After Utopia: Czechoslovak Normalization Between Experiment and Experience, 1968-1989

The Husák government that came into power after the suppression of the Prague Spring formulated the goal of restoring "normality" in Czechoslovakia. It revoked prior reforms and initiated widespread "cleansing measures" and repression. Most notably, however, it lacked a clear vision for the future. The contributions in this volume show that the 1970s and 1980s were nevertheless not a time of complete stagnation. Efforts at restoration and modernization frequently existed simultaneously and counteractively. The essays discuss this contradictoriness and the often invisible dynamics of the normalization period exemplarily. A further key topic is the normalization's echo in literature, remembrance culture, and historiography.