Zbyněk Petráček on who deserves credit for the Velvet Revolution

On Tuesday Czechs and Slovaks commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution which in 1989 brought about the fall of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia. In the Czech Republic supporters of ex President Václav Havel and incumbent President Václav Klaus bickered over who deserved most credit for the Revolution. Klaus backed down in the end, thus earning praise from conservative daily Lidové Noviny: "It's true that the communist doctrine was dead long before November 17 and that the communist power was weak and people had ceased to fear it. But it is not true that the dissidents didn't play a major part in its removal. In a welcome move Klaus has now recognised the individual role Havel played. … But the reality is much more nuanced: the Czechoslovakian dissidents didn't defeat the regime, but they gave the victory and the 20 years that followed it a face … . They failed in the exercise of power, … but it would be too convenient simply to forget the ethos they injected into society."

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