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| Part of the aftermath of theRevolutions of 1989 | |
 Czechoslovakia between 1968 (Constitutional Law of Federation) and 1989 (Velvet Revolution) | |
| Date | 17 July 1992 – 31 December 1992 (5 months and 2 weeks) |
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Thedissolution of Czechoslovakia,[1] which took effect on 31 December 1992, was theself-determinedpartition of thefederal republic ofCzechoslovakia into the independent countries of theCzech Republic andSlovakia. Both mirrored theCzech Socialist Republic and theSlovak Socialist Republic, which had been created in 1969 as the constituent states of theCzechoslovak Socialist Republic until the end of 1989.
It is sometimes known as theVelvet Divorce, a reference to thebloodlessVelvet Revolution of 1989, which had led to the end of the rule of theCommunist Party of Czechoslovakia.
Czechoslovakia was created with the dissolution ofAustria-Hungary at the end ofWorld War I. In 1918, a meeting took place in the American city ofPittsburgh, at which the future Czechoslovak PresidentTomáš Garrigue Masaryk and other Czech and Slovak representatives signed thePittsburgh Agreement, which promised a common state consisting of two equal nations: Slovaks and Czechs. However, theCzechoslovak Constitution of 1920 specified a single "Czechoslovak nation".
In subsequent years, there were political tensions in the new country betweenCzechoslovakists and those seeking greater autonomy for the Slovaks in particular. In March 1939, with pressure fromAdolf Hitler, theFirst Slovak Republic was created as asatellite state ofGermany with limited sovereignty. The alignment with theSoviet Union afterWorld War II oversaw the reunification into theThird Czechoslovak Republic.
In 1968, theConstitutional Law of Federation reinstated an official federal structure of the 1917 type, but during theNormalization Period in the 1970s,Gustáv Husák, despite being a Slovak himself, returned most control to Prague. That approach encouraged a regrowth of Slovak separatism after the fall of communism.
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 Czech Republic |  Slovakia |
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By 1991, the Czech Republic's GDP per capita was some 20% higher than Slovakia's.Transfer payments from the Czech budget to Slovakia, which had been the rule in the past, were stopped in January 1991.
Many Czechs and Slovaks desired the continued existence of afederal Czechoslovakia. However, the politicians of leading Slovak parties in Parliament, notably theSlovak National Party, would stand to benefit politically if the country were split in two, and advocated a looser form of complete independence andsovereignty.[2] For a few years, political parties re-emerged, but Czech parties had little or no presence in Slovakia and vice versa. To have a functioning state, the government demanded continued control from Prague, but Slovaks continued to ask for decentralisation.[3]
In 1992, the Czech RepublicelectedVáclav Klaus and others, who demanded either an even tighter federation ("viable federation") or two independent states.Vladimír Mečiar and other leading Slovak politicians wanted a kind ofconfederation. Both sides opened frequent and intense negotiations in June. On 17 July, the Slovak parliament adopted thedeclaration of independence of the Slovak nation. Six days later, Klaus and Mečiar agreed to secede Czechoslovakia into two separate states at a meeting inBratislava. Czechoslovak PresidentVáclav Havel resigned, rather than oversee the secession, which he had opposed.[4] In a September 1992 opinion poll, only 37% of Slovaks and 36% of Czechs favoured dissolution.[5]
The goal of negotiations switched to achieving a peaceful division. Peaceful division was prioritized as the process ran in parallel with theviolentbreakup of Yugoslavia (another formerly socialist, Slavic federal state created after thedissolution of Austria-Hungary).[6] On 13 November, theFederal Assembly passed Constitution Act 541, which settled the division of property between the Czech lands and Slovakia.[7] With Constitution Act 542, passed on 25 November, they agreed to the secession of Czechoslovakia into two entities as of 31 December 1992.[7]
The partition occurred without violence and so was thus said to be "velvet", much like the "Velvet Revolution", which had preceded it and had been accomplished by massive peaceful demonstrations and actions. In contrast, other post-communist breakups (such as theSoviet Union andYugoslavia) involved violent conflict. Czechoslovakia is the only former Eastern Bloc state that had an entirely peaceful breakup. In the following years, as Slovakia's economy struggled, Slovaks began to describe the dissolution as a "sandpaper divorce".[8]
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A number of reasons have been given for the dissolution of Czechoslovakia, with the main debates focusing on whether dissolution was inevitable or whether dissolution occurred in conjunction with or even in contrast to the events that occurred between the Velvet Revolution of 1989 and the end of the joined state in 1992.[9]
