The ÚSTR Fiasco: How to Mismanage Historical Memory and Undermine Public Trust

3. 10. 2024 / Muriel Blaive

Two years ago, I was dismissed from ÚSTR, ostensibly due to “administrative reorganization.” This marked the beginning of a series of terminations that breached the newly appointed director Kudrna’s initial assurances to the trade unions that no firings would take place. I had the dubious distinction of being the first researcher dismissed, but I was certainly not the last. To date, more than 80 employees – over half of the institute's total workforce – have either resigned or been terminated, including the entire educational department. Such extensive turnover raises serious doubts as to the institution’s ability to maintain its administrative and academic integrity. Moreover, the credentials of many of the newly appointed staff are questionable – the appointment of a former sports journalist as the editor of the institute’s flagship journal Paměť a dějiny (History and Memory) or of a policeman to lead the civic educational section come to mind.

At the time of my dismissal, I hypothesized that the management’s incompetence might be a deliberate strategy aimed at dismantling the institute. Although it remains unclear whether this assumption was accurate or not, even the Board and the new management must have been pleasantly surprised by the extent to which they could persist with this charade – exploiting public funds without encountering significant resistance or sparking widespread public outrage. This outcome has been facilitated by the dominant anticommunist narrative pervading the media and public discourse, which serves primarily as a rhetorical tool to delegitimize anyone daring to criticize the power grab of the “anticommunists.” The public indifference to ÚSTR’s moral decay is striking, as the institute continues to operate without accountability, offering lucrative positions to third-rate researchers who would struggle to secure employment in reputable academic settings. ÚSTR does not reflect the level of Czech academia, but it undeniably reflects the abysmal level of Czech politics, where public resources are mismanaged with little regard for the common good.

I could have written vastly different accounts of my legal proceedings against ÚSTR depending on the month in question. Between June 2023 and August 2024, the case saw fluctuating outcomes: I initially lost, then won, won again, and ultimately lost, with both the lower court and the appellate court alternating rulings in my favor and against me. Given the erratic nature of these decisions, it is difficult to draw any definitive conclusions about the Czech judicial system vs. communist history at this stage. My next step is to appeal to the Supreme Court, where the case may finally reach a more conclusive and substantive resolution.

The public knowledge of what the communist regime was is disappearing fast

My lawyer, Pavel Uhl, and I initially sued on freedom of opinion grounds. We presented in court the interview conducted by Barbora Tachecí with the newly appointed director Kudrna on Czech public radio, aiming to demonstrate that Tachecí had incited Kudrna to declare his intent to dismiss me based on his mischaracterization of me as a revisionist historian and, by extension in his mind, a supporter of Vladimir Putin. Kudrna’s and Tachecí’s misunderstanding of the term “revisionist historian” and the baseless association they make with support for Putin only underscores that they operate in an ideological echo with no inkling about basic historical methodology.

What particularly caught my attention, however, was the fact that the first-instance judge, though professionally competent and impeccably composed in her duties, appeared to lack knowledge of the historical context, likely due to her age. Being in her early 40s, she represented the first generation with minimal lived experience or formal education regarding the nuances of the communist period. In a country where the history of communism has been insufficiently taught and even more often, outright neglected for over 35 years, it is unsurprising that those under 50 now possess limited knowledge of that era.

Some irony lies in the fact that the educational department of ÚSTR was precisely trying to remedy this lack of historical culture in contemporary Czech society. This department, under the leadership of Čeněk Pýcha, was developing innovative curricula and educational materials to teach the complexities of the communist era to Czech pupils, an effort which was abruptly halted at the institute when Kudrna dismissed Pýcha, leading the entire department to resign in protest. Deputy Director Nedvědický and Director Kudrna then foolishly sued the departing researchers for slander after the latter publicly criticized their incompetence. The lawsuit backfired when the researchers won, with both ÚSTR leaders incurring significant damages – 773,000 Kč in all, which was later reduced to 256,000 Kč – which they were forced to pay out of their own pockets. No worries, in a new height of administrative impropriety, the institute reimbursed them through lavish Christmas bonuses. Děda Mraz, the communist version of Saint Nicolas, is still among us! The same leadership further compounded their failures by pressuring the publisher to halt the production of the award-winning educational manual Soudobé dějiny put together by the same educational department, thereby reducing an institute devoted to the study of censorship into a parody of its own mission.

