THE DILEMMAS OF DISSIDENCE IN EAST-CENTRAL EUROPE Citizen Intellectuals and Philosopher Kings

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3 THE DILEMMAS OF DISSIDENCE IN EAST-CENTRAL EUROPE Citizen Intellectuals and Philosopher Kings

4 THE DILEMMAS OF DISSIDENCE IN EAST-CENTRAL EUROPE Citizen Intellectuals and Philosopher Kings by Barbara J. Falk Central European University Press Budapest New York

5 2003 by Barbara J. Falk Published in 2003 by Central European University Press An imprint of the Central European University Share Company Nádor utca 11, H-1051 Budapest, Hungary Tel: or Fax: Website: West 59th Street, New York NY 10019, USA Tel: Fax: All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the permission of the Publisher. ISBN cloth ISBN paperback Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Falk, Barbara J. The dilemmas of dissidence in East-Central Europe : citizen intellectuals and philosopher kings / by Barbara J. Falk. p.cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN ISBN 1. Europe, Eastern Politics and government Europe, Central Politics and government 20th century. 3. Dissenters Europe, Eastern History. 4. Europe, Eastern Intellectual life 20th century. I. Title. DJK50.F '.0009'045 dc Printed in Hungary by Akaprint

6 This book is dedicated to the memory of my grandmother Ada Troyer Vetter, and my dear friend and mentor H. Gordon Skilling, as well as the two people most central in my life today, my husband Jules Barry Bloch and my daughter Alannah Ada Bloch.

7 TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Abbreviations Preface A Note on Nomenclature Acknowledgments xi xv xxix xxxiii Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION 1 SECTION 1 Chapter 2 POLAND:THE HARBINGER OF CRISIS AND COLLAPSE 13 Intellectual Opposition in Poland: The Catholic Church in Poland 18 The Students Protest: March, The Workers Protest: Gda sk, The Events of June, 1976: Radom, Ursus, and Beyond 34 Komitet Obrony Robotników (KOR): The Workers Defense Committee 35 The Alternative Civil Society? 40 Towarzystwo Kursów Naukowych (TKN): The Flying University 42 The Pope s Visit, Solidarity (Solidarno ) 45 Intellectuals within Solidarity 49 Martial Law and its Aftermath 51 Solidarity Underground 53 Re-Legalization, the Roundtable Talks (RT), and Free Elections 56

8 viii Chapter 3 CZECHOSLOVAKIA: FROM INTERRUPTED TO VELVET REVOLUTION 59 Czechoslovak Stalinism and the Role of Intellectuals 59 The Economic Crisis of the 1960s 62 Proposals for Economic Reform 63 The Writers Union and the Cultural Renaissance of the 1960s 65 The Student/Youth Movements and Strahov 68 The Prague Spring 70 The Action Program and Soviet Response 71 Independent Currents:The Untimely Rebirth of Civil Society 76 ierna nad Tisou 77 Crisis: Soviet Mobilization and the Moscow Protocols 79 Normalization 80 The Underground Music Scene and the Trial of the PPU 84 The Helsinki Accords and Charter V bor na Obranu Nespravedliv± Stihan ch (VONS) 92 The Underground University 92 Samizdat Publishing and Distribution 94 Repression and Resistance in the Czech Lands and Slovakia in the 1980s 95 The Underground Church in Slovakia 100 The Tide Turns: Just a Few Sentences 102 The GDR Exodus and the Fall of the Wall 103 November 17 and the Birth of Civic Forum and Public against Violence 103 Havel na Hrad 106 The New Year s Address and the Consolidation of Democracy 107 Chapter 4 POST-1956 HUNGARY: REPRESSION, REFORM, AND ROUNDTABLE REVOLUTION 109 The Hungarian Revolution of 1956: Lessons and Legacies 109 Kádárite Communism 112 The Politics of Economic Reform: The NEM 113 Socialist Redistribution and the Second Economy 116

