13 Probably the harshest criticism was directed at the concept of “stem assets” (in simple terms, property), with each firm being taxed on these assets as well as on profits.14 This not only meant what was in effect double taxation, but also pushed the directors of enterprises to resist investments in their firms (as investments would increase the “stem assets,” and by extension taxes, thus reducing funds for wages and so in the longer term leading to the loss of quality workers).15 For all the lively expert criticism on these issues, however, it was not the voices of economic experts that were the most urgent in the discussion on the proposed law, but those of people from the enterprise managements, whose influence was much more seriously threatened. This was because, following its Soviet model, the draft law on state enterprise introduced elements of socialist democracy into production. It envisaged the formation in the enterprises of workers’ councils that would play an active role in management and even have the right to elect and dismiss directors. It is unsurprising that directors and their deputies were keen to use every possible argument to denigrate the principle of workers’ self-government and loudly warn against its consequences. They argued that the self-governing organs would become “debating clubs” that would weaken employees’ morale, while giving free rein to their alleged tendency to “try to maximize wages” regardless of the effects on the fortunes of the firm.   See Valtr Komárek, “Ekonomika žádá revoluční změnu,” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 10 (1987): 8 ff. 14   “Stem assets are composed of the sum entrusted at the founding of the enterprise and from additions originating in the course of the operation of the enterprise.” Zdeněk Hába, “Ne zcela jasné pojmy,” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 32 (1987): 6. Since in state socialism (state) ownership of the means of production was homogeneous, a state enterprise did not own its buildings, machines, etc., but only, as it were, administered them. The means of production in state socialism could not be in private hands; ideally they were “owned by the whole society” and administered by the state, which protected them against theft, took care to develop them (by entrusting them to competent hands), and so on. By its production activity the enterprise then multiplied not its own property, but potentially the property of all (administered—that is, organized productively and redistributed by the state). 15   This was why under “normalization” the directors of enterprises tried so tenaciously to prevent any kind of investment in their concerns (and when the ministries forced new machines on them, often preferred to leave them in their packing cases). The ministries, on the other hand, pushed for “normative rules on compulsory allocations to the development fund,” and so tried administratively to fight the systematic lack of interest in investments on the part of the enterprises. Under “normalization” the enterprises were often kept in an almost desolate state (or just kept repairing old machines over and over). For a description of this mechanism and alternative proposals, see Vratislav Šlajer, “Úvahy k zamyšlení,” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 40 (1987): 6 ff. 13

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Furthermore, enterprise directors claimed that there had been no clarification regarding the parallel nature of the self-governing organs and the unions (where their activities were to overlap, where not, and why). They also argued that the new bodies would provide an opportunity for “demagogues and opportunists, and even anti-social tendencies,” and so “discipline and order” would disappear in the firms. Taking all these reservations together, they reached an entirely unambiguous formulation: “I propose that this paragraph be entirely left out.”16 The directors knew that their power inside the enterprises—and in relations outside them—was at stake. Negotiations with the higher organs (ministries or the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia) already took up a great deal of their energy and ingenuity, and now it seemed they would soon have to negotiate with employees as well. They insisted that they were not motivated by disrespect for their subordinates (in a situation of labor shortages they had to be very careful not to alienate workers, especially skilled workers), claiming instead concerns that they might not be able to cope with the new system or to navigate effectively between opposing pressures (from the ministry and workers’ councils). Otherwise, the central principles of the proposed law won general agreement from management circles. Here the positive attitude seemed not just to be traditional approbation for whatever came from above, but to reflect a sense that the proposals matched the efforts to achieve independence in decision-making. In particular, the principle of “self-financing” seemed to promise managements that, in future, they would be able to work with substantially greater financial sums and rid themselves of dependence on ministerial oversight and interference. Especially for enterprises involved in foreign trade, the reforms provided a chance to gain a certain degree of influence on hard currency trading. Alongside the loud acclamations, there were also warnings of the possibility that these principles might fall victim to supplementary modifications and special regulations (as had often been the case in the past).17   Milan Vondra, “Problémů je dost”; “Jaromír Svoboda: Diskutabilní postavení ředitele”; Karel Noga, “Volitelnost? Ano!” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 34 (1987): 6. Milan Vondra was from the Armabeton Praha concern, Jaromír Svoboda was economic deputy of Kovoslužba Praha, and Karel Noga was director of the Závody Vítězného února in Hradec Králové. The most robust formulation on “dismissal” related only to Paragraph 30, concerning the free possibilities of calling an assembly of internal bodies in the enterprise (i.e., self-governing organs, individual workshops, whole factory complexes, and so on), but against the background of the overall message of the texts cited, it can be related to the principle of “socialist self-government” as a whole. 17   See Jozef Leščišin, “Neublížme dobrej věci,” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 32 (1987): 6. Leščišin was an assistant director of Iron and Steel Works of East Slovakia. See also Jaroslav Škrhák, “Stručnost vede k nejasnosti,” Hospodářské noviny 31, no. 33 (1987): 6. Škrhák was a high official of the ČKD, one of the greatest engineering industries in Czechoslovakia. 16

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The leading role of the party Anxieties also dominated the atmosphere in the highest party circles. The greatest interest—even before the opening of discussion—surrounded the question of what would happen to the leading role of the party.18 How could it be ensured that the Communist Party would have enough influence in the self-governing organs and that the directors of the enterprises would submit their accounts to party bodies? When the “society-wide” discussion rapidly turned in an unexpected and even undesirable direction, the urgency of this question only grew. There were ever fewer guarantees that the participants in the discussion would behave in a conformist way, and ever more controversial questions and themes that could tempt them into nonconformist positions. The session of the National Economic Commission of the Central Committee of the CPCz in November 1987 nonetheless shows that there was relatively little appetite within the party for vigorous action. Instead, we find a rather defensive kind of criticism and efforts to shift responsibility for the existing economic problems and decline in party authority. Participants in the discussion considered that the date chosen for publication of the draft had been “inappropriate,”19 that “part of the active party personnel were not theoretically prepared for public discussion,” and that the discussion had not taken sufficient account of “the extensive character of the administrative apparatus” and was “inadequately orientated to the whole reconstruction of the economic mechanism.” It had allegedly exposed a series of “obscurities around the function of the council” and serious shortcomings in the work of the “theoretical front in the drawing up of documents of the perestroika of the economic mechanism,” while the materials under discussion “were not prepared with the participation of the branch organs” and in the draft law “there is no consideration of the tested system of higher supplier functions” and so forth.20 It was hard for party leaders to accept that the “society-wide discussion” need not necessarily follow a preestablished script, and that the increasing plurality of positions that the economic experts and management functionaries were publicly formulating might challenge the basic pillars of the state socialist economy. It was much easier to point to organizational problems such as poor timing, faults in organization, and theoretical preparation.   Národní archiv, Prague (hereafter NA) (former Archiv ÚV KSČ, fond (f.) 1529; Národohospodářská komise ÚV KSČ – původní označení fondu 10/8), Informace o výsledcích jednání národohospodářské komise ÚV KSČ dne 1. června 1987. 19   By “inappropriate” timing, the speaker most likely meant that the authoritative campaign (distribution of the desirable interpretation of the law on party and union lines) only got underway in June and July, when people were already going off to their country cottages or other holidays and so did not pay the campaign due attention. 20   NA, Informace o výsledcích jednání národohospodářské komise ÚV KSČ dne 23. listopadu 1987. 18

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There was a patent contrast between the embarrassment of the party leaders and the readiness of expert and managerial circles to articulate their interests clearly. Instead of demands for immediate theoretical training of “part of the active party personnel” and moves to remedy the alleged poor organization, actors from the milieu of the central party apparatus formulated purely contemplative standpoints, pushing the causes for the unfortunate turn of events beyond the borders of their own responsibility. Later, in the assessment of the economic reforms, there were still no signs that the central party apparatus would have the courage to take more vigorous action. For example, when in 1988 members of the National Economic Commission of the CPCz Central Committee were confronted with a further fall in economic growth, they reacted in the same helpless, detached, contemplative manner as before. This was exemplified in some of their statements: “We know the sources of economic growth, but we don’t know how to mobilize them”; it is essential “that the center should react faster to changes in economic conditions”; “in the plan we have so far been avoiding tackling decisive problems”; and so forth. The party apparatus seemed to have lost confidence in its own powers, eroding certainty even about the validity of the basic ideological tenets determining the direction of economic development: “To state that there has been a slow start on intensification is not accurate, because we need to admit to ourselves that so far there has been no turn toward intensity at all and the development of the national economy continues to be extensive.”21 Apart from the effectiveness of the state socialist economy, something even more sensitive and perhaps more important was collapsing: the ideological buttresses that for a relatively long time had enabled actors to legitimize their cooperation and common goals. When their validity was now uncertain even in the central party apparatus, and when even here people expressed their own doubts and anxieties instead of making demands for conformity and obedience, it was only a matter of time before this hesitancy and doubt was publicly exposed before the whole society.

“The internal enemy” Even more striking than the economic helplessness of the party leadership was its new uncertainty regarding modes of stigmatizing the “internal enemy.” In light of the Soviet policy of glasnost, there was suddenly doubt over whether dissidents and dissent could continue to be excluded from society. If, in   NA, Základní myšlenky z diskuse na národohospodářské komisi ÚV KSČ: Materiály 5. schůze národohospodářské komise ÚV KSČ 15. července 1988.

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the Soviet Union, Andrei Sakharov could be rehabilitated and censorship substantially reduced, where were the guarantees that something similar would not happen in Czechoslovakia? For the Czechoslovak party leadership this prospect represented an almost lethal threat. Challenges to the Lessons of the Crisis Development in the Party and Society after the 13th Congress of the CPCz, the document which up to this point had been the ideological bulwark of the Communist Party’s claim to a monopoly of power and the right to exclude any kind of legal opposition, might easily lead to the loss of the last remnants of its legitimacy. Unsurprisingly, urgent requests that the Soviet party should not change the official interpretation of the year 1968 usually formed a very important part of discussions between the Soviet and Czechoslovak party leaders. The latter emphasized to the Soviet side that a change in the official line on the events of the Prague Spring would endanger the position of the Communist Party and the prospects for perestroika in Czechoslovakia, and might even open the way to the destabilization of Europe.22 The plea to the Soviets to maintain the existing interpretation, confirmed by the Lessons of the Crisis Development, was perhaps most laconically expressed by the secretary of the Central Committee of the CPCz Vasil Biľak, in conversation with Gorbachev’s foreign policy advisor Alexander Yakovlev during the latter’s visit to Czechoslovakia in November 1988: “We understand the processes taking place in the USSR, but we ask you to have understanding for our situation too.”23 Apart from the specter of European destabilization and the menace to socialism in Czechoslovakia, the Jakeš leadership had few arguments to justify the repression of domestic “enemies of socialism” and “antisocial elements.” They could still insist to Soviet comrades that they had the situation under control and that most of society supported their political claims—and so, by implication, the exclusion of dissent—but it was much harder to actually cope with the domestic situation. When the validity of the official ideological schemas was exposed to challenge, the stigmatization of dissenters (as people who did not work, who were unable to accept proper “responsibility,” and who   See, for instance, the record of the conversation between Gorbachev and Jakeš in April 1989: “Iz besedy s Milošem Jakešem: Moskva, 18. aprelja 1989 goda,” in Otvečaja na vyzov vremeni: Vněšňaja politika perestrojki; Dokumentaľnyje svideteľstva (Moscow: Gorbačev-Fond a Ves Mir, 2010), 564–67. During the conversation—about a quarter of which was devoted to the problem of “enemies of socialism,” i.e., the pressure for the rehabilitation of the Prague Spring— Jakeš assured Gorbachev that a change in the official Soviet standpoint would mean catastrophe for Czechoslovak society. 23   “V zaklyucheniye V. Bilyak pryamo skazal: ‘My ponimayem proischoďashchiye v SSSR processy, no prosim ponyať i nashu situaciyu.’” Alexander Yakovlev, Perestrojka: 1985–1991; Nyeizdannoye, maloizvestnoye, zabytoye (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnyj fond “Dyemokratiya,” 2008), 273. 22

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undertook enemy activity only by order and for fat Western fees) started to lose its grounding too.24 From mid-1988, the numbers involved in opposition demonstrations rose consistently (especially at historical anniversaries in August and October of 1988 and then through the whole of 1989), showing that an ever larger section of the public was becoming interested in the aims and slogans of opposition groups. The administrative vocabulary used in party circles showed that the party leaders were extremely reluctant to engage in battles over the desirable interpretation of socialism. To accept the possibility of adopting a completely different conception of socialism (or even challenging socialism as the principle of the social order) would have undermined the fragile stability of “normalization” hierarchies. The party leadership thus considered that it was better to do nothing (or simply to use the forces of law and order against protesters) and pretend that state socialism, improved by perestroika, was continuing to function. Hence the protest actions of August and October 1988 continued to be characterized as “appearances by the enemies of socialism.” Indeed, the language of party reports became so cautious that they often referred simply to “the events that have happened” in order to avoid discussing the identity of the demonstrators or why their demands were seen as dangerous.25 When internal party reports did start to discuss the aims of the protest movement, however, they no longer used terms derived purely from the language of “normalization.” Rather than merely referring to protestors as people who spoke for no one but themselves, party materials began to refer to protests as attempts to “change the current Czechoslovak social-political order into a pluralist order” and to “form so-called independent groupings” seeking “to create the basic organizational structures of a future ‘opposition.’”26 While the party leadership had previously stigmatized all forms of protest, the approach now became more differentiated. Only certain categories, such as “abuse” (zneužití; of the figures of T. G. Masaryk, John Lennon), “confrontation” (konfrontace;   There were certainly many reasons why the earlier stigmatization of dissent was successful for a relatively long time. The biggest factor was that the demands of the dissidents, just like the official goals of communist policy, were remote from the lived world of most of the population: that in “normalized” society, any kind of activism (dissident or party, idealist or pragmatic-opportunist) seemed suspicious and alien. See Paulina Bren, The Greengrocer and his TV (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2010), especially 201–8. 25   NA, f. 1261/0/9 (Předsednictvo ÚV KSČ 1986–1989), P81/88, 81. schůze předsednictva ÚV KSČ 25.8.1988, bod 5, příloha III, Informace o politické situaci a událostech v období od 15. do 22. srpna 1988 v souvislosti s 20. výročím srpnových událostí v roce 1968. 26   NA, P85/88, 85. schůze předsednictva ÚV KSČ v polovině září 1988, bod 6, příloha IIIb, Informace k současným aktivitám vnitřního protivníka, zejména v souvislosti se 70. výročím založení ČSSR (opatřeno razítkem “Přísně tajné”). 24

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that is, the threat of uncontrollable conflict), and “revision” (revize; of the postwar order), were used with intent to stigmatize dissenting voices. In comparison to the late 1970s, we see a clear shift in interpretation as the party leadership began to adopt (at least in part) the content of what the opposition actors were saying about themselves. In this too we can identify elements of interpretational weakness and a lack of offensive energy in the party leadership and its administrative apparatus. Furthermore, the situation of visible conflict raised the question of modes of neutralizing the opposition (the legitimation of repressive measures) and increasing pressure on the meta-discourse of the central values of socialism. If “pluralism” and “independence” were to be interpreted as “enemy” and “antisocial,” there was a need to show why, but it was precisely this that the communist party leadership strenuously avoided.

An uncertain elite Let us return to the questions posed earlier. How did the claims of the ruling elites and their readiness to take concerted action change in the period of perestroika? How can we explain the loss of confidence as regards effective decision-making in the communist circles of late “normalization”? What explained their caution, or even their failure to try to develop hegemonic strategies? Why did they cling to an administrative approach to these problems, when aside from the functional mechanisms even elementary respect for the Communist Party was gradually collapsing? Here we can formulate three hypotheses that place the transformation of elite self-consciousness within the wider context of “normalization.” Primarily, with the expansion of the spectrum of themes, attitudes, and concepts in the broader public arena, it was ever harder to integrate this newly emergent pluralism into the existing ideological language. The “normalization” consensus had rested very strikingly on ideals of stability and satisfaction, confirmed on the everyday level by the ceaseless repetition of hyper-normalized formulations. The language of “normalization” had a rationale that was more pragmatic than intrinsic: it was intended to reinforce respect for consensus and existing hierarchies and was not meant to convey concrete contents.27 Since any kind of meta-discourse about ideology and the justification for desirable conditions had the potential to fracture this pragmatic-ideological praxis, the party elites had a tendency to anxiously avoid open questions and untested formulations.   Although developed for the Soviet case, it works for Czechoslovakia too. See Alexei Yurchak, Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006).

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This also explains why nonconformist attitudes to the central values and goals of socialism had been so harshly persecuted. Any kind of substantial discussion over what socialism was or why it was the optimal social order threatened to undermine the pragmatic rationality of the “normalization” language: that is, not just to challenge the interpretation of the Lessons of the Crisis Development, but also to demotivate the population from using these symbols. Any discussion of socialism itself represented a greater threat to the stability of state socialism than potential conservative, liberal, or for example racist alternatives.28 Second, the authoritative praxis of decision-making mainly involved mere expressions of admiration and praise for preprepared texts and standpoints. Although the party leadership declared its support for “socialist democracy” and presented all kinds of decisions for “society-wide discussion,” nonconformist positions were not tolerated. Instead, such positions were marginalized, criminalized, or pushed out into the world of “enemies” by various means (administrative, police). Throughout the relatively long and stable “normalization” period, party elites had become used to contemplatively watching expressions of subordination and obedience. Thus, they suddenly found themselves lacking supports and habits to aid effective decision-making when faced with unforeseen situations. Third, even in the highest party circles, images and interpretations that put greater emphasis on effective economic management based on individual performance had been gaining ground. The various “breakdowns” and shortcomings—indeed, all the phenomena that were at odds with the ideological promise—were now no longer being conceived just as exceptions, or exemplary and isolated events confirming the validity of the unifying value order. On the contrary, they were coming to be seen as systematic features of existing relations that needed to be removed by means of “experiments” or “reforms,” so that “efficiency” or “equilibrium” could be attained. Thus, even in party discourse on tackling these problems, there was a breakdown of the ideological exclusivity   On independent socialists after 1968, see Milan Otáhal, “První fáze opozice proti takzvané normalizaci,” in Dvě desetiletí před listopadem: Sborník, ed. Emanuel Mandler (Prague: Maxdorf, 1993), 11–33, especially 16. That oppositional alternatives within the socialist paradigm were perceived by the state socialist authorities as the primary threat also applied to the time of perestroika. A case in point was the oppositional group Obroda (Resurgence), which defined itself as a “club for socialist reconstruction” and comprised mainly of protagonists of the Prague Spring of 1968 who were silenced or repressed in the 1970s and 1980s. Although the activities of Obroda—which aimed to revive and vindicate the program of the Prague Spring in the context of Gorbachev’s perestroika—were of marginal significance compared to that of other opposition groups, in the CPCz materials it dominated as the supposedly most dangerous force. This also emerges from the discussions of Czechoslovak party leaders with their Soviet counterparts.

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of socialist coding. The key to remedy was no longer heroic collective efforts in pursuit of a different and more just order, but individual efforts geared to spreading prosperity and satisfaction in the framework of the existing order. The socialist promise no longer had a clear hegemony even in party circles, for it had been marginalized and replaced by another ideal: the idea of specific individual performance and self-realization. This third motive, an implicit normative order undermining the hegemony of planning and administrative control, was in tension with the first one, namely a reduced ability or will on the part of party elites to articulate difference and new ideas. This very tension helps to explain their unease as to how (or indeed whether) it would be possible to carry out even partial changes and reforms. The effects of the second motive—that is, the habit of merely contemplatively overseeing obedient behavior—as well as the seriously unfavorable international situation (from the point of view of the communist establishment) led to a deepening of unease, the evaporation of previous certainty about the stability of the socialist system, and growing apathy among party members. Faith in the sustainability of state socialism started to fall apart.

Collapse The party leadership was not entirely idle, however. In the new situation it gambled almost everything on personnel changes. At the end of 1987, Miloš Jakeš became general secretary,29 in April of the following year the central committee was rejuvenated,30 and the government too was supposed to follow: after Štrougal’s resignation in October 1988, Ladislav Adamec became prime minister. This strategy of not publicly opening up meta-theoretical questions but simply bringing younger blood into the leadership of the party and emphasizing the importance of new faces was, of course, also a response to tensions and battles in the party apparatus. It can be interpreted in retrospect as a final attempt to make changes under party control in such a way that they would not result in any challenge to the communists’ hold on power.   7. zasedání Ústředního výboru Komunistické strany Československa ve dnech 17. a 18. prosince 1987: Za důslednou realizaci linie XVII. sjezdu KSČ na urychlení hospodářského a sociálního rozvoje, za komplexní přestavbu, za prohloubení socialistické demokracie (Prague: Svoboda, 1987). 30   Antonín Kapek, Josef Haman, and Josef Havlín (all up to this point very influential) were relieved of their positions in the CC of the CPCz and Miroslav Štěpán, Rudolf Hegenbart, and Vasil Mohorita were coopted to replace them. See 9. zasedání Ústředního výboru Komunistické strany Československa ve dnech 8. a 9. dubna 1988: K práci strany v podmínkách přestavby hospodářského mechanismu a rozvoje socialistické demokracie (Prague: Svoboda, 1988). It was here that Husák and Štrougal’s positions definitively collapsed and the influence of people around Miloš Jakeš and Jozef Lenárt was clearly on the rise. 29

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The effect of the strategy, however, was that the party leadership became imprisoned in its own problems. Other groups with influence on the character of reforms, such as the economic experts, were interested less in the question of which central committee faction would gain the upper hand, and more in the question of whether it would be willing to clear the way for vigorous changes in the economy. In this context, the need was both to tackle the well-known longterm problems (the permanent excess of demand over supply, low investment, inflexible responses to economic stimuli), and to cope with immediate trends, specifically the economic downturn. Instead of continuing to frame criticism in officially recognized terms and symbols, however, the experts decided to try different routes and test how far they could go in the formulation of new conceptions that corresponded better to their ideas of a properly functioning economy. The second half of 1988 saw the formulation of demands for “the convertibility of goods and currency” (which indicated a transition from an administrative to a market system), the need “to quickly and drastically break the hypertrophy of heavy industry,” demands for the “monetarization of the economy,” and the necessity of introducing “competition” not only between small individual enterprises but above all between the big industrial concerns. As Valtr Komárek, the director of the Forecasting Institute, put it in Hospodářské noviny (Economic News), “a highly developed market mechanism functions in all advanced capitalist states today and all its modern attributes need to be critically adopted, not reinvented. Hence rather than lecturing each other on the meaning, content, and main categories of the market mechanism, it is more fruitful to bring creative efforts to bear on the questions of their application on the ground of socialism.”31 The principle of administrative management of the economy (state planning) was by this time not simply being criticized in a piecemeal fashion, but wholesale, as an altogether mistaken model of economic organization.32 The shift in interpretation meant that suddenly the argument was not about whether to adopt market principles, but in what form to adopt them, and not whether unemployment was admissible at all, but to what extent.33 During   Valtr Komárek, “Ne množství, ale kvalita a konvertibilita,” Hospodářské noviny 32, no. 42 (1988): 8.   According to the economist Milan Matějka, the system of planning was faulty because administrative management could not have sufficient information for directive organization of millions of products but on the contrary was sliding toward “stereotypicality.” In addition to this, it did not respect the fact that economic development is not “objectively” linear, and so the state plan could not ensure harmony between production and consumption, and its conception as law (with full legislative force) was therefore entirely “unreasonable.” Milan Matějka, “Pochyby o kvalitě projektu přestavby,” Hospodářské noviny 32, no. 43 (1988): 4. 33   Full employment was interpreted as problematic because it was being abused in the cause of complacency and comfort: “We can then speak of a relaxation of today’s rigorous legislation, 31

32

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1989 the taboo on the infallibility of the party leadership was also broken. Dissatisfaction with its rigid decision-making, incompetence, and inability to accept responsibility for almost anything provided an opening for Miloš Zeman, a recognized forecaster, to vent biting criticisms in an article for Technický magazín (Technical Magazine): “The enthusiastic eulogies to the bright future with which we shall be endowed thanks to the wise and inerrant leadership are disappearing. . . . Often we are discovering with horror that the most ominous risks can emerge precisely as a result of the incompetent . . . decisions of this leadership.”34 The article was a sensation, expressing the wider shared intuition regarding the state of “real existing socialism” (as a “degenerate” system, in which the party leadership took “incompetent decisions,” and bore no responsibility for their consequences), and openness to “a plurality of possible futures” and “permanent confrontation with alternative visions,” articulating hope for the introduction of political pluralism. If we return to the third actor in the elite battles about the form of perestroika, the management of state enterprises seemed to retreat a little from the stage in 1988 and 1989. The Law on State Enterprise and other legislative changes (such as amendments to the Labor Code) provided managers with a relatively wide range of possibilities. In particular, a greater space for economic deployment of profits (including hard-currency profits)35 reorientated managers away from the negotiation of favorable conditions with ministerial and party authorities, and toward practical problems inside enterprises. In fact, a double detachment was at work here. Within government circles, the detachment was related to the fact that there had so far been no relaxation of controls on price movements: in monopoly conditions, the state enterprises would have immediately raised prices and thus started an uncontrollable spiral of inflation. Within party circles the alienation caused by the introduction of workers’ self-government was still a factor;36 moreover, in the newly decentralizing economy, the negotiation of which forces everyone into work activity (see law on parasitism); it is possible to allow a certain minor temporary unemployment of structural character.” However, it remained necessary to avoid mass unemployment. Valtr Komárek, “Ne množství,” 9. On the essential need to accept a market model, see Valtr Komárek, “Volba jen z jedné variant,” Hospodářské noviny 33, no, 19 (1989): 1, 4. 34   Miloš Zeman, “Prognostika a přestavba,” Technický magazín 32, no. 8 (1989): 6–9. Here the ideal of (pluralist) socialism was set up as against inerrancy and lack of control/responsibility. This too helped to make the article enormously influential. 35   See also Law 102/1988 Coll. of June 16, 1988, whereby Law 42/1980 Coll. on economic relations with foreign countries is changed and augmented. 36   In the final wording of the Law on State Enterprise the position of the director was partly strengthened, but the principle of his election (and dismissibility) by the work collective was retained (see NA, f. 1529, Materiály 4. schůze národohospodářské komise ÚV KSČ 23.11.1987, Návrh úprav zákona o podniku: Informace o průběhu veřejné diskuse k návrhu zákona o státním podniku a návrh jeho úprav; viz také Zákon č. 88/1988 Sb. ze dne 14. června 1988 o státním podniku).

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favorable conditions with higher authorities became less important. If we add to this the annoyance among managers at the inability of the highest party circles to make prompt and effective decisions, it is clear that the relationship between them was deeply shaken. The interests and ideas of the different elite groups were evidently diverging. In the last years of the dictatorship, the Communist Party found itself in a situation in which its members and leadership were unable to articulate any feelings about the dynamics of perestroika other than uncertainty, “disappointment,” and regret at the “lack of preparation.” By contrast, the economic experts were voicing ever sharper criticism of the state-socialist economy and losing their inhibitions about criticizing either the managerial elites for their particularism or the party circles for their incompetence. Managers were becoming absorbed in their own local interests, showing growing distrust for the other two groups of actors and a readiness to defend their own economic interests vigorously. It would certainly be wrong to try and explain the collapse of state socialism simply in terms of the disintegration of elite groups.37 The society of the late “normalization” period was too differentiated and complex to enable us to regard it as a mere object of manipulation from above. Nonetheless, the disintegration of the communist establishment was an important part of the collapse, because it meant that vigorous concerted action in its own defense was later impossible. The political weakness of the late communist elites did not arise only from the incompetence of particular individuals,38 but had much to do with an inability to communicate and decide even on basic shared values and a shared course of action. In this situation the ideological language started to disintegrate. An internal plurality of value orientations and everyday strategies had not in fact been an obstacle to the process of “normalization,” but precisely what had been effectively “normalized.” Their transposition into a highly formalized ideological language   To identify this ideological transformation in the wider strata of Czechoslovak society (the sudden popularity of heretofore ignored or despised dissidents, enthusiasm for market principles and later for private ownership, and so on), we would have to follow other group constellations in parallel with the study outlined above: to analyze other social groups of “normalization”-era society and show who, in the last years of the dictatorship, was ceasing to cooperate effectively and ground their claims for recognition using the official vocabulary. I have tried to do this in my book Michal Pullmann, Konec experimentu: Přestavba a pád komunismu v Československu (Prague: Scriptorium, 2011). 38   Jiří Suk has pointed out that although the representatives of dissent were even less strategically capable than the people around Prime Minister Ladislav Adamec in the later negotiations in November and December 1989, they managed to push through most of their demands. See Jiří Suk, Labyrintem revoluce: Aktéři, zápletky a křižovatky jedné politické krize (od listopadu 1989 do června 1990) (Prague: Prostor, 2003), 118–54. 37

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had for many years neutralized the potentially destabilizing effects of this internal plurality and created at least the illusion of a consensus within which markedly heterogeneous interests could be formulated. All this could work, however, only on the crucial condition that nobody should ask what socialism actually was, why it was desirable, what the alliance with the Soviet Union meant, and so forth. A seismic shift occurred when these questions started to be publicly formulated. As soon as this happened, it became all too clear that there was no fixed content behind the reproduction of formal conformity by the official vocabulary: that socialism was not a substantial project for social change, but an intuitive idea of justice and a symbol for the achievement of consensus. As well as the former establishment, other groupings also began to take a sudden interest in alternative conceptions through which it might be possible to support a plurality of all kinds of interests, whether work ambitions, personal consumer preferences, entrepreneurial interests, and so on. This was one reason why there could eventually be so smooth a change of ideological code, confirming the intellectual weakness of the former establishment, which for the most part just moved over to a liberal or nationalist ideological coding without any serious difficulties of articulation. In this context, the three elite groups that we have considered each took a rather different route. The economic experts tried to establish themselves as authors of the economic reform (even though most of them were soon to be pushed into the background by their younger and more radical colleagues); the highest party circles turned inward and became absorbed in their feelings of injury and nostalgia; and the managerial elites (directors of state enterprises) worked hard on privatizing state property (often for themselves). At this point new elite ties and coalitions were forming.39 Their ideological cornerstones were no longer “socialism” or “planning” but categories that permitted a firmer grounding of effective cooperation and new hierarchies of decision-making. These were the “market,” “fairness,” and “democracy.”

  See also Miroslav Vaněk, Velvet Revolutions: An Oral History of Czech Society (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016).

39

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Selected bibliography

Bren, Paulina. The Greengrocer and his TV. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2010. Brown, Archie. Seven Years that Changed the World: Perestroika in Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007. McDermott, Kevin. Communist Czechoslovakia, 1945–1989: A Political and Social History. London: Palgrave, 2015. Myant, Martin. The Czechoslovak Economy, 1948–1988: The Battle for Economic Reform. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. Otáhal, Milan. “První fáze opozice proti takzvané normalizaci.” In Dvě desetiletí před listopadem: Sborník, edited by Emanuel Mandler, 11–33. Prague: Maxdorf, 1993. Pullmann, Michal. Konec experimentu: Přestavba a pád komunismu v Československu. Prague: Scriptorium, 2011. Sedlářová, Anna, ed. Ke zdokonalení soustavy plánovitého řízení národního hospodářství: Sborník dokumentů a materiálů ke zdokonalení soustavy plánovitého hospodářství po r. 1980. Prague: Práce, 1980. Suk, Jiří. Labyrintem revoluce: Aktéři, zápletky a křižovatky jedné politické krize (od listopadu 1989 do června 1990). Prague: Prostor, 2003. Šulc, Zdislav. Psáno inkognito: Doba v zrcadle samizdatu 1968–1989. Prague: Ústav pro soudobé dějiny AV ČR, 2000. Vaněk, Miroslav. Velvet Revolutions: An Oral History of Czech Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. White, Stephen. After Gorbachev. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. Wolchik, Sharon. Czechoslovakia in Transition: Politics, Economics, and Society. London: Pinter, 1991. Yurchak, Alexei. Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006.

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PART THREE

EVERYDAY SOCIAL PRACTICES AND SINNWELT

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CHAPTER SIX

Local Self-Governance, Voluntary Practices, and the Sinnwelt of Socialist Velenje Ana Kladnik

In 1994, Velenje municipality in the Šaleška valley in northern Slovenia celebrated its Municipal Day on October 8—a date chosen to remember the first partisan attack that took place in 1941, on the occupied town of Šoštanj— for the last time. In that same month the Republic of Slovenia carried out wide-reaching reforms of local self-governance. Sixty-two municipalities in Slovenia, established after 1955 within the communal system of Yugoslav self-management, ceased to operate and instead 147 new municipalities were established. Following the administrative reform, Velenje municipality was divided into three new municipalities, named after their seats: Šmartno ob Paki, Šoštanj, and Velenje. The three municipalities began to celebrate their Municipal Days on new dates. Šmartno ob Paki municipality, named after Saint Martin, chose November 11 or Saint Martin’s Day. Šoštanj municipality decided to celebrate on September 30, the day in 1436 when Frederick, the Count of Celje, granted Šoštanj market rights.1 The new city-municipality of Velenje also decided to choose a new Municipal Day. The municipal council decided that this would be September 20, the day—according to the council—when Velenje was proclaimed as a town in 1959.2 This decision, however, did not take place without disagreement, nor was this explanation unproblematic. Although Velenje had indeed experienced exponential growth as one of the main Yugoslav industrial centers from the 1950s, the first mention of Velenje market dates back to 1264, the foundation stone of Novo [New] Velenje was laid on May 1, 1946,3   Šoštanj was granted town rights in 1911 and is thus the oldest town in the Šaleška valley. Tone Ravnikar, “Nov Občinski praznik v Šoštanju,” Naš čas, September 28, 1995, 11; “Občina Šoštanj,” last modified July 15, 2020, https://www.sostanj.si/objave/175. 2   “Občina Velenje bo praznovala 20. Septembra,” Naš čas, September 28, 1995, 2. 3   Jože Hudales, Življenje v novem mestu: Velenje in njegove urbane identitete 1945–1960 (Ljubljana: Znanstvena založba Filozofske fakultete, 2015), 60. 1

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and in 1952 the new town received the status of a city municipality.4 A few years later, in 1959, contrary to what the municipal council claimed in 1994, the town was not (again) proclaimed as a town, but instead declared the grand opening of its new town center on September 20. This introduction raises the question of why the majority of the commission members in 1994 found the opening of the new center in 1959 a more suitable choice as a new municipal day, than the seemingly more appropriate date when Velenje was granted town status. In the thirteen years from the beginning of the construction of Novo Velenje in 1946 until the opening of the new Velenje town center in 1959, Yugoslavia— and Slovenia as one of its six republics—pursued its departure from the Soviet model of socialism. After being expelled from the Cominform in 1948, Yugoslav leaders started to build the new country’s identity on the Marxist notion of the withering away of the state.5 The main ideas were to decentralize the state, to give the administration of the enterprises to the workers, and to introduce socialized ownership. In 1950, the first Law on Self-Management, known also as the Law on Workers’ Committees, was imposed. Not stopping at introducing the new system in the enterprises, in 1955 Yugoslavia introduced the so-called communal system, according to which the process of decentralization, the legal competences of municipalities, and their financial independence all increased.6 Research on Yugoslav self-management has broadly focused on the development of workers’ self-management in the enterprises, alongside the integration of the Yugoslav pro-market oriented economy into the world market and its consequences.7 However, not much attention has been paid to the practices   1952 Act on the Division of the People’s Republic of Slovenia into Towns, Districts, and Municipalities. See Stane Vlaj, “Občine,” in Enciklopedija Slovenije, ed. Marjan Javornik et al., vol. 8, Nos–Pli (Ljubljana: Mladinska knjiga, 1994), 290; Damijan Kljajič, “Velenje po letu 1945,” in Velenje: Razprave o zgodovini mesta in okolice, ed. Danijela Brišnik et al. (Velenje: Mestna občina, 1999), 363; Božo Grafenauer, Lokalna samouprava na Slovenskem (Maribor: Univerza v Mariboru, 2000), 285. 5   See Dejan Jović, Yugoslavia: A State that Withered Away (West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2009), 1–12; Mateja Režek, Med resničnostjo in iluzijo: Slovenska in jugoslovanska politika v desetletju po sporu z Informbirojem (1948–1958) (Ljubljana: Modrijan, 2005). 6   Grafenauer, Lokalna samouprava na Slovenskem, 300. 7   For instance, Aleksander Jakir, “Workers’ Self-Management in Tito’s Yugoslavia Revisited,” Mitteilungsblatt des Instituts für soziale Bewegung 33 (2005): 137–55; Johanna Bockman, Markets in the Name of Socialism (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011); Jurij Fikfak and Jože Prinčič, eds., Biti direktor v času socijalizma: med idejami i praksami (Ljubljana: Založba ZRC, 2008); Igor Stanić, “Što pokazuje praksa? Presjek samoupravljanja u brodogradilištu Uljanik 1961–1968. Godine,” Časopis za suvremenu povijest 46 (2014): 453–74; Chiara Bonfiglioli, Women and Industry in the Balkans: The Rise and Fall of the Yugoslav Textile Sector (London: I. B. Tauris, 2019); Rory Archer and Goran Musić, “When Workers’ Self-Management Met Neoliberalism: Positive Perceptions of Market Reforms among Blue-Collar Workers in Late Yugoslav Socialism,” in Labor in State-Socialist Europe after 1945: Contribution to a 4

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of Yugoslav self-management at the level of local self-governance in the municipalities and local communities.8 In this chapter I investigate the ways in which the Yugoslav communal system enabled the rapid development of the town of Velenje and Velenje municipality. I argue that the increased decisionmaking abilities of local authorities and residents fostered voluntary practices and values such as solidarity, trust, and the feeling of belonging to a local community. This represented the space, or Sinnwelt, where the residents, as Pavel Kolář and Michal Kopeček state in the foreword to this volume, “daily constructed the meaning of the existing social order and its ‘legitimacy’ was repeatedly reestablished by everyday transactions.”9 From the late 1950s, Velenje developed from a market town with a small mining colony to a modern new town and one of the biggest industrial centers in the country. Firstly, I compare the development, decision-making, and participatory practices of new and industrial towns in early postwar East Central Europe and Slovenia with the changes following the introduction of workers’ self-management and the communal system in Velenje in the 1950s. Secondly, I shed light on how residents engaged in local politics in the Velenje municipality, after the 1974 constitution introduced further provisions on the realization of self-management in smaller administrative units such as local communities. Thirdly, I concentrate on the different types of local communities—urban and rural, old and new—and investigate the levels of social capital (social networks) and participation.10 Finally, I discuss the circumstances why self-management lost its significance in meeting the demands of the local residents in the late 1980s.

History of Work, ed. Marsha Siefert (Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2020), 395–418. 8   An important contribution has been made by the project Microstructures of Yugoslav Socialism: Croatia 1970–1990 (Microsocialism), run by the Centre for Cultural and Historical Research of Socialism (CKPIS), Juraj Dobrila University of Pula, principal investigator Igor Duda, “Microstructures of Yugoslav Socialism: Croatia 1970–1990 (Microsocialism),” last modified July 15, 2020, https://www.unipu.hr/ckpis/en/projects/microsocialism. 9   See Pavel Kolář and Michal Kopeček, “Foreword,” in this volume. 10   Vesna Leskošek and Srečo Dragoš, “Community and Social Capital in Slovenia—the Impact of Transition,” European Journal of Social Work 7, no. 1 (2004): 73–88; Erik van Marissing, Gideon Bolt, and Ronald van Kempen, “Urban governance and social cohesion: Effects of urban restructuring policies in two Dutch cities,” Cities 23, no. 4 (2006): 279–90; Karien Dekker, “Social Capital, Neighbourhood Attachment and Participation in Distressed Urban Areas: A Case Study in The Hague and Utrecht, the Netherlands,” Housing Studies 22, no. 3 (2007): 355–79; Karien Dekker and Ronald van Kempen, “Places and Participation: Comparing Residents Participation in Post-WWII Neighbourhoods in Northwest, Central and Southern Europe,” Journal of Urban Affairs 30, no. 1 (2008): 63–86.

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Postwar reconstruction and building new towns About sixty new towns were built in East Central Europe after the Second World War.11 Many of them grew as part of the reconstruction effort after wartime devastation, or they solidified the new postwar borders, as in the case of the new towns along the East German–Polish border. While some new towns functioned as workers’ settlements at steel plants, others served as socialist showcases. Former Stalin-cities like Stalinstadt (Eisenhüttenstadt) in East Ger-many, Sztálinváros (Dunaújváros) in Hungary, or Nowa Huta in Poland were created by the state to demonstrate the power of the new regime. However, as Rosemary Wakeman points out, the new towns were also “built by the people themselves, organized into the youthful work brigades that were an omnipresent feature of the reconstruction years.”12 The youth work brigades and building new towns In Yugoslavia, youth work brigades played a special role, particularly during the years of postwar reconstruction.13 Youth from different parts of the country worked together on important projects, including the railways in Bosnia and Herzegovina, highways connecting the republics, and parts of New Belgrade. Youth work brigades would play a large role in the socialization of those involved. Upon their return, the participants benefitted from some advantages in their daily lives: when enrolling in studies, finding a room in a dormitory, or seeking employment.14 The youth work campaigns were most numerous in the initial postwar period, but were also organized to a lesser extent at the local level in the 1970s and 1980s. By 1982, more than two million volunteers had participated in them and performed over eighty million volunteer hours.15   Rosemary Wakeman, Practicing Utopia: An Intellectual History of the New Town Movement (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2016), 66. 12   Ibid., 72. See also Katherine Lebow, “Public Works, Private Lives: Youth Brigades in Nowa Huta in the 1950s,” Contemporary European History 10, no. 2 (2001): 199–219. 13   See Reana Senjković, Svaki dan pobjeda: Kultura omladinskih radnih akcija (Zagreb: Srednja Europa, 2016); Nikola Baković, “‘No One Here is Afraid of Blisters or Work!’ Social Integration, Mobilization and Cooperation in Yugoslav Youth Brigades: The Example of Čačak Region Brigades (1946–1952),” Hungarian Historical Review 4, no. 1 (2015): 29–55; Andrea Matošević, “Omladinske radne akcije: Kontinuiteti i odmaci iz iskustva akcijaša,” Traditiones 44, no. 3 (2015): 93–111; Dragan Popović, “Youth Labor Action (Omladinska radna akcija, ORA) as Ideological Holiday-Making,” in Yugoslavia’s Sunny Side: A History of Tourism in Socialism (1950s–1980s), ed. Hannes Grandits and Karin Taylor (Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2010), 279–302. 14   Jože Prinčič and Božo Repe, “Mi gradimo progo, proga gradi nas,” Slovenska kronika XX. stoletja, 1941–1995, ed. Bojan Balkovec et al. (Ljubljana: Nova revija, 1996), 153–54. 15   Viljem Pšeničny, “Mladinska delovna akcija,” Enciklopedija Slovenije, ed. Marjan Javornik et al., vol. 7, Marin–Nor (Ljubljana: Mladinska knjiga 1993), 170–71. 11

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However, according to economic historian Jože Prinčič, the authorities were aware that the costs of organizing mass working actions were much higher than the actual economic effect.16 In postwar Yugoslavia, the construction of the first new town, Nova Gorica (New Gorica), began in 1947 on the Slovene–Italian border, after the decision was taken at the Paris Peace Conference to incorporate most of the Sloveneinhabited Gorica province into Yugoslavia and leave the town of Gorica (Gorizia) in Italy. The construction of Nova Gorica was funded by both federal and republican reserves. The then Slovenian Minister for Construction, Ivan Maček-Matija, remembered that the “Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia in Belgrade took the decision to build Nova Gorica, to be financed by the Federation. Miha Marinko [then Slovenian Prime Minister] attended this meeting and afterwards appointed me to be in charge of building Nova Gorica.”17 Historian Branko Marušič notes that the construction of a new town was part of the investment programs of both the Slovenian republic and of the federal state, although the share it constituted of both was not precisely defined.18 The plan for the new town was made by architect Professor Edvard Ravnikar, who referred to Le Corbusier’s planning ideas which imagined the design of the town as if under the sky of Provence.19 The ambitious project, however, could not be realized without the mobilization of the youth work brigades, which became the main driving force of the new town’s construction. Between 1947 and 1950, thirty youth working brigades and around 6,000 brigadiers worked on the construction of Nova Gorica, around two-thirds of them from Slovenia and the rest from other Yugoslav republics.20 After the youth brigades left, the so-called front brigades, volunteers from the nearby villages, were organized to work on the construction. In 1951, after Yugoslavia was expelled from Cominform, financial problems arose, and in the following years federal and republican grants dried up. Nova Gorica   Jože Prinčič, Slovensko gospodarstvo v drugi Jugoslaviji (Ljubljana: Modrijan, 1997), 39.   Conversation with Ivan Maček-Matija, undated, in Mesto na travniku: Videoesej o Novi Gorici, directed by Anja Medved and Nadja Velušček (Nova Gorica: Zavod Kinoatelje 2004), DVD, 10’30”–11’10”. 18 Branko Marušič, “Mesto, ki bo sijalo prek meje,” Delo, July 21, 2017, accessed July 15, 2020, https://www.delo.si/sobotna/mesto-ki-bo-sijalo-prek-meje.html. See also Jože Ivanc, “Spomini na začetke gradnje Nove Gorice,” in V spomin in zahvalo graditeljem Nove Gorice, ed. Oton Mozetič et al. (Nova Gorica: Krajevna skupnost Nova Gorica, 2008), 4. 19   Vinko Torkar, “Ravnikar’s Nova Gorica,” in Hommage à Edvard Ravnikar, 1907–1993, ed. France Ivanšek et al. (Ljubljana: France in Marta Ivanšek, 1995), 372. 20   See Ivanc, “Spomini na začetke gradnje Nove Gorice,” 4; Pšeničny, “Mladinska delovna akcija,” 171; Jure Ramšak, Ab initio: Moderne ideologije in izgradnja novega urbanega prostora; zgodovina, arhitektura in perspective kulturnega turizma v Novi Gorici in Raši (Koper: Annales, 2015), 82–91. 16

17

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was only half-constructed and economically very weak. As it was impossible to continue with the work according to the initial plan, suggestions for a new plan were made by the local authorities according to their preferences.21 The new industrial towns Between 1947 and 1951, during the first Five-Year Plan in Yugoslavia, the development of industries of federal importance was prioritized, such as electricity, coal, and other raw materials. Special attention was given to the construction of industrial facilities and housing.22 In 1947, the construction of an aluminum factory in Strnišče, near Ptuj in eastern Slovenia, began. During the Second World War, the Germans had started to build a factory and a prisoner camp with barracks for 5,000 people. After the war, the camp was first managed by the Department for People’s Protection (OZNA), while later the Republican Ministry of Industry and Mining approved further development of the factory.23 Different plans for a residential area alongside the factory were also made. The first plan was supposed to imitate a Soviet “socialist commune,”24 while the plan made in 1950 by Ravnikar tried to imitate the Scandinavian model which was, according to Ravnikar, more sensitive to topographical conditions. The concomitant construction problems of Nova Gorica led Ravnikar to think that instead of building a big town, a more effective use of technology should be made: “The idea of a new town with 10,000 inhabitants is at first glance indeed more convenient, but its realization is more difficult and expensive. A possible solution would be decentralization and a railway connection between Strnišče and Ptuj. This way, the concern for housing would become instead of a state concern, a local and individual one.”25 By 1954, apartment buildings for about 1,000 employees of the factory were bult in Kidričevo, as the town had been renamed, after the first postwar president of the Slovenian government and Federal Minister of Industry Boris Kidrič.26

  Torkar, “Ravnikar’s Nova Gorica.”   Jože Prinčič, Kapitalna, ključna kapitalna in temeljna investicijska izgradnja v Sloveniji, 1945– 1956 (Novo mesto: Dolenjska založba, 1992). 23   “Kidričevo—zgodovina tovarne v fotografovih očeh,” Sledi časa, RTV 4D, last modified July 15, 2020, https://4d.rtvslo.si/arhiv/sledi-casa/135176878. 24   Nataša Koselj, “Arhitekt Danilo Fürst: Oris življenja in dela,” Revija SRP (svoboda, resnica, pogum), no. 21/22 (1997): 149–68. 25   France Ivanšek, ed., Referati članov arhitekturne sekcije Društva inženirjev in tehnikov LRS na 1. posvetovanju arhitektov FLRJ v Dubrovniku (Ljubljana: Arhitekturna sekcija inženirjev in tehnikov LR Slovenija, 1950), 10–16. 26   Mirko Pak and Lojze Penič, “Kidričevo,” in Enciklopedija Slovenije, ed. Marjan Javornik et. al., vol. 5, Kari–Krei (Ljubljana: Mladinska knjiga, 1991), 64. 21 22

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While in the early postwar years new industrial towns and settlements were planned and constructed, the living situation of workers in Slovenia’s traditional prewar industrial areas hardly changed. In the oldest Slovene industrial area, Zasavje, where coal mining dates back to the early nineteenth century, workers’ lives in the area’s three centers, Trbovlje, Hrastnik, and Zagorje ob Savi, remained similar to before the war, with major changes occurring only in the 1960s.27 After the war, the need for new labor was great, but the housing stock was mainly administered by the companies themselves, which still continued to build housing colonies. The construction reflected the prewar ways of joint work and private life: all the new mining blocks had common laundries and the apartments had little gardens.28 In the early 1950s, Slovenian authorities were still convinced that the colonies were the most suitable living arrangement for the miners. According to the aforementioned Minister for Construction MačekMatija, miners could live in temporary arrangements and colonies, which were, he argued, most suitable for them.29 The postwar federal government decided that the Velenje Coalmine Company, comprising around 500 workers, should increase its production of lignite. At that time, Velenje was a settlement of around 600 inhabitants beneath the Velenje castle, with the coal miners accommodated in a mining colony named Pesje, situated between Velenje and Šoštanj, at that time the oldest and biggest town in the Šaleška valley. In 1946, in order to accommodate the new incoming workers, the Velenje Coalmine Company started to build a new settlement, Novo Velenje (New Velenje). A foundation stone near the shaft was laid on May 1, 1946, when ten- and four-apartment buildings were constructed. The modest ceremony was attended by the coal miners, representatives of the Coalmine Company, Local People’s Committee members, and Velenje residents.30 In 1948, a republican urban plan for Velenje was made by architect Viljem Strmecki. From his plan, which remained in force until 1955, Novo Velenje continued to exist only as a miners’ residential settlement.31 In 1948, the Federal Ministry for Labor financed nine barracks to accommodate workers returning from abroad. However, a large part of the construction was done by the Velenje miners, who worked on the site voluntarily after their regular working hours in the mine, while the Coalmine Company helped ensure the supply of building materials.   Miran Kalšek, “Čas po II. svetovni vojni—čas socializma,” in Srečno… Črne doline, ed. Nevenka Hacin et al. (Trbovlje: Zasavski muzej, 2001), 162–68. 28   Ibid., 162–68. 29   Nestl Žgank et al., Spomini “rdečega kralja” (Ljubljana: Karantanija, 1999), 200. 30   Hudales, Življenje v novem mestu, 61–62. 31   Alenka Di Battista, “Nova odkritja pri raziskovanju Ravnikarjeve Nove Gorice in Trenzevega Velenja,” Zbornik za umetnostno zgodovino (Nova vrsta), no. 47 (2011): 322–40. 27

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The company, for example, supported building the so-called “provisories” (provizoriji). Between 1947 and 1948, there was one of the biggest voluntary actions in Novo Velenje, which included building a cultural-educational house and cinema.32 By 1954, a sports stadium, a school, and a children’s playground had also been built with the help of voluntary work.33 Unlike the acclaimed construction of Nova Gorica, the construction of Novo Velenje was from the beginning more or less a local matter. In comparison with some other people’s democracies, the housing provided for the miners in Slovenia, at least in the first postwar years, was rather modest. For example, Czechoslovakia, a country with a strong industrial and architectural tradition, continued to innovate workers’ housing after the war,34 when new towns named after the miners, like Havířov or Miners’ Town, were built.

New towns and Yugoslav workers’ self-management Recent studies show how ordinary people in new socialist towns accommodated to Stalinist policies and what remained after the experience with Stalinist ideology and practice.35 From the mid-1950s, planning and building depended on scientific-technocratic vision; new towns like Hoyerswerda or Halle-Neustadt in East Germany were to showcase the planning and technological skills of the new socialist society.36 How the Stalinist style of government was replaced by the technocratic rationality of expert and economic elites is also illustrated in Matěj Spurný’s contribution to this volume looking at the town of Most in Czechoslovakia.37 What shifts in governance at the local level took place in 1950s Yugoslavia, which had already begun searching for an alternative model of socialism?   See Kljajič, “Velenje po letu 1945,” 378–79; Hudales, Življenje v novem mestu, 62–63; Janja Jedlovčnik, Mi gradimo nov svet in novo pomlad: prostovoljne delovne akcije v Velenju in okolici (Velenje: Muzej Velenje, 2014). 33   Hudales, Življenje v novem mestu, 63. 34   Ana Kladnik, “Happy Living in a New Socialist Town: The Construction, Distribution, Management, and Inhabitation of Apartments in Post-War Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia,” in Urban Planning and the Pursuit of Happiness: European Variations on a Universal Theme (18th–21st Centuries), ed. Arnold Bartetzky and Marc Schalenberg, 116–27 (Berlin: Jovis, 2009); Kimberly Elman Zarecor, Manufacturing a Socialist Modernity: Housing in Czechoslovakia, 1945–1960 (Pittsburgh: Pittsburgh University Press, 2011). 35   Sándor Horváth, Stalinism Reloaded: Everyday Life in Stalin-City, Hungary (Bloomington: Indiana University Press), 6–7; Katherine Lebow, Unfinished Utopia: Nowa Huta, Stalinism, and Polish Society, 1949–56 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2013), 4. 36   Wakeman, Practicing Utopia, 193. 37   Matěj Spurný, “Problems with Progress in Late Socialist Czechoslovakia: The Example of Most, North Bohemia,” in this volume. 32

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After 1948, the Yugoslav Communist leadership was in search for an adequate ideology, inspired in part by the Paris Commune of 1871 and Marx’s idea of the withering away of the state and the free association of producers. The main idea was to decentralize the state, to hand the administration of the enterprises to the workers, and to introduce social property. According to the new Law on Self-Management, the Workers’ Committees became the bodies of workers’ self-management, elected by the workers of the company and the Management Board, itself elected by the Workers’ Council. The business was conducted by the director of the company, who was appointed by a higher economic association or a state body, while the Workers’ Committees and the Management Board of the company could suggest a director’s replacement.38 Not stopping at introducing the new system only in the enterprises, Yugoslavia also undertook reforms in its territorial administration. The aim was to connect the activities of working organizations with their local environment. With the regulations from 1952, for example, the district (okraj) became the center of decision-making about public concerns, especially on economic and social development.39 By 1953, People’s Committees were identified as bodies of self-governance and gained independence in the management of local economic, social, and cultural policies. They could independently confirm the budget and use part of the income that the economic bodies submitted to the municipality or town, had the right to a percentage of taxes, and the right to introduce a special local contribution.40 In 1955 Yugoslavia introduced the socalled communal system, according to which the process of decentralization, the financial independence of municipalities, and their legal competences increased. The total number of municipalities decreased, so that bigger municipalities would be economically more stable and autonomous.41 Before the reform, for example, the Šaleška valley had seven municipalities, Šoštanj being the biggest; after 1955, all municipalities were consolidated into a singular Šoštanj municipality, which was part of the Celje district.42 The main creator of the new policy was Edvard Kardelj, one of the most influential members of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia—or the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, as the party renamed itself in 1952—who in his works discussed the problems of socialism, democracy, and socialist democracy,

  Režek, Med resničnostjo in iluzijo, 32–33.   Grafenauer, Lokalna samouprava na Slovenskem, 300. 40   Ibid., 275–94. 41   Janez Šmidovnik, Koncepcija jugoslovanske občine (Ljubljana: Uradni list, 1970), 147. 42   Statistični letopis LRS (Ljubljana: Zavod za statistiko LRS, 1955), 408–10. 38 39

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and how to implement it in practice.43 The next section looks at how the new system influenced the further urban development of Velenje. One million voluntary hours for building a new town After the Law on Workers’ Committees was imposed, the first Workers’ Committee of the Velenje Coalmine Company was established in September 1950. Three months later, in December 1950, the former Deputy Director of the Slovenian Directorate for Coal, Nestl Žgank, became the new director of Velenje Coalmine Company.44 He did not come to Velenje voluntarily. In Ljubljana, he had been blamed for being too authoritarian at party meetings, as well as anonymously accused of being a Cominformist and a careerist.45 In Velenje, Žgank presented himself as a disciplined, modest man, whose only concern was to increase production and provide better conditions for the workers. As a director in the newly established system of workers’ self-management, he was given greater power and decision-making competences. By 1955, when the communal system was introduced, Žgank and the Coalmine Company already had a lot of power and decision-making possibilities at the local level. Two out of seven elected members of the Velenje Town Committee became highranking heads of administration at the Velenje Coalmine Company, namely director Žgank and the company’s chief technical manager. Combining leading positions within both the company’s and the town’s administration, Žgank was able to influence the further construction of the town. With the dictum “I did not fight with the partisans so that new houses could be built that look exactly like the old ones,” Žgank rejected the construction of Novo Velenje according to the republican plan, as it looked too similar to traditional miners’ colonies, while his vision was a modern new town. After the republican Economic Committee planned an increase in the production of lignite at the Velenje Coalmine Company from one to three million tonnes per year in 1954, no sufficient plans were made to accommodate the new workers. In 1955 a meeting was held at the Celje District People’s Committee, where a suggestion was made to build a new economic and cultural center for 30,000 people.46 The next year, at a meeting of the Velenje Coalmine   See, for instance, Edvard Kardelj, Socijalistička demokratija u jugoslovenskoj praksi (Belgrade: Kultura, 1954); Edvard Kardelj, Stane Kavčič, and Vladimir Krivic, Ob novi ureditvi okrajev in občin: Ob formiranju komun v Sloveniji (Ljubljana: Cankarjeva založba, 1955); Edvard Kardelj, Democracy and Socialism (London: Summerfield Press, 1978). 44   Anton Seher, Zgodovina premogovnika Velenje (Velenje: Premogovnik Velenje, 1950). 45   Archives of the Republic of Slovenia (SI AS), 1589/III, Centralni komite Zveze komunistov Slovenije, a.e.707-727, t.e. 29. Problematika na ministrstvu za rudarstvo LRS, 15.4.1950. 46   Zgodovinski arhiv Celje (Historical archive Celje, ZAC), fond 180, ObLO Šoštanj-Velenje, t.e. 278. 43

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Company, a decision was reached to prepare a new General Plan for Velenje, which was approved by the Municipality of Šoštanj.47 However, this new plan was realized with Žgank’s corrections. The plan indicated a road running through the middle of the center, which Žgank disapproved of, since he wanted a center without any traffic. Žgank asked his family friend, Austrian gardener Paul Filipsky, whom he had met on one of his business trips in the Austrian town of Zeltweg, to design a new plan for the Velenje town center. According to Žgank, Slovenian architects later implemented Filipsky’s plan with a large main square instead of a road in the center.48 Since Žgank was not sure if anyone would try to stop the building of the center according to this unapproved plan, he ordered the terrain to be prepared and the concrete foundations to be poured as soon as possible, that was, according to him, “overnight.”49 Among those few high-ranking leaders who supported the idea of a new center was Franc Leskošek-Luka, who knew Žgank since the Second World War, where they had both been partisans.50 On the local level, the plan for Velenje new town center was approved; but who would finance the construction, and how? Most of the financing was undertaken by the Velenje Coalmine Company. The increased production and competences of the enterprises in their decision-making enabled the company to invest and direct the money into the construction of a new town built on the company’s “own account.” This was a great financial burden on the Velenje Coalmine Company. The local authorities made a decision to initiate voluntary work, where the town’s inhabitants and workers would help to build a new center. Director Žgank remembered: “As we could not get enough money from republican or federal funds, we did a lot of work voluntarily.”51 In the rest of the country, voluntary actions had declined in popularity, but the voluntary work had only just begun in Velenje. In September 1956, the biggest voluntary initiative began, with the regulation of the flow of the Paka river. The response was massive, with volunteers, locals, and workers after their working hours regulating 270 meters of the riverbed. In 1957, the work continued. In sixty-seven days, 2,653 volunteers, or 70 percent of all the inhabitants of Velenje, regulated 700 meters of the riverbed.52 They also started digging trenches for plumbing and telephone cables, as well as building   ZAC, fond 180, t.e. 22.   Žgank, Spomini “rdečega kralja,” 133. 49   Ibid. 50   Ibid., 195. 51   Ibid., 133. 52   Ivanka Močnik Polenc, “Prostovoljna dejavnost v Novem Velenju,” in Ljudje v novem mestu Velenje, ed. Zdravko Mlinar (Ljubljana: Inštitut za sociologijo in filozofijo, 1965), 325. 47 48

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a new school. In the period up to 1959, volunteers contributed over 550,000 voluntary hours.53 Rudi Železnik, who was a miner in Velenje, remembers: “We worked a lot voluntarily. In the morning we worked in the mine, then came home and quickly ate something and then off to the voluntary action.”54 The organizers of voluntary work campaigns invested a lot of energy in informing the population why these work actions were important and what they would gain from it. Good organization was also ensured during the work campaigns: volunteers were divided into individual groups; before and during the work action, groups had meetings with their group leaders; and working tools were available.55 People joined in voluntary work in order to provide better living conditions for themselves as quickly as possible. Although men and women of different age groups took part in the voluntary campaigns, married men were the most active. The organizers of the campaigns encouraged the most diligent by providing them with housing faster. 56 Železnik recalls: “The number of hours were added together: those who had more hours of voluntary work got an

Figure 6.1. Voluntary work for the river regulation, Velenje, 1956. Source: Museum Velenje.

