Oslo – September 2003

Alexander Dubcek in the Federal Parliament After November 1989

Jozef Žatkuliak

Alexander Dubcek was a multi-dimensional personality and politician, who combined humanism and democracy in his life story. He also expressed this when he received an honorary doctorate from Comenius University in December 1991: „I support a moral conception of politics. For me morality merges with humanity. Humanity and not violence is my programme“. 1 Dubcek’s programme was based on deep social feeling. He supported European federalism and integration, as well as the idea of a common Czecho-Slovak state. A further pillar of his programme was his sincere relationship to his native Slovakia and his own nation: “The Slovak nation developed into a modern nation with its own identity, which cannot be forgotten at home, in Europe or in the world. It contributes to the development and enrichment of European science and culture. Is more evidence necessary of the extraordinary internal strength of the Slovak nation?”. 2 He valued its social, Christian, democratic and humanist values.

The political evaluation of Stalinism or rather the cult of personality, heard at the Twentieth Congress of the Soviet Communist Party in 1956, as well as experiences from the “Slovak and Czech Spring” of 1968 as part of a great European and world movement contributed to Dubcek’s ideological development. Naturally, even in the seventies and eighties, Dubcek was not “silenced” with his open letters addressed to political and state authorities at home and abroad. These letters defended the reform movement of 1968, criticized the policy of the communist regime for its violation of human and civil rights and persecution of reformist communists. He welcomed Soviet Perestrojka as an impulse for social change in Czecho- Slovakia. The world appreciated his humanization of politics or socialism. The University of Bologna awarded him an honorary doctorate in November 1988, and in January 1990 he received the Andrej Sacharov Prize for the Defence of Human Rights at the European Parliament in Strasbourg.

At that time, Dubcek held the second highest state function in Czecho-Slovakia – the post of speaker of the Federal Assembly. After the collapse of the communist system, the renewal of democracy, parliamentarism, political and economic pluralism began. Dubcek understood the depth of the social changes, and the fact that they went beyond the limits of the 1968 reforms. However, this difference was both his strength and his weakness, it involved both advantages and losses in the future. He embodied the “interrupted Czecho-Slovak revolution” of 1968 and the need for the coming of 17th November 1989 and the return of Czecho-Slovakia to the camp of the democratic states. For the still vital 68 year old Dubcek a second “spring” came in a more favourable international situation than 20 years earlier. He perceived the possibility of a rehabilitation of the reforms of 1968 and the political group, which had supported them. He was aware of the changes and reasons, which led to the West failing to help the Slovak and Czech nation in the years 1938, 1948 and 1968, in spite of strong moral support. The bi- polar world ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the so-called Soviet Bloc. Renewal of the sovereignty of the Czecho-Slovak state was within reach.

1 Literárny týždenník, no.1-2, 3rd January 1992. 2 Ibid. The democratic revolution could not develop without dealing with the occupation of the state in August 1968 and apologies from the countries, which participated in it. On 26th November 1989, Dubcek already demanded the resignation of the compromised leadership of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and called on the countries, which had participated in the occupation, to declare it invalid. The Soviet communist leader Michail Gorbachov, who later described Dubcek as the “spiritual” father of Soviet Perestrojka, under pressure from Czech and Slovak society and the chief protagonists of the revolution – Obciansky forum (OF – Civic Forum) and Verejnost proti násiliu (VPN – Public Against Violence), he apologized for the occupation, and he annulled it together with representatives of other states of the former Soviet Bloc. One of the main aims of the revolution and especially of A. Dubcek was fulfilled. This, at least moderated the 20 year trauma in Czech and Slovak society, which demanded the democratic transformation of the social system. In the middle of December 1989, Dubcek announced that he would not join the Communist Party, which, in his view, would have to undergo deep changes, so that it “could learn to live in a pluralist system”. He continued: “Where foreign relations are concerned, I support the process of European integration, which covers the economic, cultural and social areas and contributes to strengthening of relations between states and nations”. 3

