Publication details
Uherský Brod v letech 1945–1989
| Title in English | Uherský Brod between 1945–1989 |
|---|---|
| Authors | |
| Year of publication | 2022 |
| Type | Chapter of a book |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description | The chapter examines the period in which the city was transformed from a small center in a rural region to a heavily industrialized settlement housing thousands of new employees. Amenities and the general way of life of the inhabitants have changed significantly. At the same time, however, there was a certain relegation of the city further to the periphery, for example by cancellation town as the seat of the administrative district and dissolution of the affiliated public institutions. The flip side of industrialization was the liquidation of the local developing private sector of services, trade, consumer goods industry, and crafts, which was also reflected in the overall and protracted degradation of consumption and the function of urban space. The chapter relies primarily on the content analysis of extensive chronicle records and various archival materials, especially from the written legacies of the municipal national committee and the district committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. The political development of Uherský Brod is characterized by the difficulties of consolidating the communist government in a traditionally distinctly non-communist region. These were manifested, among other things, in the extent of the persecution of political opponents in the 1950s. The extent of the reform attempt in 1968, the degree of punishment of the existing elites at the beginning of the so-called normalization period, and the process of the collapse of the communist system in 1989 remain largely undocumented in detail, as they did not make much of an impression in the available records, nor in the local commemorative cultures. The typical difficulties of normalization governance in ensuring the standard of living of the inhabitants and fulfilling the development plans of the city are illustrated. Attention is also paid to the role of religious, civil, or communist public rituals, to the symbolic rebranding of the city's public space, and, last but not least, to the demographic as well as structural developments of the town. |