9 Intellectuals: On the Road to Class Power? 118 The Budapest School 122 Populist vs. Democratic Dissent 125 Beszélô and Hungarian Samizdat 130 Toward an Alliance: The Bibó Festschrift and Monor 135 Lakitelek 138 Intra-party and Election Reform 139 The Rebirth of Civil Society 142 Ellenzéki Kerekasztal (EKA) and the Pacted Transition 146 The Four Yeses Referendum 151 June 16, 1989: The Reburial of Imre Nagy 152 SECTION 2 Chapter 5 INTELLECTUALS IN POLAND: THE TRADITION CONTINUES 157 Leszek Ko akowski: A Source of Hope amidst Hopelessness 157 Adam Michnik s Alliance Strategy: The Church and the Left 165 A New Evolutionism 177 Non-violence as Theory and Practice 180 Kuro : A Bridge between Generations 184 Theorizing Civil Society: The Polish Case 192 Chapter 6 OPPOSITION INTELLECTUALS IN CZECHOSLOVAKIA 199 Václav Havel s Theatre of the Absurd 199 The Evolution of Living in Truth : Its Meaning and Consequences 204 From Playwright to Dissident in Husák s Czechoslovakia 208 Theorizing Resistance: The Power of the Powerless 215 Politics and Conscience and the Destructive Capacities of Technology 225 Largo Desolato, Temptation, and the Van±k Plays 229 Letters to Olga: Being and the Absolute 236 The Decisive Influence of Jan Pato ka 242 Václav Benda s Parallel Polis 247 The Collective Oeuvre of the Chartists 251 Theorizing Civil Society: The Czechoslovak Example 254 ix

10 x Chapter 7 THE DEMOCRATIC OPPOSITION IN HUNGARY 257 The Philosophical Legacy of György Lukács 257 The Influence of István Bibó 261 Kis and Bence: Toward an East European Marxism? 266 The Social Contract of Beszélô and Radical Reformism 277 Kis Democratic Alternative 281 Miklós Haraszti:The Nature of Repression for Workers and Artists 290 Theorizing Civil Society: Konrád s Antipolitics 298 SECTION 3 Chapter 8 THE DISSIDENT CONTRIBUTION TO POLITICAL THEORY 313 Defining the Problem: Civil Society and the Shifting Boundaries of Public and Private 313 Toward a Reconstituted Public Sphere: Central European and Western Intersections in Theorizing Civil Society 316 Reappraising Civil Society: Feminist Critiques 325 Political Economy as Critique: The Dissidents Meet the Market 327 Dissident Thought as Reconstructed Liberalism 334 Political Theory Engages with Dissident Theory 348 Marginalization or Public Engagement:The Role of Central European Intellectuals in the Post-Communist Era 354 BIBLIOGRAPHY 365 Personal Interviews 397 Skilling Seminar, Toronto 398 Filmography/Videography 398 NOTES 399 INDEX 463

11 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ANC COMECON CPSU CPCz SM EKA END Fidesz FJF HNF HOS ISO KAN KDNP KIK KISZ KKK KMT Anti Nuclear Campaign Hungary Council for Mutual Economic Cooperation Communist Party of the Soviet Union Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (Komunistická Strana eskoslovenska) Czechoslovak Student Union ( eskoslovensk svaz mládeπe) Opposition Roundtable (Ellenzéki Kerekasztal) European Nuclear Disarmament Federation of Young Democrats (Fiatal Demokraták Szövetsége) Independent Lawyers Forum (Független Jogász Fórum) Patriotic People s Front (Hazafias Népfront) Movement for Civil Liberties (Hnuti za Ob anskou Svobodu) Initiative for Social Defense (Iniciativa Socialní Obrany) Club of Non-Party Engagés (Klub angaπovan ch nestraník ) Christian Democratic People s Party (Keresztény Demokrata Neppárt) Warsaw Club of Catholic Intelligentsia (Klub Inteligencji Katolickiej) Communist Youth Alliance (Kommunista Ifjúsági Szövetség) Club of the Crooked Circle (Klub Kryzwego Ko a) Central Workers Council of Greater Budapest (Nagybudapesti Központi Munkástanács)

