Decommunization as a Digital Utopia: Digitization of the Communist State Security Archives in the Czech Republic
Decommunization as a Digital Utopia: Digitization of the Communist State Security Archives in the Czech Republic
Author(s): Vítězslav SommerSubject(s): History, Archiving, Recent History (1900 till today), History of Communism
Published by: AV ČR - Akademie věd České republiky - Masarykův ústav
Keywords: digitization; post-socialism; Czech Republic; archives
Summary/Abstract: This article discusses the issue of the digitization of the archival materials of the Czechoslovak State Security (StB), the most important instrument of repressive policy during the communism (1948–1989). After 1989, a number of public disputes arose around the issue of the vast archive of the communist ministry of the interior. This situation reverberated in historiography, as well as in a broader public debate on what was called “coming to terms with the communist past”. With the arrival of digital technologies, digitization became a central point of this long and politicized debate. Seemingly a technical problem – digitization of archival materials that had been created by the State Security between 1948 and 1989 – became a battlefield of bitter disputes over who and how these materials should be stored, made accessible and interpreted.
Journal: Střed. Časopis pro mezioborová studia Střední Evropy 19. a 20. století
- Issue Year: 13/2021
- Issue No: 1
- Page Range: 82-109
- Page Count: 28
- Language: Czech