Ice (not) cracking in Kladno. The reactionary past of capitalism and bright future of communism in the local discourse of the Kladno Party and enterpriese apparatus in the period 1960-1963
Abstract
This study delas with the discursive framework through which the members of the Disctrict Committee of Communis Party of Czechoslovakia (CPC) percieved the past, present and future as importatnt components of the development of coumminst society. The past was clearly percived negatively, as the source of all present discrepancies that were manifested inf the form of the so-called burgeois or capitalist anachronisms.
These were to be remove by the present, especially by the increased ideological and agitational work with an emphasis on the suppression of individualism of the individual, strenghthening of collectivism, individual ideological work within the Party, and self-reflection of personal errors and shorcomings. The present was to form a bridging period that was imperfect not due to the activities of the Communists, but because ofthe lingering negative effects of the past.
In the future, the ideal communist society was to be established whose main sources were to be the conscious youth and scientific-materialistic approach to reality. The local time discourse reveals an utter subordination to the general discourse of the CPC, whose perspective was used to explain mainly the present events of both nationwide and international importance.
This blind adherence to models led to the ideological rigidity of the members of the DC of the CPC, who in fear of losing their social status were more or less inactive, allowing the gradual disintegration of the systém.