 Kljajič, “Velenje po letu 1945,” 386.  Milan Marič, “Pripoved kako sem postal velenjski rudar,” YouTube video, 8:23, posted by “clapa100,” September 8, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GuwiR44LJKA. 55   Močnik Polenc, “Prostovoljna dejavnost v Novem Velenju,” 325. 56   Ibid. 53 54

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apartment sooner.”57 To keep the morale of the volunteers high, the volunteer committee organized formal celebrations for the voluntary workers at the end of the season, at which the most diligent and ambitious volunteers received medals. The celebrations were usually followed by festivities with a barbecue and dancing.

Figure 6.2. Festivity at the end of the voluntary work, Velenje, 1959. Source: Museum Velenje.

The opening ceremony of the new center took place on September 20, 1959. More than 20,000 Velenje residents and people from surrounding areas gathered at the opening of the new town center. The only high-ranking leader to attend the opening was Leskošek-Luka, who unveiled a plaque which read: “In celebration of the fortieth anniversary of the KPJ [Communist Party of Yugoslavia], the center of the new Velenje was officially opened on 20.9.1959.”58 Work on the new center continued until 1964, when the number of voluntary hours reached one million. With its 8,400 inhabitants, Velenje became the most populated town in the Šaleška valley and was soon the fifth largest town in Slovenia. In 1962, the seat of the municipality was transferred from Šoštanj to Velenje, and in 1963, a decision was made to rename the Municipality of   Marič, “Pripoved kako sem postal velenjski rudar.”   Velenje Museum, photo collection.

57 58

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Šoštanj the Municipality of Velenje.59 With this move, Velenje formally became the administrative, economic, and cultural center of the Šaleška valley. Building a community through voluntary work Inaugurating workers’ self-management and enabling more decision-making abilities at company and municipality levels provided favorable conditions for the improvement of living and working conditions in Velenje. This also required stubbornness and determination from the local leaders and the involvement of the town’s inhabitants. Voluntary work was not only useful for its economic impact; it also had a major impact on the life of the community. Local authorities were aware of the importance of integrating newcomers and building a community. For this reason, the Velenje Municipality made an agreement with the Institute of Sociology and Philosophy at the University of Ljubljana to investigate activities, informal contacts, and values of the population. The research was carried out by the institute in 1964–65, with the financial and organizational support of the Velenje municipality and the republican Science Fund. The principal investigator of this survey was Zdravko Mlinar, who was just beginning his very successful academic career. He later became an international pioneer of spatial sociology and dedicated himself to the research of local selfgovernance and democratic development. The Encyclopedia Britannica included his 1978 coauthored work with American sociologist Henry Teune, The Developmental Logic of Social Systems, among the fundamental grand theories of social development.60 Mlinar conducted the survey in Velenje together with students from the University of Ljubljana. Methodologically the survey included 544 residents of Novo Velenje, as well as forty-one residents who had moved to Velenje less than nine months ago and fifty-six residents who lived in their family houses. The researchers also conducted interviews with the local authorities.61 The results of the survey were published across 760 pages, including chapters which dealt with social networks among Velenje residents, their activities in voluntary associations, their attachment to the town, and their satisfaction with it. One chapter dealt explicitly with the voluntary work in Novo Velenje and emphasized that voluntary work actions became traditional in Velenje: “Voluntary activity in Velenje is specific compared to other Slovenian towns, with well-organized and efficient voluntary work preserved only here. Volunteer work has a tradition in Velenje that has been uninterrupted since 1945.”62 The research found   Ivo Jamnikar, “Namesto uvoda: Velenje v razvoju,” in Ljudje v novem mestu Velenje, 5.   “Zdravko Mlinar,” Slovenska akademija znanosti in umetnosti, last modified July 15, 2020, https://www.sazu.si/clani/zdravko-mlinar. 61   Mlinar, Ljudje v novem mestu Velenje. 62   Močnik Polenc, “Prostovoljna dejavnost v Novem Velenju,” 303. 59 60

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that volunteer work in Velenje was not only of material importance, but also socially and politically significant. It was a way to accelerate the integration of Velenje residents. The initiators of the voluntary campaigns wanted to involve all residents in the construction of the town in order to ensure they respected social property. According to the researchers, the way people in Velenje behaved showed that, in contrast with other towns in Slovenia, they valued common goods almost as much as their own. From the interviews with the Velenje residents, the researchers found that most of those who took part in the voluntary campaigns were pleased with their work and the fact that they contributed to the construction of their town. They often proudly said: “You see, I also worked here.”63 In this way, according to the study, the residents strongly developed their identification with the community and a sense of personal responsibility for common affairs.64

Town–village solidarity Instead of workers’ self-management, the 1963 constitution of both the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Socialist Republic of Slovenia introduced the so-called societal self-management (družbeno samoupravljanje). A municipality became a constitutional unit of local self-governance, while the local community (krajevna skupnost) was a legal, but not obligatory, entity of the municipality. The 1974 constitution contained further provisions about the realization of self-management, defining it as socialist self-management. Local communities became obligatory units necessary to function as a self-managing community of citizens in town-districts, villages, or groups of villages. The idea of the local communities was to become an essential element of direct democracy, where citizens could solve their everyday needs and provide communal and social activities. The territorial frames of the municipality were intended to allow for the direct participation of citizens in decision-making about joint issues important for the community.65 In 1974 the Socialist Republic of Slovenia, with around 1,800,000 citizens, had sixty municipalities and 1,050 local communities: 9 percent of them were urban, but most of them, 86 percent, were rural and suburban. Seventy-two percent of all local communities had no more than 2,000 citizens; however, the smallest had only sixty and the biggest 15,000 residents.66   Ibid., 344.   Ibid., 352. 65   Grafenauer, Lokalna samouprava, 321. 66   Ibid., 324, 340, 464. 63 64

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Although local youth voluntary work campaigns still appeared in Slovenia and elsewhere in Yugoslavia in the last two decades of state socialism, the new voluntary practice of this period took the form of so-called self-imposed contributions (samoprispevek). They represented supplementary financing of municipal infrastructure and social welfare for which budget funds were not sufficient, as well as for inhabitants’ plans to accelerate the progress of their local community.67 The self-imposed contributions occurred especially after 1965, when wages started to grow faster, allowing inhabitants to help with financial resources rather than manual labor. Initially, self-imposed contributions were regulated by the 1969 Republic Act on Contributions and Taxes of Citizens, while in 1973 the Slovenian Assembly adopted the Self-Imposed Contribution Act.68 The municipality and local communities could introduce a self-imposed contribution only through a referendum in which at least half of the eligible voters approved the introduction of one. Before the referendum, each local community prepared a five-year program detailing what in their community would be financially supported from this fund; for example, a new school, a new road, or telephone cables. If the referendum was successful, it would then be determined how the residents contributed to the fund: for example, those with a personal income from employment contributed 2 percent of net personal income.69 The policy of referenda on important communal issues and on voluntary self-help in Yugoslavian municipalities drew attention to the New Left movement in the West, which advocated for participatory democracy and the central Figure 6.3. Voting ZA (FOR) on the referendum role of the people in determining in one of the local communities in Velenje Munici- decisions that affect their daily pality, 1980. Source: Naš čas, April 18, 1980, 1.

  Marija Cigale, “Samoprispevek,” in Enciklopedija Slovenije, ed. Marjan Javornik et al., vol. 10, Pt–Savn (Ljubljana: Mladinska knjiga, 1996), 378. 68   “Zakon o samoprispevku,” Uradni list SRS, 3/73. 69   Grafenauer, Lokalna samouprava, 321; Cigale, “Samoprispevek,” 378; Marjan Marinšek and Stane Vovk, Solidarno do dosežkov (Velenje: Center za informiranje, propaganda in založništvo Velenje, 1975), pages not numbered. 67

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lives.70 In 1970, Gerry Hunnius pointed out that at the time, the influence of local communities within municipalities in Yugoslavia appeared to be small to moderate, but had the potential to increase.71

Figure 6.4. Referendum in the local community Škale in 1975, held in the fire station. Part of the polling station was occupied by children to show how good it would be in the kindergarten built with money from self-imposed contribution. The inscription on the board reads: “We children want a kindergarten. Daddy, Mommy, you can find me in kindergarten.” Source: Naš čas, April 25, 1975, 3.

In 1969, Žgank, the former director of the Velenje Coalmine Company, was elected president of the Velenje Municipal Assembly (de facto mayor) and remained in this position for two mandates, until 1978. During his term as mayor, the first self-imposed contribution was introduced for a five-year period. The call for the self-imposed contribution was made by the municipality. Each local community in the municipality voted in favor of the introduction of the self-imposed contribution and prepared a program to determine what in their local community should be financed from it. The municipality also prepared a program detailing what should be financed from the self-imposed contribution at the municipal level. From the self-imposed contribution fund, the funding went first to high-priority causes. This way, the funding was organized in solidarity among local communities. The Velenje local authorities sought to   Dimitrios Roussopoulos and C. George Benello, eds., Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy (Montreal: Black Rose Books, 2005), x, xi. 71   Gerry Hunnius, “The Yugoslav System of Decentralization and Self-Management,” in Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy, 145. 70

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develop both urban and rural local communities; accordingly, the first selfcontribution was entitled “For the progress of villages and towns.”72 Between 1970 and 1975, more than 25 percent of the total amount spent on new investments in the Velenje municipality came from the voluntary self-imposed contributions.73 In 1975, at the end of the first self-imposed contribution and before the referendum for the second, the Assembly of the Velenje municipality published a booklet for Velenje residents to review how the funds had been spent and how the program of investments in social and communal activities had been implemented.74 The booklet described in detail which planned objects had been built, the amount of planned and invested funds from the self-imposed contribution, as well as additional investors or voluntary help from local residents. From the first five-year self-imposed contribution and additional voluntary work, nineteen schools or kindergartens were built or renovated, fourteen roads were built or modernized, and ten facilities of general interest (such as public toilets, a fire station, a bus station, shelters, a market, or a swimming pool) were built.75 In 1975, the second self-imposed contribution was voted on in a referendum. As many as 96.1 percent of voters went to eighty-four polling stations, while 76.72 percent of all registered voters cast their ballots in favor of the local self-imposed contribution. This was as much as 10.75 percent more than in the first referendum in 1970. The local newspaper justified why so many voted for the introduction of the new five-year self-imposed contribution with the fact that the first one had accomplished more than planned.76 In the following section, the article discusses how the urban or rural dimension of local communities, as well as their age and community ties, impacted participation in voluntary work and self-imposed contributions of their inhabitants.

Social capital and the local communities In order to investigate how successful the policies of development through voluntary work and self-imposed contributions were, this article investigates the connectedness of inhabitants through the concept of social capital.77 For this   Kljajič, “Velenje po letu 1945,” 387.   “Kaj smo zgradili,” Naš čas, February 21, 1975, 1. 74   Marinšek and Vovk, Solidarno do dosežkov. 75   Ibid. 76   “Politična odločitev o razvoju občine Velenje,” Naš čas, April 25, 1975, 1. 77   Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans. Richard Nice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984); Robert D. Putnam, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2000). 72 73

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purpose, I use the definition of social capital drawn up by Nan Lin, who defines it as a relational value which comes to life and is sustained through interactional networks. For Lin, social capital consists of resources invested in the social structure, which is accessible, or mobilized, through targeted actions.78 I will focus on selected local communities in the Velenje municipality in order to examine how community resources and networks influenced its development. By 1974, the Velenje Municipality had twenty-five local communities. In choosing the local communities for the purpose of this article, two criteria were taken into consideration: first, the inclusion of urban, suburban, and rural local communities; and second, the age of the local communities, both those that had developed before the Second World War and those which emerged in the decades afterward. The information is taken mainly from the weekly local newspaper Naš čas (Our Time) before the introduction of the third and fourth self-imposed contributions in the Velenje Municipality in 1980 and 1985. During this time the journalists of the newspaper visited individual local communities, speaking to their representatives and inhabitants about life in the local community, the extent to which self-management worked, what they gained from the self-contribution, and what plans they had for the future. Among the oldest urban local communities in the Velenje Municipality was Staro Velenje (Old Velenje), which covered the area of the prewar Velenje market underneath the Velenje castle, with around 1,700 inhabitants.79 This local community had an active associational life. One of the oldest and most active associations in the community was the volunteer firefighting department, established in 1897, with 150 members. The fire station represented the center of the community’s social life, with celebrations and exhibitions taking place there. The youth and scouting organizations, as well as the veterans’ association, were also active in the local community, while in 1979, the local branch of the League of Communists had only been founded. Members of the local community council and assembly tried to inform the locals as thoroughly as possible about the self-imposed contribution program. From the self-contribution fund, the local community wanted to pave the road and connect to the hot water network. The community organized special building committees in which the locals were actively involved and voluntarily helped in the constructions. After the work was completed, a celebration and sports games were organized, as well   Ronald S. Burt, Yanjie Bian, Lijun Song, and Nan Lin, eds., Social Capital, Social Support and Stratification: An Analysis of the Sociology of Nan Lin (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2019); Nan Lin, Social Capital: A Theory of Social Structure and Action (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001). 79   “Naše uredništvo na obisku v krajevni skupnosti Staro Velenje,” Naš čas, June 29, 1979, 10, 11. 78

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as a photo exhibition of their voluntary work at the fire station.80 Thanks to the committees and the local inhabitants, the local community again achieved more than planned. The value of the facilities was estimated at seventy million dinars; they collected seventeen million from the locals, thirteen million from the self-imposed contribution, and about twenty million from voluntary work.81 In 1984, for the celebration of the local community’s tenth anniversary, the Staro Velenje local community published a booklet. The functionaries in the local political structures of the community—all of them native “old” Velenians— indicated the importance of voluntary work and the self-imposed contributions for the development of their local community and made an appeal to the Velenje municipal authorities to take better care of “old” Velenje and the town’s traditions.82

Figure 6.5. Installation of public lighting in Staro Velenje, 1980. The electric lighting of one of the roads in the local community was installed with the help of local self-imposed contribution and voluntary work. Source: Naš čas, September 26, 1980, 5.

The suburban local community Pesje, with around 1,200 residents, was one of the oldest settlements in the Velenje Municipality. Before the Second World War, the settlement grew into a mining colony. It had an active associational life both before and after the war: the volunteer firefighting department had seventy-six   “Razstava o udarniškem delu,” Naš čas, January 24, 1985, 2.   “Naše uredništvo na obisku v krajevni skupnosti Staro Velenje,” Naš čas, June 29, 1979, 10, 11; B.Z., “Do cenejšega ogrevanja z udarniškim delom,” Naš čas, August 23, 1984, 4; “Sklenili dela na sekundarnem toplovodnem omrežju,” Naš čas, October 11, 1984, 4; Mkp, “25. januar—krajevni praznik,” Naš čas, January 17, 1985, 3; Mkp, “Praznovali so,” Naš čas, January 31, 1985, 4; Mkp, “Pridite med nas, da se ob delu spoznamo,” Naš čas, April 4, 1985, 4. 82   Krajevna skupnost Staro Velenje (Titovo Velenje: Krajevna skupnost Staro Velenje, 1984). 80 81

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members, there was a choir, a tambourine orchestra, a Red Cross branch, a youth organization, a pensioners’ association, and a veterans’ association. The locals supported the self-imposed contribution at the local assemblies, and they were also willing to work voluntarily. With the help of a self-imposed contribution as well as voluntary work, they got a new gym, a playground, plumbing, and partial heating.83 The two urban local communities which were built between the late 1940s and early 1960s were named Velenje–Center Right Bank (former Novo Velenje) and Velenje–Center Left Bank (the new center). In terms of population size, they were the largest local communities in the municipality: about 8,000 inhabitants lived in the first and around 5,200 in the second. The veterans’ association and, in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the youth association were among the organizations established in both local communities. In the Velenje–Center Left Bank (new center), the numbers in the League of Communists were, in comparison with other local communities, very high, at around 800. In general, residents in both local communities could be divided into those who volunteered to help build the town and those who settled in the local community after it was already built. In the local newspaper survey in 1979, Fanika Zaponšek, from Velenje–Center Right Bank (Novo Velenje), said: “We got used to this part of Velenje, we know each other well, sometimes we organize a voluntary work action.”84 Those residents who had helped build the town had become unsatisfied by seeing how the town was being damaged, as Andrej Virant commented: “In the previous years we took care of our environment voluntarily. Today we pay a contribution for someone to take care of it; but it is poorly managed.”85 In the local community of Velenje–Center Left Bank, Štefka Simonišek had a similar opinion: “I have been living in this part for ten years. Our place is nice and actually we lack nothing. However, I remember very fondly the times when we arranged almost everything in the town with volunteer work. At that time we knew each other better, and we also knew how to appreciate what we did.”86 Due to the dense settlement in these two local communities and the fairly frequent population fluctuation, community cohesion was weakened and the work of self-governing bodies in both communities was hampered. Although officials “Naše uredništvo na obisku v krajevni skupnosti Pesje,” Naš čas, November 16, 1979, 6; T.H., “Zbor krajanov,” Naš čas, January 31, 1985, 4; T.H., “Več o samoprispevku,” Naš čas, February 21, 1985, 6. 84   “Naše uredništvo na obisku v krajevni skupnosti Velenje–Center desni breg,” Naš čas, June 1, 1979, 8–9. 85   “Naše uredništvo na obisku v krajevni skupnosti Velenje–Center levi breg,” Naš čas, May 11, 1979, 6–7. 86   Ibid., 7. 83

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emphasized that citizens were not interested in working in the local community, that there were no quorums, the turnout of locals in the 1980 referendum was nevertheless high. Regarding the redistribution of self-imposed funds on the municipal level, residents of both new urban local communities approved solidarity with other local communities, especially the rural ones.87 One of the least populated local communities in the Velenje municipality was the mountain village of Plešivec, with about 350 inhabitants. It was not until 1963 that the first road led to the village; in addition to a better connection with the valley, the road also enabled younger people to stay on the farm instead of finding work in the town. One of the locals, Dominik Klančnik, commented on this acquisition: “The road has brought us closer to the world and introduced progress to the village.”88 In the village were an active cultural association, veterans’ and youth organizations, and the Red Cross, through which they also collected clothing for the socially disadvantaged and money for aid needed in Africa. In the 1970s, the village began to organize an annual so-called farmers’ festival, as well as a festival of folk ensembles on the nearby Graška mountain, which was attended by 3,000 visitors. With the introduction of the self-imposed contribution, successful development continued in the village. Local council meetings were well-attended. The local community issued a newsletter to inform residents about the plans and what had already been done. With the help of self-imposed contributions, the locals paved the road, installed a telephone network and water supply, and built a new bridge. In addition to the funds from the self-imposed contributions, the locals collected additional funds and organized voluntary work campaigns. For example, in order to pave the road, the local community received 100,000 dinars from self-imposed contributions, 400,000 through voluntary contributions, and 7,000 hours of volunteer work were also done.89 Especially in remote places, self-imposed contributions were a significant factor in the provision of a sufficient number of kindergartens, primary schools, health centers, sports centers, road connections, and telephone networks. However, in the late 1980s the readiness to enact new self-imposed contributions and the solidarity with other local communities began to decline.90 The concluding section sheds light on what contributed to this shift.   “Po dopustih živahneje,” Naš čas, June 28, 1984, 5; Mkp, “Ljudje radi delajo, če dobijo pomoč,” Naš čas, July 26, 1984, 8; B.M., “Znova nesklepčni,” Naš čas, February 14, 1985, 4; “Približati se krajanom, občutiti njihovo dihanje,” Naš čas, March 7, 1985, 6; B. Mugrele, “Priprave na 4. samoprispevek v polnem teku,” Naš čas, March 28, 1985. 88   “Naše uredništvo na obisku v krajevni skupnosti Plešivec,” Naš čas, April 6, 1979, 6–7. 89   Mira Zakošek, “Le s samoprispevkom tudi v prihodnje uspešen razvoj,” Naš čas, March 28, 1985, 4. 90   Cigale, “Samoprispevek,” 378. 87

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“I have no trust in my local community anymore” In the late 1960s, the Velenje Coalmine Company found itself in a crisis while the Gorenje household appliances company became the strongest enterprise in the Velenje municipality, as well as in Yugoslavia as a whole. In the 1970s, the rapid development of the Gorenje company and the recovery of the Coalmine Company welcomed new workers to Velenje. Every year between 1971 and 1981 around 1,200 workers from other Yugoslav republics were employed in the Velenje municipality.91 In order to accommodate the new workers and their families, new residential areas began to be built and new local communities were established. In 1974, the new local community Gorica had around 400 residents; five years later, in 1979, the population rose to 2,500, and in 1985 to 5,200. The local community was given the nickname of a “sleeping settlement,” as, according to the local newspaper, “people who did not know each other settled here, which made the work of the community’s local self-governance particularly difficult.”92 In the early 1980s, another residential settlement for new workers started construction and a new local community, Šalek, was established. However, the construction began to lack financial resources. The primary school urgently needed a gym for its many pupils. The main financial sources should have been provided by the municipality and by the self-imposed contributions, yet they were not sufficient. At the same time, no voluntary work initiative was set up to help with the construction of the gym. It was only at the end of August 1989, just before the beginning of the new school year, when the school managed to acquire enough resources to begin the construction of the gym.93 This episode with the school gym in Velenje’s youngest local community generated a lot of public attention. For example, the then director of the Velenje cultural center, Vlado Vrbič, wrote a letter to the local newspaper under the pseudonym U. Hrast94 and pointed to the construction of the Šalek primary school as an example of administrative procrastination and irrational spending of money. He then wondered if it was really necessary for matters such as road maintenance to be paid out of the self-imposed contribution. In his opinion, the public administration or the state should have maintained roads, facilities, and the like.95   Janko Lukner and Vlado Vrbič, “Delavci iz drugih republik v Rudniku lignite Velenje” (B.A. thesis, University of Ljubljana, 1982), 2. 92   “Naše uredništvo na obisku v krajevni skupnosti Šalek–Gorica,” Naš čas, February 12, 1979, 6–7. 93   Tap, “Začetek graditve telovadnice,” Naš čas, August 31, 1989, 2; “Nared prihodnje šolsko leto,” Naš čas, February 22, 1990, 5. 94   U. Hrast, “Krajani,” Naš čas, April 12, 1990, 5; “Vrbič, Vlado (psevd. U. Hrast),” Šaleški biografski leksikon, last modified February 13, 2020, accessed July 15, 2020, http://www.saleskibiografskileksikon.si/index.php?action=view&tag=578. 95   U. Hrast, “Krajani.” 91

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Many residents expressed distrust that the funds from the self-imposed contribution were well used and distributed. One of them was Cilka Dobnik from the rural local community Lokovica, while Franc Kešpert from the same local community added that with the self-imposed contributions, presidents of the local communities primarily took care of their immediate surroundings.96 Further criticisms of the municipality and the leadership of the local community came from Marinka Obu, of the rural local community Gorenje, who wrote: “Everything we planned, we got rejected. We used our sixty self-imposed contributions [every month for five years] for some less important things.”97 Dissatisfaction with the self-imposed contributions coincided with economic crisis in the country. In Velenje municipality in the early 1980s, the Gorenje company underwent a major crisis. The rehabilitation of the company took place between 1983–91. During this time, the payment of part of the salary as a solidarity contribution to common affairs became far from selfevident. Dissatisfaction with the distribution and use of these funds further led to the self-imposed contributions declining in popularity. When in 1990, a referendum on imposing a new self-imposed contribution took place in the twenty-five local communities in the Velenje municipality, only five local communities decided they wanted to introduce it for all five years. In two local communities, inhabitants voted to extend the self-imposed contribution for one year, while three voted to extend it until the end of 1990.98 In the Velenje municipality, local communities with stronger social capital were able to achieve great successes for their communities by combining the new local governance system and their social networks. It was the praxis of local governance within the system of socialist self-management which enabled the residents of municipalities and of local communities to gain more autonomous decision-making and increased functionality. From their enthusiastic involvement in the new town construction to a more institutionalized form of self-imposed contributions, residents largely formed the social networks of their communities. Using the example of the evolving competences of local government within the system of self-management, this paper has revealed the possibilities the system had in developing and building a new town, a new municipality, and new local communities. It has shown that the system’s existence and efficiency did not rely only on the relationship between rulers and ruled, but foremost on their stubbornness and self-will, on their organizational   Cilka Dobnik, “Javno vprašanje o samoprispevku,” Naš čas, April 12, 1990, 12; Franc Kešpret, “Cestne in druge zdrahe v KS Lokovica,” Naš čas, April 19, 1990, 11. 97   Marinka Obu, “Nimam zaupanja v svojo krajevno skupnost,” Naš čas, April 12, 1990, 11. 98   M.Z., “V nekaterih KS so se v nedeljo odločali o novem samoprispevku,” Naš čas, April 26, 1990, 10; “Krajani Šmartnega ob Paki glasovali ZA samoprispevek,” Naš čas, May 31, 1990, 8. 96

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capacities, social capital, and the civic engagement of local communities. This article has highlighted voluntary practices, which provided meaning and a sense of normality in the local environment. The practice of voluntary work, popular in the state’s formative years, succeeded in building a new living environment and a sense of community in a new town. Later, the constitutionally completed version of local governance enabled residents to participate directly in decisionmaking processes. The functioning of the system depended on similar values and objectives which bound the community together. In the late 1980s, when, together with the economic crisis, the new paradigm of individuality entered a community lacking inner cohesion and a sense of solidarity, the ideological infrastructure started to crumble. None of the local communities that became part of the new Velenje City Municipality in 1994, after the new local self-governance reform was brought in, decided to introduce the fifth self-imposed contribution. Nevertheless, the former voluntary practices were not discarded. In the decision of the new municipal authorities to introduce September 20 as the Municipal Day—in memory of the events in 1959—lay the desire to revive the memory of the time when Velenians together, with their work, contributed to building their town.

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Selected bibliography

Archer, Rory, and Goran Musić. “When Workers’ Self-Management Met Neoliberalism: Positive Perceptions of Market Reforms among Blue-Collar Workers in Late Yugoslav Socialism.” In Labor in State-Socialist Europe after 1945: Contribution to a History of Work, edited by Marsha Siefert, 395–418. Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2020. Baković, Nikola. “‘No One Here is Afraid of Blisters or Work!’ Social Integration, Mobilization and Cooperation in Yugoslav Youth Brigades: The Example of Čačak Region Brigades (1946–1952).” Hungarian Historical Review 4, no. 1 (2015): 29–55. Bockman, Johanna. Markets in the Name of Socialism. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011. Bonfiglioli, Chiara. Women and Industry in the Balkans: The Rise and Fall of the Yugoslav Textile Sector. London: I. B. Tauris, 2019. Bourdieu, Pierre. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984. Burt, Ronald S., Yanjie Bian, Lijun Song, and Nan Lin, eds., Social Capital, Social Support and Stratification: An Analysis of the Sociology of Nan Lin. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2019. Dekker, Karien, and Ronald van Kempen. “Places and Participation: Comparing Residents Participation in Post-WWII Neighbourhoods in Northwest, Central and Southern Europe.” Journal of Urban Affairs 30, no. 1 (2008): 63–86. Di Battista, Alenka. “Nova odkritja pri raziskovanju Ravnikarjeve Nove Gorice in Trenzevega Velenja.” Zbornik za umetnostno zgodovino (Nova vrsta), no. 47 (2011): 322–40. Elman Zarecor, Kimberly. Manufacturing a Socialist Modernity: Housing in Czechoslovakia, 1945–1960. Pittsburgh: Pittsburgh University Press, 2011. Fikfak, Jurij, and Jože Prinčič, eds. Biti direktor v času socijalizma: med idejami i praksami. Ljubljana: Založba ZRC, 2008. Grafenauer, Božo. Lokalna samouprava na Slovenskem. Maribor: Univerza v Mariboru, 2000. Horváth, Sándor. Stalinism Reloaded: Everyday Life in Stalin-City, Hungary. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2017. Hudales, Jože. Življenje v novem mestu: Velenje in njegove urbane identitete 1945–1960. Ljubljana: Znanstvena založba Filozofske fakultete, 2015. Hunnius, Gerry. “The Yugoslav System of Decentralization and Self-Management.” In Participatory Democracy: Prospects for Democratizing Democracy, edited by Dimitrios Roussopoulos and C. George Benello, 127–56. Montreal: Black Rose Books, 2005. Jakir, Aleksander. “Workers’ Self-Management in Tito’s Yugoslavia Revisited.” Mitteilungsblatt des Instituts für soziale Bewegung 33 (2005): 137–55. Jedlovčnik, Janja. Mi gradimo nov svet in novo pomlad: prostovoljne delovne akcije v Velenju in okolici. Velenje: Muzej Velenje, 2014. Jović, Dejan. Yugoslavia: A State that Withered Away. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2009. Kalšek, Miran. “Čas po II. svetovni vojni—čas socializma.” In Srečno… Črne doline, edited by Nevenka Hacin et al., 162–68. Trbovlje: Zasavski muzej, 2001. Kardelj, Edvard. Democracy and Socialism. London: Summerfield Press, 1978. Kardelj Edvard, Stane Kavčič, and Vladimir Krivic. Ob novi ureditvi okrajev in občin: Ob formiranju komun v Sloveniji. Ljubljana: Cankarjeva založba, 1955.

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CHAPTER SEVEN

Modern Housekeeping Worlds; or, How Much is Thirty Percent Really? Eigensinnige Consumer Practices and the Hungarian Trade Union’s “Washing Machine Campaign” of 1957–58 Annina Gagyiova

Introduction The uprising of 1956 touched a delicate nerve in Hungarian society, as large parts of the population questioned the legitimacy of the ruling socialist government. In 1957, at a time of political and social uncertainty, General Secretary János Kádár decided for a change in strategy, having recognized the need to combine the building of socialism with an increase in the standard of living.1 Thus, the massive expansion of heavy industry was scaled down and replaced with a conscious policy of private consumption. In other words, beyond the actual sphere of politics, an increase in consumption was intended to help the population become relatively satisfied with the socialist system. A phase of social consolidation was to follow the shock of 1956. Kádár therefore opted to focus on a social sphere that Winfried Thaa calls “prepolitical” support, one that Martin Sabrow sees as having the potential of developing “political and cultural cohesive forces” beyond coercion and violence.2 After the Stalinist Rákosi era and the uprising of 1956, the Hungarian state party was trying more than ever to find a new and lasting basis of legitimacy for the socialist system. The party did in fact manage to steadily improve the standard of living in Hungary throughout the 1960s and 1970s.3 In the late 1950s there had been a fitful effort to make a consumer economy available to the broad masses,   See Iván T. Berend, Gazdasági útkeresés, 1956–1965 (Budapest: Magvető Kiadó, 1983), 188.   See Winfried Thaa, Die Wiedergeburt des Politischen: Zivilgesellschaft und Legitimitätskonflikt in den Revolutionen von 1989 (Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 1996); Sabrow, Martin. “Sozialismus als Sinnwelt: Diktatorische Herrschaft in kulturhistorischer Perspektive.” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, nos. 40–41 (2007): 16. 3   See Tibor Valuch, Magyar hétköznapok: Fejezetek a mindennapi élet történetéből a második világháborútól az ezredfordulóig (Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 2013) and Sándor Horváth, “Csudapest és a frizsiderszocializmus: a fogyasztás jelentései, a turizmus és a fogyasztáskritika az 1960-as években,” Múltunk 53, no. 3 (2008): 60–83.

1

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with the refrigerator4 and the washing machine promising household relief to the female working population in particular. Before it became the norm in the 1970s to own modern, labor-saving electric appliances, the usefulness of a major appliance like a washing machine was neither common knowledge nor within the material reach of most Hungarians in the 1950s.5 Whereas key works on consumption under socialism put an emphasis on the delegitimizing effect of scarcity, I would like to analyze the Hungarian trade union’s “washing machine campaign” of 1957–58 as an attempt by the state to link the scarcity of a modern household appliance to the self-legitimizing postulate of social justice.6 In this context, the trade union played a mediating   In the literature, Katalin S. Nagy, “Fogyasztás és lakáskultúra Magyarországon a hetvenes években,” Replika, no. 26 (1997): 47–53, was the first to distinguish between “goulash communism” and “refrigerator socialism,” the latter being used to describe the 1970s, when consumer durables like refrigerators, washing machines, and televisions were within the means of almost everyone. The distinction appeared in public discourse as early as 1961–62 in the intellectual literary magazine Új Írás. 5   Unlike Ariane Stihler, I argue that, apart from the social distinction they offered—that is, the prestige attached to owning them—the usefulness of major electric appliances was a key concern of the population and the government. See Ariane Stihler, Die Entstehung des modernen Konsums: Darstellung und Erklärungsansätze (Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 1998), 11. 6   On the relationship between scarcity and the legitimacy of state socialism, see, among others, Ina Merkel, Utopie und Bedürfnis: Die Geschichte der Konsumkultur in der DDR (Cologne: Böhlau, 1999); Jonathan Zatlin, The Currency of Socialism: Money and Political Culture in East Germany (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007); Julie Hessler, A Social History of Soviet Trade: Trade Policy, Retail Practices, and Consumption, 1917–1953 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004); Mark Landsman, Dictatorship and Demand: The Politics of Consumerism in East Germany (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005); Patrice G. Poutrus, Die Erfindung des Goldbroilers: Über den Zusammenhang zwischen Herrschaftssicherung und Konsumentwicklung in der DDR (Cologne: Böhlau, 2002); Philipp Heldmann, Herrschaft, Wirtschaft, Anoraks: Konsumpolitik in der DDR der Sechzigerjahre (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 2004); Tibor Valuch, Magyarország társadalomtörténete a XX. század második felében (Budapest: Osiris Kiadó, 2005). The welcome rise in studies on smuggling activities under socialism is implicitly based on the relationship between scarcity and simultaneous abundance. See, for instance, Wlodzimierz Borodziej, Jerzy Kochanowski, and Joachim von Puttkamer, eds., Schleichwege: Inoffizielle Begegnungen sozialistischer Staatsbürger zwischen 1956 und 1989 (Cologne: Böhlau, 2010); Jerzy Kochanowski, Jenseits der Planwirtschaft: Der Schwarzmarkt in Polen 1944–1989 (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2013); Ferenc Hammer, “A Gasoline Scented Sindbad: The Truck Driver as a Popular Hero in Hungary,” Cultural Studies 16, no. 1 (2002): 80–126; András Lénárt, “‘A szocializmus külföldi útjain’: Idegenvezető visszaemlékezései a szervezett utazásokra,” Múltunk 57, no. 1 (2012): 122–39. Recent publications on consumer culture under state socialism include Natalya Chernyshova, Soviet Consumer Culture in the Brezhnev Era (New York: Routledge, 2013); Paulina Bren and Mary Neuburger, eds., Communism Unwrapped: Consumption in Cold War Eastern Europe (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012); Krisztina Fehérváry, Politics in Color and Concrete: Socialist Materialities and the Middle Class in Hungary (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013); Patrick Hyder Patterson, Bought and Sold: Living and Losing the Good Life in Socialist Yugoslavia (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2011); and Annina Gagyiova, Vom Gulasch zum Kühlschrank: Privater Konsum zwischen Eigensinn und Herrschaftssicherung im sozialistischen Ungarn, 1956–1989 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2020). 4

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role between state policy and the population. The sources studied here illustrate particularly well the negotiating practices engaged in by the population at large. The Eigen-Sinn—willfulness or stubbornness—they brought to bear here provides us, as Thomas Lindenberger writes, with information about a “certain type of interaction (‘domination as a social practice’) and the attendant possibilities of investing and acquiring meaning available to its protagonists.”7 With the help of this theoretical framework, I will use my essay about the washing machine campaign to inquire into 1) the gender perspective, 2) the modernization effect of this campaign, 3) the socialist logic of distribution, and 4) the function of practices characterized by Eigen-Sinn. In socialist Hungary, the initial discrepancy between supply and demand was not regulated through pricing, as it was in capitalist countries, but was evened out—at least in theory— by bureaucratic means and guided by social criteria in order to ensure maximum fairness. The question of scarcity and its social function will play a key role in this investigation. It is my hypothesis that bureaucratically managed scarcity likewise made it possible for the washing machine to become a staple of every Hungarian household once it became available in sufficient quantities in retail stores in the late 1950s. With the diminishing scarcity of washing machines, collective solutions were abandoned in favor of individual consumption. Parallel worlds of meaning—collectivity, social justice, equality, and so forth—played an important role in the process. My analysis thus supports Pavel Kolář’s notion that “presentations of social orders” are subject to “constant change.”8

Gender The nascent transition to a mass consumption society was not just a stage on the path to social stabilization in Hungary but was part of an overall trend in the industrialized world, especially after the Second World War.9 Whereas socially   See Thomas Lindenberger, “Projektskizze: Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur; Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte in Berlin-Brandenburg, 1945–1990,” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, no. 5 (1995): 42. 8   See Pavel Kolář, “Sozialistische Diktatur als Sinnwelt: Repräsentationen gesellschaftlicher Ordnung und Herrschaftswandel in Ostmitteleuropa in der zweiten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts,” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, nos. 40–41 (2007): 26. 9   See the example of West Germany: Axel Schildt, “Freizeit, Konsum und Häuslichkeit in der ‘Wiederaufbau’-Gesellschaft: Zur Modernisierung von Lebensstilen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in den 1950er Jahren,” in Europäische Konsumgeschichte: Zur Gesellschafts- und Kulturgeschichte des Konsums (18. bis 20. Jahrhundert), ed. Hannes Siegrist, Hartmut Kaelble, and Jürgen Kocka (Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 1997), 327–48; Michael Wildt, “Die Kunst der Wahl: Zur Entwicklung des Konsums in Westdeutschland in den 1950er Jahren,” in Sigrist, Kaelble and Kocka, Europäische Konsumgeschichte, 307–25; Wolfgang König, Geschichte der Konsumgesellschaft (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2000), 242–43; Michael Wildt, 7

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connoted tastes and the general need for social distinction still marked individuals’ consumer behavior, supplying the population with electric household appliances became an important economic factor when more and more women began to enter the socialist workforce.10 Household appliances were seen as a symbol of modern society, in which the rationalization criteria of productive processes were transferred to domestic chores. This idea was backed by the utopian notion that attaining socialism should include liberating women from the burden of household chores, as Mária Pataki wrote in her housekeeping guidebook of 1956.11 Rationalization in this case meant progress and relief from centuries-old burdens. Even August Bebel, one of the founders of German Social Democracy, explained as early as 1879 in his famous book Die Frau und der Sozialismus (Woman and Socialism) that the reduction of household chores was a necessary prerequisite if women were to take part in public life and join the workforce.12 At a time before the technologization of private households was even an option, Bebel saw the solution in collective forms of organization, such as the communal kitchen, replacing individual household chores.13 On the long road to emancipation, women were expected to distance themselves from the “bourgeois” private sphere and turn to a more progressive division of labor:14 “As the kitchen, so our entire domestic life will be revolutionized, and countless tasks that must be performed today will become superfluous. As the central kitchen [Zentralnahrungsbereitungsanstalten] will do away with the private Vom kleinen Wohlstand: Eine Konsumgeschichte der fünfziger Jahre (Frankfurt/Main: Fischer Verlag, 1996), 33. 10   See also Pierre Bourdieu, Die feinen Unterschiede: Kritik der gesellschaftlichen Urteilskraft, trans. Bernd Schwibs and Achim Russer (Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1982), as well as the English translation: Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans. Richard Nice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1984). On the problem of gender relations in socialism, see more recently Sabrina Ramet and Christina Hassenstab, eds., Gender (In)Equality and Gender Politics in Southeastern Europe: A Question of Justice (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015); Jill Massino and Shana Penn, eds., Gender Politics and Everyday Life in State Socialist Eastern and Central Europe (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009); Rebecca Kay, ed., Gender, Equality and Difference During and After State Socialism (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007); Hana Havelková and Libora Oates-Indruchová, eds., The Politics of Gender Culture Under State Socialism: An Expropriated Voice (London: Routledge, 2014). 11   Cited in Valuch, Magyarország társadalomtörténete, 292–93. 12   See August Bebel, Die Frau und der Sozialismus (Berlin: Dietz, 1973), 511. 13   Ibid., 271–72. As Barbara Orland points out in her essay on Germany, a technologization of the household was only made possible with the widespread provision of electricity starting in the mid-1920s. A more powerful electricity grid was the prerequisite for the myriad of household appliances in industrialized societies after the Second World War. See Barbara Orland, “Haushalt, Konsum und Alltagsleben in der Technik- geschichte,” Technikgeschichte, no. 65 (1998): 279. 14   See Bebel, Die Frau und der Sozialismus, 272.

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kitchen, so . . . [c]entral laundries and drying-rooms will assume the washing and drying of clothes; central cleaning establishments, the cleaning of carpets and clothes.”15 Bebel pictured a utopia in which the reduction of household chores would support women in becoming more independently minded and the private household would be rationalized following the division-of-labor model used in industrial production. Young socialist states were buoyed by a utopian spirit, one of the aims of which was emancipating women from men. To this end, in 1957 the National Council of Trade Unions (Szakszervezetek Országos Tanácsa, referred to below as SZOT) viewed it as an important task to unburden female workers in particular of their numerous housekeeping chores,16 enabling the purchase of scarce and hard-to-obtain washing machines through its own organization.17 The need for government-controlled distribution arose from the scarcity of available appliances in state-owned household goods stores, a situation that was exacerbated by the recent increase in wages.18 The distribution of vouchers (vásárlási utalvány) evinced a set of official ideas about how consumption should be organized according to social criteria. Apart from exceptional workers upon whom the trade union bestowed preferential treatment, families with many children or workers in difficult social circumstances were to be given preference in the allocation of vouchers. It was therefore aimed mainly at women who participated fully in “public life,” that is, in the working world. The assumption that it was a woman’s responsibility to do laundry was never fundamentally questioned.19 Bebel, Die Frau und der Sozialismus, 512. Translation taken from Bebel, Woman and Socialism (New York: Socialist Literature Co., 1910), 462–63. 16   Szakszervezetek Központi Levéltára (Central Archives of the Trade Unions, hereafter SZKL), 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. This collection is now part of the Archives of Political History and Trade Unions (Politikatörténeti és Szakszervezeti Levéltár) in Budapest. 17   In West Germany too, in the spirit of the “social market economy,” there were similar state efforts to make durable goods available to the broad masses. In 1953 the Ministry of the Economy issued a recommendation to the retail sector to begin a special promotion offering refrigerators on a thirty-month installment plan. The West German trade union organization, on the other hand, took a critical attitude toward consumption (unlike in Hungary). One article criticizing the practice of payment in installments bore the sarcastic title “A Refrigerator in Every Household!” See Arne Andersen, Der Traum vom guten Leben: Alltags- und Konsumgeschichte vom Wirtschaftswunder bis heute (Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 1997), 94. 18   SZKL 2.f. 16/1957/22.ö.e. The second Three-Year Plan (1958–60) was predicted to yield a 2.5 percent growth in real income but actually saw an 11 percent increase. See Rudolf L. Tökés, Hungary’s Negotiated Revolution: Economic Reform, Social Change, and Political Succession, 1957–1990 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 91–92. 19   On the situation of blue-collar women in Hungary from a micro-historical perspective, see Eszter Zsófia Tóth, “Puszi Kádár Jánosnak”: Munkásnők élete a Kádár-korszakban mikrotörténeti megközelítésben (Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 2007). 15

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The SZOT not only determined who needed a labor-saving washing machine most urgently, but also which type of washing machine best fit their needs. Washing machines with a capacity of one-and-a-half to two kilograms and costing 1,500 to 3,000 forints were selected for the campaign.20 Better equipped, and hence more expensive, washing machines could not be purchased through the voucher system. Purchasing options were granted monthly and expired that month if they were not used. As of October 1, 1957, 30 percent of all the washing machines available were set aside for internal distribution by the trade union and 70 percent were earmarked for retail trade.21 But the original intentions of the washing machine campaign were not borne out in the practice of distribution, neither in the original sense of promoting social justice nor to the benefit of female workers. Gyuláné Harangozó, a representative of the Adria textile factory, complained, for example, that only a single washing machine was allocated at her workplace, even though mainly women worked in the factory. Choosing a recipient from among sixteen applicants was problematic. She therefore made the suggestion “to consider how productive the factory is, how it serves the national economy, and not that 287 people work there.”22 Given the above-average number of women working there, which was common in the textile industry,23 and their high productivity, she criticized the allocation of washing machines based solely on the number of overall employees and pointed out the original criteria for allocation.

Modernization The usefulness of allocating vouchers to specific trade unions and factories depended not only on the share of women within them, but also on their openness to modernization and the resultant rationalization of housework. Slavenka Drakulić’s essay “On Doing Laundry” gives an indication of how women of different generations had a different perception of things in describing the arrival of her mother’s first washing machine: “Grandma was suspicious, my mother   For orientation purposes, the average monthly earnings of a worker at this time in Hungary was about 1,000 forints. In essence, buying a washing machine meant spending the equivalent of two months’ wages. By way of comparison, in West Germany the weekly wages of a worker in 1959 were 130 deutschmarks before taxes. Depending on the manufacturer, a washing machine cost around 1,600 deutschmarks, or about three times the gross wage of a blue-collar worker. See Jennifer Loehlin, From Rugs to Riches: Housework, Consumption and Modernity in Germany (Oxford: Bloomsbury, 1999), 67. 21   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. 22   SZKL 2.f. 16. cs./1. sor 3/1958.ö.e. 23   See Valuch, Magyarország társadalomtörténete, 230. 20

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delighted.”24 Ultimately no one could deny that the washing machine revolutionized an arduous domestic chore practiced for centuries; fully automatic machines made doing laundry a cinch.25 For the SZOT, this technological advance was closely linked to building Hungarian socialism and hence to easing the burden of female workers. Yet, it was not blue-collar workers who made up the bulk of washingmachine applicants; there was a disproportionate number of members of the intelligentsia and administrators, such as teachers or accountants. This was what the trade union of Csongrád County reported almost one year into the washing machine campaign. The interest of workers in the textile industry, where many women traditionally worked, was surprisingly low.26 The willingness to accept modern household appliances was thus not only a question of education and social background, but of the differences between rural and urban areas, as well as from county to county. In this sense, the washing machine campaign was a modernization campaign as well.

Socialist distribution The vouchers sometimes specified which price range of washing machine could be purchased, giving rise to further asymmetries between supply and demand. Although the scarcity of washing machines was so great at first that vouchers in all price ranges were redeemed, the local trade unions later reported an initial saturation: vouchers for washing machines in the high range of 2,600 forints were being returned unused, especially by low-wage workers in the textile industry.27 The SZOT therefore recommended that the industry supply more 1,800 forint machines to stores for the voucher program. On the other hand, some female workers complained that they had to ask to be shown more expensive models when redeeming their vouchers. The situation soon eased up, however, with an increasing number of higher-priced models becoming available for general purchase.28 Attempts were made to offset the shortage of washing machines due to production shortfalls—a constant complaint of the SZOT—by importing Dutch   Slavenka Drakulić, How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1993), 48. 25   The washing process had been rationalized since the late eighteenth century, but the widespread use of fully automatic washing machines in the 1950s radically simplified the procedure in private households. See Barbara Orland, Wäsche waschen: Technik- und Sozialgeschichte der häuslichen Wäschepflege (Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1991). 26   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. 27   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e. 28   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e. 24

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washing machines. At a price of 2,200 forints, these were in the median price range compared to domestic models and initially enjoyed great popularity because they came from the West. The appliances turned out to be unreliable, however, despite the widely held belief that products from a free-market economy were necessarily of a higher quality. Manufacturing defects and difficulties in fulfilling the warranty were a frequent problem, compounded by the fact that retailers generally were unwilling to take the faulty appliances back. In such cases, the union organization in Győr-Sopron County, for example, felt compelled to negotiate with retailers and thus directly represent the interests of their blue-collar consumers. According to the union report, these negotiations were a success. The central trading organization promised to issue instructions to stores to take back the defective appliances.29 For most families, purchasing a washing machine was a significant investment relative to their incomes. It was therefore a dilemma if they happened to receive a voucher, but their savings were not sufficient to cover the costs of the appliance. Thus, more and more workers receiving vouchers petitioned the trade union for the option to buy in installments.30 Seeing its campaign jeopardized and wanting to avoid bureaucratic red tape, the SZOT eventually set up its own installment plan to meet the needs of its workforce.31 Buying on credit in Hungary was neither an invention of the working population nor of the modern consumer society that developed in the postwar era. The practice was actually well-established among large segments of the middle class even before the First World War, particularly in Budapest. It was common to pay for groceries at the end of the month, and clothing, which was generally quite expensive, was usually paid for in flexible installments.32 This was also a   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e.   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. Payment in installments was a frowned-upon but increasingly common practice in Germany in the 1920s, 1930s, and beyond, enabling a larger segment of the population to make bigger purchases of this sort; see Martina Heßler, “Mrs. Modern Woman”: Zur Sozial- und Kulturgeschichte der Haushaltstechnisierung (Frankfurt/Main: Campus, 2001), 141–42. In her work on postwar West Germany, Loehlin refers to a consumer survey in southern Germany conducted in the late 1950s which concluded that nearly half of all washing machines were bought in installments. In those days buying a washing machine was a considerable economic investment: see Loehlin, From Rugs to Riches, 69. Despite this financing model, however, most people in West Germany saw their first washing machines in collective facilities, such as central laundries, shared laundry rooms in apartment buildings, or the newly invented laundromat. “Until the late 1960s many housing associations set up communal laundries for six to twelve rental units.” See Andersen, Der Traum vom guten Leben, 99. 31   After an initial downpayment of 30 percent, the rest was deducted by the union directly from workers’ wages. See SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. 32   In response to the proverbial question of how much money middle-class women spent on clothing came the proverbial answer: always more than they could afford. From Gábor Gyáni, “Department Stores and Middle-class Consumerism in Budapest, 1896–1939,” in Cathedrals

29 30

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reason why family-owned retail shops were common in Budapest even between the wars, and why department stores like the kind found in European or American metropolises did not really catch on. Shops became less and less personal after being nationalized, and the trade union eventually took on one of the functions traditionally offered by smaller retailers. The only thing that changed was how the system worked: it was now centrally and bureaucratically organized and officially the same rules applied to everyone. The system of paying in installments enabled those with minimal savings to purchase a costly appliance, provided one had a voucher and the washing machine was in stock, but was worthless if the shelves were empty due to production bottlenecks. In 1957, the first year of the campaign, the 30 percent provided for in the plan—6,900 appliances to be distributed through the trade union—was not fulfilled. The distribution of vouchers therefore became problematic. Many trade union organizations at the county level reported that in certain months no vouchers were distributed at all, or that, due to production difficulties, the promised appliances could only be delivered to these individuals the following month.33 The situation improved somewhat in the first quarter of 1958, but supply still had trouble keeping up with demand.34

Eigen-Sinn in practice As early as 1957, the idea arose to rent out washing machines for private use or provide a machine for an entire apartment building which tenants could use by the hour in exchange for a fee.35 This communal concept based on solidarity was greeted warmly by the working population, even though it was not always used the way the trade union had intended. The union reported that in three districts of Budapest the tenants of a building were sharing a washing machine and that the monthly rental fee of 135 forints was divided among these tenants. While the SZOT viewed this as a positive example compared to the practice of one single family renting their own appliance, the tenants sharing the costs of the machine were in fact renting it out for a fee to the other tenants in the building: “With that they not only recouped the rental price but even made a considerable profit.”36 The problem, according to the trade union, was the rental of Consumption: The European Department Store, 1850–1939, ed. Geoffrey Crossick and Serge Jaumain (Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999), 216. 33   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. 34   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. and SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e. 35   Ever since the 1920s, it was common practice in the United Kingdom to rent rather than buy an electric appliance. See Heßler, “Mrs. Modern Woman,” 141. 36   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e.

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company itself, whose only real concern was having the rental fee paid on time. It suggested that washing machines should only be rented out to the respective building management (Ingatlankezelő Vállalat, IKV), which would then allow tenants to use the machine for a fee.37 Although the material enrichment of individuals was in stark contradiction to the egalitarian principles of a socialist state, it nevertheless created a network of accountability that rendered the success of collective solutions more likely. As Drakulić wrote with regard to her experiences in Yugoslavia, collective laundry rooms were destined to fail precisely because of the lack of accountability. Drakulić recalls: In the cellar of our building there was a washing room with a huge concrete washing basin and three new washing machines. At the beginning, everyone washed their clothes downstairs. There was a schedule hung on the door and each family took its turn once a week. The machines didn’t work for long. To put it mildly, people didn’t take very good care of them. After all, these machines didn’t belong to anyone in person, so no one felt responsible for repairing, or even cleaning them. The first machine broke down after about a year, then the second one, then the third. In the washing room, people started to store broken chairs, children’s bicycles, beach umbrellas, charcoal for barbecues, skis, mattresses . . .38

In this regard eigensinnige behaviors, contrary to the principles of socialist ethics, could ultimately have a stabilizing effect on state policies. In Hungary, purchasing or renting one or several washing machines from the workplace was another way to circumvent this notorious scarcity, even though the union was opposed to this practice. Workers simply took smaller washing machines home with them or used them at work free of charge. These practices at the expense of the factory were unacceptable as far as the union was concerned; in its view, every worker should equally share in the amortization costs of the washing machine.39 But there were also positive examples. The main post office in Sopron received rental fees from its workers to use the company’s washing machine at home and ultimately used this money to purchase a second washing machine. And workers at the Kender-Juta factory could rent the fourkilogram washing machine installed in the laundry room of factory housing at a cost of five forints for half a day.40 The widespread asymmetry of individual demand and behavior in various counties and factories was mirrored by the asymmetry of planning and production.   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e.   Drakulić, How We Survived Communism, 48–49. 39   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e. 40   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e. 37 38

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The 30 percent of machines to be allocated to the trade union did not match up with the planned number of appliances, and trade unions realized that the 70 percent of washing machines that were supposed to be available for general purchase in stores likewise did not add up.41 The percentages turned out to be mere abstractions, for consumers and the trade union alike, with no relation to the actual number of appliances that were available. However, the washing machine campaign depended on proper planning. So, when this planning came up against the limitations of industry and trade, the campaign faced the challenge of managing the obvious discrepancy between theory and practice. The SZOT itself acted as a point of contact for the workers it represented, even if this was outside its actual sphere of responsibility. The petition of two married teachers makes this abundantly clear: “We would like to request a voucher or permission to purchase a washing machine imported from the Netherlands for sale at the agricultural collective store in Kistelek. We base our request on the fact that we are both teachers working in an elementary school. A washing machine would allow us to do our frequent laundry more quickly. We have a small child. Since November 1945 we have both been paying members of the teachers’ union.”42 The petition shows that there was obviously some confusion at the retail level about how the available appliances were to be sold on a day-to-day basis. There are at least two possible interpretations: either the appliances were being withheld intentionally to avoid a recurrence of the manufacturer failing to reach the 30 percent quota, or the scarcity of washing machines was prompting salesmen to only sell in exchange for a sufficient “compensation.” Whatever the case, it seems clear that this married couple was resorting to the voucher system in the hope of securing the right to purchase a washing machine. The official response was relatively speedy by bureaucratic standards— taking only eleven days—and came from SZOT department head, Lajos Mendly: According to the agreement between the National Council of Trade Unions and the Trading Organization, effective as of October 1, 1957, 30 percent of the washing machines landing in retail stores are earmarked for vouchers. The vouchers are distributed by the trade unions to factories, companies, and public employees. The remaining 70 percent are up for sale to the general public. [The issue regarding] the washing machine in the Kistelek agricultural cooperative store is inexplicable to us: without a voucher neither you nor any other buyer can purchase this appliance. If you do not manage to buy a washing machine, we recommend that you apply for one at the trade union council in Csongrád County, which is distributing vouchers in the first quarter of 1958.43   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e.   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e. The petition is dated December 19, 1957. 43   SZKL 2.f. 16/56/1957.ö.e., letter of reply of December 30, 1957. 41 42

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The tension created by some goods being for sale to the general public and others allocated through the trade union, as well as that caused by competing competencies, is obvious. The instability of planning led to unpredictable behavior in stores, against which ordinary customers were powerless. The SZOT merely had the agreed-upon number of vouchers at its disposal, but it was not clear to which group the imported washing machines from the Netherlands belonged, the 30 percent or the 70 percent. Both the trade union and the married couple were left in confusion. The increasingly manifest significance of the vouchers led to a temptation to desist from buying the washing machine at all and to pass on the voucher to others—for the right price, of course. The situation was discussed at a high-level meeting of the Ministry of Trade, with respect to an anonymous petition: “Our ministry received a petition informing us that in a certain factory the beneficiaries of the washing machine vouchers distributed by the trade union are reselling these vouchers for 500 to 1,000 forints. The petition did not mention the factory by name. Provided it is possible to look into the matter, I would ask you, dear Sir or Madam, to issue an appeal in the trade union councils to prevent the illicit reselling of vouchers.”44 This eigensinnig  behavior challenged the notions of society and justice embodied by the trade union and the state itself. But it was the notorious scarcity of washing machines and the necessity of being chosen by the trade union that created a situation where people were willing to invest half of the average retail price just to secure the option to purchase. This situation— socially and ideologically untenable in the eyes of the state—where some had to pay more for a washing machine, while others exploited the situation to make a profit, could have been vastly mitigated by improving the supply of goods. In August and September 1958, local trade union organizations received more and more letters informing them that the vouchers were no longer necessary, as there were enough appliances for sale in retail stores.45 The black-market trading in vouchers was therefore rendered redundant over time. At the same time, the washing machine campaign itself lost importance, and was officially discontinued at the end of the year. The improving supply situation was the prerequisite to the retail boom in electric household appliances that began in the early 1960s and included washing machines.46 Another indication of a sufficient supply of washing machines is a cartoon from 1959 in the satirical magazine Ludas Matyi with the caption “Times are changing.” It shows a household   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e., March 12, 1958.   SZKL 2.f. 16/1.sor 12/1958.ö.e. 46   See also Valuch, Magyarország társadalomtörténete, 293. 44 45

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appliances store with a vast array of televisions, radios, refrigerators, and, yes, washing machines. We see a customer whispering to the salesman, asking, “Tell me, if I buy a washing machine, will you throw in three meters of power cable?” thereby essentially inverting the well-known practice of bribing sales staff.47 The supply of goods was further improved in 1968 with the announcement of a policy of economic reform, the New Economic Mechanism, generating great interest among economists in both the East and the West for a specifically Hungarian form of market socialism. By opening the Hungarian economy to the world market, reformers hoped to offset the de facto economic monopoly in the country by expanding the market through imports and exports. Liberalizing a large segment of consumer prices helped harmonize supply and demand by way of

Figure 7.1. “Times are changing” cartoon by Pál Pusztai (caption: “Tell me, if I buy a washing machine, will you throw in three meters of power cable?”). Source: Ludas Matyi, November 12, 1959, 14.   Pál Pusztai, “Változnak az idők,” Ludas Matyi, November 12, 1959, 14.

