One of the leading authorities and most prolific writers about 1989, Professor Vladimir Tismaneanu talks about what we are learning about life under communism from newly opened archives across Eastern Europe:
In an early draft of the rules I described these societies as "totalitarian," but later I took it out. Any of our 1989 players that remembers life under communism, would you call it totalitarian, or something else? In what ways was life then better than life today? Is there anything in the societies that we can learn or benefit from?
It is very good you took that part out from the introduction, as the picture was more delicate than just call the system totalitarian. I am not sure how to call it, actually. It also depends on the time period. (I am speaking only about Hungary.) The system loosened up economically and politically from 1968; economic reforms were introduced, people were allowed to have small businesses and they were also allowed to have second private jobs besides their daily jobs.
Religion: churches were allowed to operate, but had to cooperate with the state. If you were known to be a regular churchgoer, you had not chance to a serious career in your field, although there were exceptions to this too.
Culture: this is what a lot of people are really missing. Education was fully paid by the state; music schools were set up throughout the country, a lot of them, with very well educated music teachers, and it was basically free to take music lessons one on one. The same was true about dance or any other art classes for students from the very early age. A lot of money was poured into creating a quality cultural life and making culture accessible to a lot of people, as Ted mentioned in one of his earlier posts in this thread. Going to the theatre and opera was very cheap, and this truly created cultured people. We, as elementary and high school students, had a season ticket to go to the capital to watch well known operas.
Free time: summer camps were very cheap for students, and we were regularly taken to other parts of the country for a week or two to various camps. There were resorts owned by the state where people could go at a very affordable price.
Of course, we know what the price was for all this, and Vladimir Tismaneanu was right in saying that the state basically knew about everything, but there were still private islands of freedom, but people had to accept the present state of affairs. I am not trying to paint a nicer picture as it really was, but the regime had undeniably some positive features. I and my mum too had to suffer from negative consequences of the regime (for two different reasons), but I will still not call the regime a totalitarian in Hungary. The worst years were the fifties.
I have to agree with Judit. It was very similar in Czechoslovakia. Although every aspect of our life was influenced by the official ideology.
I also want to say a few words about totalitarianism. Here I aslo agree with Judit. What I learned during my political science study was that there were only two 100% totalitarian regimes: nazism and stalinism. Regimes in satelite states were more or less authoritarian than totalitarian. Among many definitions of totalitarianism I remembered this one. There are 5 (or 6) signs of totalitarianism: 1. One official ideology; 2. One political party and the absence of political oposition; 3. Secret police; 4. State controlled media; 5. Centrally controled economy; and 6. Personality cult.
Only in German nazism during WWII and during Stalin's rule these all signs were fulfilled to 100%. I know this definition could be a subject of a debate and please feel free to prove me wrong, but this is how I see it.
The system loosened up economically and politically from 1968; economic reforms were introduced, people were allowed to have small businesses and they were also allowed to have second private jobs besides their daily jobs.
This was the goulash communism of Janos Kadar and the New Economic Mechanism. Hungary was far ahead of the rest of the Eastern Bloc in this respect. To take an extreme example, in Romania they would stop your car if your trunk was riding too close to the ground to see if you were trying to sell potatoes on the private market. I think your perspective is accurate, but Tismaneanu has a different perspective because he is from Romania.
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Free time: summer camps were very cheap for students, and we were regularly taken to other parts of the country for a week or two to various camps. There were resorts owned by the state where people could go at a very affordable price.
My wife loved her childhood in communist Poland. She likes to complain about how complicated children's lives are today. "We never had to lock our doors in Poland!"
"Of course," I say. "You had nothing to steal."
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Of course, we know what the price was for all this, and Vladimir Tismaneanu was right in saying that the state basically knew about everything, but there were still private islands of freedom, but people had to accept the present state of affairs.
In an interview with the West German magazine Der Spiegel Valtr Komarek described life under communism this way:
Komarek: The system was based on a clear division which worked for almost half a century: on the one side there was a power mafia conisting of 200,000 to 500,00 members of the party apparatus, the State Security service, the officers and the leading people in enterprise and local administration; on the other side there were 15 million citizens, who were kept at bay by the power mafia, but otherwise largely led normal lives.