12 xii THE DILEMMAS OF DISSIDENCE IN EAST-CENTRAL EUROPE KOR KSS-KOR KWZZ MDF MKJL MKS MSZMP NEM NEP NMS NOW-a OPZZ PPS PPU PZPR RMP ROPCiO RT S SS SD SKS StB SzDSz Workers Defense Committee (Komitet Obrony Robotników) Social Self-Defense Committee (Komitet Samoobrony Spo ecznej) Founding Committee for Free Trade Unions of the Coast (Komitet Za o ycielski Wolnych ZwiΩzków Zawodowych Wybrze a) Hungarian Democratic Forum (Magyar Demokrata Fórum) John Lennon Peace Club (Mírov Klub John Lennon) Interfactory Strike Committee (Mi dzak adowy Komitet Strajkowy) Hungarian Socialist Workers Party (Magyar Szocialista Munkáspárt) New Economic Mechanism New Economic Policy Independent Peace Initiative (Nezávislé Mírové Sdruπení) Independent Publishing House (Niezale na Oficyna Wydawnicza) Official Trade Union (Ogólnopolskie Porozumienie ZwiΩzków Zawodowych) Polish Socialist Party (Polska Partia Socjalistyczna) Plastic People of the Universe ( The Plastics ) Polish United Workers Party (Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza) Young Poland Movement (Ruch M odej Polski) Movement for the Defense of Civil Rights (Ruch Obrony Praw Cz owieka i Obywatela) Roundtable Talks Union of Czechoslovak Writers (Svaz eskoslovensk ch Spisovatel ) Democratic Party (Stronnictwo Demokratyczne) Student Solidarity Committee (Studencki Komitet Solidarno ci) State Security (Státni Bezpe nost) Alliance of Free Democrats (Szabad Demokraták Szövetsége)

13 List of Abbreviations xiii SZETA SZOT SZSP TIT TKK TKN VONS VPN WTO ZMS ZOMO ZSL Foundation for Supporting the Poor (Szegényeket Támogató Alap) National Council of Trade Unions (Szakszervezetek Országos Tanácsa) Socialist Union of Polish Students (Socjalistyczne Zrzeszenie Studentków Polskich) Society for the Dissemination of Scientific Knowledge (Tudományos Ismeretterjesztô Társaság) Provisional Coordinating Commission (Tymczasowa Komisja Krajowa) Society of Scientific Courses (Towarzystno Kursów Naukowych) Committee for the Defense of the Unjustly Persecuted (V bor na Obranu Nespravedliv± Stichan ch) Public against Violence (Verejnost Proti Násilu) Warsaw Treaty Organization Union of Socialist Youth (ZwiΩzek M odziezy Socjalistycznej) Motorized Units of Citizens Militia (Zmotoryzowane Oddzia y Milicji Obywatelskiej) United Peasants Party (Zjednoczone Stronnictwo Ludowe)

14 PREFACE In November of 1995 Jeffrey Isaac published an article for Political Theory which condemned political theorists en masse in the United States for failing to take seriously the revolutions of 1989 in Central Europe, through which the face of world politics for five decades was transformed (1995: 636) was a political milestone equal in scope and importance to both the French and American Revolutions, yet unlike these two previous watersheds which had sparked much debate among political thinkers, and indeed to some extent been provoked by them, 1 the reaction of the professional mainstream had been minimal. Isaac was critical of the pervasive silence and lack of attention paid to both the events themselves, and the activists/theorists and ideas behind them. The statistics are tellingly damning: in the years between 1989 and 1993 in his review of the major outlets of political theory (that is, the academic journals Political Theory, Polity, American Political Science Review, Philosophy and Public Affairs, and Ethics) he found that only two out of 384 articles dealt with 1989, one of which was a review essay (1995: 637). 2 This represents a shocking indictment of political theory, and sharply contrasts with the canon. After all, thinkers from Plato and Machiavelli to Hegel, de Tocqueville and Marx were profoundly engagé with the events and political realities of their day. Isaac suggests four possible reasons for the strange silence of political theory but in each case finds the explanation unsatisfactory. First, he posits that it is the recency of the events themselves, but then adds that current political theory itself is so intellectually faddish [that it can] hardly plead patience and caution when it comes to interpreting current events (1995: 638). Moreover, as Isaac argues, it is hard to maintain such a position in consideration of the great canonic theorists, such as Locke, Paine, Kant, Hegel, or Marx, who made it their business to comment on and theorize about the great events, move-