47

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price formation.48 Thus, radical economic policy measures played their part in ensuring that by 1970, almost 80 percent of Hungarian households owned this time- and labor-saving device.49

Conclusion The centrally steered economy, which closely cooperated with political organizations in the trade union’s washing machine campaign, by no means presented itself to the public as a closed system whose procedures were always harmonized and in line with the demands of a socialist state. With inefficient industries and a badly organized trading network, the trade union, as a representative of the working population, was the only authority most workers could turn to if they had problems. This is not only explained by the fact that the union played a leading role in organizing the washing machine campaign, but also the fact that the vouchers—if and when they could be obtained—proved relatively reliable in a situation where more goods were being distributed than freely sold. Even though the trade union’s logic of allocation was sometimes undermined by the Eigen-Sinn of individuals, the union remained a respected authority and arbiter in case of conflict. The fact that the system was not smoothly functioning and monolithic but had a variety of decision-making bodies that were not well coordinated encouraged individuals to take advantage of loopholes. Those who—with their own gain in mind—did not behave in the interests of the trade union were generally not concerned about improving the system. Such practices, which only emerged because of the scarcity of goods, were a direct challenge to official ideals of justice and communal living. They existed alongside practices that promoted the interests of the collective and represented a constructive continuation of state ideas and communal justice, without the individuals engaging in them necessarily intending their behaviors as such.   See Johanna Bockman, Markets in the Name of Socialism: The Left-Wing Origins of Neoliberalism (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011), 130. On the New Economic Mechanism (NEM), see also Iván T. Berend, The Hungarian Economic Reforms, 1953–1988 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); János Kornai, The Socialist System: The Political Economy of Communism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992), and Nigel Swain, Hungary: The Rise and Fall of Feasible Socialism (London: Verso, 1992). 49   See Valuch, Magyarország társadalomtörténete, 291, esp. fig. 14. Surprisingly, West Germany with its market economy had considerably lower figures of washing machine ownership: “Only in 1986 did virtually all West German households (98%) have a fully automatic washing machine (1980: 79%; 1975: 58%). Up until then, these figures tell us, the technological standard in West German laundry care was marked by considerable diversity.” Quoted in Orland, “Haushalt, Konsum und Alltagsleben,” 284. By comparison, in 1968 in the socialist—but Moscow independent—Yugoslavia, there were only 10.9 washing machines per hundred households. See Patterson, Bought and Sold, 60. 48

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Can the washing machine campaign be considered modern through its contribution to the emancipation of women? It was emancipatory in that it was aimed at working women, that is, women who had their own income, enjoyed financial independence, and had the legitimate right, from the perspective of the union, to have the help of a washing machine. Such an appliance would reduce housework or make it less arduous. Men were not even taken into consideration as potential helpers in running the household. Thus, traditional domestic roles were left unchallenged and working women doubly burdened, a subject of controversial debate even at the time.50 The increasing availability of washing machines made eigensinnige and potentially delegitimizing practices in connection with the washing machine campaign less virulent. Free access for everyone enabled a more democratic distribution of consumer goods, in conformity with the socialist idea of equality, while collective solutions became less necessary. The washing machine campaign therefore shows us how, in a socialist state, one world of meaning was replaced with another. Collective solutions born of necessity gradually lost their importance with the proliferation of consumer choice. In the early 1960s, the party once again emphasized individualistic consumer patterns in Hungarian society, enabling a more democratic access to consumer goods and giving fresh momentum to the principle of equality. A new era of socialist consumer culture was beginning to unfold in Hungary, even in state-run stores for household appliances, which were now starting to keep up with demand. The experience of distributing washing machines through collective strategies according to social criteria, the largely realistic fulfilment of individual consumer needs, and the simultaneous shift in worlds of meaning enabled the state to achieve widespread acceptance of washing machines as a modern household appliance among Hungarian working women. It was a small but important step on the path to creating a society in which the achievements of technology were harmonized with the future utopia of socialism. A modern society, the state party understood, should be able to integrate more women into the workforce while reducing their workload at home. Just a decade or two later, the washing machine—along with other kitchen appliances such as the refrigerator—had become an indispensable part of the   See, for example, some articles in the most widely circulated women’s magazine Nők Lapja: Mária Zsigmondi, “Óh illúzió!—Avagy Ahogy Egyes Férjek Képzelik,” August 25, 1960, 9; “Nőiideál 1970. Vitazáró,” March 26, 1970, 6–7, Katalin Koncz, “A mozgalom reneszánsza!” May 21, 1970, 4–5; Enikő Ballabás, “Megújuló Nőmozgalom,” January 14, 1989, 20–21. On the position of women under socialism, see Eszter Zsófia Tóth, Kádár leányai: Nők a szocialista időszakban (Budapest: Nyitott Könyvműhely Könyvkiadó, 2010), and Lynne A. Haney, Inventing the Needy: Gender and the Politics of Welfare in Hungary (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002).

50

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modest prosperity achieved in Hungary. Béla Tarr, in his 1982 documentary feature film The Prefab People (Panelkapcsolat), even elevated it to a symbol of the guaranteed standard of material culture in Hungarian socialism. Although the family car and family house might have remained out of reach, the average Hungarian proletarian family he portrayed was able to choose their new “Minimat 65” from a wide variety of washing machines. Nevertheless, the rising standard of living was not enough to bridge the growing estrangement between the married couple portrayed in the movie, which showed Tarr to be an outstanding critic of rampant materialism. The washing machine in the late phase of Hungarian socialism was merely a small step on the road to “consumer bliss.”

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Selected bibliography

Andersen, Arne. Der Traum vom guten Leben: Alltags- und Konsumgeschichte vom Wirtschaftswunder bis heute. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 1997. Berend, Iván T. Gazdasági útkeresés, 1956–1965. Budapest: Magvető Kiadó, 1983. ———. The Hungarian Economic Reforms, 1953–1988. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Bockman, Johanna. Markets in the Name of Socialism: The Left-Wing Origins of Neoliberalism. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011. Borodziej, Wlodzimierz, Jerzy Kochanowski, and Joachim von Puttkamer, eds. Schleichwege: Inoffizielle Begegnungen sozialistischer Staatsbürger zwischen 1956 und 1989. Cologne: Böhlau, 2010. Bourdieu, Pierre. Die feinen Unterschiede: Kritik der gesellschaftlichen Urteilskraft. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1982. ———. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1984. Bren, Paulina, and Mary Neuburger, eds. Communism Unwrapped: Consumption in Cold War Eastern Europe. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012. Chernyshova, Natalya. Soviet Consumer Culture in the Brezhnev Era. New York: Routledge, 2013. Drakulić, Slavenka. How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed. New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1993. Fehérváry, Krisztina. Politics in Color and Concrete: Socialist Materialities and the Middle Class in Hungary. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2013. Gagyiova, Annina. Vom Gulasch zum Kühlschrank: Privater Konsum zwischen Eigen-Sinn und Herrschaftssicherung im sozialistischen Ungarn (1956–1989). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2020. Gyáni, Gábor. “Department Stores and Middle-class Consumerism in Budapest, 1896–1939.” In Cathedrals of Consumption: The European Department Store, 1850–1939, edited by Geoffrey Crossick and Serge Jaumain, 208–24. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1999. Haney, Lynne A. Inventing the Needy: Gender and the Politics of Welfare in Hungary. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002. Havelková, Hana, and Libora Oates-Indruchová, eds. The Politics of Gender Culture Under State Socialism: An Expropriated Voice. London: Routledge, 2014. Heldmann, Philipp. Herrschaft, Wirtschaft, Anoraks: Konsumpolitik in der DDR der Sechzigerjahre. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 2004. Hessler, Julie. A Social History of Soviet Trade: Trade Policy, Retail Practices, and Consumption, 1917–1953. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2004. Heßler, Martina. “Mrs. Modern Woman”: Zur Sozial- und Kulturgeschichte der Haushaltstechnisierung. Frankfurt/Main: Campus, 2001. Horváth, Sándor. “Csudapest és a frizsiderszocializmus: a fogyasztás jelentései, a turizmus és a fogyasztáskritika az 1960-as években.” Múltunk 53, no. 3 (2008): 60–83. Kay, Rebecca, ed. Gender, Equality and Difference During and After State Socialism. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. Kochanowski, Jerzy. Jenseits der Planwirtschaft: Der Schwarzmarkt in Polen 1944–1989. Göttingen: Wallstein, 2013. Kolář, Pavel. “Sozialistische Diktatur als Sinnwelt: Repräsentationen gesellschaftlicher Ordnung und Herrschaftswandel in Ostmitteleuropa in der zweiten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts.” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, nos. 40–41 (2007): 24–29. König, Wolfgang. Geschichte der Konsumgesellschaft. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2000.

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Kornai, János. The Socialist System: The Political Economy of Communism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992. Landsman, Mark. Dictatorship and Demand: The Politics of Consumerism in East Germany. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2005. Lindenberger, Thomas. “Projektskizze: Herrschaft und Eigen-Sinn in der Diktatur; Studien zur Gesellschaftsgeschichte in Berlin-Brandenburg, 1945–1990.” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, no. 5 (1995): 37–52. Loehlin, Jennifer. From Rugs to Riches: Housework, Consumption and Modernity in Germany. Oxford: Bloomsbury, 1999. Massino, Jill, and Shana Penn, eds. Gender Politics and Everyday Life in State Socialist Eastern and Central Europe. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Merkel, Ina. Utopie und Bedürfnis: Die Geschichte der Konsumkultur in der DDR. Cologne: Böhlau, 1999. Orland, Barbara. “Haushalt, Konsum und Alltagsleben in der Technikgeschichte.” Technikgeschichte, no. 65 (1998): 273–95. ———. Wäsche waschen: Technik- und Sozialgeschichte der häuslichen Wäschepflege. Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1991. Patterson, Patrick Hyder. Bought and Sold: Living and Losing the Good Life in Socialist Yugoslavia. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2011. Poutrus, G. Patrice. Die Erfindung des Goldbroilers: Über den Zusammenhang zwischen Herrschaftssicherung und Konsumentwicklung in der DDR. Cologne: Böhlau, 2002. Ramet, Sabrina, and Christina Hassenstab, eds. Gender (In)Equality and Gender Politics in Southeastern Europe: A Question of Justice. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015. Sabrow, Martin. “Sozialismus als Sinnwelt: Diktatorische Herrschaft in kulturhistorischer Perspektive.” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, nos. 40–41 (2007): 9–23. Schildt, Axel. “Freizeit, Konsum und Häuslichkeit in der ‘Wiederaufbau’-Gesellschaft: Zur Modernisierung von Lebensstilen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in den 1950er Jahren.” In Europäische Konsumgeschichte: Zur Gesellschafts- und Kulturgeschichte des Konsums (18. bis 20. Jahrhundert), edited by Hannes Siegrist, Hartmut Kaelble, and Jürgen Kocka, 327–48. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 1997. Stihler, Ariane. Die Entstehung des modernen Konsums: Darstellung und Erklärungsansätze. Berlin: Duncker und Humblot, 1998. Swain, Nigel. Hungary: The Rise and Fall of Feasible Socialism. London: Verso, 1992. Thaa, Winfried. Die Wiedergeburt des Politischen: Zivilgesellschaft und Legitimitätskonflikt in den Revolutionen von 1989. Wiesbaden: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, 1996. Tökés, L. Rudolf. Hungary’s Negotiated Revolution: Economic Reform, Social Change, and Political Succession, 1957–1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Tóth, Eszter Zsófia. Kádár leányai: Nők a szocialista időszakban. Budapest: Nyitott Könyvműhely Könyvkiadó, 2010. ———. “Puszi Kádár Jánosnak”: Munkásnők élete a Kádár-korszakban mikrotörténeti megközelítésben. Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 2007. Valuch, Tibor. Magyar hétköznapok: Fejezetek a mindennapi élet történetéből a második világháborútól az ezredfordulóig. Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 2013. ———. Magyarország társadalomtörténete a XX. század második felében. Budapest: Osiris Kiadó, 2005. Wildt, Michael. “Die Kunst der Wahl: Zur Entwicklung des Konsums in Westdeutschland in den 1950er Jahren.” In Europäische Konsumgeschichte: Zur Gesellschafts- und Kulturgeschichte des Konsums (18. bis 20. Jahrhundert), edited by Hannes Siegrist, Hartmut Kaelble, and Jürgen Kocka, 307–25. Frankfurt/Main: Campus Verlag, 1997. ———. Vom kleinen Wohlstand: Eine Konsumgeschichte der fünfziger Jahre. Frankfurt/Main: Fischer Verlag, 1996. Zatlin, Jonathan. The Currency of Socialism: Money and Political Culture in East Germany. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

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CHAPTER EIGHT

Single Mothers, Lonely Children: Polish Families, Socialist Modernity, and the Experience of Crisis of the Late 1970s and 1980s Barbara Klich-Kluczewska

“He wasn’t really my husband, Boguś’s father. But I don’t think this is a sin,” says Irena, the protagonist of Agnieszka Holland’s Kobieta samotna (A Lonely Woman). “I left his father in my sixth month of pregnancy because he beat me. And before that we were beaten by our drunk father, mostly me. Because I was the weakest one. My sisters would somehow defend themselves. Some time later he died while drunk driving a motorcycle.”1 This film by the famous director, produced in the late spring of 1981 when Solidarity’s “carnival” was in full swing, is deemed the most pessimistic picture of Polish society of that time. Kobieta samotna was banned for seven years, even though Holland had hoped it would come to the big screen in 1982. By no means was it intended as a documentary. The tragic story of Irena, a postwoman from Wrocław, had no precedent in any intervention reports or nonfiction stories conceived by radio or television. Such an accumulation of misery, unkindness, vileness, and social injustice seems too much for the life of one person. Paradoxically, despite having a stable job as a postwoman in a “good patch” of a large city,2 Irena suffers extreme poverty. This is symbolized by her flat in an annex adjacent to a railway line, with absolutely no amenities, let alone a bathroom or running water, and no sense of privacy, far away from the city. With low income and no one around to help, she finds it hard to make ends meet and, consequently, has little chance to lead a peaceful life.   Kobieta samotna, 1981, directed by Agnieszka Holland, starring Maria Chwalibóg and Bogusław Linda; the movie had its first public release in Poland in 1987 (its “integral” version premiered in 1999). Holland’s movie shared the fate of other well-known pictures such as Przypadek by Krzysztof Kieślowski (1981, released in 1987) and Ryszard Bugajski’s Przesłuchanie (1982, released in 1989). See Anna Misiak, Kinematograf kontrolowany: cenzura filmowa w kraju socjalistycznym i demokratycznym (PRL i USA); analiza socjologiczna (Kraków: Universitas, 2006), 311–12. 2   A “good patch” meant an area inhabited by many elderly and disabled people who would give small tips to the mail carrier for delivering their pensions on time. 1

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Although the movie has usually been interpreted as a critique of the increasing demoralization, selfishness, and poor civic attitudes of Polish society, I would like to propose a far more literal take on this bleak vision and suggest that Holland succeeded in noticing and sketching ruthlessly, yet accurately, the margins of social life of that period. Let me therefore elaborate on a sentence uttered in one of the key scenes by the handicapped Jacek, with whom Irena forms a relationship: “These people here. . . . They will sneer the moment they see you stand out the slightest bit.” In this light, Holland’s film can be understood chiefly as documenting the stigmatization of people whom “ill fortune” brought to the very lowest rung of the social ladder. They are different, and there is no one to stand up for them. Their situation was determined by “pre-conditions”: Irena’s son, born out of wedlock, and Jacek’s disability. Holland simply could not have chosen better. These two are completely unable to cope on their own and, in order to secure a peaceful existence for themselves, need external support. In this article I would like to explore the question of the status of nonmarried single mothers in the People’s Republic of Poland (Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa, PRL). I wish to focus on the last two decades of that period, including the specific impact that the sociopolitical and economic crisis originating in the mid-1970s had on the discourse on “single mothers.” At the center of my interest, however, will be the processes of creating the taboos which affected women who single-handedly raised their children from informal relationships.3

The families of non-married mothers in numbers According to the demographer Piotr Szukalski, so-called extramarital births and the consequent single motherhood were never truly marginal issues in postwar Poland, since 1,800,000 illegitimate children were born during that forty-fiveyear period. Szukalski stresses that statistical data on such births in Poland over an extended time period are generally quite stable, particularly if we compare them with the constantly changing attitudes toward mothers and their children within their immediate environments, believed to stem from the evolving concepts of interrelations between sexuality, reproduction, and marriage.4 As indicated by micro-censuses of 1974 and 1984, single-parent families accounted for not more than 14 percent of all families in the People’s Republic of Poland. The majority of these families were formed by single mothers, rather   The main thesis of this article have been developed in my book Family, Taboo and Communism in Poland, 1956-1989 (Berlin: Peter Lang 2021). 4   Piotr Szukalski, Płodność i urodzenia pozamałżeńskie w Polsce (Łódź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego, 2001), 3. 3

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than fathers, included one child, and usually lived in a city, which was attributed to the higher divorce rate in urban areas. Having analyzed statistical data, Maria Jarosz, a renowned sociologist and expert in family pathology, expressed her concern about “the adverse phenomenon remaining at the center of interest for educationists and psychologists, i.e., a continuous increase in the number of single-parent families and, consequently, the growing population of children who are raised in such families and are thus exposed to specific material, emotional, and intellectual deficits.”5 Unmarried mothers always constituted the smallest group within this category of single mothers, and there were substantially fewer of them than divorced mothers and widows. Their number in general did not fluctuate, with the exceptions of the beginning and end of the period under analysis. Naturally, the number of mothers and children from non-formalized relationships grew during the Second World War, but after 1948 their number gradually decreased. This drop was especially noticeable between 1955 and 1968, when it decreased from 6.3 to 4.9 percent of live births.6 From that time, up to the mid-1980s, the percentage of extramarital births in Poland did not exceed 5 percent.7 However, the future of each of those children looked so different that this number can hardly be deemed to equal the number of unmarried mothers: after all, following birth, a woman could get married right away or leave her child at an orphanage. It would thus be very difficult to establish exact numerical data in this respect.8 Each year, around eleven thousand mothers decided to go to court to establish paternity. Due consideration should also be given to differences between urban and rural areas, although these are not as wide as one could expect. Barbara Tryfan, a sociologist specializing in rural areas, conducted an analysis of these statistical data (characteristically, in a subchapter titled “Deviant situations”). She expressed her utter surprise at the fact that “illegitimate children, all those ‘foundlings’ and ‘waifs,’ have been traditionally associated with the countryside. Comparative statistical data reveal, however, that the number of extramarital births in cities is proportionally higher than in rural areas, in addition to being more frequent by 30–40 percent.”9   Maria Jarosz, Dezorganizacja w rodzinie i społeczeństwie (Warsaw: Polskie Wydawnictwo Ekonomiczne, 1987), 81. 6   Barbara Łobodzińska, Rodzina w Polsce (Warsaw: Interpress, 1974), 156. 7   For more, please see Marlena Kuciarska-Ciesielska, “Urodzenia pozamałżeńskie,” Wiadomości Statystyczne, no. 5 (1988); Edward Rosset, “Urodzenia pozamałżeńskie w Polsce,” Problemy Rodziny, no. 3 (1973). 8   Bożenna Balcerzak-Paradowska, “Sytuacja środowiskowa matek niezamężnych,” Problemy Rodziny, no. 5 (1984): 24. 9   Barbara Tryfan, “Socjalne i prawne środki ochrony macierzyństwa na wsi,” in Socjalne i prawne środki ochrony macierzyństwa i rodziny, ed. Danuta Graniewska (Warsaw: Książka i Wiedza, 1976), 126–27. 5

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The most interesting aspect of the situation in Poland was the stable extramarital birth ratio during accelerated industrialization, which in East Central Europe, according to historians, was almost always accompanied by a rapid increase in the number of illegitimate children. When considering twentiethcentury Europe as a whole, the highest ratio of extramarital births was initially recorded in Sweden, where it reached 11 percent in 1900. It was not until the 1917 Revolution that Russia took a leading position, starting from 3 percent in 1900 up to the record-breaking 24 percent of live births forty-five years later. This was strongly related, inter alia, to the wartime chaos and major population losses, particularly among men.10

The situation after the Second World War Just as the Second World War damaged the long-established gender relations, the deliberate policies of those who came to power after the war undermined, at least in theory, the system in which—as argued by Małgorzata Fidelis—civil status, next to gender, class, and national affiliation, determined the situation of an individual citizen. Fidelis notes that despite being eligible for work, single mothers in interwar Poland had limited property rights, and their material and social situation was critical. To a certain extent this resulted from their status being perceived as ambiguous, bordering on what is masculine and feminine. They firmly belonged to what was seen as a sphere of “deviation” or “social disorder.”11 Forcing main breadwinners out of their homes, the war reshaped attitudes toward women who single-handedly ran their households and took care of both their parents and their children. Women without male partners became such a common sight in Europe during and after the war that they could even be called a new demographic phenomenon. Being so numerous, they had to start receiving more attention, whereas the question of civil status decreased in importance. This situation had serious consequences, the most important of which was society’s concession to women being socially active and having a degree of forced independence, despite—as Fidelis stressed—the lasting image of a woman   For more on this subject please refer to Helene Carlbäck, “Lone Motherhood in Soviet Russia in the Mid-20th Century—In a European Context,” in And They Lived Happily Ever After: Norms and Everyday Practices of Family and Parenthood in Russia and Central Europe, ed. Helene Carlbäck, Yulia Gradskova, and Zhanna Kravchenko (Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2012), 26–33; Dalia Leinarte, “Why Does Public Policy Implementation Fail? Lithuanian Office of State Benefits for Mothers of Large Families and Single Mothers 1944– 1956,” in Carlbäck, Gradskova, and Kravchenko, And They Lived Happily Ever After, 113–14. 11   Małgorzata Fidelis, “Czy ‘nowy matriarchat’? Kobiety bez mężczyzn w Polsce po drugiej wojnie światowej,” in Kobiety i rewolucja obyczajowa: społeczno-kulturowe aspekty seksualności; Wiek XIX i XX, ed. Anna Żarnowska and Andrzej Szwarc (Warsaw: DiG, 2006), 421. 10

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as a person whom maternity makes unique. In this respect, the situation in Poland did not differ from the European average. In 1946, Polish women exceeded men in number by 2.3 million (a million more than in 1931). Four years later, out of 9.5 million women aged over twenty, more than four million (44.5 percent) did not have any partner and were either unmarried, widows, or divorced. Even if we assume that some of them lived in cohabitation or only solemnized their marriage in church, this is still a very large number which, during the postwar crisis, must have imposed concrete measures aimed at catering for their families’ basic needs.12 However, the legal changes that came into force in 1946 reflected the political rather than the demographic transformation. Financial equality between married and unmarried women was introduced and single mothers now had the right to seek the establishment of paternity and alimony before court. The postwar legislation no longer differentiated (at least in theory) between children born to married and unmarried parents. In practice, this meant that, under family and guardianship law, a child born outside marriage should gain full rights if either the father acknowledges paternity or paternity is established by the courts. Much therefore depended on the father’s goodwill, as only an acknowledged child had the right to alimony and limited succession. Upon being acknowledged, a child would enjoy the same legal status as a child born to married parents, as stipulated by family law as early as 1946. Minor exceptions to this rule regarding parental authority and parents’ rights to use the property of such children were abolished by the Family Code of 1950.13 The emancipatory nature of both the legislation and the demographic situation has been emphasized by Fidelis. By the time the debate on single motherhood came to a close in 1950, the wartime emancipation had already been translated to the well-known language of maternity, with a woman-mother as a foundation for the family. In contrast to what had happened in the USSR, independent women, including independent mothers, did not turn the traditional gender system upside down. Still, a number of questions remain unanswered. How much did those macroscale changes shake the long-established world of social expectations? To what extent did they affect individual experiences? Taking just a brief look at existing scholarship, one would be inclined to doubt such a thesis, even though such studies are too sparse to allow us to trace the histories of this group of unmarried mothers against the background of the postwar years and the period of Stalinism. We can only hypothetically assume that the timescale was too short   Fidelis, “Czy ‘nowy matriarchat’?”   Balcerzak-Paradowska, “Sytuacja środowiskowa matek niezamężnych,” 23.

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and the need for stabilization and a return to “normality” too strong to induce a profound change in popular opinion, even in the face of mass mobilization, industrialization, and internal migrations.

Exclusion through omission and avoidance Only from the period following the “expert turnover” during Edward Gierek’s rule can we draw some more in-depth and source-based conclusions regarding the situation of unmarried mothers. This is partly due to the availability of biographical sources collected at that time, which I will complement here with the work of participants in diary contests. The problem of single mothers attracted attention in this period due to the specific tension that had arisen between the family and the state, understood here mainly as a distributor of goods. Family constituted an undisputed element of the structure of Polish socialist society, forming one of the pillars on which the perception of the state was grounded and without which, it was commonly believed, the entire system would have immediately corroded. This perception of the family stood in contrast to the individualization processes so characteristic of the second half of the twentieth century, on the one hand, and to the Stalinist image of modernity rejected in 1956, on the other.14 Justifications for such a vision of family may be sought in the trend toward returning to “true Polish social traditions” during the “Polish thaw,” followed by the adaptation of this vision to a system of social policy based on pillars formed by the workplace (the provider of goods) and family (the main recipient of goods).15 The resulting measures of a legal, political and, at the same time, symbolic nature, indicated the restoration of confidence in family as an element co-responsible for the welfare of the state as a whole. More importantly, however, those measures went hand in hand with the process of entrusting families with a broad spectrum of responsibilities, especially in comparison to the model Soviet system. Cooperation with the state’s welfare system led to the development of a model which, in my view, was a specifically Polish hybrid in which family assumed co-responsibility for childcare at preschool and school age, along with ensuring care for the elderly. Under this system, mutual care was especially important in rural areas. Family was the main recipient of particularly significant goods that were available or potentially available (an apartment,   For more on the return of the male breadwinner following the Polish Thaw, see Małgorzata Fidelis, Women, Communism, and Industrialization in Postwar Poland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 223–37. 15   Barbara Klich-Kluczewska, “Social Policy and Social Practice in the People’s Republic of Poland,” in Social Care under State Socialism (1945–1989): Ambitions, Ambiguities, and Mismanagement, ed. Sabine Hering (Leverkusen-Opladen: Verlag Barbara Budrich, 2009), 166. 14

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holidays, and so forth) in the state’s command-and-quota system. The position of a family member who played the role of an individual connector with their workplace, which in turn provided the family with specific, high-quality goods, had a major impact on the rank of such a person within the internal family hierarchy, usually strengthening the traditional family structure with its dominant male breadwinner. The situation of Polish society was therefore very different from the Soviet model with which it often tends to be associated, including in the context of research on the history of gender. The hybrid model proved a viable alternative to that sometimes referred to as the etacratic gender order, under which family relations and discourses are almost exclusively subject to the state through the provision of accommodation, childcare, employment, and wages paid at regular intervals.16 This theory stems from the belief that the state had successfully taken over the role of breadwinner, which in traditional societies was reserved for the man. At the same time, in Poland, making public references to family was very important, and from 1956 onward it formed one of the methods through which communists legitimized their power after the Second World War. Another aspect that stood in the way of transferring the etacratic gender order to the Polish context was the severe economic and political crisis. In this hybrid system, the force of world events, along with the aggravation of systemic dysfunctions of the state in the second half of the 1970s and the 1980s, saw more and more responsibilities imposed on family as that element of society which, in principle, could not refuse concrete forms of assistance to its members. As such, new obligations were added to the catalog of families’ social duties. According to Jacek Tarkowski, who was very critical of the growing role of family and networks of informal interdependencies, this resulted in social relations falling victim to “amoral familism.” The most characteristic feature of “amoral familism” is its double standards: for the family and the outside world, as well as the intensification of selfish attitudes. The interests of a family or small group seem to dominate over everything else: “While undoubtedly exhibiting the role of family, this [crisis] situation is placing at the center of individuals’ attention numerous measures aimed at allowing them to preserve an unchanged standard of living for their families. The prolonged crisis and permanent shortage of goods have a specific, even caricatured, exacerbating effect on the role of families and small groups, in contrast to the alien and sometimes threatening external world.”17   Elena Zhidkova, “Family, Divorce, and Comrades’ Courts: Soviet Family and Public Organizations During the Thaw,” in Carlbäck, Gradskova, and Kravchenko, And They Lived Happily Ever After. 17 Jacek Tarkowski and Elżbieta Tarkowska, “‘Amoralny familizm’ czyli o dezintegracji społecznej w Polsce lat osiemdziesiątych,” in Socjologia świata polityki: Władza i społeczeństwo w systemie autorytarnym, ed. Jacek Tarkowski (Warsaw: ISP PAN, 1994), 266. 16

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In the second half of the 1980s, Tarkowski applied Edward Banfield’s theory to criticize the manner in which public domain was shaped in the latter years of the PRL. This theory failed, however, to explain where the authority of family came from during that period, nor did it point out certain advantages of developing informal activities, as emphasized by Małgorzata Mazurek. First and foremost, these included the fostering of individual resourcefulness which could aid the decomposition of existing social hierarchies.18 Similar conclusions were formulated with regard to Polish society during the crisis period by Janine Wedel who, between 1982 and 1984, conducted her ethnological research in Poland.19 Although Wedel, like Tarkowski, was aware of the alarming process of privatization of public space, she also took notice of its positive aspects, such as the sharing of resources by those who were better off with their less fortunate relatives. She was also surprised at young people’s financial dependence on the older generation, and the fact that in the mid-1980s, nearly half of young married couples relied on aid from their relatives and friends to make ends meet, later taking over responsibility for their parents and grandparents.20 Whoever needed assistance in the late 1970s and the 1980s but fell outside the magical orbit of the basic “socioeconomic unit,”—that is, someone without any support from family, or alternatively, friends’ circles—would in practice find themselves in a highly vulnerable situation. Due to the inefficiency of the social welfare system and the resulting absence of a safety net, such persons were left out in what could be called a “no-man’s-land.” There was a reason, then, why the problem of single mothers came to light by the time the system had become so ineffective that women without family support had no chance to obtain even the most basic aid: “Let’s take queues for instance. It’s very difficult to take a small child with you and stand in a shop queue. Normally, you’d have a motherin-law, an aunt, or some other woman help out, but a single mother . . . well, she’s completely alone in this.”21

Old-fashioned Their situation, initially seen as marginal, came to be an urgent problem and the subject of a growing body of research at the Institute of Labor and Social Studies,   Małgorzata Mazurek, Społeczeństwo kolejki: O doświadczeniach niedoboru 1945–1989 (Warsaw: Trio, 2010), 69. 19   Janine R. Wedel, Prywatna Polska (Warsaw: Trio 2007), 108–9. 20  Ibid., 109, 111. 21   Archiwum Polskiego Radia (Archive of the Polish Radio, hereafter APR) 1 and 2. Pr III 84042+a, Zaczynamy we dwoje…, a conversation with Daria Plaskacz from the Catholic Counselling Center in Warsaw, Książęca Street 21. 18

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an institution addressing the state’s needs in the field of social policy. One of the most interesting analyses of the situation of single mothers was the research conducted in 1981 by Bożena Balcerzak-Paradowska within the Independent Research Laboratory for Family Problems, part of the Institute of Labor and Social Studies. Out of 2,505 unmarried mothers to whom she had sent a questionnaire, 30 percent responded with a letter. The research did not capture experiences of just one generation, as women from various age groups responded to the questionnaire. Some of their remarks were published in full in the Institute’s Studies and Materials, and the research findings presented by Balcerzak-Paradowska in the journal Problemy rodziny appeared quite optimistic. Admittedly, in the author’s view, the situation of young mothers was conditioned by their difficult financial situation, along with care and education problems, but: In general, our society has become more tolerant in perceiving certain facts and situations, once seen as “taboo.” One of the examples is having a child from an extramarital relationship. However, women who are to become single mothers experience anxiety about the reactions of their immediate environment. As shown by the research, the fear of parents’ and neighbors’ reactions, and of being the subject of gossips at the workplace, were of particular concern to expectant single mothers. Although their reactions were of central concern to the women, most parents would eventually display positive attitudes expressed through understanding and willingness to help the future mother. Parents would lend a hand even if they were shocked to hear that their daughter was pregnant. At the same time, however, every fourth mother of an extramarital child had only herself to rely on.22

The author of the research makes an a priori assumption, in a way confirming the reserved attitude of the state, that giving birth to and providing for a child—and this is clearly stressed here—are a private matter for the mother’s family and in this respect the family, albeit reluctantly, fulfills its role. Following research within the state domain, Balcerzak-Paradowska does not postulate the launching of any institution-based actions. She only suggests the following: “We should aim at preventing extramarital births among very young (especially minor) women, as their situational syndrome constitutes a prerequisite to assume that they will encounter considerable difficulties in performing family functions,” as well as taking measures designed to transform the general attitude toward single motherhood.23 A mother who puts forward any claim toward a state institution is perceived as displaying a passive or demanding attitude. The problem of the father’s responsibility is not mentioned either.   Balcerzak-Paradowska, “Sytuacja środowiskowa matek niezamężnych,” 24.   Ibid., 28.

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An unmarried mother who enters a governmental institution is a forewarning of long-term “trouble” and an insatiable need for support. Consequently, the first advice a woman would hear from the state is that she should terminate the pregnancy or leave the child at a care facility: “I was referred to hospital as early as my fifth week,” wrote a mother who got pregnant at twenty-two. They repeatedly asked me whether I actually wanted the child. But I was determined to give birth and was very happy about it. At last I would have someone to build a home with. . . . In the sixth month, the head of trade unions called me to his office. He said that I should have an abortion and that I don’t need a child if only because I have nowhere to live and they will not give me any flat. . . . Life is short and brutal but I have one wish: that no mother who loves their children ever hears that they might be taken away by the authorities and put in an orphanage.24

Women also complained about the indifference of aid institutions: “It so happened that I . . . tried to kill myself,” says one of them, “and so they found me in this unpleasant situation. I just had no choice. No roof over my head. I didn’t know what to do and where to go. I wanted to take up work and even went for advice to a lawyer and to the welfare center. But they wouldn’t help me, not a bit. Actually, they tried to make things harder.”25 Despite the fact that sociological studies indicated that single mothers “performed their duties” for an average of sixteen hours a day, with 80 percent of them sleeping fewer than eight hours and a large group only five to six hours, and although all experts agreed that these women lived in far worse conditions than biologically complete families, not much had been done to bridge these deep inequalities. While being theoretically entitled to preferential treatment in obtaining employment and having the right to perform home-based work, due to their unfavorable starting position and low levels of education, most of these women opted for menial, low-paid manual jobs.26 In their case, the typical problem of the “Polish mother,” namely the need to reconcile the duties of a worker with those of a mother and a housewife, reached the proportions of an insurmountable conflict. In contrast with neighboring countries, the maternity leave in Poland for a single mother—assuming that she was even eligible for it—did not differ from the leave taken by a mother who had her husband and family available for assistance. Nor were single mothers A twenty-eight-year-old woman, divorcee, basic vocational education, employed, mother of one six-year-old child. Bożenna Balcerzak-Paradowska, Sytuacja życiowa matek niezamężnych w świetle ich opinii (Warsaw: Instytut Pracy i Spraw Socjalnych, 1987), 159, 161. 25   APR 1 and 2. Pr III 84042+a. 26   Andrzej Chobot, “Aktualny stan prawny w zakresie uprawnień i ochrony jedynych żywicieli rodziny,” Praca i zabezpieczenie społeczne, no. 8/9 (1980): 29–30. 24

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banned from working third shifts (the ban only applied to pregnant women and mothers of children aged up to one year). There was no system of special family benefits in place. The majority of women remember, rather bitterly, a family allowance worth seventy-five zlotys. Yet, the other Eastern Bloc countries were much more generous: in Czechoslovakia, for instance, single mothers were eligible for an extra sixty-three days of maternity leave. The most favorable situation, however, was enjoyed by single parents (including fathers) in the GDR, where each month they could get one day off work to take care of any household matters. They also received allowances from their workplace on account of childcare leave. The USSR offered a wide array of privileges as regards childcare allowances which, as a rule, increased for the fourth and each consecutive child; single mothers were already entitled to higher allowances after having their first child. The allowance for Bulgarian women who raised their children alone was 100 percent higher than the standard one. Hungary introduced a similar financial support policy.27 Furthermore, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and the GDR had prohibited the dismissal of single mothers. In Poland, the Supreme Court twice (in 1961 and 1975) adjudged that an employee was not entitled to employment relationship protection on the grounds of being the sole income earner for their family.28 Polish mothers were granted financial support and easier access to workers’ holidays: the problem was that, living in poverty, very few of them could afford it. Their children were given priority for admission to nurseries and preschools, but either there were too few of such facilities or their opening hours were too short for a mother to leave her child there before her shift started and then pick them up after work.29 Such a situation was conducive to the excessive use of closed facilities—orphanages—as places of temporary stay for children. Therefore, the moderate pronatalist policy in Poland did not translate, as was the case in the USSR, to a general attitude toward unmarried women and their children. This probably resulted from their needs being substantially smaller, but also because they did not offer reasonable prospects for fostering the growth of a “healthy Polish family.” A modern family in Polish conditions had to be complete and reasonably fertile. This was an important element in the country’s discourse on modernization of that period, encompassing the transformation of family and sexuality. Through changes to the Polish birth rate—from natural to reasonable fertility—the People’s Republic of Poland was to join “developed countries, [abandoning] primitive living conditions, low civilizational and cultural levels, nearly nonexistent medical care, poor sanitary and   Chobot, “Aktualny stan prawny,” 12–14.   Ibid., 20–24. 29   Ibid., 18. 27 28

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sexual culture, insufficient education, and a procreation mentality and lifestyle shaped in these conditions.”30 This was an optimistic vision of the modern world (which can be deemed as universal for the contemporary European reality) as a civilized place based on knowledge (medical knowledge in particular), and the egalitarianism of the average living standard providing near-universal access to the latest scientific achievements. The change of heart toward procreation can be perceived as one of the pillars of social modernization in the context of socialism (which renders egalitarianism possible here) and one of the important symptoms of its modernity as a sociopolitical system. An unmarried mother in no way fitted this vision of a modern world, even more so if she reflected the widespread stereotypical image. In view of the accounts given by many young mothers on their lacking basic knowledge of sexuality, this image, while stereotypical, was to some degree based on reality.31 This factor of incompatibility with the contemporary world, even if still largely imagined or postulated, seems far more important than the vague argument of the state administrative bodies’ moral conservatism, so widespread and excessively used despite having no sufficient justification in the sources. Therefore, what seemed to lie at the heart of the exclusion of unmarried mothers and illegitimate children was in my opinion, paradoxically, not the inherited moral conservatism of the authorities, but the exaggerated focus on an imagined, though distant, future.

Becoming a citizen: The symptoms of changes Irrespective of the actual reasons for exclusion, women’s daily experiences gave rise to frustration. This emerged clearly in their accounts and stemmed from their exclusion from the promise of non-discrimination. In the statements of those born after the war, the reader notices an awareness of being equal citizens, one not present in the interwar generation. Young mothers were perceived by state institutions as not only irresponsible and untrustworthy, but also as displaying a demanding attitude; in the women’s view, this was justified by their Archiwum Akt Nowych (Polish Central Archives of Modern Records, hereafter AAN), Wycinki prasowe Ośrodka Dokumentacji i Zbiorów Programowych, TVP SA 2514/21/4, Z. Smoliński, “W kierunku nowoczesności,” Trybuna Ludu, December 20, 1977. 31   As we read in a letter from one of the respondents, a twenty-seven-year-old woman, primary education, unemployed, two children (six and seven years old): “I finished primary school in 1969 and wanted to go to a medical secondary school, but my parents said no. . . . And when I met this black-bearded boy who was eight years older and had a well-paid profession, they were very satisfied. But I, a sixteen-year-old kid, had no idea of anything like sexuality or life in a marriage. Nobody ever told me that girls have a period each month or that you can get pregnant after intercourse and, well, have a baby. . . . Back then I didn’t even know pregnancy lasts nine months.” Balcerzak-Paradowska, Sytuacja życiowa matek, 168. 30

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extraordinary situation which simply required the state to provide them with reliable support. Another frequently mentioned argument concerned the future of their children as citizens who someday would join in the common effort for the benefit of their motherland; the better educated or more experienced a mother was, the higher those expectations were. A fitting example here is that of a forty-year-old teacher, mother of Danusia, age three, for whom single motherhood was essentially her own choice. While not very common, accounts of this type were present in women’s diaries and responses to the questionnaire, and, just like the process of becoming a citizen, they might serve as evidence of limited, yet actual, transformation. In the case of the abovementioned teacher, her knowledge of the system is far superior than that of an average single mother, and the attempts she makes to improve her family situation encompass all paths of access toward consumer goods. She had prepared financially for being a mother and secured herself a cooperative apartment for which she had been saving for years; she was also going to graduate with a master’s degree in the future. “I did whatever I could,” we read in her account. “You can’t deny anything to the baby, can you?” During the pregnancy she “fixed herself ” a teacher’s sick leave to regain some health, because otherwise she would have felt “embarrassed to be around young people in that condition.” When after the birth the situation suddenly became complicated—the child’s father refused any help, loans risked compromising her financial stability, and the child, attending an all-week nursery, would always come down with some illness—she successfully applied for a disability pension. At school, she also claimed a non-refundable sickness allowance.32 In her response to the questionnaire, on the subject of what forms of assistance needed to be offered to single mothers, she listed a number of specific measures that would solve her basic (mainly financial) problems. These included a permanent fund for single mothers (1,500 zlotys) and a higher family allowance (500 instead of 75 zlotys). In her opinion, the workplace should have covered 70 percent of the nursery and preschool costs and 80 percent of the costs of summer and scout camps. This primarily applied to mothers who wished to continue education. Once or twice a year, she suggested, social organizations should provide 1,000 zlotys in aid for the purchase of clothes, and the Children’s Friends Association should organize Christmas gift and Children’s Day events. A mother should also be eligible for a long-term loan from the PKO (the State Savings Bank) for the purchase of furniture and home furnishing. Interestingly, she was willing to entrust the state with all her affairs, completely waiving any claim to alimony or establishment of paternity, even though   A thirty-nine-year-old unmarried woman, incomplete higher education, employed, one threeyear-old child. Balcerzak-Paradowska, Sytuacja życiowa matek, 164–66.

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she believed Danusia’s father was affluent enough to provide them with the necessary support. She even remained in touch with him, although their contacts were no longer so close. “I don’t know if what I’m doing is right,” she confessed, “not claiming paternity and alimony for Danusia. Now that I’ve received a disability pension, it would make things simpler. I didn’t file for alimony from her father because that would’ve broken his marriage. He said that if his wife were to find out, that would be the end, she’d surely leave him. It’s been two years now since they moved into a detached house; they even have a small Fiat.”33 A fact especially worth noting at this point is that the woman does not deem it necessary to facilitate contacts between the daughter and the father. The lack of initiative on his part seems sufficient for her to give up on having her child acknowledged. She believes that in her situation she will be able to cope on her own. By referring to state institutions as a source of aid for the family, she does not take the line of least resistance or want to burden the state with the father’s responsibilities and, in a moment of crisis, still decides to ask both the father and a governmental agency for help. A second example of maternity which, taken anachronistically, could be called “independent,” comes from a thirty-two-year-old woman, Bolesława, who in 1975 lived in a Masovian village with her mother, who suffered from a cardiac condition, and her one-and-a-half-year-old son. She ran an agricultural farm of 2.5 hectares on her own and had a job in a town nearly forty kilometers away, to which she was commuting by bus. The conditions in which they lived were very poor, as the buildings did not have electricity. Her diary depicts a different strategy for handling life difficulties. While the teacher emphasized her rights as a citizen and a mother of whom the state should take special care, Bolesława perceived her life within the generally accepted image of the “Polish mother.” Her account forms a narration in which she clearly declares: “A house must stand on a firm foundation which, in family life, is the woman. If she fails or isn’t there, the family loses its harmony, and this leads to chaos and disorder: in a word, the family falls into ruin. . . . But if the foundation fulfils its role, the family becomes a beautiful home filled with joy . . .”34 The diary’s author successfully exploits this stereotype by excluding the need for a man and a father in family wedlock. Such a strategy allows the translating of all difficult experiences into a story of success in which a single woman, against all odds, does great work not only as a mother, but also as head of her family and as a farmer. Ibid., 167.   The Archive of New Records (ANR), Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Pamiętnikarstwa (The Friends of Memoirs Society), Pamiętniki Kobiet Polskich, ref. No.: 2783, the diary of Bolesława Dobrzeniecka, 32 years old, Kozice, 1.

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Life is not easy. My newly born son was very ill. . . . No one came to help me. You see, people in the countryside still feel the urge to destroy the reputation of a girl, even the most decent one, if she gets pregnant. In my case this was both the countryside and the city. Nobody even reflected on the fact that I was in my thirties, so no longer young, and that I yearned for a child, someone to live and work for. Everybody at my work, where I had spent ten years and where people liked and respected me, suddenly turned their backs. My supervisor became cold and the GP wouldn’t help me because he, too, had this disapproving look. They were all interested in who the father was, and in the end came up with thirteen names of men of different ages, some of whom I didn’t even know. They simply made a prostitute out of me: people who for ten years had never had anything against me, people whom I liked and who liked me. I didn’t even try to explain that my boyfriend died in an accident, they wouldn’t believe me. Who cares, anyway. Let them say whatever they want. It was all the same to me. Deep inside, I was just happy to have my baby soon. . . . Someone might think ‘Girl, how do you even manage with all this?’ But somehow I do manage. My dream is to improve our living conditions. For this I have to increase my farm’s harvest capacity which should allow me to add more pigs to the stock. After all, I feel responsible for the two dearest people in my life: my mother and my son.35

In her determination, the woman, on her own, renovated her house and erected a wooden barn. On the next pages of her diary she describes in detail how her farm developed and the various problems she experienced with cow farming and the farm’s capacity: all these are to prove her resourcefulness, not only as a mother but, most of all, as a farmer. Both these situations also show that, subject to having a certain degree of financial independence, single mothers were able to successfully and quite quickly restore their social capital, despite the initial aversion from their immediate environment. Bolesława openly says that after a year of intense work, including struggling with her son’s illness and attempts to get her household out of trouble, no one seems to remember how she was treated right after the birth. Balcerzak-Paradowska saw such attitudes from her respondents as optimistic, giving the following account as an example: “So far I haven’t felt worse than my friends who have complete families. And frankly speaking, I don’t know if my situation is any different from that of a woman who got a divorce. Actually, I think that for me it’s easier than if I were to raise my child in a complete, but divided family. My advice to all those unmarried mothers would be that they   ANR, Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Pamiętnikarstwa (The Friends of Memoirs Society), Pamiętniki Kobiet Polskich ref. No.: 2783, 2.

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treat themselves and their children normally and not feel inferior in any way.”36 Some women openly disagreed to being condemned through exclusion: “You shouldn’t condemn women who raise their children alone. . . . There is so much to do in this regard and it will take a long time for things to improve. . . . But this has to end, so that our children are no longer treated as “waifs” or “foundlings.”37

The stamp of immorality and its coping strategies The vast majority of unmarried mothers could not boast such initiative and mental strength as the women described above. Still, nearly all women experiencing housing problems were adamant in stating that their children had the right to accommodation: “Why is it that we, single mothers, with children to provide for, whom we wish to keep with us and raise, and be able to work, come across such obstacles in getting a flat?”38 Such respondents were too young (usually in their teenage years or twenties) to enjoy the financial security necessary for handling the burden of caring for a small child. Yet, they all followed certain strategies to help them cope with a social exclusion founded in the belief that they had violated a specific code of conduct. This code stemmed from the generally accepted stereotype of a young woman as a person who is abstinent and responsible for her own sexuality, but also, even more importantly, for the sexuality of her immature—as stressed by experts at the time—partner.39 This widespread model of a girl or young woman who may be sensual but should nevertheless remain reserved in her sexual life went hand in hand with religious notions of premarital chastity and, finally, the perception of unmarried women with children as being poorly educated and incapable. One of these coping strategies, best illustrated by a story presented in a program on Polish Radio, was to run away from home when pregnancy could no longer be kept secret from the rest of the family. Young women usually used this method to avoid other people’s disapproval toward themselves and their children. The studies further indicate that their immediate circles of friends quickly   Balcerzak-Paradowska, “Sytuacja środowiskowa matek niezamężnych,” 26.   Ibid. 38   A twenty-five-year-old woman, primary education, employed, two children (two and three years old). Balcerzak-Paradowska, Sytuacja życiowa matek, 172. 39   For more on this subject please refer to Agnieszka Kościańska, Płeć, przyjemność i przemoc: Kształtowanie wiedzy eksperckiej o seksualności w Polsce (Warsaw: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 2014); Małgorzata Fidelis, “Młode robotnice w mieście: Percepcje kobiecej seksualności w Polsce w latach pięćdziesiątych XX-go wieku,” in Kobieta i małżeństwo: Społecznokulturowe aspekty seksualności, ed. Anna Żarnowska and Andrzej Szwarc (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo DiG, 2004), 453–75. 36 37

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diminished, because they preferred not to confide in their female acquaintances and colleagues. “I, for instance, during my first pregnancy, really sensed a difference in the way my parents behaved toward me. It somewhat changed once I gave birth to my son, but not really. On every occasion they would rub my nose in it or call me names. On the one hand, my parents helped me by staying with the child while I was at work, but on the other they kept on picking on me.”40 Isolation from their family environment was accompanied by attempts to remain anonymous. Taking a deliberate decision to keep a low profile, future mothers relocated from their homes and gave birth elsewhere. This was also the goal behind transferring pregnant girls from regular to extramural schools (for adults). Even older women, such as the teacher above, decided to give up their jobs to prevent office gossip. In this particular case, however, we are also dealing with a very interesting issue of pregnancy being in itself perceived as something embarrassing that impeded a teacher’s work with young people.41 Even in the milieu of Warsaw educationalists, which could be deemed liberal and emancipated, the pregnancy of an unmarried, well-educated woman in the 1960s caused a sensation; although in this case, as admitted by one of the mothers, “no one had the courage to say anything about it to my face so as not to appear as some ‘old fogey.’”42 So, they hid away. Disappeared from the public eye, to some extent acknowledging their “status”—as Liszowska put it—“of someone inferior, a second-class citizen.”43And they did it irrespective of their social background. Those who offered help to single mothers often stressed that stigmatization, contrary to what Tryfan had claimed, was not exclusive to small towns and villages, and appeared to be commonplace among high-ranking, well-off parents, who would never accept an “unwanted,” for lack of a better word, child of their unmarried daughter. And this is the sad reality, even though you’d think they should be more willing to help, to lend a hand. The most frequent problem about such families is that they won’t even hear about anything, and it is due to this sense of   A twenty-four-year-old woman, incomplete basic vocational education, employed, three children (four, six, and eight years old). Balcerzak-Paradowska, Sytuacja życiowa matek, 170. 41   Such a view found its legal confirmation within the territory of prewar Poland in 1926, when the Silesian Sejm adopted a widely disputed act which imposed the obligation of celibacy on female teachers. One of the main arguments in support of the act put forward by its proponents was that students kept asking their parents about “pregnant teachers.” 42   Only the supervisor of the diary’s author took the liberty of commenting on the affair: “As much as I understand and am very tolerant in these matters . . . this should not have happened. You served as a role model for the rest of the personnel.” From the diary of Danuta (a fortyyear-old office worker). Mirosława Parzyńska and Irena Tarłowska, eds., Jaka jesteś rodzino? (Warsaw: Iskry, 1965), 343. 43   APR 1 and 2. Pr III 84042+a. 40

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shame in front of general society and their closest circle that the girl needs to hide away and is often pressured by her family to give up the child.44

This space of “the excluded” has traditionally been the domain of the Roman Catholic church which, acting as a charity, offered each woman a place in one of the facilities run by female religious orders, where future mothers could stay until birth and receive psychological, medical, and legal assistance. The state, on the other hand, did not run any institutions in which women, as persons in special need, could wait until the moment of birth, with the exception of vacancies in selected state-owned small children’s homes where, as the director of one of them stressed, “women were guaranteed intimate conditions for giving birth, keeping it secret from family and friends.”45 Centers run by the Catholic church, some boasting a longstanding history, could be found in Lublin, Katowice, Kraków, Biała (near Płock), and Kąty Wrocławskie. The one in Lublin was opened in 1958. Religious orders also ran certain state-owned children’s emergency shelters. It was a commonly known fact that establishing such facilities in each town or city would not make much sense, as young women wished to leave home and go as far as possible. Aid was also offered by Catholic counselling centers at Książęca Street in Warsaw, and those administered by diocesan family ministries. In the case of church-run institutions, their existence was motivated by their desire to prevent abortions. The discourse of the Polish church stipulated that a single mother deserves help because she has decided not to terminate her pregnancy. According to the manager of one such facility, care was provided primarily to those women who did not come from Warsaw, but from the provinces, where “people still have respect for conceived life and abortion is not considered as the first option.”46 After giving birth, women again had to face the problem of homelessness. Even if they tried to be independent, life was too tough, as noted by one of the directors of the small children’s home. Workers’ hostels did not admit mothers with children, and landlords in cities would not rent rooms to them for fear of problems, such as the necessity to wash diapers. Another option was an all-week nursery, but nearly all respondents confirmed that this was not a viable solution, as children attending them would constantly come down with illnesses. In the end, some children would be referred for adoption or to an orphanage. In order to keep the child, the mother had to have her family’s support. Therefore, irrespective of whether a girl was of age or not, the personnel of church- and   APR 1 and 2. Pr III 84042+. A conversation with Irena Rewińska, director of the Small Children’s Home in Warsaw, Nowogrodzka Street 75. 45   APR 1 and 2. Pr III 84042+. A conversation with Irena Rewińska. 46   APR 1 and 2. Pr III 84042+a. A conversation with Daria Plaskacz. 44

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state-owned institutions encouraged her to go back to her family (the possibility of adoption was not mentioned by any of the mothers in their diaries or accounts). The nun managing the facility in Lublin said that she always tried to convince the girl’s parents to take care of their grandson or granddaughter. “We often call the parents, asking them to take care of the child. . . . Recently, I’ve driven this girl back home. Not so long ago, two weeks to be exact. Her mother didn’t look pleased and was being terrible to her. But the girl said: ‘I will get through this.’ We met a week ago: everything is fine [smiling]. I helped by delivering her some diapers and other stuff that we receive, even from abroad and the church.”47 Despite making every effort, girls often failed to cope on their own and after several months, together with their infant babies, turned to their relatives for help. On coming back home, however, they usually had to face humiliation: “My son often fell sick, so I took unpaid leave and moved in back with my mother. But they insulted me all the time. I was at the end of my nerves, but accepted everything they threw at me. It broke my heart to see my son babbling and going up to his grandfather, unaware of being called ‘foundling’ and all those other names. The situation became so tense that I reported it to the public prosecutor. . . . My father would throw every possible insult at me.”48 It was then that the fear of rejection became reality: reality of a very peculiar type, where fulfilling the duty of care of one’s own child entailed emotional rejection. The social stigma of “moral inchastity” hung over a young woman, casting a shadow on her entire family who blamed not only the mother, but also the child for their social exclusion. Indeed, it may have been the child that they blamed most of all. “Love between an unmarried couple is frowned upon. But an ‘illegitimate child’ will receive even harsher treatment, as we read in one of the diaries.”49 A child, by being called deeply ingrained and widely known “substitute” names such as “foundling,” “orphan,” “stray,” or “waif,” was symbolically excluded from the circle of legitimate family members who thus showed their dissatisfaction at the fact that the order of things had been disturbed.   APR 1 and 2. Pr III 84042+a. A conversation with Daria Plaskacz.   A twenty-eight-year-old woman, divorcee, basic vocational education, employed, mother of one six-year-old child. Balcerzak-Paradowska, Sytuacja życiowa matek, 160. 49   The diary of “Araukaria” (thirty-two years old, not employed in her profession, higher education, husband is a technician). Parzyńska and Tarłowska, Jaka jesteś rodzino?, 302. For a similar perspective please see the diary of Danuta (an office worker, forty years old): “When one of my friends decided to give birth to an illegitimate baby, I was outraged. I just couldn’t fathom how she . . . had the courage to bring into this world a child who from the very start would suffer a sense of inferiority, traumas and all sorts of painful experiences.” Parzyńska and Irena, Jaka jesteś rodzino?, 337. 47 48

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Also worth noting is another characteristic interrelation analyzed in statistical terms by Dorota Kałuża: the phenomenon which demographers called “remedial marriage,” namely a relationship enforced by extramarital pregnancy. This notion, dating back to the Middle Ages, was related to the concept of “damage repair” set out in the Canon Law.50 The phenomenon in question can be fairly easily traced in popular sources, due to the reduced time between solemnizing marriage and having the first child. Due note, however, should be taken of the fact that in the People’s Republic of Poland calculations are more complex, because marriages were almost always solemnized in two stages (in church and in the civil registry office). Kałuża’s research suggests that, eventually, the vast majority of unmarried pregnant women quite quickly ended up in front of the altar; sometimes so soon that their closest relatives had no idea there were “extraordinary circumstances” behind the wedding. The women described in this article belonged to a small group of those who “did not manage to do it.” Furthermore, the analysis of data over an extended period indicates that such marriages were increasing in number. This in turn shows, on the one hand, that sexual behaviors were becoming liberalized (more couples engaged in premarital intercourse), and on the other, that social pressure to legalize relationships remained rather high.51 Many will find surprising the conclusion that in the mid-1980s more than 46 percent of newborn children were most probably the reason for, not the consequence of, couples’ decision to marry. If one in two married couples violated the principles of moral rigor, why such strong condemnation of those who, for whatever reason, did not make it? The presence of pregnancy-motivated weddings is still strong in family memories, as evidenced by contemporary research on matrimonial decisions taken in the 1970s and the 1980s, conducted in Łódź by Małgorzata Potoczna. One of her respondents said: “I got pregnant with our oldest son, but I guess we were in love, me and my husband. That’s why it happened. The pregnancy made us legalize our relationship sooner. Normally it would have taken us longer, but with all that we just had to do it. Our parents said we should marry as soon as possible. People, too, look at you differently if you marry and only then have a child; but their perspective changes if you give birth while still being single.”52 It was also an important factor differentiating between the past and the future: Dorota Kałuża, “Małżeństwa ‘naprawcze’ w powojennej Polsce,” in Dziecko—Etyka—Ekonomia, ed. Edward Ozorowski and Ryszard Cz. Horodeński (Białystok: Wydawnictwo Wyższej Szkoły Ekonomicznej, 2008), 294–305. 51   Kałuża, “Małżeństwa ‘naprawcze’ w powojennej Polsce,” 300–301. 52   Małgorzata Potoczna, “Uwarunkowania decyzji matrymonialnych,” in Rodzina w zmieniającym się społeczeństwie polskim, ed. Wielisława Warzywoda-Kruszyńska and Piotr Szukalski (Łódź: Wyd. UŁ, 2004), 202. 50

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“We wanted to be together and in those times it would not be possible without a wedding; now it’s hard for me to say if we would have decided to marry right away.”53 *** The stories of unmarried mothers who raised their children single-handedly serve as an excellent illustration—though not the only one—of the role played by family and its internal non-formalized forms of social control in the complex sociocultural system of postwar Poland. In theory, those who did not have access to any family-based resources could turn to the state; but the state never came to play the role that could have been expected of it, given the position of Poland in the broader context of communist culture. Paradoxically, unmarried Polish mothers did experience full equality of rights, as they had absolutely no privileges, despite the difficult financial and social situation and the reintroduction of pronatalist policies in the 1970s. The fact that Poland’s demographic problems were not as serious as those in the USSR or the GDR was probably one of the reasons why the state authorities chose “not to notice” single mothers. The second reason was founded on modernization ideas which in the Polish context, paradoxically, put those women at a disadvantage. Hence, within the “community–unmarried mother” relation, we are dealing with a complex system in which the woman is pushed to the margins by means of omission or open condemnation. The strongly manifested and relatively durable effect of rejection is, in this case, the result of an interesting accumulation of social fears and expectations present at various levels: the first and probably the strongest one, identifiable both at the level of discourse and daily experience, was related to the image of woman as a sexually abstinent person, and fully accepted at the level of norm (not social practice) associating sexuality with marriage. This was of course connected with religious commands, but at the same time went far beyond the sphere of social impact of Catholicism per se. The stability of the Sinnwelt in Poland during the second half of the twentieth century was conducive to the maintenance of social consensus on the stable family and its appurtenant sphere of sexuality. If anything challenged this stable world, it was processes based on democratization and the process of “becoming a citizen” (which took on a specific shape in communist Poland) that led to the development of individual beliefs regarding rights: primarily rights to consumer goods, both more and less accessible. What is especially interesting, however, is that single mothers, viewed with such disfavor, concealed an even more deep-seated taboo. This was the reality   Potoczna, “Uwarunkowania decyzji matrymonialnych,” 203.

