A comparison of the 1968 social movements in Czechoslovakia and in Western Europe

Implementation: 2017–2019

Head of project: Martin Valenta

Description of project: The comparison of social movements of the year 1968 in Czechoslovakia and in Western Europe, with the main emphasis on West Germany, will focus on three periods. The first period covers the ideological roots in the years 1962–66, when, on the one hand, the prerequisites for Czechoslovak “reform Communism” were developing and on the other, the protest movement in West German was evolving. The next phase is the years 1967–1969 and the “year 1968” itself, when the efforts for the implementation of “socialism with a human face” in Czechoslovakia and the revolutionary attempts and upheavals in West Germany peaked. At the heart of the research are the impacts of the 1968 movement in the years 1970–1980, when the phenomena of the German New Social Movements and Czechoslovak dissent were established (e.g., the events accompanying the establishment of Charter 77 in comparison with the “German Autumn” 1977).