15 xvi Preface ments, and conditions of their day from the French Revolution and religious tolerance to the inhumane social conditions of primitive capitalist development. In fact, one could argue that engagement is what made them great political theorists in the first place, and qualified them for subsequent beatification and inclusion in the canon. 3 After all, political theory developed into a professionalized academic discipline long after the real lives and activities of those thinkers. The process of appropriating and institutionalizing their legacies for scholarly consumption has served to retrospectively transform them. An unfortunate result has been the false bifurcation of political theory into questions of first and second order, that is, theory about politics and metatheory about how we reflect about politics. My examination of the dissidents of East-Central Europe as political theorists is also an exercise in the reintegration of political science and normative political theory. I argue that political theory and theorists properly contextualized and understood are intimately involved in both the enterprise of understanding/explanation as well as prescription/critique. Second, Isaac postulates the explanation lies in the fact that contemporary theorists are unfamiliar with the cultures and languages of Central Europe, given the strong Western European bias of political theory. On the surface this is more plausible, but Isaac points out that language barriers have never really constrained political theorists from offering interpretations of texts or the events to which they are related (1995: 639). Isaac s example is that of Machiavelli: Question most self-respecting political theorists and they will offer you some interpretation of Machiavelli. Can you imagine many political theorists saying that they could not comment on or write about Machiavelli because they could not read Italian or grasp sixteenth-century Florentine idioms in the original? The writings of the principal Soviet bloc democratic oppositionists Havel, Michnik, Lipski, Konrád, Szelényi, Sakharov, and others have been amply translated into English. They have long been available to the English-speaking world, and there is no linguistic excuse for having avoided them. This is especially true for the contemporary political theorist who rushes to publish on Habermas, Derrida or Foucault with research and insight based on translations of their works, rather than interpretations based on the German or French originals (languages far more

16 Preface xvii accessible to the Anglo-American academic context than either Slavic or Finno-Ugric languages!). The cultural distinctiveness argument is further invalidated by the fact that any cursory reading of the their works yields an interpretation of their collective oeuvre that places it squarely in the broader European context. As Isaac points out (and my interviews corroborate) the fact is that the Central Europeans have believed themselves to be, and have been, part of a cosmopolitan tradition of humanistic values with roots in the European Renaissance and Enlightenment (1995: 639). The third point raised by Isaac is that the Central European literature of revolt although both historically [and] politically significant is regarded by those who ignore it as neither especially innovative [n]or genuinely theoretical (1995: 639). This criticism is based on a profoundly conservative assumption of what constitutes political theory, all the more ironic in light of post-modernism and its influential critique of the epistemological constructions of such creatures as authentic theory, not to mention the actual existence of the canon itself. This argument suggests that the work of the Central Europeans is mere political commentary, and that the issues dealt with are somehow casual, uninteresting, [and] unphilosophical (emphasis in original; 1995: 640). Even a cursory glance at the topics covered, however, suggests otherwise. Isaac points out that their work contains arguments about the ethical and strategic prospects of different forms of resistance, the nature of democratic citizenship, and the importance of civil society (1995: 640). I would add that the Central Europeans addressed questions of morality in political action (Havel s living in truth ) and the importance of self-limitation and non-violence in the radical transformation of politics (the formulations of Michnik and Kis change the way we conceive of revolution both historically and strategically). The addition of these topics helps defeat Isaac s fourth possible explanation that the democratic oppositionists have received too much credit, but are simply unoriginal, revisiting the themes and concerns of nineteenth-century democratic liberalism with which we are all familiar ; it is not that they are insufficiently deep, but rather simply anachronistic and old hat (1995: 640). Even if true, this charge would a) require a strong engagement with the theorists themselves, and b) is based on the assumption that re-articulation or being derivative constitutes a reason for intellectual dismissal. A major purpose of this work is to take up Isaac s challenge, and to