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of living in informal relationships, which were both absent from the public eye and not accepted by the general public. This taboo resulted first and foremost from a simple interdependence: cohabitation did not generate any social costs and could remain unnoticeable, as long as the couple took care of keeping it so.

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Selected bibliography

Balcerzak-Paradowska, Bożenna. Sytuacja życiowa matek niezamężnych w świetle ich opinii. Warsaw: Instytut Pracy i Spraw Socjalnych, 1987. Carlbäck, Helene. “Lone Motherhood in Soviet Russia in the Mid-20th Century—In a European Context.” In And They Lived Happily Ever After: Norms and Everyday Practices of Family and Parenthood in Russia and Central Europe, edited by Helene Carlbäck, Yulia Gradskova, and Zhanna Kravchenko, 25–46. Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2012. Carlbäck, Helene, Yulia Gradskova, and Zhanna Kravchenko, eds. And They Lived Happily Ever After. Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2012. Fidelis, Małgorzata. “Czy ‘nowy matriarchat’? Kobiety bez mężczyzn w Polsce po drugiej wojnie światowej.” In Kobiety i rewolucja obyczajowa: społeczno-kulturowe aspekty seksualności; Wiek XIX i XX, edited by Anna Żarnowska and Andrzej Szwarc, 421–36. Warsaw: DiG, 2006. ———. “Młode robotnice w mieście: Percepcje kobiecej seksualności w Polsce w latach pięćdziesiątych XX-go wieku.” In Kobieta i małżeństwo: Społeczno-kulturowe aspekty seksualności, edited by Anna Żarnowska and Andrzej Szwarc, 453–75. Warsaw: Wydawnictwo DiG, 2004. ———. Women, Communism, and Industrialization in Postwar Poland. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. Jarosz, Maria. Dezorganizacja w rodzinie i społeczeństwie. Warsaw: Polskie Wydawnictwo Ekonomiczne, 1987. Kałuża, Dorota. “Małżeństwa ‘naprawcze’ w powojennej Polsce.” In Dziecko—Etyka—Ekonomia, edited by Edward Ozorowski and Ryszard Cz. Horodeński, 294–305. Białystok: Wydawnictwo Wyższej Szkoły Ekonomicznej, 2008. Klich-Kluczewska, Barbara. “Social Policy and Social Practice in the People’s Republic of Poland.” In Social Care under State Socialism (1945–1989): Ambitions, Ambiguities, and Mismanagement, edited by Sabine Hering, 161–74. Leverkusen-Opladen: Verlag Barbara Budrich, 2009. Kościańska, Agnieszka. Płeć, przyjemność i przemoc: Kształtowanie wiedzy eksperckiej o seksualności w Polsce. Warsaw: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 2014. Leinarte, Dalia. “Why Does Public Policy Implementation Fail? Lithuanian Office of State Benefits for Mothers of Large Families and Single Mothers 1944–1956.” In And They Lived Happily Ever After, edited by Helene Carlbäck, Yulia Gradskova, and Zhanna Kravchenko, 105–22. Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2012. Łobodzińska, Barbara. Rodzina w Polsce. Warsaw: Interpress, 1974. Mazurek, Małgorzata. Społeczeństwo kolejki: O doświadczeniach niedoboru 1945–1989. Warsaw: Trio, 2010. Misiak, Anna. Kinematograf kontrolowany: cenzura filmowa w kraju socjalistycznym i demokratycznym (PRL i USA); analiza socjologiczna. Kraków: Universitas, 2006. Parzyńska, Mirosława and Irena Tarłowska, eds. Jaka jesteś rodzino? Warsaw: Iskry, 1965. Potoczna, Małgorzata. “Uwarunkowania decyzji matrymonialnych.” In Rodzina w zmieniającym się społeczeństwie polskim, edited by Wielisława Warzywoda-Kruszyńska and Piotr Szukalski, 197–205. Łódź: Wyd. UŁ, 2004. Szukalski, Piotr. Płodność i urodzenia pozamałżeńskie w Polsce. Łódź: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Łódzkiego, 2001.

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Tarkowski, Jacek and Elżbieta Tarkowska. “‘Amoralny familizm’ czyli o dezintegracji społecznej w Polsce lat osiemdziesiątych.” In Socjologia świata polityki: Władza i społeczeństwo w systemie autorytarnym, edited by Jacek Tarkowski, 263–82. Warsaw: ISP PAN, 1994. Wedel, R. Janine. Prywatna Polska. Warsaw: Trio, 2007. Zhidkova, Elena. “Family, Divorce, and Comrades’ Courts: Soviet Family and Public Organizations During the Thaw.” In And They Lived Happily Ever After, edited by Helene Carlbäck, Yulia Gradskova, and Zhanna Kravchenko, 47–64. Budapest– New York: Central European University Press, 2012.

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CHAPTER NINE

“Since Makarenko the Time for Experiments has Passed”: Peace, Gender, and Human Rights in East Berlin during the 1980s Celia Donert

An ornate street sign standing in the heart of Prenzlauer Berg is today scarcely noticeable amidst the cafés, tourists, and well-dressed children in one of the most gentrified districts of the former East Berlin.1 Yet, on closer inspection the wrought-iron sign directing visitors toward Husemannstraße, a street leading from the lively Kollwitzplatz, is different in design from all the other street signs in the area. Its turn-of-the-century style is neo-historical rather than an actual product of the nineteenth century. Unexpectedly, the sign is also connected to conflicts that took place in this street during the last decade of socialist rule in East Germany. During the 1980s, the dilapidated nineteenth-century tenement buildings of Prenzlauer Berg were in urgent need of renovation, and many apartments were left empty as their residents moved to the newly built estates of panel housing blocks further out of town. In one empty ground-floor apartment on Husemannstraße, a group of Prenzlauer Berg residents set up a Kinderladen, an anti-authoritarian kindergarten. The name Kinderladen was taken from the parent-led childcare initiatives that emerged from the West German New Left student movements after 1968.2 The Kinderladen survived for a few years but was shut down shortly after one of its female founders was arrested by the State Security for taking part in an unofficial peace protest. Soon afterwards, Husemannstraße became the site of a showpiece urban regeneration project to celebrate Berlin’s 750th anniversary. This was when the street sign was erected, along with other neo-historical adornments such as craftsmen’s shops, lampposts mimicking gaslights, and a museum, all of which gestured backwards to the official Socialist Unity Party (SED) vision of Berlin’s proletarian past and   For a photograph of the sign, see Bundesarchiv: Bild 183-1987-0428-300 / Sturm, Horst / CC-BY-SA-3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. 2   The literal translation of the term Kinderladen (pl. Kinderläden) is “children-store,” since many were originally set up in empty storefronts. 1

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forwards to new—albeit short-lived—attempts to transform the East German capital city.3 Since the demise of East Germany, the reconstruction of Husemannstraße has been practically forgotten. The Kinderladen, however, has been memorialized as a site in the historical landscape of Prenzlauer Berg’s alternative culture during the 1970s and 1980s. It appeared in an exhibition called Gegenentwürfe: Prenzlauer Berg vor, während, und nach dem Mauerfall curated by the Pankow Museum in Berlin in 2012, alongside other key sites of opposition and counterculture, such as the Gethsemanekirche or the Hirschhof courtyards on Oderberger Straße. This exhibition presented Prenzlauer Berg as the place that best exemplified the transformation of Germany since reunification, since it was here that “opponents and nonconformists” “dreamt up, tried out, and lived their alternative projects” to really existing socialism. Such representations chime with retrospective accounts that magnify the importance of numerically small and marginal circles of Prenzlauer Berg dissent.4 But closer examination of this short-lived experiment reveals many more layers of the East German Sinnwelt—the world of meaning that constituted the German Democratic Republic—than can be accommodated within the conventional narrative of Prenzlauer Berg dissidents battling a totalitarian state. In this article, I explore the Kinderladen as a site of conflicts between Prenzlauer Berg residents and their children, peace activists, official and unofficial women’s movements, East German planners, and Stasi informers and officers. The story of the Kinderladen was embedded in a much broader history of Cold War battles over the family and private life in both East and West.5 Childcare was central to a longer history of state-citizen struggles over gender roles in socialist countries throughout the Eastern Bloc. The provision of an extensive state-run network of crèches and kindergartens was a point of pride for East Germany, a state that by the 1980s boasted one of the highest rates of female employment in the world. In the West, some feminists saw socialist states’ provision of childcare in utopian terms, while conservative reports about the deleterious effects   On the reconstruction, see Florian Urban, Neo-historical East Berlin: Architecture and Urban Design in the German Democratic Republic 1970–1990 (London: Ashgate, 2009). 4   Thomas Mergel, “Zweifach am Rande: Die Dissidenten vom Prenzlauer Berg,” in Zeiträume: Potsdamer Almanach des Zentrums für Zeithistorische Forschung 2009, ed. Martin Sabrow (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2010), 107–17. On the place of the Kiez and alternative cultures in East Berlin in this period, see Hanno Hochmuth, Kiezgeschichte: Friedrichshain und Kreuzberg im geteilten Berlin (Göttingen: Wallstein, 2017). 5   Karen Hagemann, Konrad H. Jarausch, and Cristina Allemann-Ghionda, eds., Children, Families and States: Time Policies of Child Care, Preschool and Primary Schooling in Europe (Oxford: Berghahn, 2011). 3

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of institutionalized childcare—such as images of collective toilet training for toddlers—had also become central to the perception that socialism was destroying the family.6 The term Kinderladen conjures up a vision of autonomy and independence at odds with stereotypical notions of the Kinderkrippen, the East German crèches that were viewed in Cold War West Germany as the epitome of socialist attempts to brainwash the GDR’s youngest citizens into collectivism and conformity. Yet, as Sandrine Kott has pointed out, the Kinderkrippe only appears to be an East German peculiarity when viewed through a West German lens.7 While the number of infants placed in crèches was very high in comparison to the Federal Republic, the contrast with France or Scandinavia, not to speak of other socialist countries in the Eastern Bloc, was not so great. From this perspective West Germany, not the GDR, stands out as the exception in patterns of early years childcare. Moreover, the Kinderladen exemplified the belief of both East German activists and the state that abstract questions of peace and human rights mattered most when expressed in material ways. In this article, I ask how the Kinderladen highlights the overlaps as well as the differences between the Sinnwelt of dissidents and the East German state, as well as raising questions that are frequently ignored in histories of dissidence, such as how the burden of reproductive labor acted as Figure 9.1. Husemannstraße in Berlin, street sign. a barrier to the work of dissent.

Source: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-1987-0428-300 / CC-BY-SA 3.0.

  Donna Harsch, Revenge of the Domestic: Women, the Family and Communism in the German Democratic Republic (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007); Elizabeth D. Heineman, What Difference Does a Husband Make? Women and Marital Status in Nazi and Postwar Germany (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003). 7   Sandrine Kott, “Die Kinderkrippe,” in Erinnerungsorte der DDR, ed. Martin Sabrow (Munich: C.H. Beck, 2009), 281–91. 6

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Materializing Sinnwelt: peace, gender, and urban space “Since Makarenko the time for experiments is over. We have excellent kindergartens: there is no need for the kind of thing that you are doing.”8 Thus wrote the head of the Department for Volksbildung in the East Berlin city council to a small group of residents who had established an unofficial, anti-authoritarian kindergarten (Kinderladen) in a ground floor apartment on a dilapidated street in Prenzlauer Berg, an inner-city district of late nineteenth-century tenement buildings (Mietskaserne). One of these residents was Ulrike Poppe, who arrived in the area as a university student in the late 1970s. She was one of a growing number of people who moved into these decaying nineteenth-century tenements as part of a quest to find ways of leading an independent life in the East German capital city. Determined to avoid the regimented atmosphere of a student dormitory, she found lodgings with an elderly woman in a damp backyard, before moving later into her own black-market apartment. She recalled later that the students she met in Berlin were “all critically-minded people,” who had in many cases been dismissed from university for political reasons and were drawn together by their shared experiences of rejecting the standardization and norms of East German society: “These were all people who wanted to live their own lives. This was much more a protest attitude concerning lifestyles than something that was directly political. But of course, these two things have to be seen together since the state politicized culture.”9 The idea for the Kinderladen emerged from the countercultural milieu of these private discussion circles: “A number of women and men, who had been friends for years, were expecting children. They reached a consensus around criticism of the state-run crèches and kindergartens.”10 Above all, they criticized the emphasis on rules and order which was aggravated by the “systematic overburdening” of carers forced to look after large groups of children.11 Socialized childcare was one of the pillars of East German policies to promote women’s equality through their participation in the waged labor force. Sixty percent of East German under-threes attended a Kinderkrippe in 1989, and 80 percent of children between one and three years of age. By contrast, only 1.6 percent of West German children of the same age were placed in a crèche. The East German figures were far higher than other socialist countries: in Czechoslovakia, only 22 percent of children attended such institutions.12   Archive Robert-Havemann-Gesellschaft, Archiv der DDR-Opposition (RHG Archive), f. Ulrike Poppe 022: “Kinderladen.” 9   Interview with Ulrike Poppe cited in Andreas Glaeser, Political Epistemics: The Secret Police, the Opposition, and the End of East Germany (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011), 381. 10   RHG Archive, f. RHG/TH 03/1: “Über den Kinderladen Husemannstraße 14—Berlin, 19.12.1983.” 11   RHG Archive, f. RHG/TH 03/1. 12   Kott, “Die Kinderkrippe.” 8

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For inspiration, Ulrike Poppe and her friends looked to the Kinderladen movement in West Germany, which began in 1967 with the founding of an anti-authoritarian kindergarten in Frankfurt am Main by Monika Seifert, a student of psychoanalysis and early childhood development. Kinderläden in the Federal Republic were set up by parents’ collectives in ground floor apartments, previously used as shops, to care for preschool children aged between three and five years old. Their aim was to stimulate children to create their own collectives in order to develop their “natural” sense of justice, without any form of competition, coercion, or physical punishment.13 In 1965, only 30 percent of West German children got a place in one of the Federal Republic’s 15,000 kindergartens. By contrast, kindergarten places were available to some 84 percent of children in Belgium, 80 percent in the Netherlands, and 70 percent in France. The conservative image of the family supported by both state and church in West Germany had resulted in a lack of support for public childcare. Conflicts over publicly funded childcare for preschool-age children were partly rooted in the ideological stand-off between the two German states. Since the extensive network of state childcare institutions in East Germany was linked to the importance placed on women’s integration into the labor force, West German politicians missed no opportunity to emphasize the differences in family and childcare policies in the Federal Republic.14 But these debates were also part of a much longer tradition of conflicts about whether preschool childcare should be seen as a matter of social welfare or educational policy.15 In the mid-1960s three-quarters of West German kindergartens were run by churches or voluntary associations such as the Arbeiterwohlfahrt or the Jugendhilfe. But while kindergarten places were in extremely short supply in cities such as Frankfurt or West Berlin, the Kinderladen founders were motivated by more than just pragmatic considerations. Monika Seifert was vehemently opposed to the strict regimentation and harsh discipline associated with conservative childcare institutions. In the mid1960s, Seifert had studied in London and gained firsthand experience of the concept of “self-regulation” promoted by the educator Alexander S. Neill in his independent school, Summerhill.16   Sven Reichardt, Authentizität und Gemeinschaft: Linksalternatives Leben in den siebziger und frühen achtziger Jahren (Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2014). 14   Ute Frevert, “Umbruch der Geschlechterverhältnisse? Die 60er Jahre als geschlechterpolitischer Experimentierraum,” in Dynamische Zeiten: Die 60er Jahre in den beiden deutschen Gesellschaften, ed. Axel Schildt, Detlef Siegfried, and Karl Christian Lammers (Hamburg: Hans Christians Verlag, 2000), 642–60. 15   Meike Sophia Baader, “Das Private ist politisch: Der Alltag der Geschlechter, die Lebensformen und die Kinderfrage” in “Seid realistisch, verlangt das Unmögliche!” Wie 1968 die Pädogogik bewegte, ed. Meike Sophia Baader (Weinheim: Beltz, 2008). 16   Wilma Aden-Grossmann, “Monika Seifert—Gründerin der antiautoritären Erziehungsbewegung,” in Zugänge zur Kinderladenbewegung, ed. Karin Bock, Nina Göddertz, Franziska Heyden, and Miriam Mauritz (Wiesbaden: Springer VS, 2020), 9–26. 13

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Play, emotions, and a liberal approach to sexuality were at the heart of Neill’s progressive educational ideas, popularized in his book Summerhill: A Radical Approach to Child Rearing. Published in English in 1960, the German translation of the book appeared in the Federal Republic in 1969. Here it achieved instant success, with 275,000 copies sold in eight editions between December 1969 and May 1970.17 As Meike Sophia Baader has pointed out, Neill’s liberal ideas were much more attractive to the Kinderladen movement than theories of proletarian or socialist education. Most of the middle-class parents involved in the West German movement did not read the Soviet educator Wera Schmidt’s account of a children’s home during and after the Russian Revolution, which was also republished in 1968, Baader observes. Nor did they read Otto Rühle’s 1922 text on the proletarian child, which was cited in the afterword to Ulrike Meinhof ’s television screenplay Bambule, a scathing criticism of an orphanage for girls that was banned due to Meinhof ’s involvement in the Red Army Faction.18 By contrast, Neill’s Summerhill became essential reading for many Kinderladen founders sympathetic to his psychoanalytic approach, which was influenced by Wilhelm Reich. This was also the case for the founders of the East Berlin Kinderladen, who, along with many East German 68ers, read literature on anti-authoritarian education that was circulating from West Berlin. Excerpts from Summerhill are preserved among the papers of the Husemannstraße Kinderladen founders. The East Berlin Kinderladen was also supposed to promote individuality, anti-authoritarianism, and a “warm” atmosphere conducive to the “psychological wellbeing of our children.”19 For the East Berlin Kinderladen founders, shaping their children’s personalities was a political act that was intimately connected to the most pressing geopolitical questions of the day: the protection of peace, the environment, and human rights. Their primary goal was “[d]eveloping consciousness of [the child’s] own individuality, self-confidence, feelings of self-value and connected with this, the ability to enforce these in everyday life.”20 Educational practices during the Cold War were shored up by psychological theories that were deeply entangled with high politics. Fears about the militarization of German society multiplied at the turn of the 1980s in reaction to the NATO Double-Track Decision on the deployment of Pershing II nuclear missiles in Europe. In East Berlin, opposition to the creeping militarization of education and everyday life was pivotal in shifting the cultural opposition toward the formation of an inde  Meike Sophia Baader, “Von der sozialistische Erziehung bis zum buddistischen Om: Kinderläden zwischen Gegen- und Elitenkulturen,” in “Seid realistisch, verlangt das Unmögliche!” 16–35. 18  Baader, “Von der sozialistische Erziehung,” 31. 19   RHG Archive, f. UP 022: Kinderladen Husemannstr. 14—Methoden (undated). 20   RHG Archive, f. UP 022: Kinderladen Husemannstr. 14—Allgem. Zielstellung (undated). 17

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pendent peace movement. As the Kinderladen founders wrote: “The increasingly militaristic education with its demagogy about good and bad soldiers, good and bad weapons, is especially repulsive, but is only the tip of the iceberg.”21 The group found a three-room shop front apartment through friends, who were officially the tenants but had moved out of Berlin into the countryside, keeping the apartment registered in their name. Three months of reconstruction and renovation work were needed to make the apartment ready. Initially, five children aged between six and nine months old were looked after by a female carer for eight hours per day. For the first five months the parents cooked lunch themselves. Later, food was ordered from a canteen kitchen via a nearby state kindergarten on the Sredzkistraße. A specially built wagon was used to take the children for walks. Ulrike Poppe corresponded with the Berlin city administration about the Kinderladen, for example making an (unsuccessful) application in July 1981 for financial support from the Department for Health and Social Care in Prenzlauer Berg, on the basis that there were insufficient crèche places for babies in the district. Once a month the parents met for an evening with the carers to discuss practical and pedagogical matters. Meanwhile they were continually working to renovate the apartment, as well as sharing duties such as cleaning, preparing breakfast, washing, heating, and providing toys and activities.22 For three years the Kinderladen operated in a murky legal and administrative space, under surveillance but grudgingly tolerated by the local authorities. The history of the Kinderladen was full of difficulties, according to its founders. The parents found that the amount of work they needed to put into the Kinderladen, along with their financial contributions, was disproportionately high. In retrospect, one of the founders noted: “Looking after basic things like repairs, heating, and food for the children, on top of an 8.75 hour working day, was exhausting. The apartment was cold, damp, and moldy; this had to be hidden since the authorities could have used such problems as grounds for closing down the crèche. The Kinderladen was isolated, with no possibilities for learning from the experience of others.”23 There were constant threats from the authorities. Only a few weeks after the Kinderladen opened on October 1, 1980, the parents were accused by a local police officer of black-market speculation on the housing market, while the carer was dubbed “asocial.” The founders recognized that   RHG Archive, f. RHG/TH 03/1: “Über den Kinderladen Husemannstraße 14—Berlin, 19.12.83.” 22   RHG Archive, f. RHG/UP 022: Kurze Chronik und techn. Organisation des Kinderladens (undated). 23   RHG Archive, f. RHG/TH 03/1: “Über den Kinderladen Husemannstraße 14—Berlin, 19.12.1983.” 21

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“a legal basis for the Kinderladen never existed, and toleration on the part of state authorities, or its destruction, was dependent least of all on legal issues.”24

Figure 9.2. Kinderladen, Husemannstraße, Berlin. Source: Stasi Records Archive / BStU archives; MfS HA_XX Fo 742 Bild_0010 mast.

In the spring of 1983, the Kinderladen carer left her position, which was used as an argument by the authorities to force the Kinderladen’s closure. The organizers received an order to vacate the premises by the end of August. Places in state kindergartens were found for the children, and their parents were threatened with losing their jobs if they did not comply. However, the Kinderladen was not vacated at the end of August, which Poppe noted was “the time of the imminent actions of the peace movement in the West against rearmament.”25 In October 1983, Ulrike Poppe and her husband Gerd submitted a petition to the district mayor protesting the notice served on the Kinderladen tenant: “You know very well that a private care institution has been established here for more than three years. From the discussions about the petitions submitted by Mrs. W. and Mr. M., with their representative Mr. Schmidt, it was clear that this has less to do with an “inappropriate” use of residential space, than the fact that the state   Ibid.   RHG Archive, “Über den Kinderladen.”

24 25

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does not accept such an institution for children, established as a private parents’ initiative (Elterninitiative). For us this is incomprehensible.” To support their

Figure 9.3. Kinderladen, Husemannstraße, Berlin. Source: ‘Harald Hausmann/OSTKREUZ’; RHG_Fo_HAB_16123.

claim, the Poppes reminded the mayor that by setting up a private initiative, the parents “had saved on monies for subsidies as well as manpower. Moreover, we made the apartment habitable at our own expense, and with a lot of effort.”26 On December 16, 1983, just over three years after the Kinderladen first opened its doors, Stasi officers arrived before dawn and boarded up the entrance. “It is clearly absurd,” wrote one of the founders afterwards, that “this small Laden in the most densely populated Berlin district, full of children, in which seven children are cared for by one or two people every day for eight hours, is seen as a threat to the unified system of education and upbringing.” The founders saw the closure of the Kinderladen as akin to the state repression of “every group initiative from below, whether for the environment, preservation of historical monuments, social self-help, children, peace, women, or homosexuals.” Yet, in a certain sense, as the founders themselves clearly stated, “this is also a sort of   RHG Archive, “Gerd u. Ulrike Poppe: Eingabe (25.10.83); An den Rat des Stadtbezirks Prenzlauer Berg, Stadtbezirksbürgermeister Herrn Gnilka,” f. RHG/UP 022.

26

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opposition, namely, against the consolidation of the absolute centralized use of power, of brazenly bureaucratic principles.”27

Materializing Sinnwelt: Power and protest in the streets While the struggle over educational values was an important part of the battle between the East German state and the founders of this tiny shopfront crèche, the story of the Kinderladen was also part of a much longer history of struggles for control of urban space in postwar Berlin. After the enormous destruction of the Second World War, Jennifer Evans has compellingly argued, Berlin was not “merely an assemblage of architectural features and administrative functions but a primary actor in the historical narrative of the postwar period, both materially and discursively. It lent shape to people’s memories, sights, emotions, and experiences, conditioned their choices and sense of self, and mitigated their day-today encounters with fellow citizens, occupation authorities, and representatives of the nascent East and West German state.”28 Evans shows how approaches drawn from historical geography assist historians in revealing how the performance of sexuality in city space has shaped metropolitan life. In other words, the reconstruction of Berlin was not only a process of rebuilding urban space; it also had profound sexual and gender dimensions. As we have seen, the spatial, sexual, and gender dimensions of reconstructing Berlin did not cease after the immediate postwar period. In one sense, the story of the Kinderladen seems to fit neatly into the narrative of the durchherrschte Gesellschaft, an East German society that was increasingly dominated by the all-pervasive power of the state.29 Tucked away in a decaying street of inner-city buildings, it appears to be the flip side of the mass housing that dominated the symbolic landscape of state socialism, the large estates of prefabricated apartment blocks (Plattenbauten). In his history of Marzahn, on the outskirts of Berlin, Eli Rubin argues that physical space was crucial to the ways in which the socialist state exercised control over residents in these new housing estates.30 Marzahn was a blank slate, suggests Rubin, an “Amnesiopolis” that erased residents’ memories of their former lives. The sensory experience of the close-knit inner-city district, the Kiez, was central to these   “Kinderladen”: f. RHG/UP 022.  Jennifer Evans, Life among the Ruins: Cityscape and Sexuality in Cold War Berlin (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011). 29   Jürgen Kocka, “Eine durchherrschte Gesellschaft,” in Sozialgeschichte der DDR, ed. Hartmut Kaelble, Jürgen Kocka, and Hartmut Zwahr (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1994), 547–53. 30   Eli Rubin, Amnesiopolis: Modernity, Space, and Memory in East Germany (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016). 27 28

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memories. In place of the Kiez, according to this interpretation of Marzahn, arose a panopticon of tower blocks that enabled the Stasi to keep all citizens under constant surveillance, even as they enjoyed the modern comforts provided for them by the omnipresent state. But the very existence of the Kinderladen would have been impossible had the state possessed powers of total domination over society, and this was not simply the result of a few dissidents valiantly battling against an omnipotent state. The Kinderladen emerged in a space of accommodation between the late socialist state and its citizens, in which ordinary East Germans were permitted a certain degree of autonomy to occupy urban buildings that stood empty. This phenomenon was the flip side of the SED’s mass housing program in the 1970s and 1980s.31 A large number of inner-city apartments were left empty, often closed up by the police, but people nonetheless moved into them, without a rental contract, and without having to pay for electricity or water. These inner-city spaces provided opportunities for creating alternative forms of sociability and community. The fact that nineteenth-century tenement buildings often had much larger rooms than the standardized Plattenbauten, for example, had provided the space for the private reading and discussion groups attended by Poppe and others in the late 1970s, where the idea for the Kinderladen was born. Young people like Ulrike Poppe formed part of a significant political and cultural trend in the late GDR that the historian Udo Grashoff has described as Schwarzwohnen: large numbers of unmarried, childless citizens (who stood the least chance of being allocated an apartment by the state) who moved without official permission into vacant apartments, often in inner-city areas like Prenzlauer Berg that had been neglected in favor of building large-scale greenfield residential districts of modern, prefabricated apartment blocks.32 The Schwarzwohnen phenomenon was a creation of the peculiarities of the planned housing system: large numbers of people were waiting to be allocated an apartment, while many apartments in decaying inner cities simultaneously stood empty. Residents often paid rent and, like the Kinderladen founders, had a semi-legal relationship with the authorities. Unlike West German squatting movements, however, they did not see their occupation of these empty apartments as an intrinsically political act. One former resident of an empty flat in Prenzlauer Berg recalled that this was in no way the same as squatting in West Berlin: “We lived in occupied houses and couldn’t understand why people in Kreuzberg, with their banners and demonstrations, made such a fuss about it.”33   Udo Grashoff, Schwarzwohnen: Die Unterwanderung der staatlichen Wohnraumlenkung in der DDR (Göttingen: V & R Unipress, 2011). 32   Grashoff, Schwarzwohnen. 33   Frank Böttcher, Durchgangzimmer Prenzlauer Berg, cited in Grashoff, Schwarzwohnen, 9. 31

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Activists such as Poppe sought to reclaim concepts such as equality and peace that were central to the political culture of the East German state. But abstract notions of peace and human rights attained significance for East Germans through their everyday experiences of urban life.34 In her study of lesbians and gay men in Prenzlauer Berg during the same period, Josie McLellan has suggested that reading acts of resistance in an oppressive regime through the lens of scale allows us to see how East Germans carved out spaces of autonomy in their everyday lives.35 The story of the Kinderladen reminds us that the material conditions of everyday life had important political and practical meanings. This was not the same for everyone, since it helped to define who could take part in “dissident” work, and the forms this work took. In April 1982, the artist Bärbel Bohley, who was also a Kinderladen founder, submitted an individual petition to the Central Committee of the ruling SED against the new Military Service Law: “In 1945 I was born in Berlin and spent my childhood in this destroyed city. The ruins of the Second World War were my playgrounds. How often did I hear the adults say: better dry bread than another war!”36 Memories of postwar Berlin also occupied a central place in the Meditationstext that Bohley wrote a year later for an unofficial gathering: My childhood games were played in the rubble of the Second World War. Here in Berlin I climbed through ruins, always followed by my mother’s warnings not to touch any bullets or grenades; we tiptoed past every rusty piece of iron, because it could have exploded just at that second. Sometimes we stood in front of steel helmets, full of fear, and started to imagine who might have worn them. I have never forgotten these experiences, nor the words and stories that I heard in school or from my parents: Better dry bread than another war, better that a German who once again touches a weapon should lose his hand, than another mother should have to cry for her lost son.37

Bohley repeated one family story that had always impressed her: As my heavily pregnant mother was walking with my father through Berlin, still aflame at the end of the war—I was born on May 24, 1945—passing piles of   Paul Betts, “Socialism, Social Rights, and Human Rights: The Case of East Germany,” Humanity: An International Journal of Human Rights, Humanitarianism, and Development 3, no. 3 (Winter 2012): 427–448. 35   Josie McLellan, “Lesbians, Gay Men, and the Production of Scale in East Germany,” Cultural and Social History 14, no. 1 (2017): 89–105. 36   RHG Archive, Bärbel Bohley, 1054 Berlin, Zionskirchstr. 30—Berlin, den 21. April 1982. An das ZK der SED Berlin. Eingabe betr. Wehrdienstgesetz vom 25. März 1982. RHG /UP 021. 37   RHG Archive, B. Bohley, “Meditationstext” (undated), RHG/UP 021. 34

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corpses, dead horses, and rubble on the way to a still-functional maternity hospital in Buch, my father said to her: “One thing is certain, the little one will never live through a war, and we will not live to see these mountains of rubble cleared.” But today all the huge piles of debris have been cleared, mostly by women who had to work for years to carry away the stones that had been shot to pieces by men. How much guilt the women also carry, I will not talk about now. But today one thing is certain: that we will experience another war, and hopefully the last one, because we will have deserved nothing better, if we did not finally do everything, even the impossible, to prevent it.38

Bohley’s rhetorical strategy of weaving personal memories about the city of Berlin into her reflections on women and peace was deliberate. “Stories . . . carry out a labor that constantly transforms places into spaces or spaces into places,” wrote Michel de Certeau in 1980, elaborating: “In short, space is a practiced place. Thus the street geometrically defined by urban planning is transformed into a space by walkers.” 39 Across late socialist East Central Europe, an important strand of protest activities centered on regaining control over the built and natural environment. Ecological and environmental movements in the GDR or Czechoslovakia, for example, developed not only in response to the massive environmental damage wreaked by extensive industrialization, but also out of official rhetoric about building a socialist homeland (Heimat).40 Everyday practices of protest like the Kinderladen or the broader phenomenon of Schwarzwohnen thus served a twofold goal: solving the practical problems of daily life on the one hand, and on the other, re-collectivizing the spaces of socialist society. Simultaneously, the East German state was also belatedly displaying an interest in reclaiming the streets of the historic city, albeit in a highly selective way. Ahead of the 750th anniversary of the city of Berlin in 1987, the East German regime launched an ambitious project to reconstruct selected areas of East Berlin’s architectural heritage. In October 1983, the street on which the Kinderladen was located was chosen to be part of this project. The reconstruction of historic Berlin neighborhoods was explicitly included in Erich Honecker’s 1973 Housing Program, better known for launching the mass production of   Bohley, “Meditationstext,” original emphases.   Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984), 117–18, emphasis in original. 40   Jan Palmowski, Inventing a Socialist Nation: Heimat and the Politics of Everyday Life in the GDR, 1945–1990 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009); Edward Snajdr, Nature Protests: The End of Ecology in Slovakia (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2008); Eagle Glassheim, “Ethnic Cleansing, Communism, and Environmental Devastation in Czechoslovakia’s Borderlands,” Journal of Modern History 78, no. 1 (March 2006): 65–92. 38 39

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prefabricated blocks on East Berlin’s periphery. Overcrowding in East Berlin’s tenements gradually eased as residents moved into the new Plattenbauten, providing the opportunity for a new take on the old buildings. During the 1970s, East German officials modified their previously negative view of premodernist buildings, which they now referred to generically as Altbauten (old buildings): “In their presentation of the 750th anniversary projects, the late-19th-century Husemannstraße coalesced with the 18th century Sophienstraße and the pseudo-medieval Nikolaiviertel to a generic image of ‘Old Berlin.’”41 In October 1983, Berlin party officials chose two late-nineteenth-century tenement blocks on Husemannstraße to be restored as a “real-life museum depicting living conditions around 1900.”42 Facades, doors, and windows were refurbished, complete with gas lanterns, a water pump, business signs, and shop decorations in a turn-of-the-century style. Several street cafés and restaurants opened, as well as period shops where passersby could watch craftsmen at work, including a scissors grinder, barber, tailor, potter, and florist. The historical restoration was supposed to provide education as well as entertainment: SED officials pointed out the significance of the location for the struggle of Berlin’s working class at the turn of the twentieth century (even though the streetfacing apartments that were painted and—at least superficially—restored had originally belonged to middle-class residents, while the real proletarian apartments situated in narrow backyards were left untouched). Next door to the former Kinderladen, at Husemannstraße 12, a “Museum of Berlin Workers’ Lives around 1900” opened its doors on Labor Day (May 1, 1987) with an exhibition on The Beginning of Workers’ Leisure Time designed by Humboldt University professor Dietrich Mühlberg, chair of the newly established Cultural Theory section at the Department of Art History.43 Mühlberg’s work signaled a new interest in the everyday life of workers, including its positive aspects—such as class solidarity—which could now be acknowledged because of the triumph of socialism.44 Renovation of the Husemannstraße was officially presented as a memorial to the working-class political activism that had allegedly sprouted in the neighborhood around 1900, when “marginal groups of proletarians” had developed “forms of mutual aid to alleviate their misery.”45 Ironically enough, the closure of the Kinderladen coincided with the decision to renovate the street.   Florian Urban, “The Invention of the Historic City: Building the Past in East Berlin 1970–1990” (PhD diss., TU Berlin / MIT, 2006), 357; also Urban, Neo-historical East Berlin. 42   Urban, “The Invention of the Historic City,” 325. 43   Ibid., 334; Dietrich Mühlberg, ed., Arbeiterleben in Berlin um 1900 (Berlin: Dietz, 1983). 44   Urban, “The Invention of the Historic City,” 330–31. 45   Resolution of the Berlin Magistrat no. 090/84, cited in Urban, “The Invention of the Historic City,” 328. 41

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Gender, peace, and human rights in the GDR during the 1980s The story of the Kinderladen sheds light on the everyday lives of dissidents who later became involved in the peace and human rights movements, thereby illuminating a crucial aspect of the history of human rights in late socialism. This booming field of scholarship typically focuses on legal norms and discourses of human rights as articulated by “dissidents.” As such, as Michal Kopeček notes in his contribution to this volume, it has often been incorporated into the dichotomous “anti-totalitarian” narratives that the Sinnwelt paradigm sets out to challenge. Against this focus on human rights discourse as an oppositional practice, Kopeček shows how legal and political theorists in Czechoslovakia and Poland engaged with socialist legality and “dissident legalism” as a “strategy of behavior in and of the contest with the regime.”46 The small group of people who set up the Kinderladen on Husemannstraße were also among the founding members of the Initiative for Peace and Human Rights, a movement that turned the idea of human rights into a mobilizing issue in East Germany during the mid-1980s by connecting human rights ideas to local problems, ranging from draft resistance to environmental destruction to state-enforced military instruction for children.47 Historians of human rights have argued that the 1970s were a “breakthrough” decade in which human rights attained mobilizing power around the world.48 But this was different in East Germany. Here, as Ned Richardson-Little has persuasively argued, the ruling SED developed a hegemonic discourse of socialist human rights that helped to sustain its legitimacy since the founding of the GDR.49 By the early 1980s, human rights had become a language of protest and resistance mainly for those seeking to emigrate from East Germany. Peace and environmentalism, however, aroused far greater concern. The introduction in 1978 of military education classes for school pupils in the ninth and tenth grades swelled a peace movement that had previously been confined to a small number of pacifists and draft resisters.50 Four years later, dissident chemist Robert Havemann and Protestant pastor Rainer Appelmann launched the Berlin Appeal calling for dialogue with the SED, as well as an end to compulsory   Michal Kopeček, “Dissident Legalism: Human Rights, Socialist Legality, and the Birth of Legal Resistance in the 1970s Democratic Opposition in Czechoslovakia and Poland,” in this volume. 47   Ned Richardson-Little, The Human Rights Dictatorship: Socialism, Global Solidarity and Revolution in East Germany (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020). 48 Jan Eckel and Sam Moyn, eds., The Breakthrough: Human Rights in the 1970s (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014). 49   Richardson-Little, The Human Rights Dictatorship. 50   Steven Pfaff, “The Politics of Peace in the GDR: The Independent Peace Movement, the Church, and the Origins of the East German Opposition,” Peace and Change 26, no. 3 (2001): 280–300. 46

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military education and armed service. Around the same time, East Germans began to mobilize in response to pollution and the destruction of the environment. Peace and environmental activism that took place outside official channels found protection in the church, but in 1983–84 a Stasi campaign sought to wipe out the fledgling movement. But how might a tiny semi-legal crèche on an East Berlin street fit into these grand narratives of peace and human rights? Two of the Kinderladen founders, Bärbel Bohley and Ulrike Poppe, were among the women who set up a branch of Women for Peace (Frauen für den Frieden) in East Berlin, in protest against the increasing militarization of East German society. This is not to say that the Kinderladen founders only saw child-rearing as women’s work, but that education and peace were viewed as intertwined. As Gerd Poppe wrote after his wife’s arrest: If the Kinderladen could exist for over three years, perhaps it was to leave a relatively harmless field of action for these continually critically outspoken people. This has clearly changed. Child-rearing and peace work belong together. The Kinderladen has been proved to be a threat to the GDR state, whereupon it reacts with customary threats not only to the adults, but also to the children. New boundaries have been crossed. Ulrike Poppe, a mother of two children in the Laden, was engaged in setting it up from the outset, and in a decisive manner. Later she entered the peace movement. Her children now are not only without their mother, they have also been torn away from the trusted group of children, just like the other four children. What now: state kindergarten or maybe a church one? Everything is unknown, above all for the children.51

The gendered dynamics of the Husemannstraße were different from the West German Kinderladen movement, which after 1968 had been riven by deep ideological and gendered cleavages. This was especially true in West Berlin, where feminists in the women’s liberation council (Aktionsrat zur Befreiung der Frau) clashed with their male counterparts over paternalism and sexism within the socialist student movement.52 But by the time the Kinderladen was established in late 1980, a number of East German women were beginning publicly to question the reality of everyday life for women in the “workers’ state.” Ninety-one percent of women aged 15–60 were in employment by 1989, of whom only 27 percent were working part-time (less than forty hours per week).53 Yet, throughout   RHG Archive, f. RHG/TH 03/1: “Über den Kinderladen Husemannstraße 14—Berlin, 19.12.1983.” 52   Baader, “Von der sozialistischen Erziehung,” 27. 53 Jeannette Z. Madarász, Conflict and Compromise in East Germany, 1971–1989: A Precarious Stability (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003). 51

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the 1970s and 1980s, the Women’s Department in the SED Central Committee was engaged in a constant battle against many women’s desire to exchange fulltime for part-time employment.54 Women remained underrepresented at the top of the economic and political hierarchy: Margot Honecker (the wife of the GDR General Secretary) was the only female minister in the 1970s and 1980s, not a single woman held full Politbüro membership, and women’s membership in the SED was only 35 percent by the mid-1980s.55 Nonetheless, women’s loyalty to the regime was high, and young women and girls were well-represented and active in the Free German Trade Union Federation (Freie Deutsche Gewerkschaftsbund, FDGB) and Free German Youth (Freie Deutsche Jugend, FDJ), especially at the local level.56 Women’s interests were officially represented through the mass Democratic Women’s League of Germany (Demokratischer Frauenbund Deutschlands, DFD). By the 1980s the membership base of this organization was steadily increasing (1.5 million in 1987, or one-fifth of women over twenty-five years old) but aging (46 percent of members were over fifty years old in 1988). Only 24 percent were members of the SED. In 1989, the sixty-nine-year-old Ilse Thiele had headed the DFD for forty years.57 Young East German women active in the independent peace, lesbian, feminist, or human rights movements considered the DFD totally moribund. Women’s rights had additional political significance as a central theme for East German cultural diplomacy, which promoted the state socialist approach to gender equality through Soviet-supported international organizations such as the Women’s International Democratic Federation (headquartered in East Berlin since 1951) or international agencies like the United Nations.58 These efforts were intensified in the early 1970s, after the GDR finally won long-awaited diplomatic recognition and thus an opportunity to act on the stage of international politics. In October 1975, East Berlin hosted a large World Congress of Women as the socialist bloc’s contribution to the United Nations International Women’s Year.59 The Congress was intended to display the success of the East German regime in guaranteeing women’s equality through their participation in the waged labor force and the socialization of childcare (and to a lesser degree, housework). At the same time, an overriding goal of the East German and Soviet   Ibid.   Madarász, Conflict and Compromise in East Germany. 56   Renate Hürtgen, Zwischen Disziplinierung und Partizipation: Vertrauensleute des FDGB im DDR-Betrieb (Cologne: Böhlau, 2005). 57   Statistics from Madarász, Conflict and Compromise in East Germany, 74–75. 58   See Celia Donert, “Women’s Rights in Cold War Europe: Disentangling Feminist Histories,” Past and Present 218, supplement 8 (May 2013): 180–202. 59   Celia Donert, “Whose Utopia? Gender, Ideology and Human Rights at the 1975 World Congress of Women in East Berlin,” in Eckel and Moyn, The Breakthrough. 54 55

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bloc states was to tie the “woman question” rhetorically to discourses of peace and national independence. Although feminists on the Left in Western Europe and the United States, as well as a spectrum of activists in the global South, remained curious and sympathetic to the achievements of the socialist regimes in these respects, a number of feminist groups who attended the East Berlin World Congress raised critical questions about the recognition of female difference, subjectivity, and sexual and reproductive rights within the official discourses of state socialism.60 Within GDR society, the 1975 World Congress of Women left little impression. Yet, by the late 1970s there was an emerging discussion about the reality of life for East German women in a state that formally guaranteed equality between the sexes. In the late 1970s prominent women, such as the committed Marxist novelist Christa Wolf, began to write and speak publicly about female subjectivity and the contradictions of socialist equality policies. In a 1983 text on the position of women and their relationship to peace, probably intended for an unofficial peace workshop, Bärbel Bohley considered the dilemmas faced by women living in a socialist state that officially promoted gender equality. Explicitly contrasting the situation of women in the GDR with contemporary women’s emancipation movements in Europe and the US, Bohley echoed official East German rhetoric in her initial claim that “The reality for women in the GDR is different. Already in the first GDR constitution the right to equality was guaranteed.”61 Following Christa Wolf, Bohley switched the focus away from rights, asking whether East German women “really know our own needs? . . . Can we realize ourselves? And can men realize themselves?” The answer that Bohley gave was rooted in her personal experience as a freelance artist: I can arrange my own working hours, and have never had to bring my child to some kind of storage facility [Aufbewahrung] first thing in the morning, I never had to rush home, quickly doing the shopping beforehand, then the housework, and then flopping exhausted in front of the TV every evening. I love my work, I don’t feel alienated, quite the opposite, I can totally engage myself. . . . I think I can say that I have a certain measure of freedom in comparison with other working women.62

Bärbel Bohley was a close friend of Ulrike Poppe and a central figure in the East Berlin alternative cultural and political scene. Her reflections on the “freedom” to organize her everyday life outside the confined administrative and temporal   Donert, “Whose Utopia.”   Bohley, “Meditationstext.” 62   Ibid. 60 61

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structures of GDR society were echoed by the actions of statistically significant numbers of East German women seeking part-time work. However, these debates were only partly about gender. Historians continue to debate whether the diverse and amorphous women’s groups that emerged in the GDR during the 1980s, including artists, friendship groups, peace, church, and lesbian groups, constituted a women’s “movement.”63 Some one hundred groups emerged across the country out of the mixed-gender non-state peace and environmental movements of the late 1970s, forming cliques and working groups that met in church premises, private flats, or cafés.64 The last months of 1983 saw massive protests in West Germany against the deployment of nuclear missiles in the Federal Republic. In East Berlin an independent peace movement was also growing, within which oppositional women created their own groups. Among the most prominent of these women were the group of Prenzlauer Berg residents connected with the Kinderladen. On December 12, 1983, four days before Stasi officers forcibly shut down the Kinderladen, Ulrike Poppe was arrested along with Bärbel Bohley and Barbara Einhorn, a sociology professor and European Nuclear Disarmament (END) activist in the UK. Einhorn had been visiting the GDR to collect materials for an English-language publication on the first East German branch of Women for Peace that Poppe and Bohley established in 1982. The women were interned in the main Stasi remand prison at Berlin-Hohenschönhausen. The first Women for Peace group in East Germany was established in reaction to the March 1982 resolution of the Council of State expanding the possibilities for drafting women into military service. In October 1982, one hundred and fifty women, many of whom had previously written letters to the Parliament protesting military service, put together a collective petition (Eingabe) protesting against the resolution.65 Officially presented as a far-reaching equality measure for women, the resolution was received very differently. “We women do not see military service for women as an expression of their equality, but as contrary to their womanhood.”66 Using maternalist rhetoric (“We women feel ourselves to be particularly called upon to protect life, to support people who are old, ill, and weak”), the petition also cited the state’s official pronouncements on peace, referring to a speech at the Peace Congress of World Religions in Moscow about   Eva Sänger, Begrenzte Teilhabe: Ostdeutsche Frauenbewegung und Zentraler Runder Tisch in der DDR (Frankfurt/Main: Campus, 2005). 64   Sänger, Begrenzte Teilhabe, 67; Samirah Kenawi, Frauengruppen in der DDR der 80er Jahre: Eine Dokumentation (Berlin: GrauZone, 1995). 65   Sänger, Begrenzte Teilhabe. 66   RHG Archive, Eingabe: Staatsratsvorsitzender Gen. Erich Honecker, Berlin 12.10.1982, f. RHG/UP 021. 63

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the need for active participation in the problem of disarmament, “if we want to serve people and not weapons.” Attempts by the Ministry of State Security to threaten the signatories into retracting their statement were largely unsuccessful.67 After the launch of the Peace Decade in November 1982, Ulrike Poppe, Bärbel Bohley, and author Katja Havemann tried to expand their work under the roof of the church. They participated in meetings of the independent peace movement, signed an open letter at the Second END conference in May 1983 in West Berlin, and were among those trying to build a human chain between the Soviet and US embassies on September 1, 1983. On October 17, 1983, fifty women dressed in black met on East Berlin’s Alexanderplatz to protest the military service law; the following month, the Berlin Women for Peace group sent a telegram that was read aloud by Green politician Petra Kelly in a Bundestag debate about the stationing of US midrange missiles.68 International contacts and attempts by END campaigners in the UK to prepare a publication about Women for Peace activities led to the arrest and house searches of the group’s leaders. Protest and open letters addressed to Erich Honecker from various peace groups around the 1984 Stockholm conference, however, led to the women’s release. In June 1985, the Stasi concluded that the Berlin Women for Peace group had no significant links to the church, reporting in 1986 that because of structural changes within the East German opposition, Women for Peace “was no longer functional and signs of dissolution are becoming increasingly clear.”69 In January 1986, Poppe and Bohley were among a group of Berlin peace activists and intellectuals who created the Initiative for Peace and Human Rights (IFM), the first dissident group working outside the protection of the church and focusing on human rights within the GDR. Arguing that peace could not be achieved without “basic democratic rights and freedoms,” the IFM connected the idea of human rights to social justice, the right to work, the protection of the environment, and the end of compulsory military service.

Reconstructing Sinnwelt after 1989: Betrayal, friendship, and memory The Sinnwelt that inspired the Kinderladen on Husemannstraße has been subjected to successive rewritings since 1989, particularly after the discovery that half of the sixteen founding members of the Initiative for Peace and Human   Thomas Klein, “Frieden und Gerechtigkeit!” Die Politisierung der Unabhängigen Friedensbewegung in Ost-Berlin während der 80er Jahren (Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 2007), 150. 68   Ibid., 151. 69   Ibid., 153. 67

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Rights were Stasi informants. The story of one female informant in particular— Monika Haeger, alias Karin Lenz—was written into the history of Women for Peace in the form of a dialogue between dissidents Irena Kukutz, Katja Havemann, and Monika Haeger herself. The narrative of Haeger’s life corresponded almost perfectly with the dissident critique of East German educational policies that had inspired the Kinderladen. Abandoned by her biological mother, Monika grew up in a children’s home and explained that she turned to the party, as well as other figures of authority in her life, as a “mother-substitute.” She presented herself as torn between her affection for the members of Women for Peace, and her desire to please the party.70 The text of these dialogues were printed along with Monika’s own letters and diary entries, and were published at a moment when former dissidents were coming to terms with the reams of text and images that comprised their own Stasi files. The Kinderladen itself was memorialized as a site in the geography of Prenzlauer Berg’s alternative culture during the 1970s and 1980s. But recent work on other areas of East Berlin in the 1970s and 1980s has thrown into perspective the retrospective accounts of Prenzlauer Berg dissidents. The Kinderladen was an example of the conflicts over definitions of key terms in the political culture of the GDR, such as peace, equality, and human rights. Its short-lived history calls attention to the everyday lives of dissidents, and the gendered dynamics that shaped their negotiation of the public and private spheres. Nonetheless, the self-representation of former dissidents should be placed in perspective. As Hanno Hochmuth has recently argued, the rediscovery of the Kiez in the 1970s led to a renewed appreciation of the value of the original inner-city architecture in both East and West Berlin. Planners on both sides of the Wall now saw Berlin’s tenement buildings not as an obstacle to economic or social progress, but as an avenue toward historical authenticity: “Kreuzberg students and squatters, and Friedrichshain Schwarzwohner were the ‘pioneers’ of gentrification, who tried out new lifestyles in old buildings and thus created a new, post-Fordist urban sphere.”71 Returning to the lamppost on the corner of Husemannstraße, this article has suggested that conflicts over the meaning of the Kinderladen that once existed on this street in the early 1980s reveal multiple levels to the Sinnwelt that shaped East German citizens’ perspectives on peace, gender, and human rights in the last years of the German Democratic Republic. The story of the Kinderladen undoubtedly highlights aspects of the late socialist Sinnwelt that were specific to the Unsinn of the last   Irena Kukutz and Katja Havemann, Geschützte Quelle: Gespräche mit Monika H. alias Karin Lenz (Berlin: BasisDruck, 1990). 71   Hochmuth, Kiezgeschichte, 349. 70

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years of the GDR.72 But it also raises broader questions about the connections, as well as the differences, between the worlds of meaning inhabited by dissidents and the socialist state, and about the gendering of histories of dissent on both sides of the Cold War divide.

  I am grateful to Eve Rosenhaft for this formulation.

72

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Selected bibliography

Aden-Grossmann, Wilma. “Monika Seifert—Gründerin der antiautoritären Erziehungsbewegung.” In Zugänge zur Kinderladenbewegung, edited by Karin Bock, Nina Göddertz, Franziska Heyden, and Miriam Mauritz, 9–26. Wiesbaden: Springer VS, 2020. Baader, Meike Sophia. “Seid realistisch, verlangt das Unmögliche!” Wie 1968 die Pädogogik bewegte. Weinheim: Beltz, 2008. Betts, Paul. “Socialism, Social Rights, and Human Rights: The Case of East Germany.” Humanity: An International Journal of Human Rights, Humanitarianism, and Development 3, no. 3 (Winter 2012): 427–48. Certeau, Michel de. The Practice of Everyday Life. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984. Donert, Celia. “Whose Utopia? Gender, Ideology and Human Rights at the 1975 World Congress of Women in East Berlin.” In The Breakthrough: Human Rights in the 1970s, edited by Jan Eckel and Sam Moyn, 68–87. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014. ———. “Women’s Rights in Cold War Europe: Disentangling Feminist Histories.” Past and Present 218, supplement 8 (May 2013): 180–202. Eckel, Jan, and Sam Moyn, eds. The Breakthrough: Human Rights in the 1970s. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014. Evans, Jennifer. Life among the Ruins: Cityscape and Sexuality in Cold War Berlin. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011. Frevert, Ute. “Umbruch der Geschlechterverhältnisse? Die 60er Jahre als geschlechterpolitischer Experimentierraum.” In Dynamische Zeiten: Die 60er Jahre in den beiden deutschen Gesellschaften, edited by Axel Schildt, Detlef Siegfried, and Karl Christian Lammers, 642–60. Hamburg: Hans Christians Verlag, 2000. Glaeser, Andreas. Political Epistemics: The Secret Police, the Opposition, and the End of East Germany. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011. Glassheim, Eagle. “Ethnic Cleansing, Communism, and Environmental Devastation in Czechoslovakia’s Borderlands.” Journal of Modern History 78, no. 1 (March 2006): 65–92. Grashoff, Udo. Schwarzwohnen: Die Unterwanderung der staatlichen Wohnraumlenkung in der DDR. Göttingen: V & R Unipress, 2011. Hagemann, Karen, Konrad H. Jarausch, and Cristina Allemann-Ghionda, eds. Children, Families and States: Time Policies of Child Care, Preschool and Primary Schooling in Europe. Oxford: Berghahn, 2011. Harsch, Donna. Revenge of the Domestic: Women, the Family and Communism in the German Democratic Republic. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007. Heineman, D. Elizabeth. What Difference Does a Husband Make? Women and Marital Status in Nazi and Postwar Germany. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003. Hochmuth, Hanno. Kiezgeschichte: Friedrichshain und Kreuzberg im geteilten Berlin. Göttingen: Wallstein, 2017. Hürtgen, Renate. Zwischen Disziplinierung und Partizipation: Vertrauensleute des FDGB im DDR-Betrieb. Cologne: Böhlau, 2005. Kenawi, Samirah. Frauengruppen in der DDR der 80er Jahre: Eine Dokumentation. Berlin: GrauZone, 1995. Klein, Thomas. “Frieden und Gerechtigkeit!” Die Politisierung der Unabhängigen Friedensbewegung in Ost-Berlin während der 80er Jahren. Cologne: Böhlau Verlag, 2007.