Der Spiegel: This was possible?
Komarek: yes. We did our research, the actors played their parts on the stages. The doctors treated the people, who slept with each other, had children, and died.
Der Spiegel: And what about ideology?
Komarek: there was something like an unwritten social contract between the regime and the people. The people were prepared for cheers at the official events, while the regime did not further intervene in their lives - of course, only as long as they did not openly oppose the system. It went without saying that the people were kept under surveillance by the State Security Service, but this was also part of the contract, as well as the fact that the regime did not demand too much of them.
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I know this definition could be a subject of a debate and please feel free to prove me wrong, but this is how I see it.
I think it does come down to definitions. I define a totalitarian system as one in which the government has total control of every aspect of life. In the lexicon of the 1989 revolutionaries, there is no civil society outside control of the communist system. Even under my definition Hungary and Poland do not qualify as totalitarian states by the 1980s, and even under your professor's definition, I think Ceausescu's Romania qualifies as totalitarian to the very end.
It's a menacing concrete barrier lined with deadly obstacles dividing East from West. Many risk their lives but only a few conquer... The Berlin Wall. This week on Megastructures.
Oh yea, geek out on every detail of this hideous monstrosity/anti-fascist protection barrier (depending on which side you are playing that game). The barbed wire, the bunkers, the checkpoints, the derring-do. Interviews with Green Troopers and escapees.
I spoke privately to Ted before posting this because I am not wanting to start a flame war. That said, his advice was wise so here it is.
I simply cannot bring myself to call out any good whatsoever in a system that in a bit less than a century of existence managed in its various states to murder around 100 million people, perform ungodly oppressions, tortures, forced relocations and other barbarisms and wreak massive societal damage. I lost relatives on my mother's side of the family to the Communist gulags and outright executions. I lost friends too.
To me this was a perverse system and one of the reasons (besides Ted being a good designer) I am glad to see 1989 come out is to see in game form the history of part of the world throwing off that darkness and stepping out into a new - albeit uncertain - beginning.
First welcome to our discussion. No one will be flamed for speaking their mind for or against the communist system, especially when the events touched them personally as they did with your family. The story of 1989 is ennobling. It was the victory of ordinary people over ideology.
I will give you my take on why communism killed so many people. Marxism was a dangerous utopianism precisely because it claimed to be able to explain everything. Once you went through the gestalt shift to see the world through the prism of Marxism, you viewed every question in terms of historical materialism and the dialectics of class struggle.
Look at this drawing of a cube. Maybe you see the side of a in front and side b behind.
Look again. Side b is in front and side a is behind with the cube sitting on a rising plane from the viewer's perspective. What? Can't you see that? No, there is no other way to see it! It is perfectly obvious! You are blinded by a false consciousness! They want you to keep thinking that side a is in front! We know better than you know for yourself!
Once the Marxists came to see the world differently, they could not understand or accept those who still saw it the same. The ideology taught them that the reason the people could not see the world through the Marxist paradigm was because the capitalists set up institutions from education to religion to government to prevent the people from developing class consciousness. Being at the vanguard of historical progress and knowing better for the people than they know for themselves allowed for moral calculations where the ends justified the means, even if that means was Katyn, or the Killing Fields.
The communist system in 1989 was a shell of what it was in the 1950s and 1960s. The ideology had lost its ability to motivate. No one believed in the slogans anymore. There was still oppression, even violence in some instances, but it was no longer motivated by the certainty of seeing the world "correctly" through the Marxist paradigm. It was motivated by baser notions of a corrupt and privileged ruling class holding on to their power.
It is important to remember the victims. But to get a complete picture we also need to remember the few humanists who rose to the top, like Imre Nagy, Alexander Dubcek and Mikhail Gorbachev. We also can learn about how people coped and found spaces of freedom that Judit talked about, and how they were able to push the system aside and live normal, happy lives. Anyway thanks for posting Joel and I would encourage you to post links to sites dealing with the darker side of the communist system. We need that perspective as well.