Those who argue from the inevitability stance tend to point to the differences between the two nations, which date back to theAustro-Hungarian Empire, and to other issues. There are differences between the Czechs and Slovaks, such as problems with the shared state during communism, the success of the state in theCzech lands, its failure in the Slovak lands that still resulted in the adoption of communism since the Czechs were more influential in the running of the state than Slovaks, and the 1968 constitution with its minority veto.[10]
Those who argue that events between 1989 and 1992 led to the dissolution point to international factors such as the breakaway of the Soviet satellite nations, the lack of unified media between the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and most importantly the actions of the political leaders of both nations like the disagreements between Prime Ministers Klaus and Mečiar.[11][12]
Since thecoat of arms of Czechoslovakia was a composition of those of the historic geographic areas forming the country, each republic simply kept its own symbol: the Czechs the lion and the Slovaks the double cross. The same principle was applied to the two-part bilingual Czechoslovak national anthem that comprised two separate pieces of music, the Czech stanzaKde domov můj and the Slovak stanzaNad Tatrou sa blýska. Disputes occurred only with respect to theCzechoslovak flag. During the 1992 negotiations on the details of dissolution of Czechoslovakia, as demanded byVladimír Mečiar andVáclav Klaus, a clause forbidding the use of the state symbols of Czechoslovakia by its successor states was inserted into the constitutional law on the dissolution of Czechoslovakia.[13]
From 1990 to 1992, the red and whiteflag of Bohemia (differing only slightly from thePolish flag by proportion and tone) officially served as the flag of the Czech Republic. Eventually, after a search for new symbols, the Czech Republic unilaterally decided to ignore the aforementioned law and to keep the Czechoslovak flag, with an altered meaning.[14] Slovakia, meanwhile, adopted itstraditional flag; however, just before independence, on 3 September 1992, the coat of arms was added in order to prevent confusion with the similar flags of Russia and Slovenia.
The national territory was divided along the existing internal borders, but the border was not clearly defined at some points and, in some areas, the border cut across streets, access roads and communities that had coexisted for centuries. The most serious issues occurred around the following areas:
The new countries were able to solve the difficulties via mutual negotiations, financial compensation and then an international treaty covering the border modifications.[15]
People living or owning property in the border area, however, continued to experience practical problems until both new countries entered theSchengen Agreement Area in 2007, rendering the border less significant.
Most federal assets were divided in a ratio of two to one, the approximate ratio between the Czech and Slovak population in Czechoslovakia, including army equipment, rail and airliner infrastructure. Some minor disputes, such as gold reserves stored in Prague and federal know-how valuation, lasted for a few years after the dissolution.
Initially, the old Czechoslovak currency, theCzechoslovak koruna, remainedin use by both countries. Czech fears of an economic loss caused the adoption of two national currencies as early as 8 February 1993. On 2 February 1993 Act No. 60/1993 Coll. came in effect in the Czech Republic to create a separate currency that was already envisaged in theCzech Constitution and in Act No. 6/1993 Coll. that created theCzech National Bank which issued a new Czech currency by stamping Czechoslovak banknotes. The stamps had already been prepared in secret in 1992 after the decision about the dissolution of Czechoslovakia. In December 1992 some of the reserve banknotes started to be stamped in the selected banks[clarification needed] in secret.[16] From 8 February to 12 February old banknotes of 100, 500 and 1,000 Kčs (Czechoslovak crowns) were exchanged for the stamped ones in the Czech Republic and a new 200 Kč banknote was introduced.[17] Each person over 15 could exchange banknotes up to 4,000 crowns, and minors below 15 years of age up to 1,000 crowns. Banknotes of lower denominations and coins remained until new ones were printed and minted. Banks in the Czech Republic converted all money on 8 February 1993 from Kčs to Kč. In Slovakia stamps were also applied on banknotes, and a new 10 SK coin was introduced.[18] At the beginning, the currencies could be exchanged at par, but later the value of theSlovak koruna was usually lower than that of theCzech koruna (in 2004, around 25–27% lower). On 2 August 1993, both currencies were distinguished by different stamps that were first affixed to and then printed on old Czechoslovak koruna banknotes.[19] New Czech and Slovak coins replaced old ones during 1993.