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Kocka, Jürgen. “Eine durchherrschte Gesellschaft.” In Sozialgeschichte der DDR, edited by Hartmut Kaelble, Jürgen Kocka, and Hartmut Zwahr, 547–53. Stuttgart: KlettCotta, 1994. Kott, Sandrine. “Die Kinderkrippe.” In Erinnerungsorte der DDR, edited by Martin Sabrow, 281–91. Munich: C.H. Beck, 2009. Madarász, Jeannette Z. Conflict and Compromise in East Germany, 1971–1989: A Precarious Stability. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. McLellan, Josie. “Lesbians, Gay Men, and the Production of Scale in East Germany.” Cultural and Social History 14, no. 1 (2017): 89–105. Mergel, Thomas. “Zweifach am Rande: Die Dissidenten vom Prenzlauer Berg.” In Zeiträume: Potsdamer Almanach des Zentrums für Zeithistorische Forschung 2009, edited by Martin Sabrow, 107–17. Göttingen: Wallstein, 2010. Mühlberg, Dietrich, ed. Arbeiterleben in Berlin um 1900. Berlin: Dietz, 1983. Palmowski, Jan. Inventing a Socialist Nation: Heimat and the Politics of Everyday Life in the GDR, 1945–1990. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. Pfaff, Steven. “The Politics of Peace in the GDR: The Independent Peace Movement, the Church, and the Origins of the East German Opposition.” Peace and Change 26, no. 3 (2001): 280–300. Reichardt, Sven. Authentizität und Gemeinschaft: Linksalternatives Leben in den siebziger und frühen achtziger Jahren. Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2014. Richardson-Little, Ned. The Human Rights Dictatorship: Socialism, Global Solidarity and Revolution in East Germany. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020. Rubin, Eli. Amnesiopolis: Modernity, Space, and Memory in East Germany. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Sänger, Eva. Begrenzte Teilhabe: Ostdeutsche Frauenbewegung und Zentraler Runder Tisch in der DDR. Frankfurt/Main: Campus, 2005. Snajdr, Edward. Nature Protests: The End of Ecology in Slovakia. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2008. Urban, Florian. Neo-historical East Berlin: Architecture and Urban Design in the German Democratic Republic 1970–1990. London: Ashgate, 2009. ———. “The Invention of the Historic City: Building the Past in East Berlin 1970–1990.” PhD diss., TU Berlin / MIT, 2006.

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PART FOUR

INTELLECTUAL AND EXPERT WORLDS AND (DE-)LEGITIMIZATION

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CHAPTER TEN

Problems with Progress in Late Socialist Czechoslovakia: The Example of Most, North Bohemia Matěj Spurný

This article is based on years of research on the town of Most, north Bohemia, in the period of the state socialist regime in Czechoslovakia. It is not intended, however, to provide a detailed analysis of the remarkable events during which a historic town was demolished so that coal mining could begin in its former streets, while a modern town of the same name could be built nearby.1 Instead, the article explores the changing perceptions of the destruction of the historic town and the appearance of the new town in order to identify and explain the fundamental changes in the Sinnwelt (that is, the world as they perceived it) of the local people and experts in urban development. The destruction of heritage, the turning of land upside down, and the building of a new, rationally organized town are expressions, in a concentrated form, of industrial modernity at its peak. It is in this “laboratory” that we can also observe the birth of a critical discourse that marks the crisis of this period and casts doubt on its starting points. Under authoritarian rule, critical discourse can to some extent be silenced or sidelined, as it was under state socialism in Czechoslovakia. The hypothesis that I shall seek to confirm in this article, however, is that the change in the Sinnwelt of the local people, which is linked to the crisis of organized industrial modernity beginning in the 1960s, could not be stopped even in an authoritarian system like a socialist dictatorship. The transformation of Most and how it was presented in the 1970s and 1980s exemplifies how the state sought to cope with this development, while continuously defining itself by means of increasing production and creating a modern environment for the people. The question is to what extent the state succeeded in integrating the 1

  For a fuller exploration of that story, see Matěj Spurný, Making the Most of Tomorrow (Prague: Karolinum, 2019). This article is, to some extent, based on the original Czech version of the book: Matěj Spurný, Most do budoucnosti (Prague: Karolinum, 2016), written before the English version of the book came into being.

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new accents and critical reflections of some manifestations of classic modernity into the ideological structure of late socialism, and, on the other hand, to what extent the failure of this attempt to achieve a synthesis of two distinctly contrary approaches to the world played an essential role in the delegitimization of late socialist rule.

Between technocratic thinking and the utopia of progress The town of Most, established in the high Middle Ages, expanded and became rich in the nineteenth century thanks to the presence of coal, which eventually became its fate. This valuable raw material was to be found not only in the surrounding basin of the foothills of the Krušné hory (Erzgebirge or Ore Mountains), but also under the pavement of the town. Its coal deposits were known about long before the first freight train ever stopped in Most and before the early settlements in the foothills of the Krušné hory were ever threatened by underground mining and, later, surface mining. By the end of the nineteenth century at the latest, the architectural appearance and urban development of the town was influenced by the knowledge that coal lay underneath. The citizens of Most became less willing to invest in their town. The rich burghers therefore initially built their family homes outside the town, on the slopes of Hněvín Hill, safe from any possible plans to mine coal in the area. After the Second World War, when the demand for coal throughout Europe grew dramatically and heavy industry began to increase dynamically in socialist Czechoslovakia, the Czechoslovak government came up with the idea of demolishing the whole historic town to enable the mining of coal still hidden under the Renaissance houses and nineteenth-century boulevards. The logic of the systematic development of the national economy and the post-Stalinist ethos of the scientific-technical revolution ultimately contributed more to that end than did Stalinist productivism. Concerns for the health and comfort of the inhabitants played an important role here. The vision of a modern new Most was supposed to protect people from the derelict houses of the old town, which had been left unmaintained for decades, thereby offering a healthier environment and a more dignified life. The Czechoslovak government finally decided to demolish the old town of Most and build the new one in 1964. During the next two decades one of the most valuable historic towns of north Bohemia was thus wiped off the face of the earth. The new town was built a bit further away, in a safe place, far from any coal deposits. Official discourse about the newly built town claimed that it was the only way to guarantee the people of Most a dignified life. Today, however, the new Most generally has the reputation of a concrete communist mega-estate,

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drowning in social problems. Seen through this lens, the representations of the new town’s beauty produced in the 1960s and 1970s may seem to be nothing but communist propaganda concealing the true state of affairs, or even an act of cynicism. But that is not how it was. Images of the new Most, particularly in the 1960s, contributed fundamentally to justify the demolition of the old town and other interventions in the historic cultural landscape of the Krušné hory foothills. The plans for the new Most, originally designed to house a population of 100,000, were made when opportunities for collaboration with West European constructivists and functionalists opened up and the mass production of prefab concrete housing began. The architecture of the new Most (except for the outskirts, which were built in the 1950s, originally as satellites of the old town) openly distanced itself from Stalinist Revivalist architecture and found inspiration in, among things, Western models.

Figure 10.1. The central street of new Most with the building of the National Committee in construction. Source: State District Archives Most, photo collection.

The separation of housing from other functions of the town, particularly industrial functions, was supposed to ensure the highest quality of life for the inhabitants of the new Most. Through traffic (by automobile and rail) was planned as part of the “corridor of infrastructures” (koridor inženýrských sítí) that ran outside the town or along its outskirts. The “local-government, cultural-social, commercial, and administrative” functions were concentrated in the center. On the basis of the requirements of the architectural competition, to which other requirements were added in 1960–61, the new Most would contain a theater,

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a hotel, a restaurant, a café, a post office, a department store, a building of the National Committee of the district and of the town, a community arts center, a cinema, a bank, a savings bank, a delicatessen, specialized shops, office buildings, and the mining-works building. Until the mid-1960s, the building enterprises engaged in bitter struggles with the architects, who, by comparing similar buildings in Czechoslovakia and abroad, tried to estimate the needs of the inhabitants and the administration of the as yet nonexistent town.2 For experts and the general population alike, hygiene was a key aspect of the modern urban environment. The emphasis on the airy character of the new Most might seem, in the context of the polluted north Bohemian environment of the 1960s, like a bad joke or at the very least a paradox. However, the experts at the time, the architects and urban planners, argued their point using meteorological measurements and other scientifically demonstrated facts. Compared to the territory of the old Most, on the bottom of the Krušné hory basin, the number of days when the sun was hidden by fog (creating a greater risk of harmful concentrations of toxic fumes and dust) was demonstrably lower in the new town.3 Moreover, the new town was roughly ten times larger than the historic Most and therefore offered an ample amount of open space and broad, straight streets, through which not only automobiles but also fresh air would pass. In addition, large parks and other green spaces in the new Most were meant to ensure relatively clean air. The key feature of the urban plan of the new Most was a sixty-hectare urban forest, Šibeník (named after the hill on which it was located), which was to run right to the city center. A special feature of north Bohemia is that the trees planted on Šibeník had to be chosen (in collaboration with mine reclamation experts) with a view to local air pollution: only resistant varieties or cultivars of tree could grow and survive here.4 Great emphasis was also placed on smaller green spaces, particularly flowerbeds. Most was meant to become a “city of roses” and in the 1960s and 1970s tens of thousands of Václav Krejčí, Most: Zánik a vznik města (Most: AA 2000, 2008), 184–85.  The catastrophic atmospheric conditions and air pollution in old Most are mentioned in a report of a department of the Ústí nad Labem Regional Committee of the Czechoslovak Communist Party as early as 1962. The report states that the number of days of sunshine here had dropped to just thirty per year, whereas the number of days of fog had increased to one hundred. In these conditions, according to the report, levels of sulfur dioxide and dust were between five and ten times beyond the permissible maximum, which was already relatively high. See National Archives of the Czech Republic (NA), Fond 1261/0/43, Kancelář 1. Tajemníka ÚV KSČ A. Novotného (1951–1967), č. 193, karton 146. According to studies of the Hydrometeorological Institute from the first half of the 1960s, the atmospheric conditions in the new town of Most were considerably better (on average, fifty percent better visibility, with fogs usually lifting after sunrise), which had, according to the experts, a fundamental influence also on the strikingly lower risk of air pollution. See Krejčí, Most, 41. 4   Ibid., 99. 2

3

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roses were planted here every year.5 The rose became a symbol of the new Most, appearing in a number of newspaper and magazine articles,6 feature films, and documentaries.7 From the standpoint of the builders and political authorities of the new city, hygiene played another role. The new, clean, rational, well-lit, and safe city would, the urban planners and local politicians believed, change the habits of the population and ultimately form their characters. The new Most was therefore depicted as the counterpart to the filthy El Dorado of criminals, disturbed individuals, and alcoholics, as the historic part of the city had been described.8 It was meant to become the home of upstanding citizens who would take care of the natural environment. *** At the time, the utopian vision (and, later, to a large extent also the reality) of the new Most had an effect opposite to what might now, fifty years later, seem to have been the case. Arguments similar to those used in many other countries, both in the Soviet sphere of influence and in the West—the emphasis on rational solutions, improved hygiene, and the solution of the oppressive social circumstances of thousands of people—largely contributed to justifying the demolition of the old town and offered hope of a better life. In the two or three decades after the Second World War, the program of modern architecture dating from the interwar years, identified first and foremost with the CIAM (Congrès internationaux d’architecture moderne) and the name Le Corbusier, gained widespread influence in modern urban planning, architecture, and civil engineering on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Dozens of new towns were built in the United States, France, and Great Britain from around 1945 to 1965. The urban planners and architects executing these plans did not necessarily consider themselves advocates of the radical left seeking to introduce socialism. They did, however, share with the utopian socialists of the nineteenth century a faith in the importance of a healthy natural environment, which would, they believed, form a just society and enable people to live happy   In 1966 alone, 15,000 rose bushes were planted. See “Kronika města Most,” Město Most, created December 21, 2009, accessed April 20, 2020, http://www.mesto-most.cz/kroniky-mestamostu-z-let-1966-az-1970/d-4867. 6   See “Most, město uhlí a růží,” Svět v obrazech, September 25, 1971; “Most, město růží,” Květy, June 23, 1973; “Proměny naší současnosti: Od metropole měsíční krajiny k městu růží,” Naše rodina, February 22, 1978. 7   See Dostaveníčko v Mostě (A Rendezvous in Most), feature film, Československá televize (1977), Archiv ČT (Czech Television Archives), IDEC 277 531 21604. 8   See Jiří Brabenec, “Balada o Hněvově městě,” Krásy domova, January 1963. 5

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lives. For example, as part of the British program of building new towns, which emerged from the utopian dream of building “islands of a new civilization,” twenty new urban settlements were built in southern England alone, most of which were intended for between 20,000 and 70,000 inhabitants.9 These towns were built autocratically, without discussion with the inhabitants, but in the firm belief that everyone would ultimately benefit from the results. The spirit of planning and modernization, however, was not limited to the building of new housing estates. For example, in Great Britain the necessity of rebuilding Coventry, London, and several other cities that had been severely damaged by German bombing provided the impetus in 1947 for a vast reconstruction plan. This was intended to restore only the most valuable architectural monuments (like Coventry Cathedral), while the other destroyed built-up areas were to be cleared. On their ruins, like phoenixes from the ashes, clean, airy, functional, efficient, entirely new city centers were to emerge, representing a parting of the ways with the past. These plans eventually affected not only the bombed cities of Coventry, Bristol, and Plymouth, but also cities of northern England: Birmingham, Newcastle upon Tyne, Manchester, and Liverpool. Thus it happened that postwar urban planning changed the face of British towns far more dramatically than even the German air offensive had.10 Under the influence of the postwar enthusiasm for modern, clean cities with efficient traffic systems, and thanks to close collaboration between architects and powerful heads of urban planning departments, the vision of the future went from being a utopia to a reality. The lived-in milieux and historic appearance of many European cities were thus irrevocably destroyed before the wave of resistance in the late 1960s and early 1970s could rise up against this way of planning and reconstructing cities.

From utopia to nostalgia? Reflexive modernity and late socialism “Old cities had hearts,” writes the German psychoanalyst Alexander Mitscherlich in his renowned work on the “inhospitability of our cities,” which in the mid1960s problematized the boom in modern urban planning and architecture being   For the expression “islands of a new civilization,” see Helen Meller, Towns, Plans and Society in Modern Britain (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 70–75. 10   “Under the impetus of massive redevelopment of central areas of cities and the thrust of new roads to suburban destinations, more of the fabric of British towns and cities was destroyed in the 1960s than had been destroyed by the bombing in the whole of the Second World War. This was not considered at the time to be a problem. Comprehensive redevelopment had an air of excitement and modernity that was widely welcomed.” Meller, Towns, Plans and Society in Modern Britain, 82. 9

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carried out in the spirit of Le Corbusier, and just reaching its zenith.11 Mitscherlich also sharply condemned the mass production of blocks of flats and single-family houses, which disregarded the existing order of built-up urban areas. Towns as home environments were, he persuasively argued, becoming mere accumulations of buildings stripped of identity. And not only in Germany: Mitscherlich also examined in detail the building of new cities in the south of England. Their rationality, he wrote, was dictated by the egoism of planners and investors, just as in American cities, and would lead to uniform societies. Though he did not advocate a return to tradition, he did point out the senselessness of some modernist dogmas, such as the creation of separate spheres for living and working. Such criticism was not limited to the Federal Republic of Germany. Even before the mid-1960s we can find, particularly in English-speaking countries, pioneering critics of modern cities whose inhabitants do not feel at home and of the concomitant wanton destruction of old city quarters. Among them was the American-Canadian journalist Jane Jacobs (1916–2006), the author of the renowned work The Death and Life of Great American Cities,12 and Ian Nairn (1930–1983), a British critic of architecture that fails to respect the natural order of the cultural landscape. By the 1970s, public critics, mainstream media, and even governments in both Western and Eastern Europe were increasingly placing greater emphasis on the need to care for national heritage. The emblem of civilization no longer consisted only of ideas about a just future order for people, but also of respect for—and humility toward—the past. The socialist countries also experienced these developments. However, the emancipation ethos linked to rational planning was more closely connected here with the legitimacy of the ruling order. It was thus hard to find a language that was critical of modernist dogmas and even harder to apply that criticism in everyday politics and urban planning. In Czechoslovakia this criticism appeared in two markedly different phases: first, as intellectual critics’ direct insight into the crisis of technocratic socialism in the second half of the 1960s; and second, as an attempt to integrate conservative elements into the ideological structure and practical approach to urbanism, urban planning, and historic preservation after the return to a hardline regime, with the policy of “normalization” introduced by the Husák-led government that took power in 1969. The story of Most is an outstanding example of the way in which these two different aspects of reflexive modernity13 penetrated the state-socialist domain of progress.   Alexander Mitscherlich, Die Unwirtlichkeit unserer Städte: Anstiftung zum Unfrieden (Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1965). 12   Jane Jacobs, The Death and Life of Great American Cities (New York: Random House, 1961). 13   This term is from Ulrich Beck, Risikogesellschaft: Auf dem Weg in eine andere Moderne (Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1986). 11

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The destruction of Most and the emergence of criticism From the mid-1950s, the socialist state also came to perceive the preservation of historic monuments (and by no means only those of the labor movement) as one of its tasks. A discourse emphasizing national tradition and the “glorious past”—associated with prominent political figures like Zdeněk Nejedlý (1878– 1962, Minister of Education, 1948–53) and Václav Kopecký (1897–1961, Minister of Information, 1945–53)—had been influential throughout the “revolutionary phase” in the building of socialism from 1948 to 1953. It was, however, highly selective. In the post-Stalinist period, by contrast, it was transformed into one of the important policies demonstrating the civilizing achievements of the socialist state. This was also reflected in the legislative developments that culminated in the Historic Monuments Act (1958) and the creation of the State Institute of Historic Building Preservation and Environmental Protection (Státní ústav památkové péče a ochrany přírody). The Ústí branch of this institution was meant to look after, among other things, the heritage of the Most region. To be held responsible for the preservation and protection of north Bohemia’s historic monuments in the second half of the twentieth century was definitely not an enviable task. Surface mining swallowed up not only large areas of the former cultural landscape but also historic buildings: first, the little chapels on open land, then gradually also compact built-up areas of the villages earmarked for demolition, including their churches and other historic buildings. The tasks of the heritage conservation specialists in the Krušné hory foothills thus often came to resemble those of pathologists: it was a matter of documenting an extinct civilization before it was swallowed up by the earth once and for all. If, with some exaggeration, this metaphor works for the whole of the north Bohemian brown-coal basin, it describes the situation of historic preservation in Most almost literally. Nevertheless, here too preservationists sought not only to document the historic city in great detail before its demolition, but also to fight for the preservation of traces of the past. They did so on two fronts, looking at smaller objects, ranging from statues and monuments, to entrance portals of historic houses and church architecture, and, particularly, the costly preservation of the Church of the Assumption (the church of the deanery). To this end, they took advantage of the increasing state emphasis on socialist law, which, in matters of state or economic interest (like coal mining and the concomitant destruction of old Most), required adherence to signed agreements and also to all constitutional or other legal provisions and bureaucratic measures. Much like experts and institutions responsible for historic preservation, intellectual critics, including people working in the Krušné hory foothills, did not try to cast serious doubt on mining the coal under the historic town until the

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second half of the 1960s. By that time, however, the existing consensus amongst leading figures in the arts that the old houses and unnecessary monuments would have to give way to industry and the modern city was gradually beginning to break down. General enthusiasm for the technological progress precipitated by mining and the destruction of the land was increasingly dampened by people pointing not only to dying nature and foul air, but also to the loss of objects of historic value. Respect for treasures of the past could, however, be interpreted as a socialist value. Writers associated with the monthly Literární noviny (Literature news) thus followed on not only from the existing institutional preservation of material monuments, but also from the “revisionist” Marxist philosophy of man, as mainly represented in Czechoslovakia from the late 1950s onward by Karel Kosík (1926–2003).14 Socialism, he and his like-minded colleagues argued, was no longer to be understood as the road to material prosperity determined by technological progress, economic growth, and just distribution. These humanist intellectuals, who were becoming ever less marginal, perceived the Czechoslovak Communist Party’s one-sided focus on economic factors since 1948 as a dead end. Discourse emphasizing non-material values, beauty, and humility toward the works of past generations gradually moved from circles of philosophers, writers, historians, and art historians into mainstream Czech and Slovak journalism, and triggered a striking change in the popular Sinnwelt. People who had once been marginal were now being heard and others were accepting their views. People began to think differently about the destruction of Most’s historic core as a result of these changes. The future of the region gradually became a topic of vigorous public debate. Reflections about the loss of home and the priceless traces of the past were transformed into a specific critique of the exchange of the whole old town for tens of millions of metric tons of lignite. Moreover, this critique became established in the mainstream media. The debate became heated when an article entitled “A crime against culture is being planned” appeared in the popular daily Mladá fronta (Young front) on May 8, 1968.15 The article was like a bolt from the blue. A decision that everyone had respected—at least superficially—as a necessary concession to energy policy was now suddenly being called a “crime” in the mainstream media. Since it was published almost at the height of the Prague Spring, the article did not lead to police questioning or the censor keeping a closer eye on the content of the newspaper, but instead led to other journalistic responses and public meetings to discuss the topic.   See Michal Kopeček, Hledání ztraceného smyslu revoluce: Zrod a počátky marxistického revizionismu ve střední Evropě 1953–1960 (Prague: Argo, 2009). 15   M. Brožovský, “Chystá se kulturní zločin,” Mladá fronta, May 8, 1968. 14

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In an article entitled “Condemned city,” Olga Hníková, a Mladá fronta journalist, together with Ludvík Losos, a former head of the Most Museum, described the clash of discourses from different fields based on their direct experience in Most at meetings of preservationists, journalist-critics, and representatives of local and regional authorities and of mining enterprises: We were unable to express in numbers the extent to which the officially approved devastation of the land, old farmsteads, and churches influences the character of people and their increasingly devastating relationship to this country. We did not calculate in what percentages the desolate state of the community was projected into the desolate state of the thinking of its inhabitants. . . . We were unable to multiply the unit of beauty by the factor of centuries. We did not know how to calculate the module of the agreeableness of the environment. We used emotions, relationships, and the future of coming generations as our arguments. That evoked laughter, grimaces, and impatience. We lacked numbers, a set of tangible pieces of evidence, plain facts.16

Articles such as this one elicited a fierce reaction, even though sharp criticism of a wide variety of problems and malfunctions, large and small, of Czechoslovak life under socialism (including destruction of the natural environment, excessive emphasis on heavy industry, bureaucratic control of the economy, shortages of consumer goods, and ideological restrictions on academia) had already been in full swing for months. What was new was not the mode of criti- cism (that is, it being straightforward), but its target, the hitherto generally accepted exchange of old Most for coal and a new city. The chairman of the committee coordinating the demolition of the old town and the building of the new Most, the engineer Otakar Novák, accused the Mladá fronta journalists of failing to understand the complexity of the whole matter and reacting emotionally. Nevertheless, others, including many readers, spoke out in favor of preserving the old town, thus adding their voices “to the voices of those who resist the demolition of old Most.”17 The criticism naturally met with great disagreement, not only from political functionaries and local officials, but also— indeed mainly—from managers, manual workers, and miners, particularly those of the Severočeské hnědouhelné doly (North Bohemian Lignite Mines, SHD). The management of this enterprise warned on many fronts against turning away   Olga Hníková and Ludvík Losos, “Odepsané město,” Mladá fronta, June 21, 1968. The article is about the debate that its two authors had with representatives of the town of Most and the Severočeské hnědouhelné doly (North Bohemian Lignite Mines, SHD), to which they had been invited after the publication of a short but critical commentary on the demolition of old Most in a previous issue of Mladá fronta. 17  See the opinion of the SHD employees on how to solve the fuel-energy balance, “Potřebuje republika severočeské uhlí?,” Rudé právo, April 9, 1968. 16

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from the existing energy policy that ensured Czechoslovak energy self-sufficiency, and emphasized that continuing to mine coal, possibly even at higher levels, was the absolute priority: if the city or the natural environment stood in the way of this, they stated, that was perhaps unfortunate, but life required making sacrifices.18 The most important critical articles were published the year after the Sovietled military intervention in Czechoslovakia. Following the example of earlier articles about damaging the natural environment, journalists and other intellectuals who opposed the destruction of the old town now placed their cause into the context of industrial modernity: We are now in the current of the worldwide industrial revolution, in which we can hardly swim, and it is drawing us further and further in. With the rising standard of living we are at the same time destroying the foundations of our own existence. This is a worldwide problem; it is also a problem of the socialist countries. . . . If our lives and work today are to make any sense, we again have to set ourselves the goal that quietly vanished in the late 1950s and early 1960s. We see that goal in the highest development of human abilities and the maximum opportunities for putting them to use. The destruction of towns and the natural environment, and the plundering of our own wealth, are in clear and irreconcilable contradiction to that aim.19

At the height of these critical discussions about the legitimacy of demolishing old Most, representatives of the Institute of Historic Preservation began to speak up with greater urgency, after years of cautious struggles to save individual monuments or at least parts of them.20 Now, when some sections of the public were beginning to share or at least consider their viewpoint, they sought to take advantage of the situation to preserve part of the old town. Under pressure from both the SHD and the National Committee of Most, however, the government coordinating committee flatly refused a proposal for the overall revision of the plans to demolish the old town in the autumn of 1968.21 The National Committee also gave the Prize of the City of Most to the team led by Václav Mencl, director of the State Institute of Historic and Nature Preservation, for outstanding research. The years of normalization had begun. In the atmosphere of the Prague Spring and even during the year after the Sovietled intervention, journalists, historians, preservationists, and other intellectuals   Ivo Kořán, “Dokud stojí Most aneb o krizi země i památek,” Mladá fronta, April 12, 1969, 3.   NA, f. Státní ústav památkové péče a ochrany přírody (SÚPPOP, nezprac.), Výzkum středověkého Mostu, July 1969. 20   For more on this, see Státní Okresní Archiv Most (State District Archives Most, SOkA Most), f. 207 (ONV II), Inv. č. 1223–1233, ev.j. 444, Record of a conference on the protection of medieval houses of burghers in old Most, March 20, 1969. 21   NA, f. SUPPOP (nezprac.), Dopis MěNV Most Miroslava Fleišera řediteli SUPPOP, 24. května 1968. 18 19

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thus formulated viewpoints that rejected the project for the destruction of old Most: not simply how it was to be carried out, but the very principle of exchanging the heritage and home town of many people for coal, money, and the contribution it would allegedly make to economic growth. Though the voices of these people remained in the minority in this period and were unable to stop the destruction of the historic town, which had already begun, we find striking traces of the advent of a new discourse that was beginning to be heard throughout Europe and would, in the next two decades, also influence the appearance of public space and the treatment of national heritage in socialist Czechoslovakia. After the crushing of the reform movement in the Czechoslovak Communist Party, and with the beginning of the “consolidation” of the situation (that is, the restoration of hardline government) in the summer and autumn of 1969, direct criticism ceased to be possible. The public space was regulated far more thoroughly than during the Prague Spring, and even in comparison with the whole post-Stalinist period, at the latest from 1956 onward. Nevertheless, even in the following years, articles occasionally made their way into the newspapers, remarking, for instance, that “the next generation may well call us the barbarians who destroyed the landscape and razed a once rich historic Bohemian town that had ranked among the top ten of the thirty royal boroughs of Bohemia.”22 But because the demolition of old Most had already begun, the fight for its preservation now ceased to make sense. Cracks in utopia Decent housing for tens of thousands of working people was an important factor in the modern and rationally planned city in the 1960s, and this justified not only the coal mining, but also the demolition of old Most. However, this narrative began to get complicated toward the end of the decade. Until then, functionalist architecture and urban planning in the spirit of Le Corbusier had been perceived in Czechoslovakia as the road to happiness and beauty from two perspectives simultaneously: in connection with the general European trend of technocratic thinking about society and its needs, and also as a protest against the conservative socialist realism that was imported to Czechoslovakia in the 1950s. Faith in a modernist utopia based on the construction of the ideal city was closely linked to the Sinnwelt of the period that looked up to science, technology, and the traditions of the First Republic or West European modernism. And Most, a city planned by progressive young architects and urban planners like Václav Krejčí and Jaromír Vejl, was a leading hope of Czechoslovak modernists. Soon, however, the first mentions of problems regarding technical approaches to 22 

 Stanislav Ráček, “Až teprve ortel smrti,” Mladý svět, March 17, 1970.

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the urban environment appeared in reference to the appearance of the emerging new Most, not only in journalism, but also in specialist studies. In harmony with the Europe-wide trend, this criticism eventually intensified, especially amongst experts (including sociologists, architects, and urban planners) during the 1970s. Though it had no great impact on the actual appearance of the city and the way it was presented to the outside world, this criticism attests to a fundamental change in the Sinnwelt of societies on both sides of the Iron Curtain. The first sign of this shift in perceptions of the new city can reasonably be dated to 1966. At that time, the city generated numerous discussions about individual, mutually separated, and mostly precisely measurable plans for mining, building, community facilities, clean air, and the preservation of specific monuments. However, another factor had increasingly crept into the discourse: the term “home” (domov), as the lived-in environment formed by bonds of many years, which cannot be measured or produced like prefab concrete housing estates or utility networks. “Home,” wrote the Práce daily on October 16, 1966, in connection with the demolition of the old Most and the building of the city, is hardly born the moment one gets the keys to a comfortably furnished threeroom flat in a prefab concrete apartment house. Home is also a lane bordered with ash trees, which one hurries down on his or her way to work, and it is a playground, where one goes to play volleyball, a kiosk covered in posters where one chooses which film or play to go to, and also, say, a pleasant club or café, where one meets with one’s friends. Home can be all of that together and probably even more: but it cannot be gray and uniform.23

Nonetheless, the predominant reception of the new Most by its inhabitants, as well as external observers, remained strikingly positive well into the 1970s. In a number of articles and books, however, the gray color of the prefab concrete housing blocks gradually becomes a symbol of specific problems linked with large housing estates or entire modern socialist cities, among which Most was foremost. Otakar Nový was probably the first architect publicly to criticize the project, which had hitherto been largely described with great enthusiasm. Writing in Mladá fronta, he stated: “The center [of the new Most], which is just being built, will never totally substitute what will vanish together with the old Most, with this beautiful medieval town, magnificently situated in the landscape, this town whose ground plan and system of three squares are a rarity in Europe. I hope that it will be a warning and the end of this Gründerzeit.”24 He then argued that   Václav Vondra, “Bitva o domov,” Práce, October 16, 1966. On this topic, see also J. J., “Co je domov,” Kulturní kalendář Mostecka, September 1968, 2–4, and the critical essay about the new Most, “Stroj na bydlení kontra člověk,” Výtvarná práce, June 29, 1967. 24   Olga Hniková, “Po nás potopa?,” Mladá fronta, June 23, 1968, 4. 23

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the most recent global architectural debates were reconsidering the ideas of modern urban planning and returning to the historic core of the city as a fundamental symbolic center, from which the sense of home developed. It was becoming increasingly clear, he wrote, that nothing better than streets and squares had yet been invented to improve the livability of space. In this manner, Nový linked criticism of the productivism of state socialism with doubts about the basic modernist dogma of Czechoslovak (and not only Czechoslovak) architecture of the previous fifteen years. Already a year before, however, the Zpráva Útvaru hlavního architekta Mostu (Report of the Chief Architect of Most) had pointed out that the aesthetics of the new town were important, but problematic. Although the report mainly criticized the conservative architecture of the 1950s—in accord with the dominant discourse of the 1960s—it also pointed to the uniformity of some newly built parts of the city, the use of poor-quality prefab concrete buildings, and investors’ neglect of the actual needs of this particular place. During the late 1960s, such criticism tended to appear only amongst specialists and in allusions, but it became considerably more thorough in the subsequent decades. For example, the Propositions for Elaborating a Social Plan for the Development of the City of Most, essentially a working paper for the land development plan of the Most region, written from 1972 to 1974,25 points to the importance of the organically emerging relationship between people and their home environment, which in Most was disrupted by external interventions and could not be substituted by rational spatial planning. In the 1970s, sociologists, architects, and other experts in the socialist countries began—somewhat later than their colleagues in Western Europe—to question the possibility of formulating objectively correct rules for the planning and functioning of cities. They also began to place greater emphasis on the way cities were perceived by their inhabitants. Research on the “image of the city” became part of the process of the planning and reconstruction of cities or city districts in Czechoslovakia in the second half of the 1970s. During this period, a study of “the image of the city of Most” was produced. Though the study seems not to have played an important role in the planning process or further growth of the city, it is still a source of important information. Thanks to this research, carried out in 1976–77 by a team from the Department of Architectural Theory and Development at the Czech University of Technology (ČVUT) in Prague, we know how the newly built city was perceived by its inhabitants.   “These pro vypracování sociálního plánu rozvoje města Most” (Propositions for elaborating a social plan for the development of the city of Most), cited in Jiří Ševčík, Ivana Bendová, and Jan Benda, Obraz Mostu (Prague: ČVUT, 1977), an abridged version of which was published as Jiří Ševčík, Ivana Bendová, and Jan Benda, “Obraz města Mostu,” Architektura a urbanismus 12, no. 3 (1978): 165–76.

25

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Unlike old Most, in which people clearly differentiated between the function of the three main squares and the different characters of the individual streets or parts of the city, local people did not perceive new Most as providing a center of social life. In their eyes, the individual parts did not have any distinctive character and they tended to perceive the buildings mostly as a single mass (that is, the inhabitants were unable to recall how the buildings looked). Communication played the central role here: “The basis of the old Most is the square; the basis of the new Most is the tram.”26 Residents felt that the long, straight streets divided people rather than bringing them together, due to their great width (the distance between buildings on each side of the Most main street is greater than on Wenceslas Square in Prague). The streets created an impression of “being stretched out” and unclear, compared to the intimate nature of the old city where “one could move around the square and one had almost everything in one place.” Despite the more comfortable housing and the better “public facilities,” the inhabitants of the new Most thus felt disoriented. The search for the lost center evoked a feeling of discontent and, in some instances, frustration.27 During the years of normalization, residents of Most reported diminishing levels of gratitude and satisfaction for the higher standard of living, better hygiene, and greater availability of goods in the new town. Even the local population felt that the aesthetic of the new town lacked order and a discernible structure that would have made it possible to feel at home and truly make the public space their own. In the second half of the 1970s, local experts, informed by discussions among West German and English-speaking experts, interpreted these phenomena as signals to overhaul ideas about urban planning by once again making newly built urban centers high density, while at the same time preserving the ideal structures of historic centers.

Reflexive socialism? In the fall of 1975, old Most’s most valuable historic monument—the unique late Gothic Church of the Assumption—was moved from the center of old Most to a safe place without lignite underneath it, 850 meters to the east. The church, which weighs 10,000 metric tons, was successfully transported on custom-built rails, in an operation the likes of which had never before been undertaken anywhere in the world. What is of interest to us, however, is not the transportation of the church itself, but the role it played in public discourse and propaganda. Preservationists   Jiří Ševčík, Ivana Bendová, and Jan Benda, Obraz Mostu (Prague: ČVUT, 1977).   Ibid.

26

27

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called for the rescue of the church immediately after the Central Committee of the Communist Party had, in 1962, given the green light to the destruction of the whole town. The communist elite fairly quickly adopted the idea of rescuing the church. In the early 1960s, setting aside some 90 million Czechoslovak crowns to save an old church was not necessarily something that made the people in power popular.28 At the time, the whole operation was discussed by experts and was not part of official propaganda. Progress, it was argued, demanded obtaining coal and removing things considered old and unproductive.

Figure 10.2. The transportation of the Church of the Assumption through the old town towards its new location, October 9, 1975. Source: State District Archives Most, SOkA Most, photo collection.

In the 1970s, however, the process of moving the Church of the Assumption became a staple of news about Most. On the one hand, it was presented as a “technical event of global importance”29 and journalists enthused about a “technique bridging the gap between the centuries”;30 the project provided an “example of The inhabitants and the workers perceived the investment of huge sums in the preservation of the church, which from their standpoint was a relic of the outmoded past, as an unnecessary expenditure at a time when it was necessary to build roads and factories, hospitals and sporting grounds, housing estates and cities. See the 1966 letter from workers in the steel town of Kladno, central Bohemia, protesting the preservation of the church. NA, Úřad předsednictva vlády—běžná spisovna, file 167-356/1/12, II. 29   “Kostel versus uhlí,” Československý horník, June 11, 1970. 30   “Kostel na kolech,” Svět práce, October 8, 1975. 28

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the technical progress of our republic.”31 On the other hand, dozens of articles in all the important national and regional newspapers presented the preservation of the church as evidence that the socialist state was taking care of the monuments of the past and that “our society” was “concerned with the preservation of historic values.” Many journalists compared the thoughtfulness of the Czechoslovak authorities with the thoughtlessness of Western capitalist concerns.32 The story of the church may seem either like an absurd paradox or the victory of enlightened preservationists and other intellectuals over the destruction of the town. But it too is a logical chapter in the larger story of modernity’s changing nature and the ways in which normalization-era Czechoslovakia and other socialist dictatorships sought to deal with this change. During this period there was a substantial increase in attempts by independent social movements (that is, those not linked to the state) in East Central Europe to preserve national heritage and criticize its destruction. Such attempts emerged as much as a decade later than similar movements in Western Europe. The socialist states naturally sought in various ways to neutralize this criticism. But it turned out that censorship only had very limited success here, much as it did in environmental questions. In the long term, it was thus far more effective to pursue these activities as part of official bodies, as had been done in the Soviet Union with the All-Russian Society for the Care and Preservation of Historic and Cultural Monuments, which already had 22 million members in the mid1970s. The Soviet Union, from the late 1960s, had begun to neutralize calls for the preservation of cultural heritage by means of specific and, at first, highly selective actions. One such example was an official decision to earmark a group of exceptionally valuable Orthodox churches for restoration and protection from demolition. In 1973, the historic center of Moscow was divided into nine conservation zones, which meant that projects like the modern Rossiya Hotel (1964–67) next to the Kremlin or the reconstruction of the Arbat quarter in this period would no longer be allowed.33 Indeed, in most state socialist countries in the 1970s and 1980s, a similar emphasis was placed on national and historic continuity, which also meant greater investment in the repair of historic buildings and avoiding the demolition of valuable historic architecture.34   Ibid.   “Hmota v pohybu,” Zemědělské noviny, October 2, 1975. 33   For more on this, see Miles Glendinning, The Conservation Movement: A History of Architectural Preservation; Antiquity to Modernity (London: Routledge, 2013), 379–83. 34   For example, the German Democratic Republic, in reaction to the European Architectural Heritage Year, 1975, introduced a new law that was meant to aid in the preservation and restoration of architectural monuments. The center of East Berlin was moved from the former Stalinallee (after 1961, renamed Karl-Marx-Allee) to Unter den Linden, which was lined with monumental eighteenth- and nineteenth-century buildings that were restored in this period,

31 32

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Czechoslovakia, which could follow on from a tradition of historic preservation and an emphasis on national traditions, as embodied in the 1950s by Zdeněk Nejedlý, was no exception in this regard. Historic monuments were important from the viewpoint of the late socialist state, not only as sources of historical knowledge and aesthetic value but also for “cultural education.” As “cultural transmitters of ideology,” the state considered the preservation of monuments to be every citizen’s responsibility. The preserved traces of the past in the form of historic monuments, it was believed at the time, created an “indispensable part of the natural environment of man,” whom these traces helped “to educate, bring up, and develop with aesthetic sensibility . . . to create [the citizen’s] own sense of national pride and consciousness.”35 The emphasis on the past and on taking care of historic artefacts was not just a defensive reaction intended to show its critics—and indeed the world— the merely feigned considerateness of the socialist state. Nor was it only a figure of ideological speech. At least two aspects support this claim: first, the strenuous efforts of the socialist state to inculcate its citizens with an interest and a positive attitude to monuments of the past; and, second, a genuine effort, supported by the political elites, to preserve individual monuments and entire historic areas through designating conservation zones and systematically restoring them, with one of the largest urban conservation areas in the world, the historic center of Prague, in the lead.36 The special constellation of eliminating certain forms of criticism while actually accepting them—that is, gradually integrating the starting points of critical discourse into the ideological structure of “real Socialism”—is a feature of the normalization period.37 This dictatorship of consensus38 did not, however, accept and also the important gesture of reconstructing the Nikolaiviertel (Nicholas Quarter) of Berlin in a revival style in the 1980s. 35   Antonín Sum and Naďa Štěpinová, eds., Památky a mládež (Příručka pro mladé ochránce památek) (Prague: Státní zemědělské nakladatelství, 1983), 8. 36   For more on this, see Matěj Spurný and Brian Ladd, “The Stifled Renaissance of Urbanity: Urban Preservation and the Collapse of Czechoslovak and East German Socialism,” in “Special Section: 1989 and the Value of Historic Neighborhoods in East Central Europe,” Journal of Urban History 47, no. 3 (2021): 478–94, first published March 19, 2020, https://doi. org/10.1177/0096144220908882. 37   See Alexei Yurchak, “Soviet Hegemony of Form: Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 45, no. 3 (2003): 480–510. For the Czech milieu, see Michal Pullmann, Konec experimentu: Přestavba a pád socialismu v Československu (Prague: Scriptorium, 2012). 38   This term is used especially for late socialism by the German historian Martin Sabrow. See Martin Sabrow, “Der Konkurs der Konsensdiktatur,” in Der Weg in den Untergang: Der innere Zerfall der DDR, ed. Konrad Jarausch and Martin Sabrow (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1999), 83–116.

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difficult-to-solve or unsolvable conflicts among its stated aims and postulates. If at a general level the dictatorship praised the development of heavy industry, expansion of mining, and increased energy production as basic prerequisites for the happy life of the socialist man and woman, and at the same time promoted being considerate toward the national heritage of the country, it could avoid such a conflict of values and specific policies only at the cost of excluding some topics and even entire spheres from both the public space and, to some extent, from internal political debate. In this way, parallel realities emerged. These realities did not have to be only on the periphery, in areas that had been delivered to the tender mercies of mining and production interests. Demolition was also to take place in the Lesser Town of Prague to make room for a planned through road (which was ultimately never built); in Vinohrady, Prague, a market hall was meant to be demolished; and in connection with the construction of the Žižkov Television Tower, a large part of the local Jewish cemetery was demolished and paved with concrete. Nonviolence could be surprisingly close to brute force and looking after the citizenry could be very close to destruction. One of the most pointed parallel realities was in the foothills of the Krušné hory. While members of the National Committees and local Communist Party organizations conferred with experts about how to repair and revive, as sensitively as possible, the historic centers of north Bohemian towns like Litoměřice (Leitmeritz) and Úštěk (Auscha), a few dozen kilometers away bulldozers were tearing the pavement of old Most from the earth, and demolition crews were dynamiting historic houses, farms, chapels, churches, monasteries, and convents. But as the story of the Church of the Assumption, much like the tenacious effort to move and preserve a wide variety of old Most’s small monuments (ranging from portals to fountains), attests, even this bitter frontline conflict between the interests of industry and the cultural landscape sought to reconcile ruthless industrial exploitation with heritage preservation. Here too we can see the strenuous efforts made throughout the 1970s and 1980s to reconcile destruction with considerateness. The political and economic elites of the Krušné hory foothills needed to persuade not only the public throughout the country (and indeed in other countries too), but also, perhaps most of all, itself that the local reality was not a zone of rack and ruin but, on the contrary, an essential part of peace-loving and considerate socialist modernity. The demolition of old Most and the construction of new Most, on the basis of the modernist urban planning of the 1960s, did not stop in the normalization years. Nevertheless, many things did change, especially in the forging of relations between the future and the past. This is attested to by many factors, not only the saving of the Church of the Assumption. The main thing that

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changed was the way in which the story of Most was told. This was certainly not a dramatic change, nor did it take place everywhere. In dozens of articles and television documentaries “high-quality lignite” continued to be presented as an unquestionable treasure which demanded great sacrifice. Nor was the image of the new Most as a city of roses, a place worthy of modern men and women, questioned in the official discourse. The “feudal and capitalist” past, which, from the viewpoint of the 1950s, was meant to be jettisoned or surpassed, gradually began to play a different role. The story of the town, once a prime example of the ruthless demolition of national heritage, was now, paradoxically, told as testimony to the preservation of traces of the glorious past, a key part of the civilizing achievements of the socialist state.

Conclusion In its key starting points, the worldwide optimism of the postwar age (particularly its technocratic form, triumphant at the threshold of the 1960s) coincided with the policies of state socialist systems. This intersection consisted primarily in the conviction that progress was an unquestionable good for which one had to work and that it would provide people with increasingly greater freedom and happiness. In Czechoslovakia at that time experiments like Most contributed to shoring up, rather than shaking up, state socialist rule, which had apparently achieved such great things. But the story became complicated in the second half of the 1960s and in the 1970s. This was not only because of the Warsaw Pact military intervention in August 1968 and the initially moot legitimacy of the normalization elites installed by the Soviet occupiers. The main reason was that throughout the developed world, including the richest and most industrialized socialist countries (first and foremost, Czechoslovakia and the German Democratic Republic), the era of limitless faith in the progress of civilization and trust in the unquestionable results of a positivist understanding of science was slowly coming to a close. The reduction of the world to economic indices and technicist prognoses had, by the 1960s, begun to trigger critical reactions throughout Europe; first, among the more educated, but then gradually also among the general public. “Soft” factors of social life, such as environmental protection, the values of home as a place that is truly lived in (rather than as something constructed solely with cool, calculating rationality), and respect for national heritage and efforts to preserve it, became more important. Though the censorship and self-censorship of the normalization years stifled open discussion, it could not reverse the change in the Sinnwelt of the local

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people. The power elite of Czechoslovakia in the normalization years were well aware that the civilizing achievements upon which they had based the legitimacy of their restored dictatorship could no longer rely only on the increasing efficiency of mining and production or on the fair distribution of decent housing. For this very reason, the grand finale of the demolition of old Most in the 1970s was generally not presented as the victory of progressive forces over the past. And to the limited extent that it was presented as such, this was done in a far less forced and more sophisticated form than how the transformation of the town had been presented in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The linguistic construct of the world in which the heterogeneous and the contradictory could exist undisturbed side by side—a world that pretended to be a single, continuously perfecting, entity—could have a temporarily stabilizing effect, thus providing legitimacy to late socialist rule. Accordingly, it might have seemed for a while that the struggle for the new face of socialism, in keeping with the demands of the time, would be victorious. But it was this very feature that contained the germ of future decay.39 It turned out, and not only in Czechoslovakia, that the historic change underway was deeper than it initially seemed. Though the consensual character of late socialism and its vaunting of its generally considerate attitude could temporarily prevent a widening of the gulf between, on the one hand, the original modernist starting points of MarxismLeninism (and the technocratic socialism based on them) and, on the other, the changed framework of values of the late 1970s and early 1980s, it could neither fill nor bridge it in the long term. Consideration or the ability to rectify some of reflexive modernity’s destructive manifestations of the technological and economic exploitation of the planet could not in the long run be conceived as the normalization elites would have it: that is, as another agenda that they could tack on to an otherwise unchanged ideological structure and political practice. The normalization discourse and political practice, seeking a synthesis of material and aesthetic interests, economic growth and considerateness for the work of one’s ancestors, progress, and memory, only seemed to be reacting to the challenges of the new face of modernity. In fact, it was mainly a manifestation of the increasingly conservative regime of “decent” people (that is, those who were well disciplined and quietly went about their business), which gradually lost the ability for complete inner change. Such change, in the conditions of reflexive modernity, necessarily required critical public debate and a flexible response to the preliminary conclusions made in the course of such debate. State socialist rule was unable to counter the questioning of the direct relationship between economic and technological development on the one hand, 39 

Beck, Risikogesellschaft.

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and the degree of freedom on the other, with any comparably strong and credible alternative narrative. Just as the town of Most, once the pride of socialist Czechoslovakia, eventually became its disgrace, so too, despite all its efforts, did state socialism as such fail to be truly transformed. To the very end state socialism remained a child of the technocratic, highly modernist approach to the world, as is so well illustrated by the story of Most. That approach was its undoing.

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Selected bibliography

Beck, Ulrich. Risikogesellschaft: Auf dem Weg in eine andere Moderne. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1986. Glendinning, Miles. The Conservation Movement: A History of Architectural Preservation; Antiquity to Modernity. London: Routledge, 2013. Jacobs, Jane. The Death and Life of Great American Cities. New York: Random House, 1961. Kopeček, Michal. Hledání ztraceného smyslu revoluce: Zrod a počátky marxistického revizionismu ve střední Evropě 1953–1960. Prague: Argo, 2009. Krejčí, Václav. Most: Zánik a vznik města. Most: AA 2000, 2008. Meller, Helen. Towns, Plans and Society in Modern Britain. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Mitscherlich, Alexander. Die Unwirtlichkeit unserer Städte: Anstiftung zum Unfrieden. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp, 1965. Pullmann, Michal. Konec experimentu: Přestavba a pád socialismu v Československu. Prague: Scriptorium, 2012. Sabrow, Martin. “Der Konkurs der Konsensdiktatur.” In Der Weg in den Untergang: Der innere Zerfall der DDR, edited by Konrad Jarausch and Martin Sabrow, 83–116. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1999. Spurný, Matěj. Making the Most of Tomorrow. Prague: Karolinum, 2019. ———. Most do budoucnosti. Prague: Karolinum, 2016. Spurný, Matěj and Brian Ladd, “The Stifled Renaissance of Urbanity: Urban Preservation and the Collapse of Czechoslovak and East German Socialism.” In “Special Section: 1989 and the Value of Historic Neighborhoods in East Central Europe.” Journal of Urban History 47, no. 3 (2021): 478–94. https://doi.org/10.1177/0096144220908882. Sum, Antonín, and Naďa Štěpinová, eds. Památky a mládež (Příručka pro mladé ochránce památek). Prague: Státní zemědělské nakladatelství, 1983. Yurchak, Alexei. “Soviet Hegemony of Form: Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 45, no. 3 (2003): 480–510.

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CHAPTER ELEVEN

Authentic Community and Autonomous Individual: Making Sense of Socialism in Late Socialist Hungary * Péter Apor

In retrospect, the stage designer of Orfeo, one of the most important nonconformist artistic groups in 1970s Hungary, emphasized that the notion of community had been central to their decision to build a common house. Speaking in 2009, Péter Fábry claimed that this had been embedded in their belief that was a major difference between Western and Eastern practices of communal living: Besides, there was an argument that the house would mean a higher level of possibilities, we would be able to develop better, our personality would improve more, and common work would help taking care of each other. And what was the perspective of Orfeo’s members on Western experimental lifestyles? There was a major difference, so those communes were established on diverse bases. Somewhere there were such free communities, elsewhere those were organized around specific activities like theater or architects’ communes. Some were based on the liberty of partnership, so the liberty of loving relationships. Orfeo believed that it was based on community, on activities, and on the objectives sprung from activities, and what we could agree, those were the rules then. So, theater activism and work, and the basis of this leftist spirit was community.1

Looking back from the perspective of 1989, the demise of the socialist dictatorships in East Central Europe was inevitable. Late socialism, accordingly, is mostly a narrative about radical breaks and fundamental changes of identity, which seems most pertinent to describe in terms of disillusionment, disappointment, and revelation. This chapter approaches this story by integrating novel perspectives beyond the strictly understood history of ideas. By framing the contemporary scuffle with revitalized Marxism and the legacy of New Left in relation to * Although this chapter is the work of a single author, it should be considered as the outcome of

1

a cooperation. The core research was done in 2008–09 together with James Mark as part of the AHRC-funded project “Around 1968” coordinated by Oxford University. Interview with Péter Fábry. Conducted by James Mark, Budapest, January 23, 2009.

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one of the most important social practices and cultural themes of the 1960s and 1970s—the quest for authentic communities—this essay contributes to our understanding of how “socialism” was able to make sense for large groups of Cold War-era East Central European societies. Moreover, the broader cultural context casts new light on the peculiar answers that members of the 1960s generation subsequently gave to the challenges of 1989.

The desire of authentic communities These themes were central to Orfeo’s ideas and art. The group, which consisted of three sub-companies—a puppet theater, a performance group, and a band— regularly addressed the vulnerability of the modern individual to more powerful abstract sociopolitical forces outside of their reach and understanding. Their puppet theater play, “Children’s Toys,” dramatized these concerns by exploring how adults driven by a paternalistic benevolence forced their own ideas (and weapons) on innocent, autonomous children. Likewise, the play “Funfair” represented the mass society of numb individuals sharing the illusion of freedom and welfare, but who were in reality betrayed by the amusement park boss, who manipulated them by selling ersatz happiness. This performance depicted atomized, completely lost individuals who were alienated from both their work and their private lives. Orfeo’s message, however, went beyond such gloomy visions. The social criticism which the plays put forward also revealed a faith in meaningful, profound authentic communities.2 In the mid-1960s, the future leader of the Orfeo group, István Malgot, who had originally trained as a sculptor, had established contacts with students at the Faculty of Arts of Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) in Budapest, who had cultivated radical leftist ideas at that time. For Anna Szilágyi, a member of this student group, Orfeo evoked the tangible experience of authentic community life: So, people began to miss something serious in the twentieth century, or probably already in the nineteenth, that people began to feel better in communities than in limited families. The commune as a form, indeed, dates back to ’68. And we were dealing with this a lot afterwards, as well. Then, you know, here in Hungary Orfeo was born, which at first had a house in Szentendre, then it was sold, but immediately after, they started to build the houses in Pilisborosjenő in ’72–’73. And that on the level of art, or the everyday level of social politics, was a community institution. This attracted me a lot.3   István Nánay, “Elkötelezett amatőrök és az új színpadi nyelv,” in A kritika mérlegén: Amatőr színjátékok 1967–1982; Bírálatok, elemzések, tanulmányok, ed. Tibor Debreczeni (Budapest: Múzsák Közművelődési Kiadó, 1982), 61–63. 3   Interview with Anna Szilágyi. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, April 18, 2009. 2

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A leading figure of the student group, György Pór—at the time, Anna Szilágyi’s husband, and the first defendant in the 1968 trial of the so-called Budapest Maoist group—also highlighted in a 2009 interview his fascination with commune communities, which he identified with contemporary Western lifestyle experiments: Well I liked it, I liked it very much. That became part of my attraction to that kind of communal lifestyle and I started translating articles about the new left communes in Germany, so yeah, I was attracted to—and even did some experimentation in—living in a communal lifestyle. I was reading French and English so I was reading the National Guardian, the New Left Review, and they also had some of the leaflets and newspapers from the French ’68 movement, and then the other source of all that was Western students and Western tourists, Western visitors to whom we felt attracted and made friends because it felt like that they bring a wind of freedom, so it felt like just to be in conversation with them was very inspiring. And then we started forming our own communes, like you know that Malgot had his . . . group, and there are a couple of others, also mostly by artists.4

Pór and Szilágyi’s friend, Tibor Gáti, who was also tried in 1968 as a member of Pór’s “Maoist” group, also took part in the construction of a common apartment and living space in downtown Budapest, which subsequently gained fame as the “Budapest commune” among intellectual networks in the 1970s. Gáti emphasized the significance of the apartment for experimental lifestyles, where commune dwellers cultivated criticisms of conventional “bourgeois” marriage and the desire to shape new types of community relationships: “But for everyone first of all, or at least partly, it solved the problem of housing, then some sort of alternative way of life. I always had a certain aversion to family life, that it was not a good institution. Many of us shared this opinion and we thought that this meant some sort of alternative way of life in contrast to the traditional family-centric one.”5 In the narratives of those who participated in the cultural and social movements of the 1960s and 1970s, the community lifestyle was not simply a matter of individual choice. Ways of life that participants hoped would realize authentic communities were an answer to those broad cultural and political questions, particularly to that cultural shortcoming which seemed to emerge with the breakthrough of modernity. Even though the model of the “commune” was derived from the West, its establishment was a criticism of consumer mentalities and “bourgeois” societies. The young people of Budapest were 4 5

  Interview with György Pór. Conducted by James Mark, Brussels, March 13, 2009.   Interview with Tibor Gáti. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, October 20, 2008.

