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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Czechoslovakia
Index
CZECHOSLOVAKIA: A COUNTRY STUDY replaces the edition of this work
published in 1982. Several important developments took place in
Czechoslovakia in the period between the two publications. The
dissident movement persisted in the face of persistent attempts
by the government to crush it, and the number of Charter 77
signatories grew steadily. There also has been a revitalization
of the Roman Catholic Church in Czechoslovakia. The church's
rising popularity was underscored by the government's refusal to
allow Pope John Paul II to participate in the festivities
celebrating the 1,100th anniversary of the death of Saint
Methodius. Perhaps most significant, the aging and conservative
Czechoslovak leadership has been confronted in the last years
with the growing challenge of glasnost' and
perestroika, promoted by the general secretary of the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union Mikhail Gorbachev.
Like its predecessor, this edition attempts to deal with the
dominant social, political, economic, and national security
aspects of Czechoslovakia. Although the present volume
incorporates considerable material from the 1982 edition, it is
essentially a new book and contains statistical data and other
relevant information from recently published sources. Sources of
information included books and scholarly journals, officials
reports of governments and international organizations, foreign
and domestic newspapers, and conference papers and proceedings.
Chapter bibliographies appear at the end of the book, and brief
comments on some of the more valuable sources recommended for
further reading appear at the end of each chapter. Measurements
are given in the metric system; a conversion table is provided to
assist readers unfamiliar with metric measurements (see
table 1,
Appendix A). A Glossary is also included.
The contemporary place-names used in this edition are
generally those approved by the United States Board on Geographic
Names. The reader will find, for example, Prague rather than
Praha and Danube rather than Dunaj.
A certain amount of inconsistency seems unavoidable with
respect to historical personages. The names of many of the
important actors appear here in anglicized form. The reader will
note the use of such English names as George, Charles, and
Frederick. But the authors have decided to use Jan Hus rather
than the anglicized John Huss.
Data as of August 1987
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