In this context, “my” presiding judge interpreted Kudrna’s accusation, when he referred to me as a “revisionist historian” and associated this label with support for Vladimir Putin, as meaning that Kudrna accused me of being Putin himself, rendering the claim both perplexing and irrelevant. Consequently, in the initial ruling, she determined that the institute had the right to dismiss researchers they no longer wished to employ, leading to my defeat in court. However, the appellate court ruled in my favor, stating that the institute was obligated to offer me an alternative, even if less qualified, position. The case was returned to the first instance, where the judge now demonstrated that the institute had made no credible attempt to provide me with such a position, resulting in a ruling this time in my favor. Yet, the appellate court subsequently reversed once more this decision, now affirming, in an apparent contradiction to its earlier ruling, the institute’s right to terminate my employment. We will now appeal to the Supreme Court.

The historical narrative of the communist period was pre-written in 1993

Regarding the concept of “revisionist history”, I quickly realized that expecting people outside academic circles to fully grasp its nuanced meaning was futile. As my lawyer, Pavel Uhl, patiently reminded me, “In court, we resolve concrete legal issues, not academic squabbles.” This comment is doubtless right, but it underscores a deeper issue at stake at the core of the distortion that ÚSTR has undergone. The institute, established by a 2007 law, was tasked with researching repression and resistance understood strictly, meaning it did not include the task to study the more complex dynamics of collaboration or accommodation with the communist regime. This narrow interpretation incidentally became one of the justifications for my dismissal, as ÚSTR frequently argued in court that my work did not align with the institution’s mandate of studying repression and resistance. What is important here is that this 2007 law did not arise in isolation; it was, in fact, a direct continuation of a 1993 law which officially declared the former communist regime “illegal” and “criminal.” This legal framework shapes the institution’s rigid focus, sidelining more comprehensive approaches to understanding the communist past.

In my current research project, which focuses on dealing with the communist past – precisely the project for which ÚSTR chose not to retain my employment –, I document how the phrasing of this 1993 law has constrained the historiography of communism for decades. Historians began researching the communist era in 1990 when the Institute of Contemporary History at the Academy of Sciences was founded. These scholars, legitimately aligned with pro-Havel, pro-dissent, and pro-democracy viewpoints, saw their work shaped by the political climate of the time and the prevailing narrative, including this parliamentary declaration that the communist regime was illegal and criminal. I am quoting from Law 198/1993:

The Parliament declares that the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, its leadership and its members are responsible for the way in which our country was governed between 1948 and 1989, in particular for the programmatic destruction of the traditional values of European civilization and for the deliberate violation of human rights and freedoms, for the moral and economic decline accompanied by judicial crimes and terror against those who held different opinions … The regime based on the communist ideology, which determined the governance of the state and the fate of the citizens in Czechoslovakia from 25 February 1948 to 17 November 1989, was criminal, illegitimate and reprehensible … The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia was a criminal and despicable organisation, similar to other organizations based on its ideology, which in their activities aimed at suppressing human rights and the democratic system.

Such a legal and ideological framework made it impossible for historians to explore the complexities of the communist regime, such as its sources of legitimacy or amount of popular support. They lacked the methodological tools to illustrate how the population itself played an active role in sustaining the regime and, mainly, they were in no frame of mind to even conceive of such a heretical thought – such an interpretation was ideologically unpalatable. It was not until nearly two decades later, primarily through the efforts of Charles University scholars under the leadership of Michal Pullmann, that a revisionist perspective on the communist period began to emerge. This intellectual shift was facilitated by the financial support and methodological influence of German academic institutions, including that of my future boss in Vienna, Thomas Lindenberger.

Thus, I was somewhat surprised in summer 2024 when I transitioned to the legal phase of my research project. As I sought to collaborate with and interview legal scholars and practitioners on how Czech society has dealt with its communist past from a legal point of view, I indeed encountered an unexpected misunderstanding. I organized panels at the intersection of history and law at the International Public Law Congress (ICON) in July, and I spoke with or interviewed a number of Czech legal professionals, particularly concerning the relationship between history writing and “memory laws.” These discussions opened new avenues of inquiry into the way in which legal frameworks can both shape and constrain historical understanding. Let me explain.

A crucial misunderstanding between lawmakers, lawyers, and historians

What I discovered was that lawmakers, judges, and legal scholars have a markedly different interpretation of this 1993 law from historians. While I contend that this law significantly influenced the historiography of the communist period post-1989, the legal professionals I consulted unanimously regarded it as merely a symbolic gesture – an abstract declaration signaling the Czech Republic’s transition to democracy and its repudiation of its communist past. Several of them explicitly stated in almost identical words, “It is only declaratory; it’s a meaningless law!”