I agree that it is important to remember those who tried (even in limited ways) to do something about the situation. I'm a little unconvinced that gorbachev was genuinely trying to help as opposed to trying to "soft land" a system rotting away from the inside. Plus the blood it shed can't ever be forgotten lest we repeat the mistake.
I will admit that this is not a subject I can be 100% objective on.
Also, I think your analysis is pretty good. It captures the foundational problems nicely. It also hearkens back to Orwell's classic "2+2=5" scene from 1984 in that it matters not whether something is factual, only if it is what the ideology says is factual.
As to sites speaking about the crimes of Communism, the ones that speak to them tend to digress into praise of or condemnation of particular political figures. However a couple come to mind - I do not totally agree with them but at least they try to catalogue the crimes:
I would be the last who would defened communism here, but as I said in another thread: Politics is never only black and white. Communist regime disqualifies itself to be a moral winner because of the oppression, murders, censorship, etc. But as Judit mentioned there were many youth programmes, culture was more accessible to masses, healthcare was free,... I know that everything was influenced by the official ideology and there was strong censorship, so many movies, theatre dramas and music bands were banned. But still there were possibilities for common people. So let's try to purge these better parts of regime from it's ideology and somehow learn from it.
It is interesting that many old people today think about communist era with nostalgy. "Everything was cheap, healthcare was free, the streets were clean, crime was low, etc." I don't know why it is so, maybe one may tend to suppress negative memories. But it's a signal that people could find also something good in it. (But on the other hand, what else could they do.)
And one interesting fact I learned yesterday: In Russia there was some kind of survey and the LEAST POPULAR leader of Russia for the last 100 years was Gorbachev.
Hey, get your stinking cursor off my face! I got nukes, you know.
stosedem wrote:
I would be the last who would defened communism here, but as I said in another thread: Politics is never only black and white. Communist regime disqualifies itself to be a moral winner because of the oppression, murders, censorship, etc. But as Judit mentioned there were many youth programmes, culture was more accessible to masses, healthcare was free,... I know that everything was influenced by the official ideology and there was strong censorship, so many movies, theatre dramas and music bands were banned. But still there were possibilities for common people. So let's try to purge these better parts of regime from it's ideology and somehow learn from it.
It is interesting that many old people today think about communist era with nostalgy. "Everything was cheap, healthcare was free, the streets were clean, crime was low, etc." I don't know why it is so, maybe one may tend to suppress negative memories. But it's a signal that people could find also something good in it. (But on the other hand, what else could they do.)
And one interesting fact I learned yesterday: In Russia there was some kind of survey and the LEAST POPULAR leader of Russia for the last 100 years was Gorbachev.
Good points. One thing that has always struck me about Communist systems is their track record at raising literacy rates.
That said and to be clear lest I be accused of being a Stalinist or something, this sort of small positive in no way in my mind makes up for the massive negatives perpetrated by Communist regimes in the 20th and early 21st centuries.
As for Gorbachev, my understanding is that one of the reasons for his massive unpopularity was he lost lands conquered by previous Russian tsars/Communist dictators.
In Germany the events of 1989-90 are referred to as Die Wende, "the change." I notice that Judit Szepessy also refers to "the changes." To be honest it's hard to pique a player's interest to play a game about "system change." Whohoo! system change! Sounds exciting. So is it just hype to call these events revolutions?
Timothy Garton Ash, who coined the term "refolution" to describe the events in Hungary and Poland (reform from above and revolt from below), addresses the question: was the Velvet Revolution really a revolution?
In Hungary we definitely had negotiations. The Communists negotiated and brainwashed people so well that they saved much of their economic and political influence/power. Of course, being dressed in a different cloak. I have never been able to comprehend how they could come back to power two times after the changes.
The communist system in 1989 was a shell of what it was in the 1950s and 1960s. The ideology had lost its ability to motivate.
This is so much true. Maybe it is a little bit simplified, but still true: tell me in which year you became a party member and I will tell you if you have ever been a devoted Communist or you mainly wanted a career in your field. The two were hand in hand.
Beginning at 3:15 there are excerpts from a movie which I want to see. I am talking about the part beginning at 3:15 with tanks breaking down the fence and attacking the occupation strikers, and the color film of a ZOMO crackdown. Anyone recognize this movie?
