A Revolution in a Revolution: The Secret Police and the Origins of Stalinism in Czechoslovakia
A Revolution in a Revolution: The Secret Police and the Origins of Stalinism in Czechoslovakia
Author(s): Molly PucciSubject(s): Political history, Government/Political systems, Security and defense, WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989), History of Communism
Published by: SAGE Publications Ltd
Keywords: Stalinism; Czechoslovakia; post–Second World War history; intelligence services;
Summary/Abstract: This article examines the origins of the Stalinist secret police force, the StB, in Czechoslovakia between 1945 and 1954. By focusing on the biographies of its officials, it argues that there was not one, but two, secret police forces in this period, each recruited from a different “generation” of local communists. In pointing to the social conflicts and ideological tensions that characterized the communist secret police force in this period, it forwards a new interpretation of the party purges and motivations of secret police officials responsible for the radical political violence in Stalinist Europe in the early 1950s.
Journal: East European Politics and Societies
- Issue Year: 32/2018
- Issue No: 01
- Page Range: 3-22
- Page Count: 20
- Language: English
- Content File-PDF