17 xviii Preface analyze seriously the oeuvre of the Central European dissidents qua political theory. Central and Eastern Europe have been the political laboratory of the twentieth century par excellence, the testing ground of both fascism and the many varieties of authoritarian communism. If there is an intrinsic connection between political events and the ideas inspiring or underwritten by them, it stands to reason that this must be a birthplace and breeding ground for indigenous political theory. In fact, much of the Marxian-inspired political theory from the first half of the century (Luxemburg, Lukács, and even Gramsci) as well as the succeeding critical and post-marxist variants in recent decades (Adorno, Horkheimer, Arendt, Habermas) can be said to be distinctively Central European in both derivation and content. There are a number of strong commonalities despite the obvious differences the stress on political and economic equality; the need for humankind to be freed from alienation and instrumental reason and be able to participate meaningfully in politics and society writ large; an analysis of the mental, structural, and historical constraints mitigating such engagement; and finally what one might call the blessing and the curse of post-enlightenment European thought the central tenet that human beings as political agents and masters of their own subjectivity can act both individually and in concert to change their circumstances. Not incidentally, these commonalities also extend to the theorists and the activists of dissident movements and the democratic opposition of Central Europe prior to The challenge posed by Isaac is not a small one, for I am not merely extending the boundaries of a discipline that has often self-consciously described itself as progressive, radical or indeed revolutionary in scope or implications. Rather, I am conducting a bold experiment to further our understanding of the relationship of political ideas to political change, and to examine how in the late-twentieth century ordinary and extraordinary human beings make this happen. In order to situate this work into broader metatheoretical discussions in political theory, it is necessary to make explicit my assumptions regarding the nature of political theorizing as an activity and state the hypotheses afforded by this a priori declaration. My views on what constitutes political theory, and how it is related to politics or stated another way, the old issue of the vita contemplativa and the vita activa debated by Plato and Aristotle have been formed in reaction to the school of Cambridge contextualists, most notably Quentin Skinner

18 Preface xix and James Tully. However, as will be seen below, I have been deeply influenced by contemporary feminist theory in its efforts to broaden the political, and in effect to de-canonize the sacred and elevate the profane. And although I agree with Skinner that ideological context and intentionality of the author are especially paramount in examining the work of self-professed intellectuals, one can no more detach the author from her or his surroundings than detach intention from meaning. Thus the work of Neal Wood and C. B. Macpherson is a powerful corrective to a narrow view of contextualism rather than its materially based deconstruction. Rather than beginning with the right set of procedures in understanding a particular text, however, the prior question of what is considered political theory requires elaboration. Skinner correctly argues that political life sets the main problems for the political theorist, causing a certain range of questions to become the leading subjects of debate. 4 Thus James Tully states: Political theory, then, is as Aristotle and Marx would say, a part of politics, and the questions it treats are the effects of political action (1988: 11). As theorists we end up focussing a great deal on the big questions, such as justice, liberty, and equality, and most can agree on their relevance, having grown out of political life at certain historical conjunctures. Before going under the surgeon s knife of the political theorist and abstracted beyond reasonable comprehension, the genesis of theory was and is the need to examine and analyze the burning questions of the day critically and comprehensively. For this reason alone I believe it is sufficient to categorize the oeuvre of Central European dissident thought qua political theory. Writers such as Michnik, Havel, and Kis were pragmatically engaged in politics at the same time as they deliberately not only theorized about it but self-consciously operated within the larger tradition of European political thought. Following both Foucault and feminist theory, political theory has been expanded notionally but not practically or systematically by the idea that power relations underlie all politics and our attempts to construct and categorize knowledge about politics (and vice versa), and that the subject matter of politics is just as easily the household as the public sphere, or the family versus the formal institutions of ruling. The pursuit of political life has conventionally focussed on the polis, the explicitly political community from which the responsibilities and rights of citizenship arise. Thus Paul Ricoeur states:

19 xx Preface The point of view of philosophy is, on the contrary, that the individual becomes human only within this totality which is the universality of citizens. The threshold of humanity is the threshold of citizenship, and the citizen is a citizen only through the state. Hence the movement of political philosophy starts with happiness, which all men pursue, moves to the proper end of the state, then to its nature as a self-sufficient totality, and from there to the citizen (1984: 252). Contrary to Ricoeur, I maintain that political relationships involving mutual responsibilities and structures of obligation and consent can just as easily emerge from the private sphere (especially where it forms a substitute for the public sphere, as arguably occurred in Central and Eastern Europe) or from civil society itself. We need to recognize that programs of thought and action which are not institutionally centered may also constitute political theory. It is political life which is at issue, rather than the polis or some modern variation thereof. However, the linguistic and post-modern turn in all forms of philosophy has also meant that our Foucauldian gaze is increasingly directed toward the text, rather than the context, even as we have simultaneously robbed texts of authority and authors of meaning. Thus my metatheoretical critique of both Skinner and Derrida is that simply too much time is spent on interpretation rather than on the power or force of the ideas themselves, and how they were or can be operationalized in a particular ideological and social context. This leads me to my first assumption, which I call the ideas matter thesis. Basically, I argue that ideas matter profoundly in delimiting opportunities, helping to formulate political-cultural responses, and, and in predisposing key actors to some decisions and courses of action over others. There is a necessary connection between political theory and political change, and to me there is no better twentiethcentury example than the revolutions of Like Stark (1992), I contend path dependence is indeed important in assessing the processes of transformation, but would add that it has an ideological dimension as well. The relevant connection is not simply a logical one, such as that proposed by Alasdair McIntyre, for whom actions have meaning and theories are implicitly and logically necessary to understand those meanings. It is more causal in nature, although not in the sense of predictive social science. I suggest we separate institutional history or history-as-events and the history of ideas at our peril; in order to under-

20 Preface xxi stand complex political phenomena we must understand the dynamic relationship between them. I am not denying the staggering importance of structural determinants rooted in culture, history, or political economy or to suggest that ideas are either independently Geist-like and Hegelian, or merely superstructural. There is a compelling complexity of relationships and factors concerning all forms of change, political or otherwise. Taking ideas seriously means understanding where ideas came from and what they grew out of, as well as a thoroughgoing examination of what happened after those ideas were in circulation. Traditional Straussian historiographers of political thought privilege the interpreter; Cambridge contextualists privilege the interpreted. Two metahistorical flaws occur in both approaches. As John Keane suggests, there is the inescapable need to assert the one true methodology in both approaches, which is covertly positivist and also ignores the inescapable subjectivity of the interpretation process itself. (Furthermore, these authoritative tendencies tend to result in a curious reproduction of the same political canon regardless of whose gaze is involved.) Second, the focus is usually temporally unidirectional: on the before rather than the after. Strauss focussed on such arcane issues as how the level of political persecution would lead the author to disguise meaning only to have the sacred truths unveiled later by the clever philosopher. Similarly, Skinner or J. G. A. Pocock discussed the ideological context of the mirror of princes literature at the time Machiavelli wrote the Prince and how he literally turned the genre on its head. However, I believe strongly that in order to understand the force of ideas in politics, we have to redirect our interpretative gaze to what happened afterward. It is hard to even conceive of the twentieth-century unfolding the way that it did, for example, with the explosion of the Russian Revolution at the beginning of our era, if not for the writings and dynamism of Karl Marx. In making a causal claim for ideas, I cannot in this study focus solely on antecedents, in the same way Hannah Arendt does in The Origins of Totalitarianism or Jürgen Habermas in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere. To give the argument some force and meaning, I must also look at consequences. For this reason, in my conclusion I focus not just on dissident ideas but on the particular impact of these ideas on post-1989 East-Central Europe. To accept that ideas are powerful motivators of political actors and