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keeping an eye on Rudi Dutschke’s Aarhus communes as well as on other leftist German communes (notably the famous K1 and K2).6 A resident of the “Budapest Commune” opened in 1972, Péter Galicza had taken part in the work of the Faculty Assembly and the reorganization of faculty Communist Youth League (KISZ) organs, which had been initiated by the students at ELTE University. The students, who in spring 1969 had elected their own leadership instead of the official Communist Youth candidates, were motivated by two factors. On the one hand, they wanted to improve university life by raising the quality of education, expanding the direct voice of students in university matters, and establishing some sort of autonomous governance for managing issues of student life. Furthermore, they also emphasized the need to generate real community life, instead of the rather hollowed-out and formalized official KISZ activism.7 One of the major troubles the new faculty KISZ committee faced was how to bridge the gap between the leadership and ordinary members of the organization. They realized that ordinary members either took part rather passively or did not take part at all in community life, which therefore was essentially shaped by the decisions and ideas of the leaders. In their call for the new first-year students of the academic year 1969–70, the new leadership warned of the danger of “inward-looking mentalities and self-exclusion from social life.”8 There was no community at the university, as several of the members of the mobilizing KISZ agreed. In an attempt to change this situation, the new leadership organized a range of public events to inspire discussion of common issues and decision-making, as well as initiatives to transform KISZ base organizations into real working groups reflecting genuine personal interests. For the true foundations of communities were those long-term common activities which could be generated by common work based on common interests; “however, the condition of making a KISZ base organ fit for life beyond mere vegetation is the establishment of a community inside the base organ itself !”9 Accordingly, the new leadership believed, the faculty KISZ organization would transform itself into a genuine community through the real personal participation of members: “It will be able in this way to establish genuine active community life, to create such communities whose deepest essence and content will be simultaneously the deepest essence and content of those working inside them.”10   Péter Galicza, “Hol volt, hol nem volt: Kommuna 1972-ben,” 2000 20, no. 7–8 ( July–August 2008): 11. 7   Zoltán Iván Dénes, “Diákmozgalom Budapesten 1969-ben,” 2000 20, no. 7–8 ( July–August 2008): 19–35. 8   “Szervusztok! BTK KISZ Végrehajtó Bizottság felhívása,” Kari Híradó, no. 3 (September 1969): 1. 9   Dániel Szabó, “Az alapszervezet,” Kari Híradó, no. 1 (1969/70): 2. 10   -kcs-, “A munkacsoportokról,” Kari Híradó, no. 2 (May 24, 1969): 2; László Trencsényi, “Még 6

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Groups of individuals were turned into genuine communities through personal participation and direct individual commitment, wrote Sándor Radnóti in his assessment on the working plan of the faculty KISZ committee in May 1969.11 Radnóti had already built close connections to members of Lukács’s network, particularly with Ágnes Heller and Ferenc Fehér. Radnóti met them regularly following their first contact in 1962, mostly in the philosopher couple’s apartment, where they would discuss the opportunities of rejuvenated Marxist social and political philosophy.12

Authentic community and socialist ways of life In 1969, Heller had just published a collection of essays, Érték és történelem (Values and History), which was based on her works of the mid-1960s. The essays addressed diverse topics including morals, everyday life, and individuality, but recurrently returned to the questions of authentic community and lifestyle choice. Although Heller admitted the relevance of individual choice for establishing authentic communities, for her in the 1960s an individual’s choice of lifestyle was far from being innocent. Lifestyle was connected to politics in subtle and complex ways. Different lifestyles were firmly attached to different political systems: socialism and capitalism. As regenerated Marxist social theory tended to argue, individuals could not exercise their moral autonomy in the circumstances of capitalism. This was due to the conviction that capitalism inherently and necessarily alienated individuals by subjecting them to the constraining laws of economy, binding them forever to their respective social classes. The class system had freed individuals from the burden of feudal traditional community ties, and in so doing had produced atomized individuals and lonely crowds by creating the illusion that individual self-realization was possible without and outside of communities. In contrast, as rejuvenated Marxist social theory argued, the individual could find his or her meaningful life objectives within the frames of authentic communities that encouraged autonomous, independent choice and decision in a purpose-oriented way, thus rejecting voluntarism, particularism, and social egoism.13 The relationship toward consumption, as Heller wrote a year before the publication of her volume, sharply distinguished socialist community life from capitalist ways of life. In her contention, capitalist consumption destroyed the több KISZ-aktivistát!,” Kari Híradó, no. 1 (1969/70): 1.   Sándor Radnóti, “A Kari Híradó köszöntése,” Kari Híradó, no. 2 (1969): 10. 12   Interview with Sándor Radnóti. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, December 17, 2008. 13   Ágnes Heller, “Egyén és közösség—ellentét vagy látszatellentét,” in Érték és történelem: Tanulmányok (Budapest: Magvető, 1969), 56–68. 11

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chances of individuals to pursue useful social or political activism, or to live a meaningful life. Capitalist consumerism, as Heller pointed out, generated the desire of possession in individuals, who therefore lost their broader personal interest in matters of society and community. Led by a worldview of usefulness and motivated by the desire to possess, individuals turned into egoist persons deconstructing the collective texture of society.14 Mihály Vajda, Heller’s personal friend and coauthor, a member of the younger cohort of the Budapest School, raised similar concerns in the same year. Reading Lukács, Vajda pointed out that the high level of consumption typical of contemporary Western societies meant a new stage in the development of capitalism. Vajda rejected in principle the idea that this phenomenon meant either a step toward a more just society or a future socialism. Individualized and manipulated consumption, he explained, triggered alienation and maintained the general helplessness of workers.15 Ágnes Heller had already concluded years before, in the mid-1960s, that consumption as the crucial element of structuring modern capitalist societies was the major factor responsible for their socio-psychological troubles. In general, consumption appeared to her as the means to frame all major spheres of life in the West: work emerged as only the means necessary for subsequent consumption, whereas leisure time found its legitimate place in capitalist society as part of overall broader consumption. The mechanism of producing consumer objects turned consumption into a mere repetition, while everyone was forced to consume the same things in the same way.16 Heller’s criticism of consumerism addressed broader issues of the division of socialism and capitalism and, in fact, of the ideas of “good” or “bad” societies. Capitalism as a regime of consumption, in her contention, resulted in the dissolution of authentic individuals. First, the capitalist system of work rooted out all possibilities of individual initiatives, responsibility, and personal contact from the workplace. Second, as leisure, private life, and emotional relationships became homogenized, individual expressions of identity were more reflections of convention than real personality. Third, the routine of everyday life disintegrated genuine communities since existing groups were linked together more by form, by some superficial common hobby-like activity, than by content, by real authentic common objectives into which personal stakes were invested. Fourth, all these created alienated, conformist, mentally ill personalities incapable of autonomous action and sociopolitical innovation, living in solitude and mortal fear.17   Ágnes Heller, “A marxi forradalomelmélet és a mindennapi élet forradalma,” Kritika 6, no. 12 (December 1968): 50. 15   Mihály Vajda, “Az ontológia aktualitása,” Kritika 6, no. 7 ( July 1968): 30–31. 16   Ágnes Heller, A morál szociológiája vagy a szociológia morálja (Budapest: Gondolat, 1964), 30–42. 17   Ibid., 30–55. 14

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Lifestyle and the broader distinctions between capitalism and socialism did not only trouble philosophers who worked on the critical rethinking of Marxism in the 1960s, however. In fact, such questions became the most frequently debated themes of contemporary intellectuals. In these rather abstract speculations, the highest crime of Western capitalism seemed to be its obstruction of the establishment of genuine authentic communities. The degeneration of the individual was the greatest danger posed by capitalist ways of life, argued Miklós Almási, a leading Marxist philosopher and scholar of aesthetics, in a 1964 essay devoted to the problem of alienation. Capitalism, in his perspective, distorted personal relationships as it translated them into pure monetary terms. In capitalist circumstances, he contended, the structure of human subjectivity disintegrated into fragments and formed multiple personalities that divided individuals into emotional, social, and physical persons. Private and civic lives were isolated from each other and, as a consequence, citizens of capitalist societies ignored public activities. Within the excessively individualistic conditions of Western capitalism, there was no chance for adequate authentic communities.18

Socialist elites and ways of life The creation of a socialist way of life was always an integral part, or indeed the core, of classic avant-garde Bolshevik and Stalinist programs throughout the broader socialist world. The idea that vanguard sociopolitical elites had to perform a civilizing mission and to produce the “New Man” of communism turned everyday life into an obvious target of intervention.19 So long as communist states were engaged in a militant controversy with both the capitalist world and their own domestic sociocultural traditions, the meaning and content of a particular socialist way of life seemed relatively easy to define. Nonetheless, after the mid-1950s, with the advent of de-Stalinization and the Khrushchevite program of increasing the production of consumer goods, circumstances changed. As socialism in Europe began to concentrate on technological modernization and raising citizens’ standard of living, theories on the eventual convergence of both global systems emerged, pointing out the growing statist tendencies in the capitalist West and the increasing role of the market in the socialist East.   Miklós Almási, “Elidegenedés és szocializmus,” Valóság 7, no. 2 (February 1964): 8–9.   A growing body of literature discusses the politics of everyday life and the building of a Stalinist civilization. See, for instance, Stephen Kotkin, Magnetic Mountain: Stalinism as a Civilization (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995); David L. Hoffmann, Stalinist Values: The Cultural Norms of Soviet Modernity, 1917–1941 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003); Ulf Brunnbauer, “Alltag und Ideologie im Sozialismus—eine dialektische Beziehung,” Berliner Osteuropa Info, no. 23 (2005): 4–16.

18 19

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In general, such reasoning was endorsed by communist elites as they could confidently claim that economic competition would favor the better social system of their countries. Nonetheless, it also raised concerns about how to define specifically socialist ways of living if the general frames of modern culture were becoming increasingly uniform. Although communist elites ardently argued that the ownership of means of production constituted a crucial irreversible difference, as technological frames and consumer habits tended to converge, the meaning and content of socialist ways of life became blurred and uncertain. At the same time, as socialism began abandoning military and political confrontation, emphasizing the need for peaceful coexistence, and pursuing economic and consumerist competition with capitalist countries, mainstream socialist culture started to discover the territory of everyday life as the most important remaining field where the distinction between capitalism and socialism could be plausibly played out. As ways of life were what made the difference between socialism and capitalism, everyday life became problematic. In several Soviet bloc countries, sociological research on the transformation of ways of life was introduced during the mid-1960s. In Poland, it was in 1965 when a major collection of studies concerning postwar social transformations was published. In Czechoslovakia, a comprehensive sociological survey on aspects of work, leisure and consumer habits, education, cultural values, and political participation began in 1967.20 These sociological explorations shifted the focus of understanding sociocultural issues in terms of class or property toward aspects of ways of life. In Hungary, the first broad sociological investigation into ways of life started in 1969. The research program of the Institute of Sociology of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences evinced the growing concern of both intellectuals and the party leadership with ways of life: the idea of the investigations emerged from the rather worrisome recognition that ways of life in the village remained unchanged and traditional, despite previous programs of transformation. The sociological program was motivated by an explicit objective of policy making: as the report on the research stressed, sociologists, struck by the resilience of ways of life and the apparent ineffectiveness of previous programs of transformation, sought a better understanding of lifestyles in order to develop more effective programs to reshape them. Ways of life were considered the deepest essence of sociocultural structures and hence the most important aspect to be taken into account when social programs were designed.21   Joachim von Puttkamer, “Gesellschaftliche Selbstbeschreibungen und soziales Krisenbewusstsein in den ostmitteleuropäischen Volksrepubliken,” in Theorien und Experimente der Moderne: Europas Gesellschaften im 20. Jahrhundert, ed. Lutz Raphael (Cologne: Böhlau, 2012), 234–36. 21   Ágnes Losonczi, “Életmód és társadalmi változások,” Szociológia, no. 2 (February 1972): 153. 20

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The relatively urgent and effective transformation of ways of life was considered all the more pressing as it appeared to be a sphere where capitalism could potentially infiltrate socialist life. Party and Communist Youth League officials began to be worried very early, since 1959–1960, about the issue of ways of life. Their concerns were expressed in reports that the party regularly commissioned on the survival of petit-bourgeois lifestyles and the impact of Western “moralizing” attitudes to ways of life.22 Party officials also feared the dangers of the impact of Western lifestyles on Hungarian youth and particularly of Western tourists and Hungarian dissidents who seemed to propagate Western forms of life.23 There is evidence of a growing concern with the penetration and expansion of petit-bourgeois, intellectualist, or utopian mentalities into socialist culture from at least early 1964. Party officials highlighted the importance of the struggle against bourgeois and petit-bourgeois attitudes to life and behavior, alongside establishing and disseminating socialist forms of life and morals.24 The heavy weight of questions that ways of life allegedly posed would help convince many party leaders, as well as intellectuals either loyal to party programs or nonconformist, but leftist, that the most important immediate task of making socialist societies was the transformation of everyday life. Several of these intellectuals and politicians understood it as a crucial question of socialist revolution, which they believed would remain unfinished, despite the transformation of political and economic structures, unless a socialist way of life based on authentic communities emerged in the field of culture and everyday life. In her 1970 book A mindennapi élet (Everyday Life), Ágnes Heller argued that the philosophical promise of socialism, the free choice of objective values—which should have meant individual perfection in appropriating the essential qualities of the human species—could only be fulfilled through the experience of authentic communities being made available for every individual. The central question of socialism, the struggle with alienation by experiencing authentic communities, was, however, eventually impossible to detach from the texture of everyday life.25 The Hungarian communist leadership tried to meet these challenges by means of concepts such as “the revolution of the everyday” or “everyday revolution.”   “Jelentés az Agit. Prop. Bizottságnak a jelen színházi évad néhány problémájáról,” March 18, 1964. National Archives of Hungary (MOL) M-KS 1964/21, 47–48. 49; “Tájékoztató jelentés az Agit. Prop. Bizottság részére,” September 30, 1965. MOL M-KS 1965/49, 72. 23   “Jelentés az Agit. Prop. Bizottságnak az ideológiai Irányelvek megtárgyalásának tapasztalatairól,” October 15, 1965, MOL M-KS 1965/49, 66. 24   “Javaslat az Agit. Prop. Bizottság részére az 1964–65. évi népművelési feladatokra,” June 4, 1964, MOL M-KS 1964/25, 7. 25   Ágnes Heller, A mindennapi élet (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1970), 40–67. 22

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According to the official position, the spectacular and violent phase of the revolution occurred at the moment of the postwar political turn and, accordingly, it had already been closed. By this they did not mean, however, that revolutionary activism was no longer possible. The new type of revolutionary action was less spectacular, as ideologists argued, but it was still important for the construction of socialism: in the new phase of “invisible revolution,” “there is a need for thoroughly systematic, durable, long-term, patient, regular activism in economics, in culture, and also in politics.”26 Literary scholar István Király, a key figure in late socialist literary criticism and cultural policy, published a long treatise in the periodical Kortárs in 1973. In this he claimed the following: “This revolutionary attitude means demand. Demand toward society, toward the external world, as well as toward ourselves. Demand for life pertinent to ordinary days and to everyday work. One should live according to its laws every day—including very small mundane actions, too—that one could feel the pathos of the cause, of the task, of future and the seriousness of the matter.”27

Everyday life and the criticism of technological civilization Ágnes Heller’s criticism of capitalist consumer societies was based on contemporary Western works of social theory and criticism. Authors like Eric Fromm, David Riesman, Theodor Roszak, and Herbert Marcuse formulated their analysis of contemporary Western societies from a particular leftist perspective sharing a strong aversion against capitalism. At the same time, although several of them were impacted by a reading of Marxism, they were not typically Marxists. Their sociopolitical ideal was truly not communism, and even less the socialist dictatorships of East Central Europe. The main target of the social criticism of these mostly American authors, later categorized as belonging to the New Left, was the repercussions of technological-industrial civilization. In their contention, individuals in modern Western societies were distanced from decisions that concerned them. Besides, the chances of their participation in relevant social-political processes decreased, because these processes were shaped by technocratic-bureaucratic elites who excluded others from such institutions. One of the major categories of this social-political thinking became alienation, which seemed a pertinent tool to interpret the helplessness and isolation of individuals and their distancing from modern practices of power.28   Péter Rényi, “A forradalom, mely nem falja fel gyermekeit,” Valóság 13, no. 9 (September 1970): 13–22; István Király, “A mindennapok forradalmisága,” in Irodalom és társadalom (Budapest: Szépirodalmi, 1976), 622. 27   Király, “A mindennapok forradalmisága,” 622. 28   Gábor Kovács, “Revolution, Lifestyle, Power and Culture,” in Muddling Through in the Long 26

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The concept of alienation led to strange conclusions, possibly unexpected by some authors in the socialist states. Such conclusions, however, proved to be obvious even for several authors who considered socialism unquestionably superior to capitalism. Miklós Almási, for instance, was already hesitating in 1964 to consider alienation typical only for capitalism. He recognized that socialism was not automatically inimical to the alienation typical of the capitalist past. An exaggerated state control could suppress citizens’ initiatives. If the double morality of work and private life remained, the person would be disintegrated even in socialist circumstances. As Almási argued, the excessive adoration of material goods would develop a socialist petit-bourgeois mentality and foster inward isolation.29 In the mid-1960s, criticism about the bureaucratized elites who supported petit-bourgeois consumer mentalities was also taken up by those radical leftist groups with which a few Orfeo group members had formerly linked themselves. One of the pieces of evidence frequently used by the prosecution in the 1968 “Maoist” trial was a handwritten study entitled “Who owns the factory?” by a student of economics, Péter Simon. The essay, which the detectives wanted to use to demonstrate the heresy of the group, argued that the New Economic Mechanism introduced on January 1, 1968, constituted the major evidence for the transformation of the official socialist elite into a bourgeois one. The young radicals were afraid that the New Economic Mechanism would bring Hungary closer to the alienating world of Western consumer culture and would recreate the exploitation of workers. The group also rejected the market because they believed it would generate bourgeois competition, material interests, and mentalities that preferred property ownership over collective solidarity. Market processes would eventually create a society that would resemble that of the West: a society that would allow those with petty-bourgeois mentalities to accumulate and gain higher incomes than workers. This would further help a narrow band of leaders, and hence increase inequality further, as members of the Budapest “Maoist” group would argue in 1966–67.30 If the essential feature of socialism was the establishment of authentic communities embedded in everyday life, then the program of constructing socialist societies might be taken out of the hands of elites who were focusing on political and economic structures. The suppression of “democratic socialism” in Czechoslovakia and the simultaneous sanctioning of critical leftist intellectuals in 1960s: Ideas and Everyday Life in High Politics and the Lower Classes of Communist Hungary, ed. János M. Rainer et al. (Budapest: Institute for the History of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, 2005), 27–52. 29   Almási, “Elidegenedés és szocializmus,” 10–21. 30   Historical Archives of the State Security Services (ÁBTL) V 154419/1, 167–68.

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East Central Europe, moreover, created the impression that official elites had abandoned a central promise of socialist societies: the establishment of a “democratic socialist” everyday life based on authentic communities, which would make free, autonomous human life possible. After 1968, many critical leftist intellectuals recognized that Western New Left social criticism had important implications not only for critiques of capitalism. Later, particularly after 1989, Heller and Vajda emphasized their eventual realization of the deep divides between themselves and the Western New Left, and related their encounters with Western extremists and terrorist groups in the mid-1970s to illustrate this point. Nevertheless, before this they had seen the potential for a combined assault against the overly bureaucratized, rationalized, and alienating forms of political development that had occurred under both capitalism and communism.31 They had dismissed the revolutionary potential of the working class and considered them too successfully integrated into the Western European bourgeois capitalist systems during the postwar boom, and too depoliticized and alienated in the East, to operate as authentic carriers of social change.32 Rather, Heller viewed the Western student-led protests as harbingers of a broader resistance against modern bureaucratized, industrialized, and alienated systems that could further develop as youth rebellion on both sides of the Iron Curtain.33 Marxist revisionists within Hungary (besides Heller and Vajda, particularly the young György Bencze and János Kis), 34 along with many New Left thinkers in the West, were collapsing distinctions between socialism and capitalism by arguing that these were merely two similar forms of modern industrial bureaucratic systems which alienated their populations, and required a joint struggle across the Iron Curtain to reform them. Even older non-Marxist intellectuals like István Bibó followed such New Left debates closely, pointing to the dangers of intellectual technocrats controlling societies in both capitalist and communist systems.35 The revolutionary anti-capitalist transformation of everyday life seemed increasingly to be a field independent of political processes, an objective that had to be realized in opposition to elites. The central question of anti-capitalist revolution, the goal of authentic communities embedded in everyday life, became detached from the political program of socialism; indeed, it began to   Simon Tormey, Agnes Heller: Socialism, Autonomy and the Postmodern (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001), 8. 32   Agnes Heller, Everyday Life (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984), 58. 33   Open Society Archives HU 300-40-2-Box 84; see also György Lukács, The Process of Democratization (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1991), 88. 34   György Bence, “Marcuse és az újbaloldali diákmozgalom,” Új Írás, no. 8 (September 1968): 95–102; János Kis, “Rejtett forradalom. Franciaország május előtt és után,” Új Írás, no. 9 (March 1969): 88–96. 35 Kovács, “Revolution,” 48 f. 31

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carry a potential criticism of socialism. Faithful to this conception, the cultural collective Orfeo performed the play “Etoile,” which was based on Jorge Semprun’s screenplay The War is Over. The play attacked both Western capitalism and— implicitly—Eastern socialism for the construction of a police state, the overwhelming burden of bureaucracy, and the exploitation of workers. Orfeo itself was an exceptionally politically-oriented group of artists with a particularly strong leftist vision of politics. Their sociopolitical agenda was based on a firm commitment to the working class, identified as ordinary wage-earners, whom they viewed as being exploited by technology-ruled capitalism in the West. At the same time, they saw the socialist states of the Soviet bloc as reproducing this exploitation through a bureaucratized, alienated class of state officials.36 Authentic communities, which realized “the revolution of the everyday,” were situated increasingly within countercultural practices directed against elites. Ágnes Heller and Mihály Vajda’s coauthored article about the commune as a way of life made a case for the future of the commune as an authentic anti-capitalist community, while positioning it against prevailing power structures. In all probability, the real message of the essay was not even then to establish the commune as a positive lifestyle model. The critical content was more important for the authors: to render the program of transforming everyday life a matter of counterculture against the authoritarian and hierarchical way of life normally reproduced by official politics of ways of life.37 Saving the world and transforming the whole of society seemed less and less achievable goals for several activists in the early 1970s. The field of realizing ideals was replaced within their true small communities—such as the Budapest commune—and it increasingly centered on personal life.38 At the turn of the 1960s and 1970s, leftist radicalism and its associated revolutionary romanticism provided an attractive alternative way of thinking for these young people, mainly in Budapest but also elsewhere. Thus the artist Győző Somogyi, who had been socialized in his adolescence into a fascinating cultural mixture of Jewish mysticism, classical European high culture, and Catholic religious devotion, briefly believed at this time in protecting spiritual values and representing criticism of the Western consumer society in radical leftist terms, particularly through Maoist language. Moreover, Marxist criticism of consumer capitalism and leftist radicalism seemed to conform to his ideals of helping the disadvantaged as a Catholic “worker priest” between 1968 and 1975 in working-class districts in Budapest. Although he soon abandoned Maoism,   ÁBTL 3.1.2. M-38310. Agent “Kárpáti Emese,” Report, May 3, 1972, 61–62.   Ágnes Heller and Mihály Vajda, “Családforma és kommunizmus,” Kortárs 14, no. 10 (October 1970): 1655–65. 38   Galicza, “Hol volt, hol nem volt,” 12. 36 37

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Catholic spiritualism remained an important motivation for him to reject the material world and technological civilization.39 The focus on developing true spiritual values and the rejection of Western capitalism’s materialism was extremely important in generating Catholic activism in the late 1960s and early 1970s, especially in small nonconformist communities such as the clandestine Regnum Marianum group. By the end of the 1960s, a new generation of young lay activists and priests became influential within the community. This was partly due to the aging of the previous predominantly clerical leadership, but also to the arrest and subsequent imprisonment of most of them in 1971. Socialized in devoted Catholic families and looking for spiritual values, the new cohort of radical Catholic activists was motivated by the idea of regenerating religious cultures and reaching out to the young. The social movements of Latin America were an attractive model for many of them, particularly the role of “Marxist priests” who defended the rights of the exploited and the poor, which Hungarian readers typically understood as a protest against local oligarchies and American monopolies.40 Enthusiastic about Vatican II, they were eager to recreate committed Catholic communities, which they saw as having been undermined by the concerns of everyday working to live and the rush for consumer goods.41 The new generation of Catholic activists emphasized the collective ownership of spiritual or material values and goods. They considered sharing “treasures of the soul” or even material property, such as a common piece of land or house, as important vehicles of community-building. For Regnum Marianum activists, the morality of renouncing material goods and sharing one’s own property with others for the sake of the common interest was an extraordinarily important spiritual value.42 In that perspective, they considered atheist communism and materialist Western capitalism as equally threatening their vision. At the turn of the 1960s and 1970s, the criticism of consumer capitalism and the idea of authentic community provided a pool of cultural resources that many activists who were open toward social issues, communities of solidarity, criticism of the alienating effects of industrial societies, and the rejection of modern technocratic elites could draw upon.   Interview with Győző Somogyi. Conducted by Péter Apor, Salföld, November 7, 2008; Hedvig N. Dvorszky, “Győző Somogyi,” in Győző Somogyi, ed. Márk Somogyi (Budapest: Ernst Múzeum, 2003), 7–8. 40   Interview with István Deák. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, February 19, 2009. 41   Interview with Béla Balás. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, February 24, 2009; Interview with Gábor Kemenes. Conducted by Péter Apor, Nagykovácsi, December 12, 2008; Interview with László Diószegi. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, December 1, 2008. 42   Interview with László Diószegi. Interview with Jutka Hajba. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, March 10, 2009. 39

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The individual hidden in communities Influenced by Vatican II in the mid-1960s, several significant changes occurred in the Catholic Church as well as in the practices of Catholic religious communities. Church practice became more open toward cooperation with lay believers, integrating new cultural forms such as beat music, and more intensive consideration of the interests and demands of the young generation. These processes transformed the relationships between the Church hierarchy and believers, as well as ways of thinking about religion and Christianity, thereby helping to shape a new religious activist generation. Still, the core and essence of Catholic religious practice and lifestyle remained the establishment of authentic communities. As former youth leader of the clandestine Regnum Marianum group Károly Elek states: There are two important aspects of group meetings, so people gather for two reasons. On the one hand, for each other, for the community, since we feel great when we are together, and we know each other, and love each other. One comes for this and, on the other hand, comes as something reasonable happens. If either of the two is missing, the balance breaks and the group dies sooner or later. So, if they do not take care of each other, if they are not interested in each other, that is also a big problem. So, it was our belief that we needed to deal with the youth and that it was possible to practice Christianity in community.43

The most important aspect of the spiritual communitarian criticism of modernity was the experience of the mysticism of authentic community and of those transcendent processes that transform the simple gathering of individuals into something qualitatively different, into genuine communities. Faith and community are inseparable from this perspective: faith can be experienced and transmitted within a community, and misgivings can be overcome by the power of community. Leftist communitarian criticism of modernity, by contrast, already carried the possibility of an alternative reading in the 1960s. During this period, New Left thinkers working on the renaissance of Marxism gradually recognized the multiplicity of lifestyles and considered their selection and appropriation as the right of the individual. Thus Ágnes Heller, from one perspective paradoxically following György Lukács’s explanation of Makarenko’s ideas about ideal socialist communities, emphasized in 1969 that the crucial element of such communities was the liberty of the individual to choose or to reject them.44 Although   Interview with Károly Elek. Conducted by Péter Apor, Budapest, January 9, 2009.   Heller, “Egyén és közösség,” 72–73.

43 44

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communities always represented certain sets of values and objectives that bound their members together, it was the individual who could and should make the final decision. The foundation of ideal communities was the autonomous and free individual. Morality, it follows, “is an attitude freely (relatively freely) taken on ourselves in a relationship to life, society, men and women.”45 Individuals became genuine communities through personal participation and direct individual commitment, wrote Sándor Radnóti in his assessment of the workplan of the faculty KISZ committee in May 1969.46 The quest for communities meant searching for the possibilities of individual liberty. The concept of authentic community was highly relevant, although in a rather pragmatic way, for leftist critical thought in the 1960s and 1970s. It had no value in itself; rather, its significance lay in its apparent capacity to protect the individual from the repercussions of alienation. The morality of communities was based on the individual: the meaning of communities was that they could secure the perfection of the individual. Although critical leftist thought and the social practice related to it continued talking about the community, the real central element and true stake of those discussions was the individual. The quest for authentic communities brought personal inner freedom: at the end of the road toward communities, there stood the private person, the citoyen. “Communards were searching for freedom through ideological straying and they have achieved their personal inner freedom: they have become true civilians, private persons.”47 A commune-dweller, Tibor Gáti remembered an important event of the community as follows: János Kis, Bence, and György Márkus had a common work, which was titled as “Is Critical Economics Possible at All?” or as it was shortly referred to, the Überhaupt. I read that book as samizdat, since then samizdats started to appear here, and it gave me a lot then, in 1972–73, for my personal ways. . . . The Überhaupt was so important for me that I thought to share it with others, and I thought to tell the other commune-dwellers about it. But then it was so interesting, that I suddenly realized that the living room was full.48

The contemporary relevance of the work, which was not officially published until 1992, was that it systematically evinced the theoretically untenable state of Marx’s main political economical treatise, Capital. The authors pointed to the theoretical impossibility of a functioning socialist planned economy and   Heller, “A mindennapi élet szerkezetének vázlata,” in Heller, Érték és történelem, 32.   Radnóti, “A Kari Híradó köszöntése,” 10. 47   Galicza, “Hol volt, hol nem volt,” 9, 12, 18. 48   Interview with Gáti.

45

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simultaneously contrasted the reality of socialist dictatorships with the original philosophical intentions of Marx through a criticism of his concept of use-value and theory of work-value. However, even if it looks rather strange today, the work was not anti-Marxist. On the contrary, its original intention was to harmonize East Central European socialist reform programs with Western European and North American New Left criticisms of capitalism, in a way that could sustain the validity of the core of Marx’s philosophy. The program itself, however, led to rather radical conclusions. If the possibility of socialism that should follow and replace capitalism in Marx’s terms disappears, if Marx’s laws concerning capitalist economy are invalid, and if there is no Marxian historically necessary progress, then all that remains of Marx’s ideas are those regarding anthropology, the statements concerning human essence and their moral consequences. As the authors wrote: The free fulfillment of individuality—the meaning of socialism—is impossible to think of without really opening up and making material needs dynamic [so as to be adaptive to changes of taste and necessity; author’s note]. The free choice of consumer habits is an inescapable condition for the autonomous and conscious shaping of ways of life and—as we have to address this issue later in more detail— the diversity of ways of life and the opportunity to choose freely among them are included in the fundamental goals of the socialist movement in Marx’s terms to the same extent as the possibility of constantly transforming the relationships of distribution of labor and social contacts in broad terms.49

Without the validity of the peculiar Marxian road leading toward achieving those values, they become practically the common values of modern European progress. In these circumstances, however, the act of insisting on values can lose its ideological cover, whereas the stakes of theoretical thought can become pragmatic: the process of making institutions and procedures to realize and to protect values can take center stage.

  György Bence, János Kis, and György Márkus, Hogyan lehetséges kritikai gazdaságtan? (Budapest: T—Twins, 1992), 127.

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Selected bibliography

Bence, György, János Kis, and György Márkus. Hogyan lehetséges kritikai gazdaságtan? Budapest: T—Twins, 1992. Brunnbauer, Ulf. “Alltag und Ideologie im Sozialismus—eine dialektische Beziehung.” Berliner Osteuropa Info, no. 23 (2005): 4–16. Dénes, Zoltán Iván. “Diákmozgalom Budapesten 1969-ben.” 2000 20, nos. 7–8 ( July– August 2008): 19–35. Galicza, Péter. “Hol volt, hol nem volt: Kommuna 1972-ben.” 2000 20, nos. 7–8 ( July– August 2008): 11. Heller, Agnes. Everyday Life. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1984. Hoffmann, David L. Stalinist Values: The Cultural Norms of Soviet Modernity, 1917–1941. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003. Kotkin, Stephen. Magnetic Mountain: Stalinism as a Civilization. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. Kovács, Gábor. “Revolution, Lifestyle, Power and Culture.” In Muddling Through in the Long 1960s: Ideas and Everyday Life in High Politics and the Lower Classes of Communist Hungary, edited by János M. Rainer et al., 27–52. Budapest: Institute for the History of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, 2005. Lukács, György. The Process of Democratization. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1991. Puttkamer, Joachim von. “Gesellschaftliche Selbstbeschreibungen und soziales Krisenbewusstsein in den ostmitteleuropäischen Volksrepubliken.” In Theorien und Experimente der Moderne: Europas Gesellschaften im 20. Jahrhundert, edited by Lutz Raphael, 229–51. Cologne: Böhlau, 2012. Tormey, Simon. Agnes Heller: Socialism, Autonomy and the Postmodern. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001.

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CHAPTER TWELVE

The “Will to Publicity” and its Publicists: Curating the Memory of Czechoslovak Samizdat Jonathan Larson

An unimposing, middle-aged man in thick glasses and a gray overcoat steps to the balcony. Several stories below him, in a panorama over several city blocks of a large square, stand thousands of people bundled in colorful hats and scarves, shifting their feet to distract themselves from the cold. The man had been introduced by a previous speaker as a writer recently released from prison. The crowd cheers. The man waves, and then begins to speak. The emergence of dissident intellectuals to declare truth to power before crowds and mobilize regime change from within has become an alluring myth of contemporary Western democratic modernity and of its spread to other parts of the globe. Depictions in particularly North Atlantic popular media by journalists and filmmakers alike, such as the 2009 documentary film The Power of the Powerless, tend to credit an intellectual such as Václav Havel with having almost single-handedly generated, sustained, and guided a democratic revolution to its progressive conclusion. If we follow these narratives’ depictions of offstage preparation for the theater of public protest, many lead to these dissident intellectuals’ efforts to sustain national essence and civilization by keeping “truth” and an unadulterated national creative spirit alive in the written word. One image of this virtuous labor is fixed on a lonely typist in dim lighting, perhaps flanked by an ashtray with cup and saucer, crafting withering critique on sheets of paper to be passed on to compatriots through mimeographs hidden in gloomy basements and subsequent furtive meetings in dark streets.1 From these narratives, it is reasonable to conclude that the foundation of modern democratic resistance and civil society in authoritarian states is built by those who brave the censors and secret police to produce and circulate incorruptible texts.   See, for instance, the cover of H. Gordon Skilling’s Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1989), Czech Television’s fascination with the figure of the typist in its 2003 series on samizdat, and a fictional reenactment of the heroic dissident typist in the 2009 documentary The Power of the Powerless.

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How does a reassessment of the corpus of those self-published texts in East Central Europe, known by many as “samizdat,” lead us to reconsider the generation of political alternatives in that milieu and elsewhere today? If we reevaluate our understanding of samizdat based on a wider appreciation for what forms and content existed, and how the forms and content we most commonly know were preserved and documented for our perusal today, what changes? How might a richer understanding of the making of post-socialist “contemporary history” in the former Czechoslovakia reinforce this volume’s collective conviction that the modeling of East Central European late socialism and its collapse demands a feel for the Sinnwelt of that period, including of the topics taken up by those who wrote and the relationships formed with those who read? This chapter looks at the different conclusions about the political role of samizdat that one could draw over the past forty years—from socialism to post-socialism—depending on the brokering of access to documentation of this phenomenon. I build on scholarship that has questioned narratives and definitions of samizdat as heroic resistance,2 alongside bias in how samizdat from across the region has been collected at one US-sponsored Cold War-era institution.3 I focus on the work of two Czech archives to explore how the features of samizdat remembered as consequential have been shaped by that memory’s national grounding. Much literary, historical, political, and other self-published work during the period engaged passionately with discourses of Czech (and Slovak) national identity. The actors who identified this work as valuable and started to collect it did so out of a sense of national duty: fairly self-consciously, they sought to preserve a record of their nation’s creative spirit. Attending to latent dynamics of “culture” and distinction helps us trace a specific process through which self-published work was sorted as significant, or even heroic, while the past was unfolding into the future. My chapter contributes to histories of late socialism that have reevaluated the importance of dissident intellectuals for the collapse of communist rule. As a study of this period, it points to problems in research on what might be called “the history of the present” or “contemporary history.” First of all, for an anthropologist such as myself to study “postsocialism” has been to engage in multiple temporalities simultaneously—from excavating pasts to anticipating   Ann Komaromi, “The Material Existence of Soviet Samizdat,” Slavic Review 63, no. 3 (2004): 597–618; Peter Steiner, “Introduction: On Samizdat, Tamizdat, Magnitizdat, and Other Strange Words That Are Difficult to Pronounce,” Poetics Today 29, no. 4 (2009): 613–28. 3   Olga Zaslavskaya, “From Dispersed to Distributed Archives: The Past and the Present of Samizdat Material,” Poetics Today 29, no. 4 (2009): 669–712. 2

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futures—and seek influence over how they play in the present. This engagement is central to how postsocialism emerged as a critical analytic for the study of contemporary capitalism.4 To the extent that any past is sufficiently recent as to place it outside the purview of traditional historians who cannot yet access archival materials, the study of it as “history” is often differentiated as contemporary history. But professional and lay historians often involve themselves in documenting the present out of anticipating its future significance. We shall see that the two Czech archives described here were established very much with an eye to preserving and facilitating alternative accounts or forms of national memory as the socialist past was unfolding in the present and leading toward a possible post-socialist future. To the extent that these archives presented themselves as important alternatives to institutions of the Czechoslovak state, they suggested that they documented notable alternative sites and forms of cultural production. Yet in doing so, they have occluded to some degree our understanding of grassroots textual production and its social and historical significance. How and why these archives sought to remember the communist past during its present still frames our memory of that past today. I will first provide an overview of how samizdat writing came into practice in late socialist Czechoslovakia. I review scholarly discussion of one particular problem central to this chapter: what properties define samizdat monographs and periodicals alike? I will then illustrate this problem by describing the activities, holdings, and philosophies of two archivists and archives of samizdat: Vilém Prečan with his Czechoslovak Documentation Center (CSDS) and Jiří Gruntorád with Libri prohibiti (LP). Focusing on the content of periodicals, we will see that Prečan’s background and interests led him to assemble a collection much more restrictively defined than Gruntorád’s. I outline these differences quantitatively and qualitatively, analyzing why they arose and what they mean ethnographically as well as for the historiography of samizdat in the former Czechoslovakia. Unpacking Slovak Catholic samizdat periodicals as an illustration, I conclude with a discussion of the suppositions of meaningful political action that underlie and are sustained by the predominant popular memory of samizdat, aligned more with the content collected by CSDS than by Libri prohibiti.

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 Dominic Boyer and Alexei Yurchak, “American Stiob: Or, What Late-Socialist Aesthetics of Parody Reveal about Contemporary Political Culture in the West,” Cultural Anthropology 25, no. 2 (2010): 179–221; Sharad Chari and Katherine Verdery, “Thinking between the Posts: Postcolonialism, Postsocialism, and Ethnography after the Cold War, Contemporary Studies in Society and History 51, no. 1 (2009): 6–34.

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Samizdat: Political action, form, and metacultural meanings “Samizdat” is a term borrowed by Czech and Slovak from the Russian to describe a phenomenon of producing and disseminating generally written work in a context where state regulation of publishing restricts it for political reasons. The phenomenon has been around for centuries under various labels, but first gained this new moniker, a play on the name of state publishing agencies, in the Soviet Union after the Second World War.5 In Czechoslovakia, such forms of politically motivated self-publishing made brief appearances during the Nazi occupation and the early years of communist rule. They included literary experiments, historical essays, and political commentaries that were either blocked from authorized channels or never submitted to them. After a lull in the 1960s and the first half of the 1970s, such politically sensitive samizdat expanded rapidly by the second half of the 1980s. The record of socialist-era Czechoslovak samizdat that we can describe today seems closely tied to political developments. First of all, why did illegal publishing even exist if not in response to the intervention of state power in the world of ideas and aesthetics? As a case in point, it has been suggested that by the time of the Prague Spring reforms of 1968, no significant volume of samizdat was produced because there was virtually no need to circumvent state institutions in order to disseminate one’s ideas, arguments, or work. During the 1960s, those interested in publicizing dissenting or disruptive voices did so predominantly within institutions such as the Communist Party and professional unions. However, only once the party leadership cracked down on public expression following the Warsaw Pact invasion of 1968 did samizdat reemerge. A second argument for the relationship between samizdat and political oppression is contained within the biographies of persons now identified as main players in the field of samizdat: journalists, scholars, writers, and artists who were persecuted during this period. In a period when unsanctioned publication could be prosecuted as a crime, surely only those with courage or a real axe to grind would risk the costs of illegal publishing to oneself and one’s family. Yet, while the history of samizdat in the former Czechoslovakia—like that of samizdat elsewhere in the region—is closely connected to the history of censorship and other political interventions in public discourse, we should be cautious as to how much this history helps us either outline this field or color it in. As literary scholar Peter Steiner summarizes about the region as a whole, “the vitality of samizdat had more to do with local cultural traditions than with the intensity of the political repression confronting it.”6 Samizdat does not seem to   Gordon Johnston, “What is the history of samizdat?” Social History 24, no. 2 (1999): 115–33.   Steiner, “Introduction,” 615.

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have germinated, grown, or died solely according to laws of a political nature, as the repressive contexts but comparatively low levels of samizdat activity in Romania and Bulgaria attest. Nor are those laws the whole story. To define samizdat primarily as illicitly published political dissent is to miss “innate fuzziness”7 that several recent scholars have found important. On the one hand, if we held to an idea that samizdat was the work of certain kinds of “authors” and “texts,” such as novelists and their work, Ann Komaromi has pointed out that some Soviet “samizdat” work was banned purely because of the author attributed to it, not because of something inherently transgressive about the text itself. Likewise, a text might flow back and forth between “officially” and “unofficially” published forms within the course of a few years, again calling into question that text’s intrinsically “samizdat” properties.8 On the other hand, to focus on a more conservative literary view of authors and texts is to neglect the view from the street: what did producers, handlers, and consumers themselves consider to be “samizdat,” and how was that category meaningful for them? For instance, was it the “truths” that certain physical properties suggested of a text, such as primitive production indexing sincerity,9 or the “trusted network” implied by a text’s circulation?10 To consider samizdat texts as objects that lived among and mediated human relationships is to realize that, as literary scholar Martin Machovec has put it, “[i]t is necessary to take into account various extraliterary, extralingual, extra-aesthetic functions of these samizdat activities as well as their social, political, and psychological dimensions.”11 In short, part of what we need to examine are the metacultural and metacommunicative meanings of samizdat. Much work can still be done on how samizdat was part of late socialist everyday practices and epistemics. Before this task proceeds further, however, I argue that we must contextualize the means by which samizdat materials have been collected for us to study today: we need to conduct an ethnography of samizdat’s archives.12 This imperative becomes clearer if we consider briefly the typical primary source of information for historians: state archives and libraries. In the former Czechoslovakia, major public research libraries such as the Czech   Steiner, “Introduction,” 621.   Ann Komaromi, “The unofficial field of late Soviet culture,” Slavic Review 66, no. 4 (2007): 605–29. 9   Komaromi, “The Material Existence,” 600–609. 10   Ann Komaromi, “Samizdat as Extra-Gutenberg Phenomenon,” Poetics Today 29, no. 4 (2008): 629–67. 11   Martin Machovec, “The Types and Functions of Samizdat Publications in Czechoslovakia, 1948–1989,” Poetics Today 30, no. 1 (2009): 4. 12   See also Katherine Verdery, Secrets and Truth: Ethnography in the Archive of Romania’s Secret Police (Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2013). 7 8

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National Library (Klementinum) and Slovak National Library hold very little samizdat in their collections. This might not be surprising if we consider some basic physical features of these “publications”: in variable quantities, of often fragile production, and authored or assembled by persons either unknown or off-limits to the staff of public libraries. After 1989, copies of some “unofficial” publications might have been received, evaluated, and rejected as the work of dilettantes, for minus the kind of editorial validation inherent to authorized publications, how to know if it was worth keeping? Libraries must make decisions on what to hold, and even the US Library of Congress—sometimes fabled to have held every book ever produced—does not attempt this. Yet, various factors have also discouraged substantial lay collections. For some people, samizdat became worthless artifacts of a past worth forgetting. If the collapse of the previous order opened a flood of new materials from the West, it was easy to invert a previously widespread attitude that samizdat equaled quality, where “official” publications equaled trash.13 But even for those with a more tolerant, curious, or nostalgic view of it, there has been the problem of how to identify it. Cataloging practices in libraries throughout the former Czechoslovakia (as elsewhere) can be inconsistent, potentially thwarting patrons who search for samizdat in their holdings. Furthermore, what private persons would have the motivation, training, and wherewithal to seek out “samizdat,” become known as collectors of it (thereby attracting more), screen it, and oversee the physical space necessary to manage collections of it? So, who preserved samizdat materials under or after socialism, and for what reasons? Olga Zaslavskaya has asked the same question of the Radio Liberty Samizdat Unit, moved at the end of the Cold War from Munich to Budapest. This archive, she finds, became a repository for potentially “political” texts that found their way to Radio Liberty for broadcast into the Eastern Bloc. The execution of Radio Liberty’s mission meant that literary work, for example, was typically excluded.14 Yet, today most accounts of samizdat, including those of the Russian-language Soviet samizdat that comprised the bulk of what was collected in Munich, would not dream of excluding literary output. In fact, some of the most recent explorations of samizdat have sought to correct a perceived bias against the non-literary.15 Zaslavskaya’s study of the Radio Liberty Samizdat Unit opened up the very important question of how our understanding of samizdat today can be colored by the factors that shaped the saving of this output. To extend her line of inquiry,   See essays in Martin Machovec, Pohledy zevnitř: Česká undergroundová kultura ve svědectvích, dokumentech a interpretacích (Prague: Pistorius & Olšanská, 2008). 14   Zaslavskaya, “From Dispersed to Distributed Archives.” 15   For instance, Friederike Kind-Kovács and Jessie Labov, eds., Samizdat, Tamizdat, and Beyond: Transnational Media During and After Socialism (New York: Berghahn Books, 2013).

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I submit that we look more closely to a wider culture of production than what institutionally managed collections, such as that of Radio Liberty, reflect. While I do not know of any village, district, or communal level samizdat archives that are accessible to scholars, in the former Czechoslovakia there are two that aim be at least somewhat “national” in scope. As I have noted above, much literary, historical, political, and other self-published work during the period was engaged passionately with discourses of Czech (and Slovak) national identity; so was collecting. Through comparative descriptions of these two periodical collections, I aim to show that the “national” frame and an accompanying lexicon of distinction began to influence the historical memory of samizdat already during late socialism. If a presupposition of political dissent fails to capture properly the spectrum of samizdat form, then a comparison of two collections of materials in the same languages (Czech and Slovak) might flesh out at least the topical “fuzziness” of samizdat periodicals and its political implications. In short, I hope to show that to contextualize the means through which we can access the samizdat production of one former socialist state (Czechoslovakia) is to contribute to the Zeitgeschichte of late socialist cultural life and its post-socialist legacy.

Exile, CSDS, and the historiography of culture Vilém Prečan was a Czech historian of the twentieth century who was among the hundreds of Czech intellectuals purged from their jobs after the Warsaw Pact invasion of 1968 and the subsequent political normalization. Prečan and his family emigrated in 1976, settling in the northern West German city of Scheinfeld, where Prečan began to build up a personal archive of Czech, Slovak, and Czechoslovak intellectual, literary, and (in a word) cultural production. Many of these texts—novels, articles, studies, essays, short stories, feuilletons, poetry, and periodicals—were samizdat sources. This material came to Prečan either smuggled directly out of Czechoslovakia or indirectly via other contacts in Europe. Much of what he collected in turn passed from his hands to those of colleagues elsewhere. Some of this material arrived in the form of single “offprints,” while some of it was published in periodicals run by fellow émigrés. Prečan became a nexus in flows between samizdat texts coming from Czechoslovakia and periodicals and monograph series run or influenced by Czech émigrés in Cologne, Rome, Paris, London, Stockholm, Toronto, New York, and Ann Arbor. For nearly ten years the labor and material infrastructure behind this personal archive was supported from small individual donations and several consecutive stipends he held as an academic historian employed by the West German government.16   H. Gordon Skilling, “Archiv svobody,” in Ročenka Československého dokumentačního střediska 2003, ed. Vilém Prečan (Prague: Československé dokumentáční středisko, o.p.s., 2004).

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By 1986, Prečan and several collaborators pulled together funding and administrative support from the US National Endowment for Democracy, the Stockholm-based Charter 77 Foundation, the Canadian Jan Hus Foundation, the émigré Czechoslovak Society of Arts and Sciences based in the United States, and descendant of Bohemian nobility Karel Schwarzenberg to institutionalize his collecting, distributing, and advocatory activities.17 In an issue of the émigré periodical Svědectví (Testimonial), Prečan announced the opening of “The Czechoslovak Documentation Center” (or the abbreviation CSDS, from the Czech without diacritics), the name that this archive still bears today at its new location in Prague under the Czech National Museum. CSDS was first registered near Hannover as an official organization pursuing the public good. The board consisted of Prečan as custodian, émigré writers Ján Vladislav as chair and Jiří Gruša as acting chair, and Canadian H. Gordon Skilling as chair of the scientific council. Honorary members included a group of representatives of independent literature living in Czechoslovakia, such as Václav Havel. Prečan wrote that the Center’s goal was to “support scientific research on Czechoslovak culture, history, and politics, especially the collecting of testimonials and documentation of independent thinking after 1948.” He defined samizdat as “all written works of a documentary or literary character written in Czechoslovakia by individuals or groups and circulated by them because in the country of their origin they could not be published or circulated through officially sanctioned means due to censorship.” CSDS would attempt to make as “globally public as possible” this “cultural inheritance” of Czechs and Slovaks, largely held until that date in private collections. Prečan added, “CSDS is open to cooperation on all sides in exile and to the international cultural public [kulturní veřejnosti].”18 As I noted, CSDS has held a range of textual materials, but for several reasons (including the interest of space) I would like to explore what its periodicals can tell us about an explicitly “national” frame with which Prečan sorted and apprehended the nature of samizdat. Today CSDS holds 110 periodicals, almost (if not) all of them from the period of normalization. They began and ended at different points relative to one another, some interrupted and later resumed, others not. CSDS has not broken down this large number of periodicals into specific categories, although a set of short descriptive phrases has accompanied a list of holdings. The reason for this approach probably had more to do with   Skilling, “Archiv svobody.”   Vilém Prečan, “Čs. Dokumentační středisko nezávislé literatúry,” Svědectví, no. 20 (1986): 402–5.

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the fuzziness of samizdat periodical content than it does the training and inclination of Prečan and his assistants. Tallying by clean and concise categories is an imperfect task: is it better to list one periodical that is more literary, but contains some political content, as “literary,” along with other periodicals on literature that might include essays on philosophy or high culture? Should one classify according to genre (and thereby intentions regarding audience) or intent to simply “inform”? Librarians of traditional public libraries of course face similar challenges with more traditionally published material. But librarians of traditional public libraries can also look to peers at other institutions (such as the British Library, the Library of Congress, and major research libraries) for assistance with classification. A samizdat archive not only has few (if any) peers, but also does not have resources conducive to consistent descriptors.19 CSDS has provided over one hundred differently phrased descriptors, suggesting some interesting diversity to its holdings, which is indeed what I have found from my own browsings of its collection. Let me provide a few examples covering a range of numerical representation. For instance, at that time CSDS held nearly twenty periodicals pertaining primarily to “literature.” About nineteen serve to “inform” on the activities of a group or current events outside of Czechoslovakia. Thirteen are primarily “religious.” At least three are devoted to music without regional specificity, while a few other periodicals about regional cultural activities cover music of interest to readers, including music from abroad. One periodical is devoted to the particularly Czech twentieth-century phenomenon of weekend outdoor living known as “tramping.” Despite the challenges to a professional standard of cataloging, I have found the holdings correspond to descriptors’ frequency of occurrence. In the late 1980s, Prečan and his collaborators in CSDS assisted the research of Austrian Johanna Posset on Czech and Slovak samizdat.20 From her contact with CSDS and with in-country sources Posset documented the existence of 150 samizdat periodicals, forty (or roughly 30 percent) more than CSDS’s holdings today. While Posset noted “literature” and “politics” as the most represented categories (twenty-two and thirteen, respectively, not including other periodicals covering the broad category of “culture”), she also documented two on Jehovah’s Witnesses, two on peace, and one on bioethics, among others. It is probably not surprising that the relative ease with which a non-exiled foreigner such as Posset could explore Czechoslovakia by the late 1980s (compared to a   A problem that one of the CSDS’s employees, Jitka Hanáková, emphasized in 2011 correspondence. 20   Johanna Posset, Česká samizdatová periodika 1968–1989, trans. Zbyněk Petráček (Brno: Továrna na sítotisk ve spolupráci se Společnosti pro reklamu a tisk R & T, 1991). 19

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political exile such as Prečan) might yield different field-based knowledge of samizdat periodical activity than was captured in CSDS’s holdings. This difference hints at a gap between the kinds of samizdat (in this case, periodicals) that were actually produced and the kinds that Prečan and his colleagues collected, redistributed, and thus promoted as the field of samizdat. When we compare the holdings of CSDS with that of another archive of samizdat from the former Czechoslovakia, Libri prohibiti, we can see more clearly some of the consequences of CSDS’s “national” framework.

The underground, Libri prohibiti, and Czech memory The nonprofit private archive Libri prohibiti in Prague is run by the bibliophile Jiří Gruntorád. Gruntorád never studied at a university and is not the kind of intellectual that formed the board of CSDS. Unlike Vilém Prečan, Gruntorád lived in Czechoslovakia throughout the socialist period and participated in various centers of “unofficial culture,” more behind the scenes as a facilitator than visible as an author or performer (except, notably, for signing Charter 77). He was a member of the officially sanctioned Jazz Section that used its standing as an arts organization to produce and circulate written works that could otherwise not be published legally, such as some by internationally acclaimed writer Bohumil Hrabal. Gruntorád was imprisoned from 1980 to 1984 for distributing samizdat, afterward remaining engaged with various activists for civil liberties.21 In 2002 he characterized the founding goal of his samizdat collection in the late 1970s as to preserve “national memory.”22 He opened his private collection to the public in July 1990. He has relied on a number of benefactors and sources of employment including the Office for the Documentation and Investigation of Communist Crimes (Úřad pro dokumentaci a vyšetřování zločinů komunismu), the Czech Television, the Charter 77 Foundation, and the Office of the President of the Czech Republic. Libri prohibiti has been in some regards remarkably similar to CSDS. Its collection is defined by the national/lingual boundaries of Czech and Slovak production, consistent with Gruntorád’s claim of preserving “national memory.” Like CSDS (now under the auspices of the Czech National Museum), Libri prohibiti also relies significantly on “national” financing, either through the Czech state or through what CSDS characterized as “an international cultural public.” A significant portion of the two collections is identical, and Gruntorád and Prečan have in fact collaborated or benefited from the same patrons; for   Jiří Gruntorád, O nezávislých iniciativách v Československu (Prague: Reprint Xerox, 1989), 26.   Jiří Gruntorád, “Stručná historie čs samizdatu,” Literární noviny, no. 29 (2002): 10–11.

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instance, Prečan was a founding member of a society for LP and both have been funded by the Charter 77 Foundation and the Czech Ministry of Culture. The differences between the two archives, however, are important for what we can learn about samizdat, both in regard to the potential range of production that the term could incorporate and to how activities of collecting, brokering access to, and publicizing samizdat have contributed to our understanding of it. In 2010 Libri prohibiti reported nearly 400 samizdat periodicals in its collection, and had documented the existence of others.23 Unlike CSDS’s catalog, which was established mostly during the 1980s when Vilém Prečan was living in Germany, Libri prohibiti’s collection continued to grow significantly right after the Velvet Revolution, quickly adding 150 titles.24 By 2010 its collection reached over three times that of CSDS, having since added 1,995 more titles than CSDS had in its entire collection. Libri prohibiti’s electronic database also contained up to three times as many categories, some of which had a much larger proportional representation than in CSDS’s collection. This is not simply a matter of a differently educated director (Gruntorád received no professional training for his current work) and a differently administered facility (when visiting Libri prohibiti, one was likely to encounter more staff, at earlier stages in their careers). The range of periodical titles in the collections reflects fundamental differences. For example, whereas one of CSDS’s 110 core periodicals concerns “tramping,” over sixty of the almost 400 in Libri prohibiti’s collection do. Libri prohibiti has counted at least thirty-three science fiction publications, whereas CSDS has counted none. Topics have been broader, ranging from the well-documented urban periodicals of CSDS concerned with literature, political analysis, news updates, history, and religion, to countless small-town periodicals on music, science fiction, historic preservation, or alternative lifestyles such as tramping. From Libri prohibiti’s records we can learn that some periodicals appeared monthly with circulations in the hundreds or even thousands, while others appeared irregularly with circulations of a dozen or less. Many representatives of tramping and science fiction are listed as origi- nating from locations outside of Prague. Browsing these periodicals, they seem to have circulated often in completely different milieus in which contributors and audiences were unaware of other samizdat. At other times, contributors advertised on behalf of, or exhibited solidarity with, other journals by noting the creation of new ones, interesting contributions that had appeared in them, and police repression.25   Libri prohibiti, Libri prohibiti: Zpráva za rok 2009 (Prague: Libri prohibiti, 2010).   Daniel Anýž, “Pro Gruntoráda je samizdat svědectvím doby,” MFDnes, November 3, 1995. 25   See, for instance, cross-periodical discussion of the imprisoned Catholic activist Ivan Polansky in the late 1980s. 23

24

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The fact that this collection has documented so many more periodicals originating from outside of Prague (the national intellectual and political center) than has CSDS’s collection hints at the alternative lifeworlds forged through illicit writing and reading. Indeed, Libri prohibiti’s collection includes dozens of samizdat periodicals addressing the above topics as well as regional culture and environment, the occult, and more. Many of these periodicals and their subjects have not been even documented by CSDS. So how to make sense of the two accounts of the scope of “samizdat” periodical production that these two archives have told?

“Significant” differences As I noted, Vilém Prečan and Jiří Gruntorád have collaborated and their collections overlap, with Gruntorád (despite his less credentialed background) clearly valuing some of the same “intellectual” and literary output that defines the collection at CSDS.26 CSDS’s periodical collection skews toward materials more obviously aligned with “dissent,” be it demands for open political dialogue or a certain intellectual/artistic dialogue of expression that the communist regime considered ideologically dangerous. More than Libri prohibiti’s broader sense of what might count as relevant to someone interested in samizdat, CSDS’s collection resembles the epistemology of “heroism” that recent scholars of particularly Soviet samizdat cited earlier—such as Komaromi, Steiner, and Zaslavskaya— have critiqued. Yet, while Vilém Prečan was in dialogue and collaboration with the same interlocutors and donors as the Radio Liberty archive of Zaslavskaya’s study, I would argue that the frame here is somewhat different: not a Cold War against communism, per se, but a perceived struggle for “national” survival. CSDS collected material that would document the “cultural inheritance” of Czechoslovakia, much as would traditional archives and memories. Its board solicited advice and sought credibility from a circle of literary intellectuals, such as Václav Havel or Ludvík Vaculík. This literary leaning to an understanding of “culture,” we would be wise to recall from Pierre Bourdieu, performs significant semiotic boundary work, endowing intellectuals and a high cultural elite, as well as those who reference them, with social capital as guardians of national For instance, in 2009 Gruntorád contributed to the editing of a hardcover release of articles from Kritický sborník, a samizdat critical review of literature, language, and philosophy from the 1980s. During the journal’s decade-long run after the Velvet Revolution, Gruntorád assembled bibliographies of several literary and intellectual samizdat periodicals. For the 2002–03 Czech Television series on samizdat, interviews with Gruntorád on literary monographs featured prominently.