The rehabilitation of 1968 strengthened Dubcek’s social position, but the OF and VPN still blamed him for his communist past and feared his candidature for the post of president of Czecho-Slovakia. In spite of this he expressed the trustworthiness of the social changes for the world, and shouts of “Dubcek for the Castle” resounded on Letenská plán in Prague. They gave priority to the hitherto little known representative of the OF Václav Havel, who was helped in the presidential election by the new federal prime minister, the Slovak Marián Calfa, who sacrificed the Slovak national aspect to his personal careerist interests. Havel already publicly promised that he would only be a “temporary” president until the parliamentary elections, when Dubcek would replace him, but Havel and Calfa did not fulfill this. This brought the first split in Slovak – Czech and Czech – Slovak relations. In spite of the change in the social system, there was a repeat of the disputes about the division of the highest state posts between the Slovaks and Czechs at the time of the election of the speaker of the Federal Assembly at the turn of the years 1968-69. They contributed to the removal of Josef Smrkovský, who was very close to Dubcek.

After April 1969, Dubcek became for the second time speaker of the Federal Assembly on 28th December 1989. He received this post in an entirely different internal political situation to that in April 1969, when he was forced to leave the highest political position. He became one of the main representatives of change in the social system after 17th November, associated with the coming of political and economic plurality, a new legal order and the renewal of parliamentary government. However, nobody had experience of parliamentary government. They started from the beginning. Dubcek, with substantial support from the first deputy speaker of parliament and later Czech Social Democrat Zdenek Jicínský, and with the Czech National Council and Slovak National Council, needed to establish a new legal order guaranteeing democratic changes. However, at the beginning of 1990, Havel himself indirectly caused a serious dispute between the Czech and Slovak political representatives. He did not realize that it was not enough to remove the word “Socialist” from the existing name of the federation – “Czechoslovak Socialist Republic”, but it was necessary to rehabilitate the position of Slovakia in the name and shield of the common state as a union of two national republics. Dubcek, the most significant supporter of Czecho-Slovak unity, played a key role

3 Interviews for the newspapers L’UNITA and LA REPUBLICA. CTK, Rome, 17.12.1989. In: www.ceskenoviny.cz/iso/1989/zpravy/ on the floor of the federal parliament in solving the disputes and easing the tension, which had spread between the Slovak and Czech societies. “Today we start from the primary sovereignty of the national republics and we respect the relationship between the sovereignty of the federation and the republics on the basis of the principle that without the sovereign republics there cannot be a firm federation, while without a stable federation there will not be strong republics”. 4 He supported the justified proposals of the Slovak national authorities, and, in the complex internal political situation, he participated in ending the hyphen war in April 1990 and adopting the following name for the common state: Ceská a Slovenská Federatívna Republika (CSFR – Czech and Slovak Federal Republic). However, he realized that part of the VPN was not able to flexibly react to the intensity and depth of the conflict over the federal symbols.

Dubcek’s “Europeanism” received a new dimension in May 1990, when Michail Gorbachov described the occupation of Czecho-Slovakia as a strategic mistake of the former Soviet leadership. Up to the parliamentary elections of 8th-9th June 1990, he figured as one of the leaders of the VPN. His internal and international credit meant that he was again given the post of speaker of the federal parliament. Czecho-Slovakia then completed the basic democratic changes in the social system.

Before the approving of the so-called responsibilities act on 11th December, he declared that his whole life had been „dedicated to ensuring that a spirit of understanding, tolerance, cooperation and fellowship prevailed between the Czechs and Slovaks“. 5