On 1 January 2009, Slovakia adopted theeuro as its currency, with a conversion rate of 30.126 SK/€, and the€2 commemorative coin for 2009, Slovakia's first, featured the 20th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution in remembrance of the common struggle of the Czechoslovaks for democracy.[20] By a quirk of fate, the welcoming speech on the behalf of theEuropean Union on the occasion of Slovakia's entry to theeurozone was delivered byMirek Topolánek, the prime minister of the presiding country, the Czech Republic, naturally in his native language, but the other guest speakers used English. The Czech Republic continues to use the Czech koruna, or crown.
Neither the Czech nor Slovak republics sought recognition as the solesuccessor state to Czechoslovakia. This can be contrasted to thedissolution of the Soviet Union, when theRussian Federation was recognized as successor state not only to theRussian SFSR but also to theSoviet Union itself, and also contrasts with thedissolution of Yugoslavia, where therumpFederal Republic of Yugoslavia, dominated bySerbia and encompassing only it andMontenegro, unsuccessfully demanded recognition as the sole successor to theSocialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia, even though the four remaining ex-Yugoslav states, now independent, collectively encompassed around three-fifths of former Yugoslavia, both in population and in territory. Therefore, Czechoslovakia's membership in theUnited Nations ceased upon the dissolution of the country, but on 19 January 1993, the Czech Republic and Slovakia were admitted as new, separate states.[21]
With respect to other international treaties, the Czechs and the Slovaks agreed to honour the treaty obligations of Czechoslovakia. The Slovaks transmitted a letter to theSecretary General of the United Nations on 19 May 1993, to express their intent to remain a party to all treaties signed and ratified by Czechoslovakia and to ratify treaties signed but not ratified before dissolution of Czechoslovakia. The letter acknowledged that underinternational law, all treaties signed and ratified by Czechoslovakia would remain in force. For example, both countries are recognized as signatories of theAntarctic Treaty from the date that Czechoslovakia had signed the agreement in 1962.
Both countries have ratified theVienna Convention on Succession of States in respect of Treaties, and it was not a factor in the dissolution of Czechoslovakia since it did not come into force until 1996.