26

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production.27 This is not to say that there was not expansive potential to this understanding of samizdat. CSDS collected some periodicals of the Czech “underground” such as Vokno, a venue for writing and visual arts that was infused with a spirit of youthful rebellion strikingly similar to flavors of Western European punk. Just as Western European sensibilities initially rejected but later accepted aesthetically transgressive painting and music as worthy of distinguishing institutions, such as museums and concert halls, not all distinctive Czech samizdat needed to be produced by a closed set of elders. The long-time editor of the periodical Kritický sborník, Karel Pálek, at one point offered a basic distinction in types of samizdat that seems germane here. In an interview with Johanna Posset for her study of samizdat periodicals, he asserted that a basic criterion must be a “vůle k veřejnosti” (will to publicity), or what Posset parsed as “the conscious circulation of work in a circle extending beyond an author’s personal friends.”28 In June 2010, I repeated this phrase to Jiří Gruntorád, who did not recall having heard it before, but who agreed that the distinction is productive. This would explain, he added, why a 2003 Czech Television series on samizdat to which he contributed did not feature genres such as science fiction or tramping: they simply were not “important” or “significant” (podstatné) according to this implicit criterion. Elsewhere, however, Gruntorád has celebrated the less heroic or “wild” genres of samizdat periodicals, such as bulletins by “tramping groups, musicians’ parties, artistic cells, and unofficial fanclubs.” In 1995, he told a journalist that he was delighted that the task of collecting and documenting samizdat, which he characterized as “pre-Velvet human creativity,” would seemingly never end.29 It probably is worth distinguishing between forms of samizdat in some way. Martin Machovec has done this, characterizing unauthorized publishing of fanzines and tramping stories as “unconscious samizdat” or perhaps even “graphomania.”30 This distinction utilizes a notion of “will to publicity,” noting appropriately the more politically innocent motives behind some publishing, such as that of high school sci-fi fans writing for their friends. However, the increased importance today of the blogosphere and social media in politics suggests we should be cautious in drawing lines between a “politically” motivated will to   Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste, trans. Richard Nice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984 [1979]); see also Jonathan L. Larson, “Cosmologies of Criticism: Taste, (Dis)trust, and Uses of Literature in Slovak Secondary Schools,” Critique of Anthropology 29, no. 4 (2009): 447–69. 28   Posset, Česká samizdatová periodika, 9. 29   Jiří Gruntorád, “Zpráva o Libri prohibiti,” in Česká nezávislá literatura po pěti letech v referátech: Konference uspořádaná ve dnech 17. a 18. listopadu 1994 Obcí spisovatelů, Centrum Franze Kafky a Nadací H. Bölla v Praze, ed. František Kaufman (Prague: Primus, 1995). 30   See Komaromi, “Material Existence,” 611; Machovec, “Types and Functions,” 11. 27

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publicity and graphomania that either does or does not seek wider attention. Drawing a distinction between something like “conscious” (intentional) and “unconscious” (or accidental) samizdat, or looking for a “will to publicity” as definitive of samizdat work, reminds us of earlier academic debates about political activity and agency. How might engaging with what lies outside the boundaries of “distinctive” samizdat help us avoid binaries, such as the older one of “domination” and “resistance” from the 1990s? To answer this question, I would like to turn to the curious place of Slovak samizdat within a “Czechoslovak” legacy. Martin M. Šimečka, a participant in several samizdat periodicals in Bratislava, closed the Czech Television episode on Slovak samizdat in 2003 by dismissing the topic of Slovak samizdat as unworthy of study. Šimečka’s rejection seems fitting for the “distinctive” understanding of samizdat as defined by the interests and work (well-represented at CSDS) of Czech secular-literary-political contributors such as Václav Havel and younger generations such as František Stárek and Ivan Lamper. Indeed, from the historical record at CSDS and LP it appears that Slovaks produced a paltry output of only two to three secular-literary-political periodicals, chief among them Fragment and Fragment K in the late 1980s. However, evidence exists that there was more to Slovak samizdat than just what made it into Czech hands. For instance, we have reports of the production of samizdat periodicals in the eastern city of Košice.31 More startling for the summaries and representation of samizdat to which CSDS and Libri prohibiti have contributed are samples of Slovak Catholic periodicals produced by the thousands, dwarfing the output of Fragment and Fragment K. Some of these periodicals are documented in CSDS; a few more are documented in Libri prohibiti. Others have been noted by Slovak Catholic scholars.32 Did Šimečka consider these endeavors or not when he dismissed Slovak output? Regardless of whether Šimečka did consider them, his tacit understanding of “significant” mirrors a common rebuke by Czech and some Slovak intellectuals that Slovaks’ general absence from the signatories of Charter 77 signaled their lack of political engagement and moral clarity regarding the need to oppose communist rule.33 Interestingly, if we were to assume this critique’s tacit standard that any significant publishing activity should generate mass events challenging   See, for instance, discussion in Slovenské pohľady, “Samizdat,” Slovenské pohľady, no. 106 (1990): 74–82. 32   Rudolf Lesňák, Listy z podzemia: Súborná dokumentácia kresťanskej samizdatovej publicistiky na Slovensku v rokoch 1945–1989 (Bratislava: USPO Peter Smolík, 1998); Imrich Vaško, O hodnotě samizdatu: Samizdatová náboženská periodika před rokem 1989 (Kostelní Vydří: Karmelitánské nakladatelství, 2008). 33   See, for instance, Samuel Abrahám, Pokus o analýzu slovenskej spoločnosti (Bratislava: Kalligram, 2002), 209–12. 31

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communist values and rules, some of the largest illicit social gatherings in late socialist Czechoslovakia actually took place in Slovakia and organized by Slovaks. The Catholic pilgrimage to the town of Velehrad in 1985, which by one account drew 150,000 participants, was likely the largest such occurrence in Czechoslovakia since 1970. In March 1988, the “Candlelight Demonstration” of several thousand Catholics in Bratislava was one of the largest public protests disbanded by force in Czechoslovakia since normalization.34 Downplaying the relevance of Slovak Catholic samizdat within Czechoslovak samizdat has many potential causes and motives. For instance, it is hard at this point in time not to look back to the late socialist and early post-socialist years and recall the long, recurrent tensions between secular or culturally Protestant “Czechoslovak”-identifying nationals and Catholics identifying themselves more pointedly as “Slovak.”35 When asked to consider “significant” contributions to a “national” Czechoslovak cultural legacy, prevailing discourses would discourage figures such as Prečan or Šimečka from including Slovak cultural production marked as “Catholic.” Yet, how samizdat has been registered as such, remembered, and analyzed likely also has much to do with metacommunicative assumptions of political resistance and even civil society. When contributors to Slovak Catholic samizdat periodicals included members of small churches and others who were educated, but not socialized to certain metacultural and metacommunicative norms of “self-expression,” their writing could fail to register as “significant” because it was not engaged in the same shared field of discourse with which secular dissidents and communists were engaged.36 Indeed, in some pages of Catholic samizdat periodicals, we can find criticism of cultural trends such as discos seen as alienating to the human spirit in communist and capitalist Europe alike. Conversely, the study of literature features prominently in both secular-leaning samizdat and communist periodicals; from what I have reviewed, Catholic samizdat periodicals tend to focus more on community activities than on individual expression. So rather than make public-facing (communicative) acts into a basic human right, for Catholics the value of communication through samizdat might have been the preservation and deepening of spiritual faith in spite of the state, not in opposition to it. It was but one part of an “ethical repertoire” that included other practices such as private prayer, collective pilgrimage, Bible study, and attendance at mass.37   Ján Šimulčík, Čas svitania: Sviečková manifestácia 25. marec 1988 (Prešov: Michal Vašek, 2003).   See, for instance, Carol Skalnik Leff, National Conflict in Czechoslovakia: The Making and Remaking of a State, 1918–1987 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988). 36   See Serguei Alex Oushakine, “The Terrifying Mimicry of Samizdat,” Public Culture 13, no. 2 (2001): 191–214. 37 On the concept of ethical repertoires, see Douglas Rogers, The Old Faith and the Russian Land: A Historical Ethnography of Ethics in the Urals (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2009). 34 35

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In short, if we return to the earlier point that a conservative take on what counts as samizdat might neglect an important view from the street, we might ask if certain categories of samizdat—be they Catholic, science fiction, tramping, or other—might not have been taken as seriously because the values, visions, and lifeworlds from which they had emerged were foreign to some of those outside of Czechoslovakia who helped shape the field of understanding samizdat as a phenomenon. Thus, while much Catholic samizdat might have “political” implications of challenges to communist policies and worldviews, it has not been glossed as “political” in the same way that non-Catholic journals’ discussions of politics have been. The same might hold for other collectives and subcultures, such as science fiction fans and tramping enthusiasts, even if their alternative worldviews and social prescriptions were unacceptable to official ideology. The “fuzziness” of some samizdat periodicals’ content has been viewed as less significant than others’, and the lens that has formed this view has been shaped by “national” discourses and senses of duty.

Conclusion In this chapter I have explored the collections of two Czech samizdat archives in order to reflect on problems with defining the field of late socialist samizdat periodicals. I have argued that the “national” undertones of the Czechoslovak Documentation Center in particular, unlike a less “national” archive such as Radio Liberty’s comprising predominantly Soviet samizdat, have helped delineate one powerful set of criteria for defining samizdat as a field of communicative activity. Notions of distinction hewing to restrictive notions of “politics” have— under labels such as “significant” or exhibiting a “will to publicity”—excluded a large body of samizdat as second-rate, inconsequential, or merely graphomaniacal. Yet, one largely discounted set of samizdat periodicals, those produced by Slovak Catholics, prompted the kinds of public activism commonly viewed as consequential. This samizdat and other kinds of content, I have argued, deserves inclusion in a more expansive understanding of samizdat consistent with the findings of recent explorations of samizdat form. In my view, we should be generous in how we evaluate CSDS’s bias toward the heroic intellectual. First, if had not been for the interests, motivation, and skills of Vilém Prečan and his colleagues, people in the West then and now might know even less about the lifeworlds that emerged both inside and outside the purview of the Communist Party, some of which was supported by Western contacts. Second, some of what we know of Prečan’s émigré years is that they were filled with the constant distraction of financially supporting not only his activities, but also his family: a distinctive political economy undoubtedly

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limited the scope of his research on alternative activities in Czechoslovakia. If the collection of samizdat periodicals at CSDS did not grow at the same rate as Libri prohibiti’s after the Velvet Revolution, there are potential explanations other than historiographic neglect. Third, we might ask how easy it would have been for even writers on samizdat like the Canadian H. Gordon Skilling to encounter the fullest range of activities during visits to socialist Czechoslovakia because of their social status. He learned, as many ethnographers might, much more about the practices of discursive communities like his own than those of small- to mid-size town adolescents and non-intellectual bourgeois adults who engaged in “wild” samizdat. The first scholar who began to correct this picture, Johanna Posset, did so as the party began to regulate public life less closely and the volume of samizdat mushroomed. Barbara Falk has sought to clarify that one way to think about the traditional core of how we have understood samizdat, as “dissent,” is not the same thing as “resistance.” “Resistance” might take the form of non-compliant foot-dragging, while “dissent” is more political in its public projection (in short, in its will to publicity).38 Falk’s assessment shows that, despite the diversity of metacultural and metacommunicative characterizations of potentially “political” activity that emerged in the era—such as “parallel polis” and “antipolitics”—the contraction of a potentially more expansive and complex field for inquiry has continued to be strong. Following in the spirit of a different approach, such as that which emerged in Alexei Yurchak’s seminal 2006 book, other recent scholars of samizdat encourage a return to a more expansive sense of its social implications, even if some samizdat has seemed more consequential as training and visibility for future formal political activity.39 Earlier in this chapter I pointed out how a samizdat archive such as CSDS sought to document clandestine cultural production under communist rule with an eye to protecting a national future. Trajectories of future development are difficult to predict: for instance, few people saw that the hopeful changes of 1989 might result in significant dispossession, rather than justice. Future endeavors in other parts of the world to document alternative metacultural and metacommunicative fields, such as late socialist Czechoslovak samizdat, would do well to maintain a more expansive sense of inquiry into the different forms that a Sinnwelt of self-expression can take, and how it might contribute to political imaginaries.   Barbara J. Falk, “Resistance and Dissent in Central and Eastern Europe: An Emerging Historiography,” East European Politics & Societies 25, no. 2 (2011): 321. 39   Alexei Yurchak, Everything Was Forever until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006); Falk, “Resistance and Dissent,” 333–34; Miloslav Petrušek, “The sociological ‘samizdat’ as a factor of social change in Czechoslovakia,” in Social Actors and Designing the Civil Society of Eastern Europe, ed. Alberto Gasparini and Vladimir Yadov (Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1995). 38

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Selected bibliography

Abrahám, Samuel. Pokus o analýzu slovenskej spoločnosti. Bratislava: Kalligram, 2002. Bourdieu, Pierre. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Translated by Richard Nice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984 [1979]. Boyer, Dominic, and Alexei Yurchak. “American Stiob: Or, What Late-Socialist Aesthetics of Parody Reveal about Contemporary Political Culture in the West.” Cultural Anthropology 25, no. 2 (2010): 179–221. Chari, Sharad, and Katherine Verdery. “Thinking between the Posts: Postcolonialism, Postsocialism, and Ethnography after the Cold War. Contemporary Studies in Society and History 51, no. 1 (2009): 6–34. Falk, J. Barbara. “Resistance and Dissent in Central and Eastern Europe: An Emerging Historiography.” East European Politics & Societies 25, no. 2 (2011): 318–60. Gasparini, Alberto and Vladimir Yadov, eds. Social Actors and Designing the Civil Society of Eastern Europe. Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1995. Gruntorád, Jiří. O nezávislých iniciativách v Československu. Prague: Reprint Xerox, 1989. ———. “Stručná historie čs samizdatu,” Literární noviny, no. 29 (2002): 10–11. ———. “Zpráva o Libri prohibiti.” In Česká nezávislá literatura po pěti letech v referátech: Konference uspořádaná ve dnech 17. a 18. listopadu 1994 Obcí spisovatelů, Centrum Franze Kafky a Nadací H. Bölla v Praze, edited by František Kaufman, 146–50. Prague: Primus, 1995. Johnston, Gordon. “What is the history of samizdat?” Social History 24, no. 2 (1999): 115–33. Kind-Kovács, Friederike, and Jessie Labov, eds. Samizdat, Tamizdat, and Beyond: Transnational Media During and After Socialism. New York: Berghahn Books, 2013. Komaromi, Ann. “Samizdat as Extra-Gutenberg Phenomenon.” Poetics Today 29, no. 4 (2008): 629–67. ———. “The Material Existence of Soviet Samizdat.” Slavic Review 63, no. 3 (2004): 597–618. ———. “The unofficial field of late Soviet culture.” Slavic Review 66, no. 4 (2007): 605–29. Larson, Jonathan L. “Cosmologies of Criticism: Taste, (Dis)trust, and Uses of Literature in Slovak Secondary Schools.” Critique of Anthropology 29, no. 4 (2009): 447–69. Lesňák, Rudolf. Listy z podzemia: Súborná dokumentácia kresťanskej samizdatovej publicistiky na Slovensku v rokoch 1945–1989. Bratislava: USPO Peter Smolík, 1998. Machovec, Martin. Pohledy zevnitř: Česká undergroundová kultura ve svědectvích, dokumentech a interpretacích. Prague: Pistorius & Olšanská, 2008. ———. “The Types and Functions of Samizdat Publications in Czechoslovakia, 1948–1989.” Poetics Today 30, no. 1 (2009): 1–26. Oushakine, Serguei Alex. “The Terrifying Mimicry of Samizdat.” Public Culture 13, no. 2 (2001): 191–214. Posset, Johanna. Česká samizdatová periodika 1968–1989. Translated by Zbyněk Petráček. Brno: Továrna na sítotisk ve spolupráci se Společnosti pro reklamu atisk R & T, 1991. Rogers, Douglas. The Old Faith and the Russian Land: A Historical Ethnography of Ethics in the Urals. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2009. Šimulčík, Ján. Čas svitania: Sviečková manifestácia 25. marec 1988. Prešov: Michal Vašek, 2003. Skalnik Leff, Carol. National Conflict in Czechslovakia: The Making and Remaking of a State, 1918–1987. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1988. Skilling, H. Gordon. “Archiv svobody.” In Ročenka Československého dokumentačního střediska 2003, edited by Vilém Prečan, 191–216. Prague: Československé dokumentáční středisko, o.p.s., 2004.

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———. Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1989. Steiner, Peter. “Introduction: On Samizdat, Tamizdat, Magnitizdat, and Other Strange Words That Are Difficult to Pronounce.” Poetics Today 29, no. 4 (2009): 613–28. Vaško, Imrich. O hodnotě samizdatu: Samizdatová náboženská periodika před rokem 1989. Kostelní Vydří: Karmelitánské nakladatelství, 2008. Verdery, Katherine. Secrets and Truth: Ethnography in the Archive of Romania’s Secret Police. Budapest–New York: Central European University Press, 2013. Yurchak, Alexei. Everything Was Forever until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006. Zaslavskaya, Olga. “From Dispersed to Distributed Archives: The Past and the Present of Samizdat Material.” Poetics Today 29, no. 4 (2009): 669–712.

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CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Dissident Legalism: Human Rights, Socialist Legality, and the Birth of Legal Resistance in the 1970s Democratic Opposition in Czechoslovakia and Poland * Michal Kopeček

Much has been written about human rights language as a keystone of dissidence. The “Helsinki effect” fundamentally changed the dynamism of international politics, and human rights—the new important element of international relations—became a powerful tool in the hands of the democratic opposition facing militaristic, police dictatorships in East Central Europe. One obvious part of the story is legalism as a key political strategy of dissidence in the struggle for the public renegotiation of rights, particularly human and civil rights, as an important part of dissident human rights politics. The human rights origins and the legalist origins of dissidence are in fact difficult to tell apart. Yet, human rights discourse and dissident legalism are two different things: the first was an ideological and philosophical foundation for dissidence, while the second was primarily a strategy of behavior in and of the contest with the regime. Dissident legalism is recognized in the existing literature, yet it is undertheorized and sometimes misunderstood. This article departs from the Sinnwelt research paradigm, which debunks the dichotomous schemes of anti-totalitarianism, the victorious identity narrative in Europe after 1989. The story of dissidence in the post-dissident liberal narrative is, by definition, an anti-totalitarian story par excellence. However, the focus on dissident legalism challenges some of the prevalent motives in this post-dissident narrative that some former dissidents were themselves questioning in the early 1990s. *



This study was partly created within the project “Media of the Cultural Opposition in Czechoslovakia,” identification code LTC18040, supported by the INTER–EXCELLENCE program of the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of the Czech Republic. An earlier version of this study appeared in Czech, see Michal Kopeček, “Disidentský legalismus: Socialistická zákonnost, lidská práva a zrod právního odporu v demokratické opozici v Československu a Polsku v 70. letech,” in Šest kapitol o disentu, ed. Jiří Suk et al. (Prague: ÚSD AV ČR, 2017), 10–48.

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Firstly, it questions the straightforward notion of human rights as a dissident weapon. The analysis of dissident legalism shows how complicated and far from self-evident was the “translation” of human rights discourse into a socially and politically exigent tool of “legal resistance.” Secondly, it sheds a different light on the development of the late communist state, specifically the evolution of its legal system, a crucial tool of relatively peaceful governance and of the “normalization of rule” (in Mary Fulbrook’s terms) in communist political order during this period. Our story shows that it was the normative state and its key concept of socialist legality that, on the one hand, became the primary ruling instrument of late socialist regimes and, on the other hand, was a precondition for the rather surprising effectiveness of dissident legalism, unlike in earlier phases of communist rule. Thirdly, in the most general terms, the focus on the legalist history of dissidence contributes to a partial debunking of the prevalent triumphalist picture of the victorious crusade of human rights in this period. It points out the internal preconditions for the success of human rights politics and of legalist strategies, namely the long duration of domestic traditions of human rights activism, but also the variety of legalist practices connected to the history of state socialist societies per se (especially the 1960s reformist era), as well as to preceding political regimes. This study shows how closely dissident legalism was tied to official legalpolitical structures, ideas, and practices. In other words, it investigates the contest but also the mutual compatibility between, metaphorically speaking, the legalism of the dissidents and the socialist legality of the regime. The article starts with a short description of the “legalist origins” of dissidence, before turning to the concept of “socialist legality.” Later the paper turns to the Czechoslovak and Polish sources of dissident legalism, within as well as outside the “mental world of state socialism,” and shows how varied were not only these sources but also the practices of dissident legalism in these two countries.

The legalist origins of dissidence Legalism, in general, has a long history and poor reputation, yet it plays an important role in the development of sociopolitical order.1 It stresses the importance of conformity with the law for both state and citizen, and as such it has been criticized for its formalism in both legal philosophy and theology. This negative connotation is perhaps why political opponents of communist regimes, whose self-identity was based on their moral and political commitment 1

  Paul Dresche and Hannah Skoda, eds., Legalism: Anthropology and History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).

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to human rights and lived authenticity, themselves rarely used the term. A debate on legalism took place in Anglo-American jurisprudence and political philosophy in the 1960s and 1970s, initiated by a book-length essay on the topic by Judith Shklar. It mattered little in East Central Europe of the time, yet it gives us a point of departure. Shklar defined legalism as a philosophical stance especially characteristic of a liberal and liberal-conservative worldview in law-abiding countries, or an “ethical attitude that holds moral conduct to be a matter of rule following, and moral relationships to consist of duties and rights determined by rules.”2 By contrast, dissident legalism was a legalism not “in” but “before” the rule of law. It was legalism avant la lettre, legalism anticipating and envisioning the rule of law, a pragmatic or strategic legalism at best. Most scholarly literature on the democratic opposition’s history acknowledges its legalist origins. The beginnings of the human rights-based opposition in East Central Europe were usually connected to a concrete act of repression and a legal defense against it. The first rallying moment in Poland came in late 1975 with the so-called constitutional amendments. The party launched a press campaign to publicize two constitutional amendments declaring the “leading role of the party in society” and the “unshakeable and fraternal bonds with the Soviet Union.” The amendments were accepted, but this was a Pyrrhic victory for the government, since the changes rallied the opposition and became a target for legalist as well as political criticism in collective and individual letters to the Sejm.3 The most well-known response was the Memorandum of 59, a letter of fiftynine prominent intellectuals to the Sejm defending basic political and civil rights and freedoms, initiated in December 1975 by lawyers Jan Olszewski and Aniela Steinsbergowa and composed by dissidents Jacek Kuroń and Jakub Karpiński. Significantly, the letter featured a diverse group of signatories who represented a variety of milieus; from active oppositionists, through well-known scholars and artists, up to lay and ordained Catholics. Against the constitutional amendments, they counter-posited basic civil and political rights recognized and accepted by the Polish government, both through the country’s Constitution and the signature of international covenants and the Helsinki Accords. The letter exemplified the logic of dissident legalism based on positioning international human rights against the socialist legal order. A couple of thousand people from all walks of academic and cultural life took part in the constitutional discussion. Whereas Marxist revisionist opposition   Judith Shklar, Legalism: Law, Morals and Political Trials (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1964), 1; cf. Robin West, “Reconsidering Legalism,” Minnesota Law Review, no. 88 (2003): 119–58. 3   Andrzej Friszke, Przystosowanie i opór: Studia z dziejów PRL (Warsaw: Biblioteka Więzi, 2007), 231–55. 2

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had previously questioned the legitimacy of the regime in the name of its ideology, these letters now demanded the regime observe its own laws and rules; in other words, they were stressing legality rather than legitimacy. This laid the foundations for cooperation between the two major potential oppositional forces, namely the lay intelligentsia and the Church. Another alliance, between the intelligentsia and the workers, formed after the repression of a new wave of workers’ strikes in June 1976. The Workers’ Defense Committee (KOR), founded in September 1976, and the Movement for Defense of Human and Civil Rights (ROPCiO), founded in March 1977, were two of the most well-known organizations concentrating on the defense of human and civil rights and appealing to international human rights covenants, as well as to the Polish Constitution.4 Both used a technique that some authors call “gaming with law” (gra prawem), an attempt to use the existing legal frameworks for social resistance purposes, to provide legal help to the persecuted and to expose the state’s encroaching on its own laws.5 The origins of both organizations were solidarist, that is, driven by the aim to help the powerless workers and others targeted by state repression. They did not shy away from activities such as publishing samizdat that was not fully legal according to the existing law, yet legalism was their basic strategy. Symptomatically, the events that led to the creation of the new human rights movement in Czechoslovakia were similar to legal events in Poland, namely political trials. Judicial repression did not aim at the most outspoken opposition groups, as the post-1968 consolidation regime tried hard to avoid noisy trials. Nonetheless, it was the summer 1976 trial of members of the cult underground band Plastic People of the Universe (PPU) that—unexpectedly for its organizers—caused alarm among the Prague intelligentsia and cultural opposition.6 Now sensitized in the immediate aftermath of Helsinki, to the notorious misuse of judicial power, they started to write open letters protesting against both the trial in preparation and later against the harsh sentences delivered.7 The best example of the nascent dissident legalism was a protest letter addressed to all major constitutional organs of the republic, penned by ten lawyers and legal scholars who before 1969 had been members of the Communist Party,   Jan Skórzyński, Siła bezsiłnych: Historia Komitetu Obrony Robotników (Warsaw: Świat Książki, 2012), 101–33; Jan Józef Lipski, KOR (London: Aneks, 1983); Grzegorz Waligóra, Ruch obrony praw człowieka i obywatela, 1977–1981 (Warsaw: Instytut Pamięci Narodowej, 2006), 64–94. 5   Jarosław Kuisz, “Stosunek dysydentów do obowiązującego w PRL prawa w drugiej połowie lat 70: Wybrane zagadnienia,” accessed April 15, 2020, http://docplayer.pl/6445397Stosunek-dysydentow-do-obowiazujacego-w-prl-prawa-w-drugiej-polowie-lat-70-wybranezagadnienia.html. 6   Milan Otáhal, Opoziční proudy v české společnosti, 1969–1989 (Prague: ÚSD AV ČR, 2011), 116–23. 7   Vilém Prečan, ed., Kniha Charty: Hlasy z domova 1976/77 (Cologne: Index, 1977), 43–88. 4

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high functionaries in the public prosecution service, and university professors, such as Zdeněk Mlynář, Zdeněk Jičínský, Vladimír Klokočka, Michal Lakatoš, and František Šamalík. They criticized the long prison sentence for musical performances and claimed the verdict was “in direct contradiction to the Constitution and valid laws of the ČSSR.” In particular, they noted a breach of the principles of publicity of criminal procedure, of the verbal requirement (požadavek ústnosti) during the hearing, of the presumption of innocence, and infringement of the right of defense. Furthermore, through constant media pressure, especially by the central press organ of the Communist Party, the daily Rudé právo, there was a clear violation of the principles of judicial independence. In conclusion, the authors maintained that the multiple violations of the elementary principles of legal order cannot be understood as either mistakes or negligence of power and judicial apparatus, but rather as a systematic violation of law conducted on the orders of the leading political institutions, which revealed the deficiency of judicial independence in the country.8 In a similar manner to the Polish case, the solidarity action—this time with the little-known underground artists—led to an unexpected unification of the various opposition forces. The result was the Declaration of Charter 77 on January 1, 1977, an “unlikely text [that] completely rewrote the script of oppositional activity in the Czech lands.”9 Its first years of existence were marked by its legalistic origins and the relative success of the human rights and legalist formula. One of its concrete results was the establishment, in 1978, of another important independent initiative reacting to police and judicial persecution, the so-called Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Persecuted (VONS). Its goal was to document the repressive measures and injustice meted out by the state against dissidents and, following the Polish example, to provide help and support to the families of the arrested. VONS was a direct challenge to the socialist normative state and thus in 1979 its leading representatives were prosecuted in a major political trial.10 The repressive socialist state tried hard to get rid of the dissident critics, yet in the long term it failed to do so. To a large extent this was thanks to the state’s own insistence on “socialist legality,” which was binding its own prerogative powers.   “Otevřený dopis deseti právních odborníků ústavním orgánům ČSSR ve věci mladých hudebníků odsouzených v Plzni a Praze pro údajné výtržnictví k odnětí svobody,” in Prečan, Kniha Charty, 78–86. 9   Jonathan Bolton, Worlds of Dissent: Charter 77, The Plastic People of the Universe and Czech Culture under Communism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012), 154. 10   Petr Blažek and Tomáš Bursík, eds., Pražský process 1979: Vyšetřování, soud a uvěznění členů Výbor na obranu nespravedlivě stíhaných; Dokumenty (Prague: ÚSD AV ČR, 2010). 8

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Socialist legality as instrument of governance Dissident legalism may have become a regular part of the opposition’s tactical repertoire only because the late socialist regimes adhered more emphatically than ever before to law as a crucial instrument of governance. The role of law in state socialist dictatorships changed significantly between the 1950s and the 1970s. The Soviet Stalinist system was—in reference to Ernst Fraenkl’s wellknown theory of the “dual state”—described as a combination of the prerogative state, whose use of force was nonetheless quasi-regulated through a system of norms, and the normative state. Stalinism therefore was dubbed the “jurisprudence of terror” characterized by vague and arbitrarily used flexible norms. In such a system there was a tendency to make abrupt changes in legal rules or their application in the interest of maximizing the power of the state or party over the individual. Interestingly, however, the expansion of the normative state and development of state socialist legal culture received major impetus under Stalinism.11 The extensive legislation, including the Stalinist Constitutions, in postwar East Central Europe were not created to invest the authorities with any political legitimacy. The party was strong and therefore law was not as important as a legitimization tool. This started to change in the late 1950s and 1960s with the ascendancy of reform communism. In countries such as Czechoslovakia and Poland there was significant change in socialist jurisprudence, as a reaction to the “Stalinist dogmatism” of the previous era and its “voluntarist understanding” of socialist law. In the reformist understanding, law, and particularly the concept of socialist legality, started to be understood as a potential guarantee against the misuse of power and the apparatus of repression, and thus also as an important source of legitimacy for the reformist project. Law was understood by the reformists as a general civilizational instrument. As such, socialist societies, once the revolutionary changes had been implemented, should have been governed primarily by law, not by direct political interventions. This trend was partly reversed again in the consolidation regimes of the 1970s and during the first half of the 1980s, a period characterized by compromise. The legal systems of the late communist dictatorships kept most of the 1960s “liberalization” institutional forms; however, legal theory and assertion of law was again supposed to serve primarily the political and ideological needs of communist governance. In its Brezhnevite conception, socialist legality was again interpreted as a means of implementing the political domination of the “working 11 

 Robert Sharlet, “Stalinism and Soviet Legal Culture,” in Stalinism: Essays in Historical Interpretation, ed. Robert C. Tucker (New York: W. W. Norton & Comp, 1977), 155–79.

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people” and their political vanguard: in other words, the party. Binding the state administration to the existing legal order and the question of guarantees of legality—the main concern in the previous period—became of secondary importance in contrast with the ruling qualities of law and the legal system. Yet, the binding nature of socialist legality did not disappear altogether. This had much to do with the more general processes of “normalization of rule” in state socialist societies, which after all—with all the upheavals and protests—had already been in existence for decades.12 Communist law was becoming a part of the “systemic-specific form of normality” accepted not only by the ruling party and its apparatus, but also by significant parts of the population.13 Hence, in this period we can trace a diminishing gap between the normative state and governance practices. In Czechoslovakia after 1968, the consolidation regime relied to a large extent on the reintroduction of a strict, repressive socialist Gesetzesstaat, or the normative state. The “jurisprudence of repression” was surely not the sole or even main tool of repression. Yet, law as an instrument of rule stood high on the agenda of the consolidation regime.14 In most of the cases, however, the normative state was content with the legal framework inherited from the 1960s and settled for the changes in the sphere of interpretation and the application of law. It was not the norm, but the judicial interpretation of norms that became the main target of the legalist criticism of Charter 77. Moreover, most of the new laws were not aimed primarily at the political opposition. Husák’s regime, with its strong technocratic tendencies, understood law in general as one of the most effective instruments for directing and regulating social life.15 Law was conceived as a universal instrument for the planning of scientific-technological development and of the “scientific management of . . . society.” The steady increase of bureaucratic mechanisms and ways of management naturally led to an increase in economic corruption throughout society, which even the official reports on socialist legality recognized. A great bulk of the amended norms—ineffective as they were—were principally aimed not at political opponents, but at economic criminality.16   See Mary Fulbrook, ed., Power and Society in the GDR 1961–1979: The ‘Normalisation of Rule’? (New York: Berghahn Books, 2009). 13   Martin Sabrow, “Sozialismus als Sinnwelt: Diktatorische Herrschaft in zeithistorischen Perspektiven,” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, nos. 40–41 (2007): 9–23. 14   For further details, see Jan Kuklík et al., Dějiny československého práva 1945–1989 (Prague: Auditorium, 2011), 265–73. 15 For an analysis of technocratic rule in communist Czechoslovakia, see Vítězslav Sommer, ed., Řídit socialismus jako firmu: technokratické vládnutí v Československu, 1956–1989 (Prague: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny – ÚSD AV ČR, 2019). 16   Kuklík et al., Dějiny československého práva, 383–405; Zdeněk Jičínský, Právní myšlení v 60. letech a za normalizace (Prague: Prospektum, 1992), 175–81. 12

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Poland in the 1970s differed quite significantly from Czechoslovakia. Edward Gierek’s first years in power were a period of remarkable modernization, marked by an increase in industrial production and technological innovation, and a considerable improvement in living standards. Furthermore, the official party rhetoric put less emphasis on the class-based, Marxist-Leninist vocabulary and instead promoted general patriotic slogans about “working for the country” (rather than socialism) and building a better, “second Poland.” Nevertheless, the pragmatic bent of Polish leaders by no means implied that the regime had dropped its ideological cohesion or pro-Soviet orientation, nor that the possibility of social benefits given to the broad strata of the population were no longer conditioned by political loyalty. As it turned out, much of the modernization leap was based on huge loans from the West to finance daring investment projects, which eventually did not yield the hoped-for results. Instead, the country plunged into an even deeper economic crisis at the end of the decade.17 In law and legal practice, however, Gierek’s Poland more or less followed the trend that characterized the whole socialist bloc, diminishing the gap between the letter of the constitution (and individual laws) and social reality. The symbolic coronation of social stabilization, along with regaining political control over society, should have come in the mid-1970s with the introduction of two constitutional amendments, which galvanized the political opposition as shown above. Yet, the steady rise of the importance of the socialist normative state was hardly challenged by political setbacks. During the time of Solidarity from 1980 to 1981 the situation in Poland changed for a while, and the concept of “socialist legality” or simply “legality” without predicates underwent a fundamental revision. It became a basic legal framework for negotiations between the independent trade union movement and the government.18 The legalist position was characteristic of both sides, with both claiming to be acting in accordance with existing laws while accusing the other side of trespassing against the legal order. The regime did not just accept it as an imposed playing field. The acknowledgement of the constitutional framework and the relatively transparent structure outlined by “socialist legality” put the government on solid ground when it faced the most organized and powerful challenger in its history. At that point the party in Poland could no longer claim to represent the interests of the working class against Solidarity. The party was therefore at pains during the negotiations to make the workers recognize the leading role of the party through references to the Constitution.19 Andrzej Friszke, Polska Gierka (Warsaw: Wydawn. Szkolne i Pedagogiczne, 1995); for a different view cf. Augusto Pradetto, Techno-bürokratischer Sozialismus: Polen in der Ära Gierek (1970–1980) (Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang, 1991). 18   Jarosław Kuisz, “O pojmowaniu praworządności w Polskiej Rzeczypospolitej Ludowej w latach 1980–1981,” Czasopismo Prawno-Historyczne 60, no. 2 (2008): 331–61. 19   Jan Zielonka, “Poland: The Experiment with Communist Statism,” in The Crisis-problems in 17

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This was completely overrun after the imposition of martial law in December 1981. Law once again became openly repressive;20 yet the character of repression, which was very harsh and often violated all possible civil and human rights, was still quite different from Stalinist times. The gap between the reality of the military regime and its legal justification (often blatantly voluntarist), between the normative state and the prerogative state, was effectively reduced to a minimum in comparison to Stalinism. The legal development, the perfection of the normative state, did not represent a mere facade of the authoritarian regime. In contrast to the revolutionary Stalinist era, law and socialist legality became one of the central pillars of the exercise of power. 21 It legitimized repression and communist political dominance but it also served as a means of governing society and its stabilization. In this way, it could have provided a relatively firm ground for dissidents challenging the regime.

The intellectual sources of legalism and human rights among Czech dissidents In the existing literature, the rise of the importance of the human rights doctrine among the emerging democratic opposition in communist East Central Europe is usually understood as a more or less one-sided transfer process from the West to the East. In fact, there were many sources of the human rights doctrine as well as of legalism among the politically divergent streams and milieus, which enabled a relatively easy transfer into dissident strategy. For the sake of space, I shall focus on the divergent sources of legalism and point to the broader question of the domestic roots of human rights doctrine where necessary. Charter 77 defined itself explicitly as wishing to conduct “a constructive dialogue with the political and state authorities” in the field of human and civil rights.22 In its founding declaration, the Charter referred to the international covenants of human rights, with the doctrine of natural law underpinning the whole document. The key explicit motive was strictly a legalist one: signing and incorporating the covenants into the Czechoslovak legal order created a situation in which “citizens have the right” and the “state has the duty to abide by them.” Poland, Part II, ed. Krzysztof Mreła and Jan Zielonka (Cologne: Index, 1987), 71–82; cf., Jarosław Kuisz, Charakter prawny porozumień sierpniowych 1980–1981 (Warsaw: Trio, 2009), 76–78. 20   See, for instance, Andrzej Swidlicki, Political Trials in Poland 1981–1986 (London: Croom Helm, 1988); Antoni Dudek, ed., Stan wojenny w Polsce 1981–1983 (Warsaw: IPN, 2003); Antoni Dudek and Krzysztof Madej, eds., Świadectwa stanu wojennego (Warsaw: IPN, 2001). 21   For the elaboration of this argument, see Michal Kopeček, “Was there a socialist Rechtsstaat in late communist East Central Europe? The Czechoslovak case in a regional context,” Journal of Modern European History 18, no. 3 (2020): 281–96. 22   Lyman H. Legters, ed., “Charter 77,” in Eastern Europe: Transformation and Revolution 1945–1991 (Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath & Co., 1992), 231–34.

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Charter 77 argued that the general reason for infringements of these and other rights and freedoms was a disregard for the law. Here, the declaration to some extent made a political argument by claiming that the major instrument of the curtailment or even elimination of many civic rights is “the system by which all national institutions and organizations are in effect subject to political directives from the apparatus of the ruling party and to decisions made by powerful individuals.”23 Yet, it did not go so far as to criticize the party dictatorship. Instead, the Charter used legalist arguments and claimed that the problem was unconstitutionality. In other words, such directives and decisions were not regulated in form or content by the Constitution or valid laws and instead, within the hierarchy of political organization, they had precedence before the law. Thus the Charter’s key analytical argument was criticism of the prerogative state of the party and state apparatus, as against the normative state or the existing legal order of Czechoslovakia. It did not use the “bourgeois” notion of “rule of law,” yet it proposed a “functioning legal state” as the best solution to remedy the numerous infringements of human rights. Former reform communists and leading representatives of the Prague Spring such as Jiří Hájek or Zdeněk Mlynář, both experienced politicians and trained lawyers, were particularly instrumental in embracing a strict and consistent notion of legalism in the Charter milieu. They were among the first to understand the dynamic potential of the Helsinki Accord.24 In an interview with the Swedish television in September 1975, Hájek and Mlynář not only suggested that the Helsinki principle of non-interference enabled a verdict against the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, but also emphasized the Helsinki Accords’ embrace of human rights as a means of mitigating repression against opponents of the communist consolidation regime.25 While Mlynář was more politically pragmatic in his use of human rights as a basis for oppositional strategy, former foreign secretary Hájek was more principled in terms of the need to respect international commitments and obligations. That both welcomed Helsinki was due to their political experience within the state socialist system, and after 1970–72, within the oppositional milieu that resulted from Husák’s huge purges of the most active Prague Spring reform communists. The so-called party of the outcasts (strana vyloučených) comprised thousands of active, politically-minded people, previously used to privileges, special treatment, and to their words being taken seriously in public discussions. Now they  Legters, “Charter 77,” 232.   Daniel C. Thomas, The Helsinki Effect: International Norms, Human Rights, and the Demise of Communism (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001), 97–103. 25   “Rozhovor Zdeňka Mlynáře a Jiřího Hájka natočený pro švédský rozhlas a televise,” in Hlasy z domova 1975, ed. Adolf Müller (Cologne: Index 1975), 87–98.

23  24

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found themselves at the lowest level of the social hierarchy, stigmatized and full of resentment. Writing letters or petitions protesting persecution, censorship, or police harassment was one of their most common forms of activity. Thousands of letters were written during the first half of the 1970s, and the practice of petitioning intensified after Helsinki and the political trials against the Czech musical underground in the summer of 1976.26 Chartist legalism was surely a pragmatic choice for the “socialist opposition,” but it was not just a smokescreen for opposition and political action. Many of the ex-reform communists were in fact “believers” in the socialist legal state. Among the leading personalities of the Charter were politicians and lawyers such as Zdeněk Jičínský, František Šamalík, Zdeněk Mlynář, Jiří Hájek, and Gertruda Sekaninová-Čakrtová, who were the foremost theoreticians or practitioners of socialist law, legality, and socialist democracy during the 1960s and the reform project of the Prague Spring. At that time, they were calling for the establishment of possibly autonomous judicial power in the “democratic socialist state.” Since the notion of the “rule of law” had too many “bourgeois” connotations for them, they stressed instead a new interpretation of “socialist legality.” The law’s lack of autonomy and the direct subjugation of the judicial sphere to prosecution and the repressive apparatus was, in their eyes, the crucial problem of Stalinist injustice. By analogy, in the 1970s and 1980s, the same authors addressed more or less the same problems, now from the position of opponents of the regime. The “lawlessness” of Husák’s Czechoslovakia and the infringements of civil rights became the major point of their dissident criticism.27 Yet, their stress on civil and political rights did not denote any liberal conversion. They still understood the struggle for human rights very much within the socialist conception of human rights flourishing during the Prague Spring, as a step toward the democratization of socialism. Indeed, whereas the Charter declaration claimed that the state should meet its normative order and liabilities, for Hájek the main aim was that the state should meet its socialist aspirations, including compliance with human rights conventions. Unsurprisingly, Hajek still considered socialist society “far better equipped than any other society” to unify all possible generations of human rights, provided it would be able to democratize itself. Yet, he maintained the Chartist position in his emphasis of the fact—in contrast to the official communist human rights   See Prečan, Kniha Charty, 30–88. Many of these letters were published by the socialist opposition’s exile journal Listy, published in Rome by Jiří Pelikán. See also the memoirs of Jiří Hájek from this period: Jiří Hájek, Paměti (Prague: Ústav mezinárodních vztahů, 1997), 295–342. 27   See Hlasy z domova 1975; cf. Jičínský’s analysis of Czechoslovak law in the 1960s and the 1970s, initially published in samizdat, and after 1989 officially: Jičínský, Právní myšlení v 60. letech a za normalizace. 26

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doctrine—that social, economic, and cultural rights “are not worth the paper on which they are printed” if civil and political rights and freedoms are trampled upon.28 Dissident legalism in Czechoslovakia, however, did not have only reform communist roots. Within the Charter 77 movement, a relatively small but influential group of Protestant activists represented the most distinct non-Marxist roots of the new human rights-oriented oppositional strategy. These activists came mostly from an informal group of younger theologians and nonconformists in relation to the regime, as well as their own Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren structures. This group, called “New Orientation” (Nová orientace), was established by the end of the 1950s. Their major inspirations were Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his non-religious, civic interpretation of the Christian Gospel binding Christians for civic activities in this world; the outstanding theologian of their own Church, Josef Lukl Hromádka, arguing similarly for public activities of believers, even though they revised his activist stance toward the communist regime; and, last but not least, Emanuel Rádl, the maverick Protestant philosopher, biologist, adherent of Masaryk’s “critical realism,” and human rights promoter from the interwar period. 29 This was the intellectual background that influenced Božena Komárková, the greatest Czech Protestant historian of human rights in the twentieth century and the creator of an original interpretation of their genealogy. Komárková saw the struggle for religious freedom in early modern Europe as a crucial element of this genealogy, above all the Calvinist branch of the Reformation, which contributed to the understanding of the modern state as a human—not divine— organization, whose main task is to create and guard space for the freedom of conscience. The translation of religious freedom into political freedom—at best represented by the 1776 Virginia Declaration of Rights—gave birth to the notion of inalienable human rights intrinsic to every human being and not derived from any state organization.30 As a non-Marxist intellectual with genuine, undisguised religious concerns, Komárková could not publish throughout most of the state socialist period.31 Shortly before her seventy-fourth birthday, Jiří Hájek, “The human rights movement and social progress,” in The Power of the Powerless: Citizens Against the State in Central-Eastern Europe, ed. Václav Havel et al. (London: Hutchinson, 1985), 134–40. See also his broader historical interpretation of Czech society in the “normalization” regime, highlighting the 1968 Prague Spring as the democratization climax; Jiří Hájek, Setkání a střety: Poznámky a úvahy o působení vnějších faktorů na politické postoje české novodobé společnosti (Cologne: Index, 1983). 29   Emanuel Rádl, Válka Čechů s Němci (Prague: Melantrich, 1993), 141–57. 30 Božena Komárková, Lidská práva (Heršpice: Eman, 1997), 40–57. 31   For her “from-the-drawer” writings, see Božena Komárková, Sekularizovaný svět a evangelium 28 

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around Christmas 1976, Komárková signed Charter 77. Most important, from our point of view, was her major book Původ a význam lidských práv (Origins and Meaning of Human Rights) in which she summarized her years of research, circulated in samizdat form among the whole Chartist community.32 While the Czech Protestant school of human rights possessed a relatively well-elaborated historical interpretation of human rights and saw it as the main philosophical principle behind their own engagement in the Chartist opposition, they had much less practical experience with legalism than their ex-reform communist counterparts. Instead, they drew on older political traditions, such as the theory of “legal resistance” (zákonný odpor) as the citizen’s path toward democracy developed by the nineteenth-century Czech liberal thinker and political journalist Karel Havlíček in the early 1850s. This domestic liberal democratic political tradition was claimed by philosopher and Protestant theologian Ladislav Hejdánek.33 Within the Chartist milieu, Hejdánek belonged alongside ex-communists such as Hájek or Jičínský among the most consistent defenders of dissident legalism. Hejdánek’s Dopisy příteli (Letters to a Friend), explaining the main traits of Charter 77, as well as the context and reasons for its creation, represents one of the classics of Chartist literary and philosophical production, albeit one that is less well-known internationally.34 A greater part of human life, Hejdánek argued with reference to Rádl, is anchored outside of the state and beyond its competence; as such, any state that encroaches upon these vast areas of life is an evil state and must be pushed back to its proper place. This is what the Chartist struggle for civil and human rights stood for. No state can be a guarantor of universal human rights; it can only recognize and respect them. A state that persecutes the exercise of fundamental rights and freedoms exceeds its competence, commits injustice, and behaves lawlessly.35 Adopting the Havlíčkian concept of “legal resistance” as a weapon, Hejdánek maintained it was not just right, but a duty for citizens to stand against such a lawless state. Written during the first months of the Charter’s existence, Hejdánek’s collection of fictitious letters was not a legal or jurisprudence treatise, nor was it a concrete instruction of how to behave or how to use legalist strategies. It was a philosopher’s and citizen’s (Brno: Doplněk, 1992).   Božena Komárková, Původ a význam lidských práv (Zurich: Cramerius, 1986). 33   Jan Šimsa, “Předmluva,” in Dopisy příteli, ed. Ladislav Hejdánek (Prague: Oikoymenh, 1993), 12. 34   Hejdánek, Dopisy příteli. One of the few exceptions recognizing the identity-building character of Hejdánek’s Letters is Jonathan Bolton, in his close reading of the Chartists’ world of meaning: Bolton, Worlds of Dissent, 186–91. 35   Especially letters 1, 2, and 6; see Hejdánek, Dopisy příteli, 13–23 and 38–43. 32

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substantiation of the legalist position that Charter 77 represented. As such, it was widely read by members of the dissident community and endorsed by many of them. Very similar reasoning can be found in Václav Havel’s most famous dissident treatise “The Power of the Powerless” from the summer of 1978, in which he masterfully described the mechanisms of power in the late socialist dictatorship and suggested the ways in which the “dissident” might face it by refusing the lies and appearances of the system and upholding the truths of life.36 Legalism is not the major argument in this existential and phenomenological analysis, but it plays an important role in Havel’s reasoning. When widespread and arbitrary abuse of power is the rule, he asks, why is there such a spontaneous and ubiquitous “acceptance of the principle of legality” among dissidents? First he juxtaposes the legalist stance with that of resistance or revolt and states that no revolt has a chance of success in conditions of consolidated dictatorship such as that under Husák in the 1970s, where social crisis is only latent. Law in communist dictatorship—much like ideology—is a facade, but it is also an instrument of ritual communication within and outside the power structure as well as an instrument that is binding the social system within a dense network of regulations. “A persistent and never-ending appeal to the laws—not just to the laws concerning human rights, but to all laws—does not mean at all that those who do so have succumbed to the illusion that in our system the law is anything other than what it is. . . . Demanding that the laws be upheld is . . . an act of living within the truth that threatens the whole mendacious structure at its point of maximum mendacity.”37 Havel was well aware that dissidents could not succeed only by making appeals to legality. Yet, he insisted that to assume that the laws are a mere facade with no validity, and thus to resign from appealing to them, would only reinforce that facade, the regime’s ritual, and its power. Charter 77 is often treated in the literature as the most distinctly “legalist” and “rights-oriented” among oppositional groups in the region.38 Yet, the Charter’s founding members had different opinions about the scope and aims of dissident legalism. These controversies emerged quite soon among the most active Chartists, who faced police and judicial repression and an official press smear campaign in the first month of 1977.   Václav Havel, “The Power of the Powerless,” in The Power of the Powerless: Citizens Against the State, ed. Václav Havel et al. (Abingdon: Routledge, 2009), 23–96. 37   Havel, “The Power of the Powerless,” 76. 38   See, for instance, H. Gordon Skilling, Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1989), 43–72; Winfried Thaa, Wiedergeburt des Politischen: Zivilgesellschaft und Legitimitätskonflikt in den Revolutionen 1989 (Opladen: Leske + Buderich, 1996), 191–270. 36

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The legalist stance, which did not directly challenge the official communist human rights doctrine, was challenged at that point by a radical democratic group within the Charter. Jan Tesař, for instance, criticized the former reform communists in opposition and their legalist stance as potentially more dangerous to the Charter than police repression, since they could bring the dissident community into stagnation. Tesař disagreed that Czechoslovak laws were basically good, since one could not actually act in accordance with them in almost any area of life, particularly not in the economy, where many laws contradicted each other. Inspired by the more radical Polish opposition groups, Tesař maintained that the Chartist calls for observance of laws were “merely Platonic and did not solve anything.”39 Instead of “toothless legalism,” the radicals suggested that Charter 77 could overcome its isolation from wider Czechoslovak society by focusing on broader social issues beyond the political harassment and legal defense of the persecuted intelligentsia. Tesař and Jaroslav Šabata took the lead in drafting Charter documents such as the “Analysis of the state of affairs of economic and social rights in Czechoslovakia” from March 1977.40 With reference to the International Covenant on Social, Economic and Cultural Rights, they questioned the claim of official communist propaganda about the fulfillment of social and economic rights in the country. They pointed to infringements of the right to work and lambasted “hidden unemployment” in the Czechoslovak economy, the gender inequality of incomes, and the inequality between different professions. Last but not least, the Analysis criticized the complete subordination of trade unions to the state apparatus and thus the inability of workers to support their economic and social demands through collective action. In the following two years, Charter 77 issued other documents mapping out the situation in the realm of social, economic, and cultural rights, yet after 1979 this effort almost disappeared from Chartist activity. The majority of the critiques within the Chartist orbit, however, did not doubt the legalist strategy as a general principle. Mostly they looked for ways of broadening Chartist activity and increasing its number of supporters. Yet even they agreed that the legalist minimum was an important and indispensable base. Dissident legalism remained the leading principle of Charter 77, not least because it was virtually the only general principle that most of the Chartists could agree upon.   Quoted in Otáhal, Opoziční proudy, 183. Tesař’s critical texts from 1977 to 1980 to Charter’s legalism and strategy in general are available in Jan Tesař, Co počít ve vlkově břiše: Práce o vytváření struktur občanské společnosti z let 1968–1980 (Prague: Triáda, 2018), esp. 219–355. 40   Blanka Císařovská and Vilém Prečan, eds., Charta 77: Dokumenty, vol. 1 (Prague: ÚSD AV ČR, 2007), 26–29. 39

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Moreover, legal defense and its expertise was a practical necessity for the relatively small and vulnerable community of Chartists exposed to heavy repression in the first years of its existence. In April 1978 the Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Persecuted (VONS), the most important dissident legal defense body, was established to defend political prisoners. By 1989 the Committee had published 1,125 reports on individual cases of injustice.41 Usually addressed to the Czechoslovak authorities, urging them to remedy the injustices in the cases monitored, these reports were also published in the Charter 77 bulletin Informace o Chartě 77 and passed abroad, from where the information was reported back into the country by foreign broadcasting stations such as Radio Free Europe, Voice of America, and the BBC. The language of VONS communiqués was consciously restrained in terms of its possible political and ideological content, with a huge effort made to use the “neutral” language of valid legal doctrine and existing laws. The majority of VONS’ work was thus strictly legalist in its form, argument, and practice, requiring detailed knowledge of criminal law. Due to a lack of lawyers willing or able to cooperate with VONS, leading activists such as Petr Uhl, his wife Anna Šabatová, and Václav Benda realized they themselves had to become self-taught experts in criminal law.42 In the end it was they who produced most of the VONS reports and documentation and who thus embody the Chartist dissident legalism, which contrasted with the significant engagement of professional lawyers in similar activities within the Polish opposition, as we shall see below.