We know now that martial law was not the only alternative to another Soviet invasion. We know that the Polish Communists knew that there would not be another Soviet led invasion. There was pressure from Brezhnev and Andropov, but the Soviets recognized they were overstretched after their Afghanistan intervention. Jaruzelski's speech about the grave national danger was just a cover that the Polish army used to sieze power and impose order, as much as could be done. In fact for the Communists Poland had become almost ungovernable.
A matter of debate (at least in Poland), a recent opinion poll made by GW showed that approximately half of Poles believes Jaruzelski's opinion (if not for the martial law, Soviets would enter and crash resistance) and the other half doesn't believe it.
In interesting outcome was the very recent sentence on Czesław Kiszczak (head of Department of the Interior at that time) for introduction of the martial law (Jaruzelski is tried independently due to his bad health). He was sentenced to two years in prison (won't have to go also because of the old age and bad health) for being a member of a criminal-military organization. Apparently, the whole process of introduction of the martial law was against the law, even the communist law at that time. In the sentence justification the court, however, mentioned that according to historical records the probability of Soviet invasion was basically zero and the martial law has been passed just to keep the ruling party in power, which cost a number of lives.
I think they can still be justly called revolutions. The actual mechanism may in some cases have been negotiation but the end result was government replacement and indeed system replacement with ones that paid a lot more attention to civil rights and civil society.
I think, it would be interesting to discuss what happened with the Communist elite in the various countries. In Hungary, the post Communists came back to power, and the Prime Minister was Gyula Horn, who agreed to open up the borders to the East Germans. (He had played another role too, however: he had been interrogating people who participated in the revolution in 1956.) The former Communists came back for the second time too, and then the Prime Minister was another former party member).
After 1989 a lot of factories and other state owned buildings had been sold and with all their belongings and financial assets. Much of these was bought up by former party members. They also maintained a strong influence in the media.
What about other countries? Poland, Chech, Slovakia, Romania, etc.?
Apparently, the whole process of introduction of the martial law was against the law, even the communist law at that time.
The process of charging officials with crimes during the Communist period has been complex. The constitutions said all the right things about human rights. They also had procedural safeguards and divided powers, but these rights and procedures were largely ignored. Legislatures were just window dressing and courts were usually rubber stamps for decisions made by the Party officials or Central Committee. In the Federal Republic of Germany this was even more complicated because the state where the crimes took place no longer existed. Stasi Chief Mielke was finally charged and convicted of a murder that he committed in 1931 during the Weimar Republic! He had some incriminating materials in his safe I believe.
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In the sentence justification the court, however, mentioned that according to historical records the probability of Soviet invasion was basically zero and the martial law has been passed just to keep the ruling party in power, which cost a number of lives.
I believe the judge was correct and that the archives from the Soviet Union show that a decision was made not to intervene and that decision was clearly communicated to the Polish leadership before martial law was declared. The Soviets wanted Solidarity crushed, but wanted their Polish comrades to do it. The Soviets were already stretched thin with the Afghanistan intervention, and they could ill afford another misadventure financially or in the court of world opinion. I will get you some source material on that. Of course later the decision could have been reversed, but a Soviet invasion was not possible in December 1981, let alone imminent.
It is interesting that many old people today think about communist era with nostalgy.
This is true. For one thing, we are human and the past always gets a shinier outlook that the present with its challenges. But people were full of positive expectations about economy, and a lot of people lost their jobs, factories had to close down, and no miracle happened. In a lot of countries, the economy struggled, and in some countries, it is still struggling.
After 1989 a lot of factories and other state owned buildings had been sold and with all their belongings and financial assets. Much of these was bought up by former party members. They also maintained a strong influence in the media.
I need help from people to find some good discussions on the web about the Nomenklaturization of the post-Communist economies in Eastern Europe. It is a topic I would really like to learn more about. Basically, the elites saw the system was crumbling so they found an opposition to negotiate a transition to the capitalist system. However, the elites rigged the transition so that they were able to retain a great deal of power, either through positions in government or through special access to the best financial opportunities during the privatization of state industries. If anyone finds a comprehensive discussion of this popular topic please post a link to it here.