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The dissolution had some negative impact on the two economies, especially in 1993, as traditional links were severed to accommodate the bureaucracy of international trade, but the impact was considerably less than expected by many people.[citation needed]
Acustoms union between the Czech Republic and Slovakia remained in place from the dissolution until 1 May 2004, when both countries entered theEuropean Union (EU).[citation needed]
Many Czechs hoped that dissolution would quickly start an era of high economic growth in the Czech Republic, which no longer had to sponsor the "less-developed Slovakia". Similarly, others looked forward to an independent unexploited Slovakia that might become a new "economic tiger".[citation needed]
According toThe Prague Post, "Slovak GDP reached 95 percent of the Czech GDP, and it is likely to draw level with it. The Slovak gross national product (GNP), which includes citizens' incomes abroad and deducts the money multinational companies move out of the country, is higher than the Czech one. Old-age pensions are more or less at the same level in both countries, and the consumption per capita is slightly higher in Slovakia. However, salaries are 10 percent lower on average in Slovakia than in the Czech Republic".[22]
However, Martin Filko, the head of the Institute of Financial Policy of the Slovak Finance Ministry, pointed out that Slovakia is among the EU countries whose salaries form the lowest portion of their GDP. In other words, some of people's incomes come from sources other than their main employment, which reduces the real difference between the Czech and the Slovak salaries.[citation needed]
Until 2005, the GDPs of the two countries were growing at a similar rate. However, from 2005 to 2008, the Slovak economy grew faster than the Czech economy.[citation needed]
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Since federalisation in 1968, Czechoslovakia had divided citizenship, either of theCzech Socialist Republic or of theSlovak Socialist Republic, the word Socialist being dropped from both names shortly after theVelvet Revolution. That distinction, however, had little effect on citizens' life. On 1 January 1993, all Czechoslovak citizens automatically became citizens either of the Czech Republic or the Slovak Republic, based on their previous citizenship, permanent residence address, birthplace, family ties, job and other criteria. Additionally, people had one year's time to claim the other citizenship under certain conditions.[23][24]
Slovak legislation allowed dual citizenship until 2010, when it was abolished under theCitizenship Act.[25] Only a handful of people have exercised that right, but its significance is lessened by both nations' membership in the EU as thefreedom of movement for workers, a policy that guaranteesEU citizens the right to work and to live anywhere in the Union. In the case of movement between the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the policy took effect from 2004.
By contrast, the Czech Republic has prohibited dual citizenship for naturalized citizens and requires them to give up existing citizenship(s) prior to receiving citizenship of the Czech Republic. That requirement can be waived only if giving up an existing citizenship might put the applicant or their relatives in danger of persecution in their homeland, which was not the case of applicants from Slovakia. That situation changed with the new Citizenship Act of 2013 (186/2013 Sb.), in force since 1 January 2014.[26] However, most Slovak citizens are still unable to become dual citizens of both the Czech Republic and Slovakia since they automatically lose Slovak citizenship upon voluntarily acquiring another one (see previous paragraph). Exempt from that law are only Slovak citizens who obtain a foreign citizenship by virtue of marriage with a foreign national. Some Slovak politicians[who?] have speculated in the media[example needed] about softening the Citizenship Act, but no change has yet materialised as of January 2015.
Citizens of both countries were allowed to cross the border using an ID card instead of a passport and were allowed to work anywhere without the need to obtain an official permit. Border checks were completely removed on 21 December 2007, when both countries joined theSchengen Agreement.
Under the current European regulations, citizens of either country are entitled to the diplomatic protection of any other EU country and so both have been considering merging their embassies, together with nations of theVisegrád Group, to reduce costs.[27]
One of the problems not solved during dissolution was the question of a large number ofRomani living in the Czech Republic born and officially registered in today's Slovakia. Most of them did not re-register their official place of stay during the months before dissolution and so the question of their citizenship was left open. The 1992 Czech Nationality Act allowed a grant of automatic citizenship only to those who were born on Czech territory. For others, the right to citizenship required proof of a five-year period of residence, an "unobjectionable" criminal record, significant fees and a complicated bureaucratic process, which reportedly excluded a rather large percentage of Roma.[28]
The Slovak government did not want to grant citizenship to nonresidents. Significant numbers of Roma living in Czechorphanages did not have their legal status clarified and were released from care as adult noncitizens without any right to work or live in the Czech Republic.[29] Under pressure from the European Union, the Czech government made amendments to its nationality law in 1999 and 2003, which effectively solved the problem, but compensation has not been provided to those rendered stateless in 1992.[28]
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In the former Czechoslovakia, thefirst television channel was a federal one, and theCzech andSlovak languages were used in equal ratios in the television news there, but foreign films and television series were almost exclusively dubbed into Czech, for example. That and the great similarity of the two languages made almost all people of both nationspassively bilingual: they could understand but not necessarily speak the other language. After the dissolution in 1990s, the new television channels in the Czech Republic practically stopped using Slovak, and young Czech people now have a much lower understanding of Slovak. Also, the number of Slovak-language books and newspapers sold in the Czech Republic dropped drastically. The Czech television news, however, started to reintroduce Slovak-language coverage from Slovakia and Slovak television (STV2) rebroadcasts the Czech television newscastUdálosti ČT daily, ten minutes after midnight.