Legalism as social and political practice of the Polish opposition The way in which the new democratic opposition came into being prefigured the importance but also the somewhat subordinate status of dissident legalism in Poland.43 The Polish opposition was as a whole always more politically minded and diverse than the opposition elsewhere in East Central Europe. As a rule, its individual organizations declared themselves to be part of the political opposition. This concerned not just organizations with a clear political program, such as the League for Independent Poland, the Movement of Young Poland,   Jaroslav Pažout et al., eds., VONS: Výbor na obranu nespravedlivě stíhaných 1978–1989; Dokumenty (Prague: Academia, 2015). See also the detailed documentation on the history of VONS at “VONS.cz,” accessed April 15, 2020, http://www.vons.cz/. 42   See Petr Uhl, Právo a nespravedlnost očima Petra Uhla (Prague: C. H. Beck, 1998), 50–51. 43   For different understanding of legalism in Polish intellectual history, see Rafał Matyja, “Przestrzeń powinności: Myśl polityczna a postawy patriotyczne w Polsce powojennej,” Ośródek myśli politycznej ( June 24, 2007), accessed April 15, 2020, http://www.omp.org.pl/ artykul.php?artykul=173. 41

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the Confederation of Independent Poland, or the National Democratic Party. In contrast to the Czechoslovak Charter 77, even human rights organizations such as KOR or ROPCiO, which acted on the basis of “anti-political” strategies based on monitoring human rights violations, understood themselves explicitly as a part of the political opposition.44 Dissident legalism played a less prominent role in Poland than in Czechoslovakia. As such, it was less frequently reflected in the strategic samizdat discussions in comparison with other concepts such as the “self-organizing society.” However, the Polish dissident movement would have been very different without its legalist underpinning. As in Czechoslovakia, the legalist strategy of dissidence in Poland was in formation long before the arrival of the Helsinki rhetoric on the international stage. It was connected to various longer-term intellectual currents in the opposition, as well as to forms of civic and cultural resistance to communist dictatorships that had been practiced for decades. Jacek Kuroń, one of the crucial future strategic minds of the KOR opposition, called in 1974 for legalist means as an important part of the oppositional strategy. When warning the younger opposition militants about the detrimental results of violent struggle and violent actions for the overall oppositional endeavor, he urged them to use nonviolent methods and observe the existing legal order: “If you want to fight—read, read a lot! Talk, talk a lot, write and present your views at meetings, look around, look for those similar to you! Ask your relatives and friends for books from abroad and lend them readily. Above all, though, buy a criminal code for yourself and make sure never to trespass it! . . . This is they, who represent the unlawfulness—let only them trample on the law!”45 In Kuroń’s political theory of democratic opposition, which he had been working out in numerous samizdat articles and tamizdat books during this period, legalism was an indispensable but still supplementary strategy. The heart of his theory had been the idea of a self-organizing society as a continually expanding sphere of non-coerced social activity that creates and expands public space as both a defensive barrier against the “totalitarian state” and a way of building up democracy and reinforcing democratic values.46   See Jan Jozef Lipski, KOR: A History of the Workers’ Defense Committee in Poland, 1976–1981 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985); Andrzej Friszke, Czas KOR-u: Jacek Kuroń a geneza Solidarności (Kraków: Wydawnictwo Znak—Instytut Studiów Politycznych Polskiej Akademii Nauk, 2011); Waligóra, Ruch obrony Praw Człowieka i Obywatela 1977–1981. 45   Jacek Kuroń, “Opozycja polityczna v Polsce,” in Opozycja: Pisma polityczne 1969–1989, ed. Jacek Kuroń (Warsaw: Krytyka Polityczna, 2010), 57. 46   See Kuroń, Opozycja, 6–208; Jacek Kuroń, Zasady ideowe (Paris: Instytut Literacki, 1978); cf. Andrzej Walicki, “Od utopii do utopii: pisma polityczne Jacka Kuronia,” in Kuroń: przewodnik Krytyki Politycznej, ed. Seweryn Blumsztajn and Michał Sutowski (Warsaw: Wyd. Krytyki Politycznej, 2014), 62–105. 44

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The legalist stance as a fundamental oppositional attitude was contested by activists who wished for a more radical political opposition that strove for independence and democracy. Antoni Macierewicz, for example, argued that the opposition should represent a “free voice of public opinion” and not be restrained by legalist constraints if it were to gather forces and create a fully-fledged resistance movement in the future.47 In the end, however, Macierewicz himself became one of the founding members of KOR and accepted legalist ways and means. After achieving its major goal of an amnesty for most worker-protesters in 1977, KOR shifted its focus from the ad hoc issue of workers’ defense to the more general defense of democratic freedoms. It also transformed itself into a permanent body; the Social Self-Defense Committee (KSS-KOR). This included the Social Self-Defense Fund that was to provide financial help for the victims of state repression but, importantly, also the Intervention Bureau led by self-taught legal activists Zofia and Zbigniew Romaszewski. They were the true practitioners of dissident legalism in the KSS-KOR group, and the ways and means of their dissident legalism was pragmatic, emerging mainly out of practical concerns.48 The Intervention Bureau acted to a large extent as a legal advisory office that focused on the cases of illegal murders and heavy beatings committed by the repressive apparatus of the state. Indeed, the Bureau often resembled a private detective agency investigating abuses of power by the Citizens’ Militia and the prosecution office courts. Notable were its efforts to publicize—sometimes in the form of leaflet action—cases of brutal legal violations by the militia.49 The Intervention Bureau compiled samizdat articles mainly for Biuletyn Informacyjny and later for Głos, alongside other publications that documented state injustice, violations of human and civil rights, and physical violence against citizens.50 Furthermore, in 1980, the comprehensive Madrid Report, which drew on the Bureau’s findings about the state of justice, prosecution, and the prison service in Poland, was issued officially by the Helsinki Committee in Poland, also a KOR-based organization.51 Marian Korybut (Antoni Macierewicz), “Refleksje o opozycji,” Aneks, no. 12 (1976): 65–82, quoted in Zygmunt Hemmerling and Marek Nadolski, eds., Opozycja demokratyczna w Polsce 1976–1980: wybór dokumentów (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 1994), 81–96. 48  Piotr Skwieciński, ed., Romaszewcy: autobiografia (Warsaw: Trzecia Strona, 2014), 154–65. 49   Lipski, KOR, 150–51, 193–96; Skwieciński, Romaszewcy, 156–80. 50 Dokumenty Bezprawia: “Biała Księga” (Warsaw: Komitet Samoobrony Społecz­nej “KOR,” Wyd. NOW-a, 1978); Biała księga Kazimierza Świtonia (Komitet Samoobrony Społecznej KOR, 1979). 51   Raport Madrycki o przestrzeganiu praw człowieka i obywatela v Polsce (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo im. Konstytucji 3 Maja, 1980). 47

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Run mostly by opposition activists, the Bureau nevertheless attracted a number of barristers as permanent opposition collaborators, including Aniela Steinsbergowa, Andrzej Grabiński, Władysław Siła-Nowicki, Jan Olszewski, and Jacek Taylor. They did not just lend a helping hand in individual cases, but also supervised letters, reports, and publications of the KOR to ensure the necessary legal vocabulary and argumentation. Thus, in Poland a peculiar informal institution developed, comprising legal advisors and active barristers within the opposition and, later, Solidarity. Some of them were former political prisoners in the Stalinist era, a certain number of whom were allowed to practice advocacy again in the late 1950s, a phenomenon unimaginable in any other country of the Soviet bloc. These lawyers were, so to say, fighting the system from within its own legal structure much earlier than the birth of any dissident legalist strategy. They were professing and practicing what Hejdánek in the Czech context called “legal resistance.” Hence in KOR, apart from the pragmatic legalism of dissident activists, there was always something we might call lawyers’ legalism, represented by two generations of legal scholars and active lawyers who provided the much-needed legal expertise. One of the most experienced was Aniela Steinsbergowa, already active in the interwar period as a barrister in political trials against the members and activists of the illegal communist movement, as well as those against the socialists in opposition to the Piłsudski regime. She was a member of the League for the Defense of the Rights of Man and the Citizen (Liga Obrony Praw Człowieka i Obywatela), which actively fought national, political and religious persecution in the country.52 Despite her Jewish origins making her a target, she played an active part in the anti-Nazi resistance movement. After the war, she was employed in the Legal Office of the Council’s Presidium, helping indirectly to change the legal system in order to serve the communist dictatorship. 53 Between 1954 and 1968 she worked as one of the lawyers in the rehabilitation trials of Home Army (AK) soldiers; together with Władysław Winawer, she represented one of the most famous AK victims of communist political trials, Kazimierz Moczarski. This activity, together with her public stance in 1956, made her a quite well-known figure in the Warsaw cultural elite, which was further boosted by her engagement on the side of the defendants in later political trials such as the 1959 trial of Hanna Rewska or the 1965 trial of Jacek Kuroń and Karol Modzelewski.   Andrzej Friszke, “Aniela Steinsbergowa i jej książka,” accessed April 15, 2020, https://www. rpo.gov.pl/sites/default/files/Steinsbergowa_0.pdf. 53   Ibid., 11. 52

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In 1968, Steinsbergowa eventually lost her barrister license. In the mid-1970s she took part in the most important protest letter writing within the so-called Constitutional affair. Together with Jan Olszewski, she was one of the brains behind the Letter of 59, the most daring protest against the constitutional changes. In 1976 we find her among the cofounders of the KOR, albeit skeptical and with reservations, advising for cautious and legalist methods.54 From the beginning she served as KOR’s chief legal expert, supervising the appeals to the population and letters to the government in order for them to comply with the existing legal order. Steinsbergowa also was the main legal expert in the Intervention Bureau, where she served—without having a barrister license herself—as a consultant to her colleagues and friends, themselves practicing lawyers. Steinsbergowa could be considered as one of the outstanding examples of lawyers’ legalism in the service of dissidence. As a member of the oppositionist Kłub Krzywego Koła between 1956 and 1962, she allegedly held a couple of short lectures on the penal code and instructed her colleagues and friends on how to behave in case of police interrogation. This later bore fruit in the first tamizdat publication which documented and reflected on the political processes of the 1960s.55 Apart from the rich documentary collection, the volume published by the Paris-based Kultura included articles such as “Reflection on political processes” and “Conduct during interrogations.” There were no authors indicated in the volume, but as historian Andrzej Friszke claims, the main author of the collection, as well as of the aforementioned articles, was most likely Steinsbergowa in cooperation with Jan Olszewski and Ludwik Cohn.56 The instructions on how to behave during interrogation and what the law does and does not allow, known from Soviet samizdat, was the first of its kind published in the Polish language in this period. Leaning on the applicable rules of the penal process code, it cast light on the possibilities of defense including the refusal to testify without any further justification. Furthermore, similar to Soviet dissident instruction booklets and built on practical experience with interrogations, the article discussed the relationship between interrogator and interrogated, and the possible psychological traps this entailed. Special attention was given to the protocol of interrogations. It warned that interrogations without protocols were unacceptable, dangerous, and illegal.57 At the end of the 1960s, Steinsbergowa stated her intention to write her “memoirs” from the time of the Stalinist political trials. Her Widziane z ławy   Ibid., 70.   Sąd orzekł (Paris: Instytut Literacki, 1972). 56   Andrzej Friszke, “Aniela Steinsbergowa i jej książka,” 61. 57   Sąd orzekł, 299–310. 54 55

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obrończej (Seen from the barrister’s bench), published in Polish exile press in 1977, was an important portrayal of the most infamous period in terms of the “breaking of law” (łamanie prawa) in communist Poland.58 Far from being a personal recollection, the booklet was in fact a rigorous and matter-of-fact description of some of the political trials, most importantly those around Kazimierz Moczarski. The point was not to describe what happened, as knowledge about the infamous Stalinist political trials was widespread in the country. Rather, the purpose was to describe in detail the working of the repressive mechanisms, in which law was a key instrument, with the implication that similar mechanisms, though with much milder punishments, survived in the Polish communist state until the present day. Steinsbergowa later employed this argument in her report and defense speech on behalf of the KOR leaders detained during martial law in Poland, when a political trial was under preparation in 1983.59 She drew a direct analogy between this case and various other political trials in communist Poland that targeted anti-communist organizations such as Freedom and Independence (WiN) or Freedom, Equality, and Independence (WRN) in 1945–47, the Home Army, and wartime underground state officials, as well as students and writers between 1965 and 1972. Whereas Steinsbergowa served mainly as a legal advisor to the KOR group and a self-standing writer on legal issues, keeping her distance from direct political engagement, most of the younger generation of active lawyers served as true “fighters on the ground,” lawyers at political trials of dissidents. The exemplary case is Jan Olszewski, one of the founders of KOR, who was intentionally omitted from the public list of signatories—much like other practicing barristers such as Władysław Siła-Nowicki or Jacek Taylor—so that he could act as an official and professional lawyer on behalf of persecuted workers and, later, for dissident activists themselves. Olszewski came from the tradition of Polish independent socialism and by the 1970s already had unmistakable oppositionist credentials. In the 1960s Olszewski made his name as a defender of oppositionists in taking up, among others, the legal defense of Melchior Wańkowicz in 1964, who was charged with supplying information to Radio Free Europe, or similarly defending Kuroń and Modzelewski in 1965 in their trial concerning their famous left-radical critique of the Polish communist regime, the so-called Open Letter. In 1970, after he was allowed to pursue his profession again, he took part in the   Aniela Steinsbergowa, Widziane z ławy obrończej (Paris: Instytut literacki, 1977); several samizdat editions appeared later after 1981 in the so-called “second circuit.” 59   Aniela Steinsbergowa, Proces KSS KOR—refleksje i analogie (Warsaw: Wyd. CDN, 1983); see, in particular, the text “Sprawa KSS KOR,” 3–10. 58

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trial against the militant anti-communist organization Ruch. Olszewski himself was one of the major practitioners and promoters of legalism in the mid-1970s, which he did not interpret as an anti-political strategy, however, but a necessary supplement to other oppositional activities. He was an initiator and signatory of the Letter of 59 in protest against the constitutional changes, as well as of the Letter of 14 in protest against the introduction into the Polish constitution of a notation about the irrevocability of the alliance with the USSR. In 1976, he was one of the cofounders and organizers of the clandestine Polish Independence Agreement (PPN), where he was a prolific writer.60 His most influential text exemplifying legalist strategies was Obywatel a Służba Bezpieczeństwa (The Citizen and the Security Services), published as an instruction booklet for oppositionists, which explained how to deal with interrogation and surveillance by the political police.61 Seven editions of the booklet were published by various Polish samizdat publishers between 1977 and 1981, which testifies to its popularity and usefulness among the opposition. After December 1981 it became a true manual for the underground Solidarity members in the era of martial law. Legalism leaning on human rights language also characterized the rival organization to KOR, the Movement for Defense of Human and Civil Rights (ROPCiO), which had quite a different political genealogy. Whereas KSS-KOR originated mainly out of left-wing opposition, the 1968 student movement, and democratic socialist activism, ROPCiO, led by Leszek Moczulski and Andrzej Czuma, represented the center-right opposition closer to the Catholic Church. The defense of religious rights thus played a far bigger role in its activities. Its leaders referred to right-wing streams of Polish national political traditions as their major inspiration, including the prewar and wartime Christian Democrats, the centralist Piłsudski movement, the Peasant Party, and the Movement for National Independence.62 Within the movement it was the Łódź barrister Karol Głogowski, one of the founding members of the Movement of Free Democrats and later of ROPCiO, who was the most unflagging proponent of the legalist formula. He set out his position at the first general meeting of the movement in Warsaw in September 1977, in a long presentation that was perhaps the most profound, self-reflexive, and unequivocal elaboration of dissident legalism in Poland of the time.63 He positioned himself between existing legal codifications, both Polish   Polskie Porozumnienie Niepodległościowe: Wybór tekstów (London: Polonia, 1989).   Obywatel a Służba Bezpieczeństwa (samizdat PPN, 1977); see also Polskie Porozumnienie, 54–61. 62   Andrzej Friszke, Opozycja polityczna v PLR 1945–1980 (London: Aneks, 1994), 452–89. 63   “Referat Karola Głogowskiego,” in Ruch Wolnych Demokratów 1975–1980 (Kraków: Fundacja Centrum dokumentacji czynu neipodległościowego, 2003), 33–47; see also Karol Głogowski’s similarly fundamental standpoint from 1979, “O podstawach prawnych i koncepcji Ruchu 60 61

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and international, the current official Polish jurisprudence, and the Czechoslovak Charter 77 approach in polemics within which he elaborated his and ROPCiO’s understanding of the struggle for observation of human and civil rights in Poland. Though sympathetic to Charter 77, Głogowski did not accept its apolitical stance that claimed as its goal a dialogue with power in order to improve the situation. To him this meant merely an effort to democratize the dictatorship of the proletariat: in fact, nothing more than the prolongation of the “socialism with a human face” project, which for him was insufficient. Instead, Głogowski argued that in Poland there was no independent institutional guarantee of the “legality” (praworządność) of valid laws, since no matter how much the letter or the operation of the law was changed, in reality the party would still have the last word when it comes to decision making. Thus the criterion was not constitutional but political-ideological, the doctrine of MarxismLeninism. Accordingly, the whole construction of the Polish legal system was in contradiction with the declared equality before the law and the clause of non-discrimination on the basis of racial, national, religious, or political views. Głogowski came to the conclusion that the position of ROPCiO must not therefore be as a passive observer merely pointing out the violation of existing legal obligations. He called for an active approach that would force the government to publish the ratified international agreements in the country’s legal gazette (making it, at long last, an abiding norm in the country) or to initiate fundamental changes in the Polish legal and constitutional system in order to make it compatible with international conventions. In theoretical terms, Głogowski went beyond the dissident legalism of the KOR and later of the KSS-KOR and its Bureau of Intervention, and far beyond the moderate legalism of Charter 77. His conception aimed explicit criticism at not just legal practice but also legal codifications in the country, a position reminiscent of that of Jan Tesař in Czechoslovakia. A precondition for this was an active civic-reformist movement whose goal was overhauling the existing legal system in favor of political democracy, most significantly making the rule of law superordinate to the rule of the party. As such it was an “idealist” (in the given political situation) but also militant approach, which did not hide its clear political aim of replacing the party dictatorship by liberal rule-of-law government. Głogowski’s exposition was welcomed at the ROPCiO meeting; however, the legal language as well as the legalist position met with criticism from Czuma, who branded it “legal gabble” not appropriate for broader agitation. Both charismatic leaders of ROPCiO, Czuma and Moczulski, considered Głogowski’s legalist formula as merely a supplementary strategic trait that must Obrony Praw Człowieka i Obywatela w Polsce,” in Ruch Wolnych Demokratów, 104–110.

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be replaced by a more outspoken political program. Yet, as they soon started to quarrel over the leadership and direction of the Movement, the broad legalist formula in fact remained the programmatic background of ROPCiO during the four years of its existence.64 One of the most innovative elements of ROPCiO’s activity in putting this legalist stance into practice were the so-called Consultation-Information Points (PKI) in private flats, to which individuals discriminated against or persecuted by the authorities could turn for help and legal advice. However, the practical execution lagged behind the idea. There were not enough legal experts in the Movement, such as Bogumił Studziński in the Warsaw PKI, who could provide specialist advice. Thus the PKIs, established initially in twelve larger cities and facing various practical problems, eventually played a more important role in the relatively fast territorial expansion of the Movement beyond the capital city than in concrete legal battles, as practiced by KOR’s Intervention Bureau. PKIs facilitated contacts between the dissident activist core and the broader society struggling with the injustice of the communist state.65 Although rather unique in his explicit connection of the legalist stance and general political program of the establishment of rule of law, Głogowski was surely not alone. The lawyers around the Polish political opposition came from various political backgrounds, yet a much smaller proportion came from the reform-communist legal milieu than in the Czechoslovak case. Some, such as Steinsbergowa, might have been historically left-wing and felt connected to the Left. Others with leftist pasts, such as Olszewski, adopted positions closer to the Catholic Church and the right-wing independentist streams within the opposition, even though Olszewski continued to communicate across the ideological spectrum within the opposition. What is striking, however, is the number of “opposition lawyers” that came from the environment of the Roman Catholic intelligentsia. This concerns some of the most well-known patrons (mecenas), as they called them, such as Władysław Siła-Nowicki, Wiesław Chrzanowski, Adam Strzembosz, and Andrzej Stelmachowski. Working for the dissidents and often politically quite outspoken, they were still able to retain their jobs and positions (often as barristers or jurisprudence scholars) within the justice system of the country.66   Waligóra, Ruch obrony, 87–93. Ibid., 70–71. 66   See Maria Nowicka-Marusczyk and Marian Marek Drozdowski, eds., Władysław Siła-Nowicki: Wspomnienia i dokumenty, vol. 2 (Wrocław: Biblioteka Zeszytów historycznych WiNu, 2002); Wiesław Chrzanowski, in contribution with Piotr Mierecki and Bohusław Kierenicki, Pół wieku polityki, czyli rzecz o obronie czynnej: rozmowa (Warsaw: Ad astra, 1997). 64 65

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These lawyers were consistent and convinced adherents of a moderate, realist, and strategic legalistic approach. They professed and practiced tireless gradualism that, nonetheless, was far from any hopes that the communist system might be reformed. Their gradualism foresaw society growing in its autonomy, resistance capacity, and capability to exercise pressure on the communist regime. The resistance needed to grow and society needed to become more independent. This is why all of the legal advisors later disliked what they understood as Solidarity’s revolutionary zeal. They feared any form of revolutionary radicalism, calling instead for negotiation, legal means, and organic growth.67 Unsurprisingly, then, the lawyers were the most consequent legalists in the Polish opposition. They understood this kind of legalism neither as a challenge to the opposition political program, nor its replacement, nor the only platform from which to combat the repressive communist regime. But they did not understand it as merely a “complementary” strategy either. Legalism, for them, was nothing less than an indispensable, important, and at times even quite effective pillar of the long-term struggle for political freedom, civil rights, democratization, and, not least, national independence.

Conclusion Dissident legalism, formed during the 1970s, henceforth played an immensely important role until 1989 and—by contributing to the establishment of a strong liberal constitutionalism—also afterwards. It was taken over as one of the fundamental standpoints and strategic tenets of Solidarity’s “self-limiting revolution.” Many contemporary observers noted that Solidarity did not strive for a different constitutional order, but tried hard to make use of and gradually change the existing one. The concept of “socialist legality,” however much it was misused and trampled upon by the state authorities, became the foundation for Solidarity’s contest with the communist regime as well as its ground for negotiations.68 Albeit for just a little over a year, the Solidarity period considerably changed the Polish political landscape and legal-political culture, reestablishing the understanding of law as a “social contract.” Due to the unprecedented August agreements in 1980, law briefly ceased to be exclusively an authoritative, topdown command structure created by the state in order to tame its citizens.   Nowicka-Marusczyk and Drozdowski, Władysław Siła-Nowicki, 131–59.   Krzysztof Brzechczyn, “Program i myśl polityczna NSZZ ‘Solidarność,’” in NSZZ Solidarność 1980–1989: Ruch społeczny, ed. Łukasz Kamiński and Grzegorz Waligóra, vol. 2 (Warsaw: Instytut Pamięci Narodowej, 2010), 13–74.

67

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Instead, leaning on the compromise reached by the major social and political forces that represented society, law might have become an instrument of social integration.69 Despite the setbacks to this understanding of law and legal culture, particularly drastic after martial law was imposed in December 1981, these changes proved to have a lasting impact and, eventually, contributed to the nonviolent, legalist character of the democratic revolution in 1989. For all this, there was still a long way to go. The law and legality, the regime’s rule by law, and dissident-envisioned rule of law was a matter of regime-opposition interaction, communication, and semantic struggle. Increasingly during the 1980s it took on a form of confrontation between two semiotic and ideological systems: socialist legality versus the democratic Rechtsstaat. Yet, this general picture needs refining. Neither of these systems represented a complete and fullfledged ideological vision. They developed from similar roots and evolved in an ongoing mutual interaction. The very field of contest marked out by existing positive legal norms, but also expanding through the accepted international human rights conventions, predetermined the movement possibilities for the communist authorities that still tried hard to use their prerogatives, but ultimately became more and more bound by their own normative state. The same struggle, however, pushed dissident legalists into more clearly defined liberal constitutional corners. Pro-dissident lawyers, mostly noncommunists with conservative leanings such as Głogowski, Siła-Nowicki, or Olszewski, but also left-leaning Protestants such as Komárková or Hejdánek, maintained a high regard for the rule of law and human rights as a part of their worldview. For former Marxists who had become dissidents, such as Kuroń or Uhl, but also for ex-reform communist lawyers and politicians like Hájek, Mlynář, or Steinsbergowa, this was an ongoing process. While keeping their “socialist convictions,” they drifted gradually to a more emphatic acceptance of the quasi-neutral character of the liberal rule of law principles. In this study I have followed the origins of dissident legalism for which international circumstances, such as another phase of détente and the new post-Helsinki human rights politics, surely created favorable conditions. I have shown the ways in which human rights politics was transformed into a concrete and relatively efficient dissident strategy of legal resistance or legal defense, a mixture of philosophical arguments and sociopolitical and cultural practice, the dissident legalism. The newly internationalized human rights doctrine was an inevitable precondition for the rise and sustainability of dissidence and its in  Kuisz, Charakter prawny porozumień sierpniowych 1980–1981, 469–80; Jarosław Kuisz, “O pojmowaniu praworządności w Polskiej Rzeczypospolitej Ludowej w latach 1980–1981,” Czasopismo Prawno-Historyczne 60, no. 2 (2008): 350.

69

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ternational visibility. Yet, without dissident legalism on the ground, the human rights doctrine would hardly have become an efficient mechanism. As we have seen, dissident legalism is a composite notion; in fact, it stands for many forms, approaches, and convictions. Whereas for Charter 77, legalism was a staple and, in a way, a self-limiting mechanism against temptations to turn itself into political opposition, in Poland, legalism was more of a practical instrument used as an exigent tool of the opposition’s struggle against the communist dictatorship. At times, legalism was conceived rather dogmatically, as in Hejdánek’s case; in many other cases, however, legalism was viewed pragmatically, including by ex-reform communists like Hájek and Mlynář, or by the self-taught dissident legalists such as Uhl, Benda, and the Romaszewskis. In the writings of leading dissident strategists like Havel and Kuroń, legalism was considered important, but as only one of the many ways of how to face and challenge the regime. For many “opposition lawyers,” legalism was simply a continuation of long years of practice. These various forms of dissident legalism grew from quite different local cultural, intellectual, and social resources, and sometimes reached back to older traditions of political thought such as Karel Havlíček’s nineteenth-century concept of “legal resistance,” or the “traditional” practice of political resistance through legal defense as practiced by the Polish Catholic Church and by barristers coming from this environment. Yet, in fact, one of the major preconditions for the feasibility of dissident legalism was an intrinsic part of the state socialist “world of meaning”: namely, the development of the socialist normative state or legal system. As an indivisible part of the “normalization of rule,” the aging communist dictatorships could not dispense of a strong normative state as a ruling instrument over its own administration, as well as over society. Unintentionally but inevitably, the intricate development of the socialist normative state not only partly produced its own legalist challengers, as in the case of some of the former Czechoslovak 68ers, but even more importantly, it provided a playing field. It was surely bent in favor of the communist prerogatives, and for most of the time adverse to dissidents, yet it ultimately enabled the possibility to “game with the law,” to voice legal criticism, and to stand up for rights.

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Selected bibliography

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Kuroń, Jacek, ed. Opozycja: Pisma polityczne 1969–1989. Warsaw: Krytyka Polityczna, 2010. ———. Zasady ideowe. Paris: Instytut Literacki, 1978. Legters, H. Lyman, ed. “Charter 77.” In Eastern Europe: Transformation and Revolution 1945–1991. Lexington, MA: D.C. Heath & Co., 1992. Lipski, Jan Józef. KOR. London: Aneks, 1983. ———. KOR: A History of the Workers’ Defense Committee in Poland, 1976–1981. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985. Nowicka-Marusczyk, Maria, and Marian Marek Drozdowski, eds. Władysław Siła-Nowicki: Wspomnienia i dokumenty. Vol. 2. Wrocław: Biblioteka Zeszytów historycznych WiNu, 2002. Otáhal, Milan. Opoziční proudy v české společnosti, 1969–1989. Prague: ÚSD AV ČR, 2011. Pažout, Jaroslav, et al., eds. VONS: Výbor na obranu nespravedlivě stíhaných 1978–1989; Dokumenty. Prague: Academia, 2015. Pradetto, Augusto. Techno-bürokratischer Sozialismus: Polen in der Ära Gierek (1970–1980). Frankfurt/Main: Peter Lang, 1991. Prečan, Vilém, ed. Kniha Charty: Hlasy z domova 1976/77. Cologne: Index, 1977. Rádl, Emanuel. Válka Čechů s Němci. Prague: Melantrich, 1993. Sabrow, Martin. “Sozialismus als Sinnwelt: Diktatorische Herrschaft in zeithistorischen Perspektiven.” Potsdamer Bulletin für Zeithistorische Studien, nos. 40–41 (2007): 9–23. Sharlet, Robert. “Stalinism and Soviet Legal Culture.” In Stalinism: Essays in Historical Interpretation, edited by Robert C. Tucker, 155–79. New York: W. W. Norton & Comp, 1977. Shklar, Judith. Legalism: Law, Morals and Political Trials. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1964. Šimsa, Jan. “Předmluva.” In Dopisy příteli, edited by Ladislav Hejdánek, 12. Prague: Oikoymenh, 1993. Skilling, H. Gordon. Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe. Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 1989. Skórzyński, Jan. Siła bezsiłnych: Historia Komitetu Obrony Robotników. Warsaw: Świat Książki, 2012. Skwieciński, Piotr, ed. Romaszewcy: autobiografia. Warsaw: Trzecia Strona, 2014. Sommer, Vítězslav, ed. Řídit socialismus jako firmu: technokratické vládnutí v Československu, 1956–1989. Prague: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny – ÚSD AV ČR, 2019. Steinsbergowa, Aniela. Proces KSS KOR—refleksje i analogie. Warsaw: Wyd. CDN, 1983. ———. Widziane z ławy obrończej. Paris: Instytut literacki, 1977. Swidlicki, Andrzej. Political Trials in Poland 1981–1986. London: Croom Helm, 1988. Tesař, Jan. Co počít ve vlkově břiše. Práce o vytváření struktur občanské společnosti z let 1968– 1980. Prague: Triáda, 2018. Thaa, Winfried. Wiedergeburt des Politischen: Zivilgesellschaft und Legitimitätskonflikt in den Revolutionen 1989. Opladen: Leske + Buderich, 1996. Thomas, C. Daniel. The Helsinki Effect: International Norms, Human Rights, and the Demise of Communism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001. Uhl, Petr. Právo a nespravedlnost očima Petra Uhla. Prague: C. H. Beck, 1998. Walicki, Andrzej. “Od utopii do utopii: pisma polityczne Jacka Kuronia.” In Kuroń: przewodnik Krytyki Politycznej, edited by Seweryn Blumsztajn and Michał Sutowski, 62– 105. Warsaw: Wyd. Krytyki Politycznej, 2014. Waligóra, Grzegorz. Ruch obrony Praw Człowieka i Obywatela 1977–1981. Warsaw: Instytut Pamięci Narodowej, 2006. West, Robin. “Reconsidering Legalism.” Minnesota Law Review, no. 88 (2003): 119–58. Zielonka, Jan. “Poland: The Experiment with Communist Statism.” In The Crisis-problems in Poland, Part II, edited by Krzysztof Mreła and Jan Zielonka, 71–82. Cologne: Index, 1987.

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Contributors

Péter Apor is Senior Researcher at the Institute of History, Research Center for the Humanities, Budapest. Ciprian Cirniala is Primary School Teacher at Anna Lindh Grundschule, Berlin. Celia Donert is Associate Professor in 20th Century Central European History at the University of Cambridge. Annina Gagyiova is Researcher at Masaryk University, Brno. Ana Kladnik is Researcher at the Institute of Contemporary History, Ljubljana. Barbara Klich-Kluczewska is Associate Professor at the Institute of History, Jagiellonian University, Kraków. Pavel Kolář is Professor of History of Eastern Europe at the University of Konstanz. Michal Kopeček is Senior Researcher at the Institute of Contemporary History, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague and Co-director of Imre Kertész Kolleg, Friedrich Schiller University, Jena. Jonathan Larson is Associate Director of the European Union Center and Research Associate Affiliate in Anthropology at the University of Illinois. Thomas Lindenberger is Director of the Hannah Arendt Institute for Totalitarianism Studies at the Technische Universität Dresden. Michal Pullmann is Associate Professor of History at Charles University, Prague, currently the Dean of the Faculty of Arts. Hedwig Richter is Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at the Bundeswehr University Munich. Martin Sabrow was from 2004 to 2021 Director of the Leibniz Centre for Contemporary History in Potsdam and Professor of Recent and Contemporary History at Humboldt University, Berlin. Matěj Spurný is Associate Professor of Social History at Charles University, Prague, and Researcher at the Institute of Contemporary History of the Czech Academy of Sciences.

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Translators

From Czech Anna Bryson (Late Communist Elites and the Demise of State Socialism in Czechoslovakia [1986–89]) Derek Paton (Foreword; Problems with Progress in Late Socialist Czechoslovakia: The Example of Most, North Bohemia) From German David Burnett (Policeman Nicolae: The Story of One Man’s Life and Work in the Socialist Republic of Romania, 1960–89; The East German Reporting System: Normality and Legitimacy Through Bureaucracy; Modern Housekeeping Worlds; or, How Much is Thirty Percent Really? Eigensinnige Consumer Practices and the Hungarian Trade Union’s “Washing Machine Campaign” of 1957–58) Lucais Sewell (Socialism as Sinnwelt: Communist Dictatorship and its World of Meaning in a Cultural-Historical Perspective)

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Index

A acceptance, x, xiv, 6, 8, 10–11, 15–16, 59, 125, 254, 266 activism, 39, 166, 168, 203, 206, 208, 212, 216, 236, 242, 262 Adamec, Ladislav, 74, 77n agency, 35, 142, 234, 258 alienation, xv, 24, 76, 208–9, 211–13, 218 Alltagsgeschichte, ix alternative; model of socialism, 90; culture 154, 173, 237; forms of community, 163; narrative, 200; way of life, 205, 231; way of thinking 215; forms of national memory, 223; lifeworlds, 232; worldviews, 236 America, 96, 119, 185, 212, 216, 219, 243, 256; Latin, 216. See also United States anti-Fascism, 5, 7, 22 anti-political, 257, 262 apparatus; administrative, 59, 68, 72; bureaucratic, xiii, 52, 59; judicial, 245; party, xv, 6, 69, 74, 247, 250; repressive, 53, 246, 251, 258; state, 48, 53–54, 250, 255, 258; surveillance, 51, 55 approaches; citizen-oriented, 38; comparative, xi; cultural-historical, xiii; everyday life, x; modernist, 200; Sinnwelt, 15; socialist, 169; transnational, xi Arendt, Hannah, 11 associations, 51, 91, 96, 101–4, 141, 157 authenticity, xiv-xv, 44n, 52, 173, 204–5, 207–9, 211, 213–18, 243 authoritarian, xii, xv, 11, 92, 179, 215, 221, 249; anti-authoritarian, xiv, 153, 156–58 authorities, xiii, 23, 26, 51, 52, 54, 55, 57, 68, 76–77, 85, 87–89, 93, 96, 99, 102, 107, 138, 124, 140, 149, 159–60, 162–63, 183, 188, 195, 246, 249, 256, 264–66 authority, 8–13, 16, 19–20, 23, 53, 124, 133, 136, 173

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autonomy, 9, 91, 106, 155, 163–64, 206, 207, 251, 265; idea of autonomous individual, 204, 207, 208, 214, 218–19, 251 B ballots, 57–58, 100 Bebel, August, 7, 114–15 Berlin Wall, 6, 8–9, 173 Berlin. See East Berlin; West Berlin Biľak, Vasil, 70 Bourdieu, Pierre, 22, 26, 232 bourgeois, 4, 15, 39, 114, 205, 211–14, 237, 250–51 ; petit-bourgeois, 211, 213 Bulgaria, 139, 225 bureaucracy, 51, 59, 118, 212–15; bureaucratic acts/procedures, 51, 56, 58, 59, 186; bureaucratic mechanisms, 65, 113, 119, 188, 247; bureaucratic surveillance, 51–53, 59 C capitalism, xiv, 207–16, 219, 223 Catholicism, 149, 215–17, 234–36, 243. See also under Church Ceauşescu, Nicolae, 37–38, 39, 42, 47 censorship, 15, 24, 56, 59, 70, 187, 195, 198, 221, 224, 228, 251; history of, 224 Certeau, Michel de, 165 Charter 77, 228, 230–31, 234, 245, 247, 249–57, 263, 267; Chartist legalism, 251, 256; Chartist community, 253 Church, 39, 52, 54, 56–57, 133, 146–48, 157, 168, 171–72, 186, 193–95, 197, 217, 244, 252; Catholic, 146, 262, 264, 267 citizenship; the idea of, 140–42, 149, 183, 249, 253; citizen-oriented, 38, 44 civil rights, 241, 243–44, 249, 251, 258, 262–63, 265

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INDE X

civil society, 4, 221, 235 civilization, 139, 184–86, 198, 212, 216, 221, 246 coercion, 5, 51, 111, 157 Cold War, 4, 154–55, 158, 174, 204, 222, 226, 232 collapse, xiv–xv, 4, 15–17, 62, 74, 77, 222, 226 collective, 6, 11–12, 22, 48, 53–54, 74, 113–14, 120–21, 124–25, 155, 171, 208, 213, 215–16, 222, 235, 243, 255 collectivization, 3–4, 7, 24 Cominform, 84, 87, 92 communal, 54, 57–58, 83–85, 91–92, 97–98, 100, 114, 119, 124, 203, 205, 227 communes, 88, 91, 204–6, 215, 218 communism, 4–6, 13, 19, 43, 65, 209, 212, 214, 216, 232, 242, 265; study/history of, xi, 33; “goulash,” 112; reform, 246; Sinnwelt of, 19; utopia of, 18, 22; idea of the future, 14; communist leadership, 91, 211; communist regimes, xiii, 4, 12, 232, 242, 250, 252, 262, 265; history of, xi, 33 See also socialism and under dictatorship; domination; ideology; law; state communist parties, 39, 61, 63, 67–68, 70, 72, 77, 87, 91, 95, 187, 190, 194, 197, 224, 236, 244–45. See also party and individual communist parties Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, 61, 67, 68, 70, 72, 77, 190, 194, 197, 224, 236, 244–45 Communist Party of the Soviet Union, 63 Communist Party of Yugoslavia (KPJ), 87, 95 Communist Youth League (KISZ), 206, 211 communities, 24, 96–97, 100–103, 105, 107, 149, 163, 182, 188, 191, 203, 205–208, 215–218, 235, 253–56; authentic, xiv-xv, 203–4, 207, 216–18; local, xiv, 85, 97–107 compliance, 11, 19, 251 conformism, xii, xv, 23, 55, 57, 68, 208;

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nonconformism, 55, 68, 73, 154, 203, 211, 216, 252 conformity, xiii, 23, 48, 61, 69, 78, 125, 155, 242 confrontation, 19, 26, 47, 71, 76, 210, 266 consensus, xiii–xiv, 5, 12, 15, 21, 72, 78, 149, 156, 187 consent, xiii, 19, 51 conservatism, 73, 140, 154, 157, 185, 190, 192, 199, 225, 236, 243, 266 consolidation, 11, 40, 111, 162, 190, 244, 246–47, 250, 254 constitution, 85, 97, 107, 170, 243–45, 248, 250, 262, 265; constitutional amendments, 243, 48; constitutional changes, 260, 262; constitutional criterion, 263; constitutional order, 265; constitutional polities, 28; constitutional system, 263 consumerism, ix, 111, 125–26, 205, 208, 210, 213, 215–16; consumer behavior/ habits, 78, 114, 125, 141, 205, 210, 213, 219; consumer society, xv, 118, 212, 215 consumption, xiv, 111–13, 115, 207–8 counterculture, 154, 156, 215 crimes, 230 criticism, 36, 65–66, 68, 75, 77, 126, 156, 158, 185–86, 188, 190–92, 195–96, 204–5, 208, 212–17, 219, 235, 243, 247, 250–51, 263, 267 culture, 10–11, 13, 25, 41, 46, 59, 125–26, 140, 156, 187, 210–13, 215–16, 222, 227–29, 231–32, 246, 266; alternative, 154, 173; communist/socialist, 149, 211; unofficial, 230; political, 10, 13, 164, 173, 265 Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (CSSR), 11, 19 Czechoslovakia, xiv–xv, 61–64, 67, 70, 90, 139, 156, 165, 167, 179–80, 182, 185, 187, 189–90, 192, 195–96, 198–200, 210, 213, 222–30, 232, 235–237, 241, 244, 246–248, 250–52, 255, 257, 263 D decentralization, 76, 84, 88, 91 decision-making, 64, 85, 107

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INDE X

demand, 8, 9, 15, 22, 28, 45, 62, 65, 69, 71, 75, 85, 113, 117, 119–20, 123–25, 137, 140, 180, 194, 198–99, 212, 217, 222, 232, 244, 254–55 democracy, xi, 78, 91, 253, 257–58, 263; direct, 97; German Social Democracy, 114; liberal, xi; participatory, 98; socialist, 66, 73, 91, 251 democratization, 149, 251, 263, 265 demonstration, 12, 56, 71, 163, 235 denunciation, 56, 59 dictatorship, xi, 5, 8, 10–11, 20–22, 28, 51–52, 57, 77, 197, 199; communist, ix-xi, 3, 6, 20–22, 25, 246, 254, 257, 259, 267; consolidated, 254; dictatorship of borders, 9; GDR dictatorship, 6, 11; history of, xiii; modern, xiii, 11; Nazi, ix-x; of consensus, 196; of the proletariat, 263; participatory, 5; party, 11, 250, 263; police dictatorship, 241; SED dictatorship, 4, 9, 10; socialist, ix-xi, xv, 12–13, 179, 195, 203, 212, 219, 246, 254; welfare dictatorship, 45 discrimination, 26, 140, 263, 264 dissidence, 23, 155, 241–42, 257, 260, 266. See also opposition dissidents, x, xiv, 69, 154–55, 163, 167, 173, 211, 235, 241–43, 245, 249, 254, 261, 264, 266–67 distribution, x, xiv, 25, 56, 65, 106, 113, 115–17, 119, 121–22, 124–25, 134, 187, 199, 219, 228, 230 domination, x–xi, 6, 9–10, 19–23, 25, 52, 163, 234, 246; as social practice, 25, 113; communist, ix, xiii, 20, 249; practices of, 59 E East Berlin, xiv, 154, 156, 158, 168–73 East Central Europe, ix, xi, xiii, 3, 5, 85, 86, 132, 195, 203, 204, 212, 214, 222, 242, 246, 256, 249 East Germans, 6, 12, 16, 21, 51, 56, 156, 162–64, 173; women, 168–71 East Germany (GDR), x, 4–9, 11–13,

Making Sense of Dictatorship 01.indd 275

275

15–16, 19–27, 51–52, 54, 57, 59, 90, 139, 149, 153–57, 163, 165, 167–74 egalitarianism, 12, 120, 140 Eigen-Sinn, xiii, 20, 22–28, 36, 113, 120, 122, 124–25 elections, 12, 15–16, 54, 57–58. See also voting elites; communist, 61, 77, 194, 210 emancipation, 114–15, 125, 133, 145, 170, 185 enemy, 10, 13, 69–73 engagement, xiv–xv, 24, 47, 59, 65, 71, 85, 107, 113, 124, 148, 167, 168–170, 182, 209, 222–23, 227, 230, 234–35, 237, 253, 256, 259, 261 environment; environmental movements, 158, 161, 165, 167–68; protection of, 198 equality, 7, 12, 113, 125, 133, 149, 156, 164, 169–71, 173, 261, 263; inequality, 138, 213, 255 establishment; communist, 61, 74, 77 everyday life, ix, xiv, 5, 8–10, 11, 13, 14, 20, 22, 23, 25, 35, 51, 158, 165, 166, 169–70, 207–14; authority and, 13, 16, 40; “banality” of, x; democratic socialist, 214; experience of, xiv; history of, ix–xi, xiii, 21; material conditions of, 164; transformation of, 211, 214–15 exclusion, 6, 10, 69–70, 134, 140, 144, 146–47, 206, 212, 226, 236 exile, 7, 227–30 experts, xiii–xiv, 16, 62–66, 68–69, 75, 77–78, 90, 131, 134, 138, 144, 179, 182, 186, 191–94, 197, 256, 260, 264 F family, x, 26, 38–41, 43, 46, 58, 93, 96, 105, 115, 118–20, 126, 129, 130–31, 133–39, 141–49, 154–55, 157, 164, 180, 185, 204–5, 216, 224, 227, 236, 245 Foucault, Michel, 9 freedom, 5, 21, 39–40, 43, 47, 57, 170, 172, 198, 200, 204–5, 218, 243, 250, 252–53, 258, 261, 265

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276

INDE X

G GDR. See East Germany gender, xiv, 16, 113, 132–33, 135, 153–54, 156, 162, 167–74, 255 Germany, 5, 17, 20–21, 28, 154, 169, 185, 205, 231; Nazi, 20, 22. See also East Germany; West Germany Gesetzesstaat, 247 Gierek, Edward, 134, 248 Gorbachev, Mikhail, 62, 63, 70 governance, 6, 8–9, 15, 25, 47, 62–65, 74, 76, 88–90, 111, 115, 138, 142, 180, 185, 189–90, 206, 227, 242–43, 246–48, 260, 263; communist, 246; local, 106–7, 181; self-governance, 66–68, 76, 83, 85, 91, 97, 103, 105, 107 grassroots, 59, 223 Gruntorád, Jiří, 223, 230–33 H Hager, Kurt, 15 Hájek, Jiří, 250–51, 253, 266–67 Havel, Václav, 221, 228, 232, 234, 254, 267 hegemony, 61, 72, 74, 167 Heimat, 25, 165 Heller, Ágnes, 207–8, 211, 212 214–15, 217 Helsinki Accords, 241, 243–44, 250–51, 257–58, 266 heritage, 165, 179, 185–86, 190, 195, 197–98 Herrschaft, x, xiii, 23 history; contemporary, xi, xv, 222, 223; cultural and social, ix, xiii, 8, 11, 20–21, 23; gender, 135; global, xv; of human rights, 167; intellectual, xiii; microhistory, 24; oral, 44 Honecker, Erich, 6–8, 12, 15, 165, 169, 172 human rights, xiv, 47, 251, 154–55, 158, 164, 167–69, 172–73, 235, 241–45, 249–55, 257, 262, 266–67; history of, 167 Hungary, xiv, 19, 26, 86, 111–13, 117–18, 120, 123–26, 139, 203–4, 210–11, 213–14, 216

Making Sense of Dictatorship 01.indd 276

Husák, Gustáv, 11, 74n, 185, 247, 250, 254 Husserl, Edmund, 10 I ideology, ix, 12, 23, 25, 72, 91, 196, 236, 244, 254; communist, ix, x; MarxistLeninist, 6, 8, 10; Stalinist, 90; ideological (infra)structure, xiii-xiv, 19, 107, 180, 185, 196, 199 independence, 71–72, 155, 207, 214, 228, 245, 258, 263, 265; administrative, 64, 67, 91; financial, 84, 91, 125, 143; independent movements, 169, 171, 172, 195, 245, 248, 261, 264; judicial, 245; national, 170, 265; of women, 115, 125, 132, 133, 142, 143, 146; individualism/individuality, xiv, 73–74, 107, 113, 120, 125, 134–35, 149, 157, 158, 207, 208, 209, 218–19; individual and the state, 6, 8–9, 20, 246; in a relation of domination, 23, 41, 204; and power, 34; Sinnwelt of, 37, 48; individual rights, 11, 217; self-realization, 207, 218; individual behavior and Eigen-Sinn, xiii, 26–28 industry, 20–21, 66, 75, 83, 85, 88–90, 111, 113, 115–17, 121, 132, 134, 165, 179–81, 187–89, 197–98, 212, 214, 216, 248 informers, 36, 42–43, 46–47, 51, 52, 55, 59, 154 intellectuals, xiv-xv, 172, 185–87, 189, 195, 205, 209, 210, 211, 213–14, 221–22, 230, 232, 234, 236–37, 243, 249, 252 Iron Curtain, 183, 191, 214 J Jakeš, Miloš, 70, 74 K Kádár, János, 111 Kardelj, Edvard, 91 Kidrič, Boris, 88 Kidričevo, 88 Koestler, Arthur, 3

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INDE X

Komárková, Božena, 252–53, 266 Kopecký, Václav, 186 Kopelev, Lev, 3–4 Kuroń, Jacek, 243, 257, 259, 261, 266, 267 L labor, 67, 76, 89, 98, 112, 114–16, 124, 136–37, 155–57, 165–66, 169, 186, 219, 221, 227 law, 4, 12, 36, 45–46, 64–68, 71, 76, 84, 91–92, 133, 136, 148, 164, 172, 186, 242, 244–50, 254, 256–57, 260–67; lawlessness, 11, 251, 253; rule of, 5–6, 54, 243, 250–51, 263, 266; socialist/ communist, xv, 146, 186, 247, 251; (socialist) legal state, 241, 250; unlawful, 21, 58–59, 257 Le Corbusier, 87, 183, 185, 190 League of Communists of Yugoslavia, 91, 101, 103 Lebenswelt (living world), x legal system, 242, 246–47, 259, 263, 267 legalism, xv, 167, 241–44, 246, 249–60, 262–63, 265–67 legislation, 15, 75n, 76, 133, 186, 246 legitimacy, ix-xi, xiii-xiv, 10, 12, 19, 27, 36, 45, 53, 56–57, 59, 70, 85, 111, 167, 185, 189, 198–99, 244, 246; legitimization, 5–8, 11, 13, 33, 35, 36, 38, 40, 48, 59, 69, 72, 112, 135, 246, 249; delegitimization, xiv, 33, 36, 48, 112, 125, 180 leisure, 24, 40, 43, 166, 208, 210 liberalism; liberal approach, 73, 78, 145, 241; worldview, 243; liberal constitutionalism, 263–66; liberal democracy, xi, 253; lifestyle, 12, 26, 140, 156, 173, 203, 205, 207, 209–11, 215, 217, 231 Lüdtke, Alf, 8, 20–22, 24, 34 M Makarenko, Anton Semyonovich, 156, 217 management, ix, 62–68, 73, 76, 91, 120, 188, 247; administrative, 65, 75; self-management, xiv, 83–85, 90–92, 96–97, 101, 106

Making Sense of Dictatorship 01.indd 277

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Marx, Karl, 91, 218–19 Marxism, xiv, 6, 10, 84, 170, 187, 203, 207, 209, 212, 214, 215–16, 217, 219 243, 248; anti-Marxist, 219; non-Marxist, 214, 252; Marxism-Leninism, 6, 199, 248, 263 mass organizations, 53 media, xiv, 25, 63, 185, 187, 221, 233, 245 memory, xi, 33, 41, 107, 172, 199, 221–23, 227, 230, 232 middle class, 118, 158, 166 military, 6, 37, 45, 158–59, 164, 167–68, 171–72, 189, 198, 210, 241, 249 miners, 89–90, 92, 188 mining, xiv, 85, 88–89, 102, 179–80, 182, 186–88, 190–91, 197, 199 Mlinar, Zdravko, 96 Mlynář, Zdeněk, 245, 250–51, 266–67 mobilization, 19, 69, 87, 101, 134, 167, 168, 206, 222 modernity, xi, 134, 140, 179–80, 184, 185, 189, 197, 195, 199, 205, 217, 221 modernization, 113, 116–17, 139–40, 149, 184, 209, 248 municipality, xiv, 12, 15, 83–85, 91, 93, 95–107 N nation, ix; national framework, 227, 228, 260, 262, 236; national identity, 27, 222, 227; national memory, 223, 230; national tradition/heritage, 186, 190, 195–96, 197, 198, 235, 262 NATO, 158 Nazis, ix–x, xiii, 7, 11, 52, 224, 259; Nazi Germany, 20, 22 negotiation, 8, 61, 63, 67, 76, 118, 173, 248, 265 Neill, S. Alexander, 157–58 Nejedlý, Zdeněk, 186, 196 New Economic Mechanism, 123, 213 New Left, 98, 154, 203, 205, 212, 214, 217, 219 nomenklatura, 62

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278

INDE X

normality, x, xv, 10–11, 20, 48, 52, 107, 134, 247 normalization, 62, 71–73, 77, 185, 189, 193, 195–99, 227–28, 235, 242, 247, 267 nostalgia, 78, 184, 226 O obedience, x, 9–10, 56, 61, 69, 73 officials, 63, 103, 166, 188, 211, 215, 261 opponents, 6, 15, 19, 154, 242, 247, 250–51 opportunism, 52, 63, 67 opposition, xiii, 7–9, 16, 19, 48, 53–54, 61, 70–72, 154, 158, 162, 167, 171–72, 214, 235, 241, 243–59, 262, 264–67. See also dissidence oppression, 4–5, 224 P paradigm, 107; Sinnwelt, 167, 241; shift in, xi participation, 23, 53–54, 58–59, 85, 97, 100, 156, 169, 172, 206–7, 210, 212, 218 party, the, 3, 6, 22, 24, 37, 45, 54, 57, 63, 65, 70–71, 73–74, 76–78, 91–92, 111, 125, 173, 210, 237, 243, 246–48, 263; one-party system, 21; party apparatus, xv, 6, 69, 74, 247, 250; party dictatorship, 11, 250, 263; party elite, 13, 19, 72–74; party leadership/authority, 13, 55, 62–63, 68–69, 70–73, 75–76, 211, 224; state and party, 6, 250; party officials, 53, 166, 211. See also individual communist parties peace, ix, xiv, 5, 8, 20, 37, 40, 87, 161, 164–65, 173, 197, 229; peace movement, 17, 153, 154, 158–59, 160, 167–69, 171–73 perestroika, xiii, 15, 62–64, 68, 70–72, 76–77 perpetrators, 4–6, 59 persecution, 4, 6, 13, 245, 251, 259 petition, 121–22, 160, 164, 171, 251 pluralism, 72, 76 Poland, xiv–xv, 19, 86, 130–33, 135–36,

Making Sense of Dictatorship 01.indd 278

138–39, 148–49, 167, 210, 241, 243– 44, 246, 248, 256–59, 261–63, 267 police, 33–40, 42–48, 53, 56, 73, 159, 163, 187, 215, 231, 241, 245, 251, 254–55, 260, 262; history of, 33; secret police, 3–4, 42, 221 (see also state security under security) power, x, xv, 5–17, 19, 24, 26, 33–34, 38, 43, 47, 51–54, 56–57, 67, 74, 92, 123, 132, 135, 167, 185, 194, 217, 221, 244– 46, 248–49, 251, 254, 263; abuses of, 47, 162, 246, 254, 258; acceptance of, 59; demonstration of, 86; distribution of, x; erosion of, 27, 69; legitimation of, 11, 33, 38, 59; manpower, 161; monopoly of, 19, 61, 70; party power, 6; power elite, 199; power of the powerless, 221, 254; power politics, ix; powerless, x, 6, 122, 221, 224, 254; practices of, 212; relations of, x, 22, 53; representation of, 12, 20; state power, 163, 224; structures of, xiii, 8, 10, 36, 215 Prague Spring, 70, 187, 189–90, 224, 250–51 Prečan, Vilém, 223, 227–32, 235–36 prepolitical, ix, 25; acceptance, x, 15; ideals, ix; space, ix; support, xiii, 12, 112; non-political/unpolitical, 11, 24 private, 7, 15, 26, 33, 41, 43, 111, 114–15, 119, 137, 156, 160–61, 163, 171, 218, 226, 228, 230, 235, 258, 264; private life/sphere, 12, 36, 39–41, 43, 89, 114, 154, 173, 204, 208–9, 213 progress, ix, 7–8, 13–14, 19, 98, 100, 104, 114, 158, 173, 185, 187, 190, 194–95, 198–99, 219 propaganda, 33, 181, 193–94, 255 protest, 13, 15, 19, 26, 71, 153, 156, 160, 162, 165, 167–68, 171–72, 190, 214, 216, 221, 235, 244, 247, 251, 260, 262 public space, 41, 136, 190, 193, 197, 257 R reconstruction, xiv, 13, 19, 40–41, 68, 86, 154, 159, 162, 165, 184, 192, 195 referendum, 98–100, 104, 106 reform, xv, 7, 15, 61–65, 67, 69, 73–75, 78,

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INDE X

83, 91, 107, 123, 190, 214, 219, 224, 246, 250–53, 255, 264, 266–67 remembrance, 10, 59 repression, 20, 22, 26, 36, 53, 70, 72, 161, 224, 225, 231, 243–47, 249–51, 254–58, 261, 265 resistance, xiii, 9, 23, 26, 36, 48, 66, 142, 164, 167, 184, 188, 214, 221, 234–35, 237, 241–42, 244, 253–54, 257–59, 265–67 revolutions, 17, 19, 59, 132, 158, 180, 189, 211–12, 214–15, 222, 231, 237, 265–66; revolutionary activism/radicalism, 212, 265; revolutionary era, 186, 249; revolutionary legitimacy, ix; revolutionary romanticism, 215 Romania, xiii, 33, 34–36, 38–39, 42, 46–48, 225 Romanian Communist Party (PCR), 39 rulers and ruled, x, xiii, 10, 52, 106 rural, 24, 85, 97, 100–101, 104, 106, 117, 131, 134 Russia, 132, 158, 195, 224, 226; Soviet Russia, 3. See also Soviet Union

S samizdat, xv, 218, 221–30, 232–37, 244, 253, 257–58, 260, 262 scarcity, 39, 112–15, 117, 120–22, 124 Securitate, 34, 39, 42–43, 45, 47–48 security, ix, 40, 144, 262; public, 33; state security, xiii, 34, 51–52, 54–55, 57, 153, 172 SED, 4–6, 8–10, 12–13, 15–17, 21, 25, 52–53, 153, 163–64, 166–67, 169 self-imposed contribution, xiv, 98–107 self-organizing society, 257 Sinnwelt, ix–xi, xiii–xv, 3, 15, 19–20, 25–26, 36, 83, 85, 149, 154–56, 162, 167, 172–73, 179, 187, 190–91, 198, 222, 237, 241. See also world of meaning sociability, 163 social capital, 85, 100–101, 106–7, 143, 232 social justice, 11, 112–13, 116, 172

Making Sense of Dictatorship 01.indd 279

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social movements, 195, 205, 216 social order, x, xiii, xiv, 7, 11, 71, 73, 85, 113; disorder, 132, 142 social practices, x, xiv–xv, 9–11, 22–23, 25, 113, 149, 204, 218 socialism, ix–x, xiv–xv, 3, 5, 7–8, 12–14, 20, 34, 47, 70–71, 73, 75, 78, 91, 111–12, 114, 140, 155, 183, 199, 203–4, 207–11, 213–15, 219, 226, 248; alternative model of, 90; and capitalism, xiv, 207–10, 214; construction/building of, xv, 111, 186, 212–13; democratic/democratization of, 213, 251; East German, 23; enemies of, 69–71; history of, xi, 242; Hungarian, 117, 126; late, xiv, 176, 180, 184, 199, 203, 222, 227; market socialism, 123; Polish independent, 261; post-socialism, 222–23; real (“really existing”), xiii-xiv, 23, 63, 76, 154, 196; reflexive, 193; Soviet, 84; state socialism, ix, xiv–xv, 9, 20, 22–23, 33, 35, 61, 65, 71, 73–74, 77, 98, 162, 170, 179, 186, 187, 188, 192, 200, 242; technocratic, 185, 199; triumph of, 166; utopia of, 114–15, 125, 183; values of, 72; with a human face, 263 socialist state. See under state socialist town, 90 Solidarity (trade union), 129, 248, 259, 262, 265 solidarity, xiv, 38, 44, 61, 85, 97, 99, 104, 106–7, 119, 166, 213, 216, 231, 245 Soviet Bloc, 169, 183, 210, 215, 259 Soviet model, 64, 66, 84, 88, 135, 158 Soviet system, 5, 134, 246 Soviet Union (USSR), 15, 63, 70, 78, 133, 139, 149, 172, 189, 195, 224, 243, 262; reforms in, 15, 62–64, 69 (see also perestroika); samizdat in, 225, 226, 232, 236, 260 stability, ix, 6, 8, 10–11, 19, 40, 62–63, 71–74, 141, 149 Stalinism, xv, 3, 13, 90, 111, 134, 180–81, 209, 246, 249, 251, 259–61; de-Stalinization, xv, 209; post-Stalinist, 180, 186, 190; Stalin-cities, 86 Stasi, 4, 16, 52, 56, 59, 154, 160–61, 163, 168, 171–73

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280

INDE X

state socialism. See under socialism state; communist, xv, 209, 242, 261, 264; normative, xv, 242, 245–50, 266–67; socialist, xiv, 54, 115, 120, 124–25, 154, 162–63, 170, 174, 186, 195–96, 198, 213, 215, 227, 245; welfare, 8; withering away of, 84, 91; workers’ and peasants’, 7, 51, 59 Steinsbergowa, Aniela, 243, 259–61, 264, 266 stigmatization, 69–72, 130, 145, 147, 251 Štrougal, Lubomír, 62, 74 struggle, 13, 162, 166, 199, 211, 214, 232, 241, 251–54, 257, 162, 182, 189, 263, 265, 266–67 subordination, 47, 73, 255 surveillance, xiii, 4–5, 41–43, 51–59, 159, 163, 262 T taboo, xiv, 54, 76, 130, 137, 149–50 Tarr, Béla, 126 Thaa, Winfried, 12, 111 totalitarianism, xi, 8, 12, 21, 22, 241; totalitarian systems/states, 5–6, 11, 154, 157; anti-totalitarian perspective, 5, 167, 241 trade unions, 54, 112, 115–19, 121–22, 124, 138, 169, 248, 255 tradition, 15, 89, 92, 96, 125, 133, 135, 157, 185, 205, 207, 210, 229, 232, 253, 261, 267; national tradition, 186 transformation, xi, 22, 27, 64, 72, 133, 139, 141, 154, 179, 199, 210–11, 213–14 U Ulbricht, Walter, 3, 6, 12 United States, 170, 172, 183, 228 Unsinn, 173 urban, x, 46, 85, 89, 92, 97, 100–101, 103– 104, 117, 131, 153, 156, 162–65, 173, 179–80, 182–85, 190–93, 196–97, 231 US National Endowment for Democracy, 228 utopia, x, 13, 22, 114–15, 125, 154, 180, 183–84, 190, 211

Making Sense of Dictatorship 01.indd 280

V Velenje, xiv, 83–85, 89, 90, 92–107 victims, 3–6, 38, 59, 67, 135, 258–59 violence, 3, 6, 10–11, 13, 16, 19, 47, 54, 112, 212, 257–58 voluntarism, 207, 246, 249 voluntary contribution/work, xiv, 85, 89–90, 93–98, 100–107, 157 voting, 12, 15, 56–58, 98, 100. See also elections W Warsaw Pact, 198, 224, 227, 250 Weber, Max, 6, 10, 22, 53 welfare, ix, 5, 8, 45, 46, 98, 134, 136, 138, 157, 204; welfare state, 8 West Berlin, 157–58, 163, 168, 172–73 West Germany (Federal Republic of Germany), 7, 26, 155, 157–58, 171, 185 Wolf, Christa, 7, 170 work brigades, 24, 86, 87 workers’ councils, 66–67, 91 working class, 25, 166, 214–15, 248 world of meaning, xiv, 3, 10–13, 16, 20, 26–27, 36, 48, 125, 154, 267. See also Sinnwelt World War II, 88, 93, 131, 132, 162, 164, 184n Y youth, 86–87, 98, 101, 103–4, 169, 206, 211, 214, 217 Yugoslavia, 84, 86–88, 90–91, 95, 97–99, 105, 120 Z Zeman, Miloš, 76 Žgank, Nestl, 92–93, 99 Zinoviev, Grigori, 3

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