On a related subject I was able to find an article about the success of Vaclav Klaus's privatization program in Czechoslovakia. The Czech Miracle: Why Privatization went right in the Czech Republichttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1568/is_n11_v26/ai_16...
"Unlike Nicolae Ceausescu, who smelled like somebody who takes care of himself, she smelled embarrassingly bad."
Yes it's everything you always wanted to know about the capture, trial and death of the Great Conducator and his wife, the Mother of the Romanian Nation, and some things you probably didn't want to know. Actually, they edit out the part where Elena tells the guard "Go f#*% your mother." Classy to the very end. Interesting interview with the guard in the court room who was also head of the firing squad.
The firing squad was under orders not to hit Nicolae in the face so he could be recognized in the video. There were no such limits for Elena.
EDIT: Did the Ceausescus receive justice? How did the trial set a course for Romania's future?
In reality, the "constitutions" of the Warsaw Pact (itself a Soviet fiction created to show publically what already existed privately) countries were not worth the paper they were written on. Just like the Soviet Union itself. the only place where any actual power resided was the Politburo. And the Politburos of these countries were subordinate to the Politburo in Moscow.
Also, they did not even have control over their own armed forces. The senior officers tended strongly to come from the Red Army (see Polish Defense Minister Rokossovsky for example).
In such a situation it is easy to see why putting people on trial for the numerous murders and other crimes of communism in these states is problematic - in a very real sense they were not states but rather Soviet vassals. I am not excusing the behavior (like I said earlier nothing can excuse mass murder) just noting the difficulties in pursuing justice.
A Hungarian politician, Gyula Horn had a key role in opening up the borders. As a minister he was in charge of foreign affairs when Hungary decided to open the western border (the "Iron Curtain") to East Germans wishing to emigrate to West Germany. Communist politicians began to realize they had to agree to changes if they ever wanted to retain any power after the changes. I have to say, they played their cards quite well, as they did retain power after the fall of Communism, both economically and politically.
Actually there was a more mundane story behind this. In 1988 Hungarians got the world-passport. Soon East-Germans realized this and started to migrate to West-Germany taking two steps - first Hungary and then West-Germany.
So the "Iron Curtain" got nothing more then a joke from the past. Additionally the barrier itself was in a really bad shape and the border guards had no budget to repair it. So they started the suggestion to deposit it.
The actual political negotiations started between Miklós Németh (Hungarian prime minister) and Gorbatsev. Gyula Horn had no real role in the process except for bringing the news to Austria. In March 1989 the border guards started to disassemble the curtain and at the time when the official news was spread, the process was so advanced that they had to rebuild the border on a short section. This was the location where the reporters were invited to see Horn to cut the curtain in May 1989.
Actually there was a more mundane story behind this. In 1988 Hungarians got the world-passport. Soon East-Germans realized this and started to migrate to West-Germany taking two steps - first Hungary and then West-Germany.
Hungarians were able to travel. However Hungary was still bound by treaty with East Germany to not permit East Germans to cross the border. The decision to open the border for East Germans to cross to Austria created a flood of refugees, and that created tremendous pressure on the East German government. Horn and Nemeth travelled to West Germany and met with Kohl to discuss the decision. In October Hungary received billions of Marks from West German banks. Perhaps these events were related.
On a related subject I was able to find an article about the success of Vaclav Klaus's privatization program in Czechoslovakia. The Czech Miracle: Why Privatization when right in the Czech Republichttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1568/is_n11_v26/ai_16...
On the other hand, it wasn't that perfect. I think that the privatization was the instrument how the political power transfered into economic power. Common people didn't have any experience with stocks, shares, etc. and I think they were quite lost in this privatization. I remember there was a TV series about a fictional family who took part in privatization to show people what to do. But ex-communists, I mean the communist elite, people close to them and former agents of StB (State Security) got the best information and inner data about state companies, factories, etc. and they exploited it to gain economic power. There were scams and speculations with coupon books and people were selling for less than real price. The whole privatization was maybe a good idea, but badly executed, I think.
