Czechoslovakia’s remarkably expeditious and peaceful exit from Communism—the so-called ‘velvet revolution’—was made possible by a confluence of circumstances. As in Poland, the intellectual opposition was united above all by the memory of past defeats and a determination to avoid outright confrontation—it was not for nothing that the leading civic organization in Slovakia called itself ‘Public Against Violence’. As in the GDR, the utter bankruptcy of the ruling Party became clear so fast that the option of an organized rearguard action was excluded almost from the start. But the role of Havel
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