On the publicRadio and Television of Slovakia, it is common to have at least one daily newscast from the Czech Republic during prime time news. Furthermore, many programmes on Slovak television channels are still dubbed into Czech, some films in cinemas are subtitled in Czech and there are far more Czech-language books and periodicals on the market than there were before the dissolution. The major boost for the language interchange has come from private television channel providers likeCS Link (Czech Republic) andSky Link (Slovakia) that offer Slovak channels in the Czech Republic and vice versa. Additionally, several channels, regardless of their national origin, offer programs both in Czech and Slovak (CSFilm,TV Barrandov) or even mix likeTV Nova'sNova Sport coverage of the EnglishPremier League. New impulses to mutual contacts coming via television are also common shows like the Intelligence Test of Nations, Czechoslovakia'sGot Talent, andMasked Singer[30] broadcast by PRIMA and TV JOJ, andCzecho-Slovak SuperStar, the latter being the first international edition of thePop Idol song contest broadcast by TV Nova and Markíza (both owned byCME), which also organized joint versions ofMasterChef andThe Voice in 2012. Also, the New Year's Eve Program for 2009 was prepared and broadcast jointly by ČT and STV and for 2010 by the Czech TV PRIMA and the Slovak TV JOJ, this time even including the singing of the Czechoslovak national anthem.
Young Slovak people still have the same knowledge of Czech as their predecessors, if not better.[citation needed] In Slovakia, Czech may still be used automatically in all judicial proceedings, and all documents written in Czech are acknowledged by Slovak authorities and vice versa. Further, the Slovak Official Language Act, passed in 2009, reconfirmed the right of Czechs to use their language in all official communication when dealing with Slovak authorities although it explicitly limited the use of Czech in Slovakia to persons with Czech as their mother tongue. The same is true about usingSlovak in the Czech Republic under the Administration Procedure Act of 2004.[31]Gustáv Slamečka, a Slovak citizen who was theCzech transport minister (2009–2010), used Slovak exclusively during his official communication.
The official breakup occurred right in the middle of the1993 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships, which took place inSweden. The team representingCzechoslovakia was renamed "Czech–Slovak" on 1 January. In international ice hockey tournaments, the Czech Republic took over Czechoslovakia's place in the A-groups, and Slovakia had to start in the lower divisions.[32][33][34][35]
During theFIS Nordic World Ski Championships 1993 inFalun, Sweden, the ski jumping team competed as a combined Czech–Slovak team in the team large hill event and won silver. The team had been selected before the dissolution.Jaroslav Sakala won two medals in the individual hill events for the Czech Republic at those games along with his silver in the team event.
In theirqualifying section for the1994 FIFA World Cup, theCzechoslovakia national football team competed under the name RCS, which stood for "Representation of Czechs and Slovaks". In their last game as "Representation of Czechs and Slovaks", the team failed to qualify after it got only a draw in its final match againstBelgium, a match that it had to win to qualify.[36] It was afterward that it was officially split up intoCzech andSlovak national teams, with both being declared successors to Czechoslovakia.[37][38][39][40][41]
The mutual encounters between the national teams of both countries in many sports are followed by most of the populations, and the number of players and coaches active in the other republic is significant. Martin Lipták, a Slovak handball coach, successfully led the Czech national team to the EHF 2010 Handball European Championship in Austria.[42] A Slovak team under his coaching, Tatran Prešov, won the Czech national league in 2008 and 2009.[43] Czech ice hockey coachVladimír Vůjtek led the Slovak national team to the silver medal at the2012 IIHF World Championship, having beaten the Czech team in the semifinals.
Several sports have featured a common league, and discussions about having a common football or ice hockey league continue.[44]
The road cyclistJán Svorada earned Slovak citizenship in 1993. In1994, he became the first Slovak rider ever to win aTour de France stage. Two years later, he earned Czech citizenship, and he became the first Czech rider ever to win another Tour de France stage in1998.