As a historian, I was slightly taken aback by the casual dismissal of a law as “meaningless” by legal experts. I must admit I tend to believe that the Czech parliament should exercise caution in enacting laws deemed without substance, and that legal professionals ought perhaps to actively oppose such developments rather than wave them away as harmless. But more crucially, I was surprised to find that these legal professionals seemed entirely oblivious to the law’s ramifications for historical writing. They perceive it as an abstract indulgence of the post-communist state that has had no tangible consequences. This perspective overlooks the fact that the law has decisively shaped the state’s narrative on communism and has laid the groundwork for subsequent memory laws and for the later establishment of ÚSTR precisely within this anticommunist memorial framework.

This disconnect between legal theory and historical practice highlights a significant gap in understanding the implications of legal instruments on the construction of collective memory and national identity, as well as the potential for laws to influence the historiographical landscape in profound ways.

The narrative framing the former communist regime as illegal and criminal has, incidentally, been constructed largely without substantial historical basis. In fact, the legality of the communist regime was more pronounced in Czechoslovakia than anywhere else, as it was the only country to adopt communism through a voluntary political process. The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ) secured a genuine victory in the free elections of 1946 (38% of the vote), leading to a series of compromises with the Democrats, which included the restriction of certain democratic rights to facilitate and legitimize the expulsion of the Sudeten Germans. The February 1948 takeover was ratified by Parliament, with no dissenting vote, and was endorsed by President Beneš, who formally appointed the new communist government. Jan Masaryk, the son of the founding president, chose to remain in the communist cabinet. Additionally, the Red Army had left the country already at the end of 1945, indicating that external military intervention was not a factor in this transition.

While the criminal aspect of the communist dictatorship is undeniable, the question arises to know why, rather than codifying these transgressions within a so-called “meaningless” law, did the post-communist Czech state fail to pursue more vigorous efforts to investigate and prosecute those responsible for these crimes? In the aftermath of a 41-year dictatorship, fewer than ten individuals faced imprisonment for their roles in enforcing repression. Furthermore, in contrast to several other post-communist countries, the Czech Republic has shown no interest in invoking the category of crimes against humanity to identify and prosecute additional offenders. This passivity raises questions as to the commitment of the Czech state to deliver justice for the victims of the communist rule.

So this is how a law which sounds abstract and meaningless to legal professionals turned out to be very concrete and meaningful to me, a historian who lost my job almost thirty years later because my boss deemed me a revisionist historian without understanding what this means, while the presiding judge in my court case was not in a position to determine whether this accusation had any merit, or why it should even matter. I venture that the disconnection between legal frameworks and historical accountability does not only undermine the legitimacy of the state narrative, but it also hampers broader efforts to foster a comprehensive understanding of the complex legacy of communism in Czechoslovakia.

Conclusion: ÚSTR as a symbol of institutional decay

The progressive disintegration of ÚSTR serves as a poignant reflection of the broader institutional decay in the Czech Republic’s approach to its communist past. Over the past two years, a series of contentious decisions, including, as mentioned above, the dismissal of excellent researchers and the installation of unqualified leadership, has not only undermined the credibility of ÚSTR but also exposed a more profound failure within the Czech post-communist governance framework. The leadership of ÚSTR has prioritized ideological conformity and personal advancement over academic rigor and public trust, leading to a substantial erosion of both the institute’s purpose and its societal impact. ÚSTR’s mission has become compromised by partisan politics and administrative incompetence, transforming it into a caricature of the very authoritarianism it aims to study.

The Czech justice system, for its part, has struggled to uphold accountability, with rulings in related legal battles that have fluctuated in an unpredictable manner. This instability and interplay between institutional failure and societal disengagement poses significant challenges for the Czech Republic in reconciling its past and constructing a cohesive narrative for future generations.

The ÚSTR fiasco serves as a cautionary tale about the dangers of politicizing institutions that are meant to safeguard historical memory and foster public trust. Its failed management is a symptom of a broader cultural and institutional malaise, whereby simplistic anticommunism has been wielded as a tool to dismiss and suppress more nuanced discussions of the country’s history. In a world in which historical understanding is increasingly politicized, ÚSTR’s trajectory reminds us that institutions designed to serve the public can just as easily be used to abuse it.