From responsibility to control : Censorship during the early normalisation period (September 1968 - August 1969)
Abstract
The topic of the study is the censorship apparatus in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic between September 1968 and August 1969, i.e during the first year after the invasion of the Warsaw Pact armies, with a particular focus on the system of authorized representative in the context of the media policy of the government and the Communist party. The representatives (zmocněnci) were the central executive element of censorship in the early normalization period.
The author identifies four models of preliminary supervision over the media, which reflect the authorized representatives' changing role and tasks. In the first model, the representatives were selected by publishers and editors among their employees; activities of rank-and-file journalists were thus supervised by their colleagues who were following direct instructions of the government.
The model was implemented and used since the establishment of the authorized representatives' category in September 1968 throughout the period under review, in dailies, weeklies, and also in the Czechoslovak Press Agency; in the winter of 1968, they were joined by the Czechoslovak Radio and the Czechoslovak Television. It gave editorial boards and editorial staff enough leeway to circumvent and negotiate and, in the opinion of the Czechoslovak political leadership, and particularly in the eyes of the Soviets, it did not prove too successful.
In the second model, offi cial representatives were checking test copies submitted by editorial boards. The model was implemented in February 1969 in selected magazines which were considered problematic (Listy, Reportér and Zítřek) and it also fell short of expectations from the viewpoint of the pro-Soviet consolidation policy.
In the third model, implemented since April 1969, official (or army) representatives were checking test copies directly in editorial offi ces and their interventions were seen as a substantial improvement. At that time, the role of the Czech Office for Press and Information (Český úřad pro tisk a informace), which started making independent decisions concerning appointments of representatives and personnel of editorial boards, was becoming more important.
The fourth preliminary censorship model employed representatives who, at the time of the fi rst anniversary of the Soviet intervention in August 1969, were checking signal copies directly in printing works. This mode of supervision was viewed as an unquestionable success.
The Czech Office for Press and Information subsequently abandoned the policy of representatives and replaced it by a follow-on supervision model combined with a targeted personnel policy; the very last documents referring to the system of representatives date back to 1971.