However, the Czech right never „forgave“ the Slovak side for gaining responsibilities for the national republics and not supporting the variant of a centralized federation. In addition, the two main political groups of the democratic revolution in Czecho-Slovakia – the OF and VPN – disintegrated, after differences on the organization of the Czecho-Slovak state appeared within them. The Czech Obcianská demokratická strana (ODS – Civil Democratic Party) of Václav Klaus and the Obcianská demokratická aliancia (ODA – Civil Democratic Alliance) and the Slovak nationalists led by the Slovenská národná strana (SNS – Slovak National Party) accused Dubcek of joining the „pro-federal forces“, but in reality he continued to support political consensus on the functioning of the existing Czecho-Slovak federation on the basis of respect for the national and state attributes of the Slovak and Czech nations. From this point of view, he regarded the dismissal of Meciar as an erroneous step, because he was a „consistent defender of the rights and needs of the Slovak Republic and nation“. 6 Dubcek welcomed the formation of the Hnutie za demokratické Slovensko (HZDS – Movement for a Democratic Slovakia), but refused to join it, which Meciar „never forgot“. He did not understand that Dubcek was not concerned with his conception of a confederation, but with the elimination of centrifugal forces within the common state.

In September 1991, he said with concern in an evaluation of the results of various discussions between Slovak and Czech representatives on the state of preparation of the federal and national constitutions, that „they were constantly bringing into this process new approaches, names of procedures but not the content of relations, which should be based on the

4 Slovak National Council, 21st meeting, 9th February 1990, Stenografická správa o schôdzi Slovenskej národnej rady (Short hand record of the meetings of the Slovak National Council), Bratislava, February 1990, p.39-40. 5 www.psp.cz Digitální knihovna, FS CSFR 1990-1992, Spolecná schuze Sl a SN – stenoprotokoly, 9. Schuze, (Digital Library, Federal Assembly of the Czecho – Slovak Federal Republic 1990-1992, Joint Meeting of the Chamber of the People and Chamber of the Nations – short hand record, 9th meeting) 11.12.1990, part 85/114, p.5-6. 6 Národná obroda, 26.4.1991. Constitutional Act on Responsibilities, the Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms and so on“. 7 Dubcek was greatly troubled by the problems in the constitutional talks. He reacted by pointing to the far-reaching consequences of disintegration of the Czecho-Slovak federation: „The new federation will clearly express the autonomy of the republics and not a centralized unitarism, which is not in harmony either with the present processes of democracy or with the market economy. The future constitution of the federation will probably include the principle of the sovereignty of the republics... Therefore, we should not place sovereignty in opposition to the federal form of Czecho-Slovak statehood. It is necessary to respect political reality on both sides, so that the principle of equal with equal can be fulfilled in practice“. 8 He attempted to integrate the different approaches of the Slovak and Czech sides to the form of the federation and the division of legal powers between it and the republics. Precisely these areas had to be worked out for the proposed federal constitution, and they became a stumbling block in the constitutional negotiations. He endeavoured for mutual understanding even on the occasion of his seventieth birthday: „I am putting all my effort into ensuring that the name of the Czecho – Slovak Federal Republic and its integral parts – the Czech Republic and Slovak Republic become synonyms of democracy, prosperity, humanity, tolerance, law and the rule of law...“9

The Czech right „did not forgive“ the Slovak side for transferring legal powers to the republics in December 1990, and it „did not forgive“ Dubcek either. These political circles, grouped especially in ODS and ODA, directly demanded the resignation of Dubcek from the post of speaker of the federal parliament. He also supported preservation of the Chamber of the Nations in the Federal Assembly, which the right wanted to abolish and so open a space for one nation to use its majority to impose its will on the other before the next parliamentary elections. Dubcek’s submitted proposal started from the view that the Czecho – Slovak Federal Republic was a parliamentary republic on federal principles. The proposal introduced “a functional system of checks and balances, which aimed to secure a balance between the legislative and executive powers, to avoid conflicts between the constitutional bodies and enable their solution if they arose”. 10 Therefore, two chambers were included in the proposal – the Chamber of Representatives and the Senate. Their legal powers and mutual relations were defined. The constitutional negotiations ended in failure at Mílovy in February 1992. Dubcek, together with the speaker of the Czech National Council Dagmar Burešová and the speaker of the Slovak National Council František Mikloško, with whom he was on good terms, appealed to the coming parliamentary elections in their decision on what would happen next in relation to the common state of the Slovak and Czech nations. In reality, however, they handed over the political power to decide on the future of the federation to the dominant Czech party ODS, which insisted either on a centralist federation or independent state and to the Movement for a Democratic Slovakia (HZDS) with its conception of a confederation. As a supporter of a common state with strong national republics, Dubcek rejected both solutions.

