Baka V. Sociopolitical changes in Czechoslovakia and its disintegration (December 1989 - 1992)

The thesis explains the socio-political changes in Czechoslovakia starting from the end of the active phase of the "velvet revolution" and until the demise of the Czechoslovakian federation. A special attention is dedicated to the process of legislative preparation for the peaceful separation of the Czechoslovak federation into in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. The thesis provides a systematic analysis of the main directions, forms, and methods of the reformists' activities in the political, economic, and multiethnic relations in the period of democratic transformation of the Czech society. After the end of the "velvet revolution" in 1989, Czechoslovakia faced the problem of conducting a set of reforms aimed at the construction of a democratic society within a very short time. The thesis defines the complex of the causes that stimulated a parliamentary crisis in the country which gradually evolved into a constitutional. The author claims the socialistic Constitution and the Constitutional Law #143 to be among the causes which complicated not only the transformational activities, but also the czech-slovakian dialogue. The thesis justifies an opinion that the main changes in the Czechoslovakian internal politics were: the establishment of a multiparty system and a network of NGOs; the holding of free parliamentary elections in 1990 and 1992; the elimination of the system of National Committees; the introduction of local self-government; the establishment of the Constitutional Court; the elimination of the monopoly of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, the Socialist Security Service, and the censorship; the introduction of the lustration process and the adoption of restitution legislation.