Small Development Within the Bureaucracy Interests: The Nonprofit Sector in the Czech Republic

In the Czech republic, the concept of civil society was introduced to public consciousness after 1989, when the Communist Party’s monopoly of power was abolished. This historical event left indelible traces also on the meanings in which the term “civil society” appears in the public usage. In the beginning the mass media expounded the circumstance that it had been the civil society in the form of dissident organizations that had a decisive share in the downfall of Communist totalitarianism. Civil society was understood to be organized defiance towards an unjust government and undemocratic conditions. The new political leaders presented the organizations of civil society as the authentic expression of the will of the people. When the euphoria from gaining freedom subsided, questions of political stability and smooth functioning of democratic institutions started to dominate. Under the influence of the authority of R. Dahrendorf, the idea began to spread that civil society is not mature enough to fulfill the role of guardian of stability of the political situation, and that it will take several decades until this can materialize. This way the idea gained ground that civil society is some kind of a generator of political culture among the population, a culture that shall be the guarantee of a truly democratic and peaceful development of society (Frič/Deverová/Pajas/Šilhánová, 1998: 14f.). These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.