7 Dubcek’s statement appeared under the warning title “Disintegration would have far-reaching consequences”. In: Národná obroda, 9.9.1991, p.1. 8 Report from the Czecho-Slovak Press Agency (CSTK), 29.9.1991. 9 Slovak National Archive, Collection of Hubert Max. 10 www.psp.cz Digitální knihovna, FS CSFR 1990-1992, Spolecná schuze Sl a SN – stenoprotokoly, 20. Schuze, 2. Cást (Digital Library, Federal Assembly of the Czecho – Slovak Federal Republic 1990-1992, Joint Meeting of the Chamber of the People and Chamber of the Nations – short hand record, 20th meeting 2nd part) 22.1.1992, part 12/135, p.2-4. Dubcek resisted strong pressure from the Czech right, which forcibly blocked his access to an assembly in Prague from the balcony of Melantrich on 21.11.1991. President Havel did not protest against this incident, but „only“ took him by the hand. Full of fear of the possible break up of the common state, Dubcek wanted to speak in its defence and support. In: Národná obroda, 23.11.1991. The Czech right, but also some Slovak political groups, attacked Dubcek not only for his defence of Slovak and federal national and state interests, but also because he represented a route to creating a model of society with a definitely social democratic orientation. He had already progressed from reformist communism to the democratic socialism of Western European social democrats. He emphasized the social aspects of the market economy, in contrast to the ever more insistent neo-liberals, who gave priority to the „free“ market. He did not favour this, because such a market negatively effected the social weaker groups in the population and lowered their standard of living especially in Slovakia.

These social phenomena stimulated consideration of the meaningfulness of his political orientation. His discision took relatively long. On 12th March 1992, he said that „I still have not entered the social democrat scene, but various machinations are already appearing to put this against HZDS or the Party of the Democratic Left (SDL) or other parties and movements“. 11 On 14th March 1992, he joined the Sociálnodemokratická strana na Slovensku (SDSS – Social Democratic Party in Slovakia) and at its congress on 28th March in Košice, he became its chairman and leader for the parliamentary elections, which were held on 5th – 6th June 1992. A short time before them, he emphasized that only the national republics could solve the problem of the future of the Czecho-Slovak federation. He pointed to the negative attitude of part of the Czech political scene towards the proposals of the Slovak side to anchor national identity in legal documents. He was one of the few politicians, who understood the consequences of failure to solve the Czech national question for the position of Slovakia in the common state. He commented: „I hope I will never hear the sentence: „There is already nothing to talk about!“ (He reacted to the reaction of the Czech National Council to the failure of the constitutional negotiations. – Note J.Ž) This argument of the Czech side was a product of their national-chauvinist wave, although outwardly they express things differently. I can prove this with one convincing argument. In part of the Czech political scene, the representatives outwardly declare support for Czecho-Slovak unity, for common statehood, but their real steps and actions lead to the opposite“12, as well as to radicalization of the political scene. In the end, Dubcek, promoter of national harmony, failed in his position between the two constitutional conceptions for organization of the Czecho-Slovak state. Perhaps he attempted the impossible, although under his leadership, the federal parliament played a significant role in laying the legislative and constitutional foundations for irreversible changes in the social system. He spoke of the two year electoral period as the years of the „renaissance of parliamentarism“.13

His political charisma helped the Social Democrats to win seats in the federal parliament and he became a member of the Chamber of the Nations. The Social Democrats did not gain seats in the Chamber of the People or in the Slovak parliament. Had Dubcek „failed“ again, or was it a sign of the weakness of the Slovak Social Democrats?