The two successor states continued to use thecountry code+42 until February 1997,[45] when it was replaced by two separate codes:+420 for the Czech Republic[46] and+421 for Slovakia.[47] Since then, telephone calls between both countries have required international dialing.[48]
Soon after the dissolution, public satisfaction was relatively low, with large portions of the population on both sides of the border protesting the fact that the dissolution of the common state was not put to a vote, as described by politologist Lubomír Kopeček ofMasaryk University. A March 1993 study conducted byMartin Bútora and his wifeZora indicated that in case of a referendum about 50% of the population would've voted against the dissolution of the state with only about 30% in favour of the dissolution.[49]
Former SlovakMinister of CultureMarek Maďarič, pointed out, in January 2023, that the dissolution without a referendum reflected the historic practice and a tradition of constitutional stately affairs decided without a referendum in Czechoslovak history. Namely, both the formation of theFirst Czechoslovak Republic from the rubbles ofAustria-Hungary in 1918 as well as the reunion of theProtectorate andSlovak State to form aThird Republic in 1945 after the conclusion of theWorld War II were achieved without a referendum, solely through the pursuit of political representatives of the era.[50]
Public perception of the dissolution has not changed much, with a December 2017 poll showing that just 42% of Czechs and 40% of Slovaks agree with what happened (compared to 36% and 37% in 1992, respectively). Surveys from 2010 showed that the majority of the population of Prague (Czechs) still considers the division of the country a mistake;[51] similarly, the general representative survey in Slovakia (from 2008)[52] showed that society is still divided in opinion on the dissolution, with 47% favouring the dissolution and 44% considering it a mistake. A 2023 poll from the Czech republic has shown that 50% of Czechs consider the dissolution a correct decision, 39% consider it wrong and 11% are neutral or undecided.[53]
In 2015, a Slovak movement called "Czechoslovakia 2018" was established to try to get a referendum by 2018. Its leader, Ladislav Zelinka, said that he had received thousands of emails and calls from supporters, but it was unable to reach the necessary 350,000 petition signatures. The younger generations of both countries are largely indifferent to the issue since they never experienced the previous period themselves, and older generations are more focused on present issues such asimmigration and favour their own separatenationalism.[54]
Political influences between the countries are minimal, but social democrats tend to cooperate very closely on regional and European topics in recent years. Furthermore, it has become customary that the elected presidents pay their first and last official foreign visits during their term to the other republic of the former Czechoslovakia. Appointed foreign ministers tend to follow that unwritten rule. On 29 October 2012, to commemorate Czechoslovakia's declaration of independence, which occurred on 28 October 1918, the Czech and the Slovak governments held, for the first time, a joint cabinet meeting in the communities ofTrenčín andUherské Hradiště, near the common border.[55]
Peacekeeping troops stationed in the formerYugoslavia were put under joint command on several occasions. For example, from 2002 to July 2005, the Czech Armed Forces joined with the Armed Forces of the Slovak Republic to form a joint Czech–Slovak KFOR battalion inKosovo, which contributed to the Multinational Brigade CENTRE.[56]
Trade relations were re-established and stabilised, and the Czech Republic continues to be Slovakia's most important business partner.[citation needed] After a short interruption, Slovakia's resorts in theCarpathian mountains, especiallyHigh Tatras andLow Tatras are again the destination of a growing number of Czech tourists.
Following the death of the last Czechoslovak (and the first Czech) president,Václav Havel, on 18 December 2011, both the Czech Republic and Slovakia observed a day of national mourning. During the funeral mass inPrague'sSt. Vitus Cathedral, prayers were recited in an equal ratio inCzech andSlovak.
Some companies and organizations established in former Czechoslovakia, such as the bankČeskoslovenská obchodní banka, the political partiesKDU-ČSL andSPR–RSČ, and theCzechoslovak Hussite Church have continued to use the Czechoslovak name after the state's dissolution.