Dubcek attempted to gain a significant position for the Social Democratic movement in Slovakia under the influence of their foreign partners, and so in the context of the policy positions of the social democratic parties of Europe. Good relations with European socialists and social democrats such as Olaf Palme, Willy Brandt, Francois Mitterand, Bruno Kreiski

11 Národná obroda, 13.3.1992, p.1-2. 12 Smena, 3.6.1992, p.3. 13 www.psp.cz Digitální knihovna, FS CSFR 1990-1992, Spolecná schuze Sl a SN – stenoprotokoly, 22. Schuze, (Digital Library, Federal Assembly of the Czecho – Slovak Federal Republic 1990-1992, Joint Meeting of the Chamber of the People and Chamber of the Nations – short hand record, 22nd meeting) 30.4.1992, part 144/144, p.5. and the political approaches of the Italian Communists to the leftist movement also influenced him. He rejected union with Czech Social Democracy, because he did not want to accept the Czechoslovakist understanding of social democratic politics, which existed before and after the Second World War. He also supported the national principle in the party structure.

The parliamentary elections were won in the Czech Republic by Klaus’ ODS and in the Slovak Republic by Meciar’s HZDS. Their talks in Brno, Bratislava and Prague were clearly directed towards the division of the common state of the Czechs and Slovaks. Not only Dubcek, but also the Christian Democratic Movement (KDH), the Party of the Democratic Left (SKL), the Czech Social Democrats and other political groups in the Czecho – Slovak Federal Republic objected to their decision. Dubcek took it hard that in searching for starting points they did not reach a compromise solution because of the party interests of the divided Czech and Slovak political elites. On 16th July 1992, probably in his last appearance in the federal parliament, he asked the members whether parliament, without the decision of the citizens, could give the government authority “to carry out the transfer of property including obligations to newly created entities.”14 He supported the preservation of the common Czecho-Slovak state, but the leaders of the ODS and HZDS Klaus and Meciar agreed on the “legitimate” dissolution of the Czecho-Slovak federation at a meeting in Bratislava on 22nd- 23rd July 1992. He realized that if there was not enough strength and will for its preservation, it would mean the end of it.

On 1st September 1992, the day on which the Constitution of the Slovak Republic was adopted, the car, in which Dubcek was travelling because of his parliamentary duties, crashed on the motorway near Humpolec. Dubcek was taken to the Na Homolke hospital in Prague with serious injuries. He died there on 7th November 1992.15 His death not only provoked speculation, it also opened further contradictory and often insensitive, undignified discussions and disputes about his message and political activity. He was buried on 14th November with his wife Anna in Slávicie údolie in Bratislava. The participants in his funeral included the chairman of the Socialist Internationale Pierre Mauroy and the speaker of the Austrian parliament Heinz Fisher.

During a special event held in Bonn in honour of A. Dubcek in November 1996, the speaker of the German parliament Rita Süssmuth stated: “No statesman symbolizes the dramatic changes of the last ten years as well as Alexander Dubcek. He represented his time, but was also ahead of it”. 16 She added that Dubcek’s life was full of paradoxes. At Uhrovec, where he was born on 27th November 1921, a memorial tablet bears the inscription: “The nation he directed with his reason and with his conscience will not perish”. However, it is a paradox that for a long time now, official circles have devoted little or only occasional attention to Dubcek. His message is remembered more by Slovak society, which places him among the three most important historic personalities and the reform process of 1968 and the beginnings of the democratic revolution after November 1989, in which he was substantially involved, among the brightest pages of Slovak and Czecho-Slovak history. Dubcek’s death is still symbolically associated with the dissolution of Czecho-Slovakia.

14 Ibid., 2nd meeting, 16.7.1992, part 14/18. 15 After Dubcek’s death, the Social Democrats never got into the Slovak parliament independently and varied around one percent in public opinion polls. “If Dubcek had lived” also applied in this direction, not only for gaining the possible post of President of Slovakia, where the majority of Slovaks wanted to see him. 16 Parlamentný kuriér no. XXXV, December 1996, p.4.