Czech Republic: History, Governance & Economy

• Czechia, fully named the Czech Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Europe

Establishment and Governance

• Became independent on January 1, 1993, as the successor state to Czechoslovakia
• From January 1, 1969, it existed as one of the two republics of the Czechoslovak Federation
• History of Czech statehood and culture extends for over a thousand years
• According to its constitution, it is a parliamentary, democratic, and rule-of-law state with a liberal state regime and a political system based on free competition among political parties and movements

Government Structure

• The head of state is the President of the Republic
• The supreme and sole legislative body is the bicameral Parliament of the Czech Republic
• The Government of the Czech Republic stands at the top of executive power

Economy and Development

• Czechia has a market economy
• It is considered a highly developed country based on economic, social, and political indicators, such as GDP per capita, Human Development Index, Index of Press Freedom, and Index of Internet Freedom
• Belongs to the group of 31 richest countries in the world with the highest financial income, according to the World Bank
• Has a very small proportion of the population living below the poverty line compared to other countries
• Exhibits relatively low inequality and a balanced redistribution of wealth across the population
• The unemployment rate is consistently low and below the average of developed countries
• Has a smaller ecological footprint compared to some other developed countries

Safety and International Relations

• Consistently ranks among the 15 safest countries in the world, according to the Global Peace Index
• A member of the European Union, North Atlantic Alliance, United Nations, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, World Trade Organization, International Monetary Fund, World Bank, Council of Europe, Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, European Customs Union
• Part of the Schengen Area, the European Economic Area
• A member of the Visegrad Group, among other international structures

Geography and Demographics

• A landlocked state with an area of 78,870 km²
• Borders Germany to the west (810 km), Poland to the north (762 km), Slovakia to the east (252 km), and Austria to the south (466 km)
• Administratively divided into eight regions and 14 self-governing regions
• Prague is the capital city and also one of the regions
• Had approximately 10.7 million inhabitants in 2020

Population and Religion

• A significant majority of the population identifies as Czech or Moravian nationality
• The largest Roman Catholic Church has over 10% of the population
• Almost 80% of the population is without religious affiliation or did not fill in this item in the census

Historical State Formations

• Czechia continues the statehood traditions of Great Moravia, dating back to the 9th century, the Duchy of Bohemia, the Kingdom of Bohemia, the Silesian Duchies and the Duchy of Silesia, the Margraviate of Moravia, and Czechoslovakia

Early Statehood

• The first documented state formation in the territory of today's Czech Republic was the supra-tribal union of Samo's Empire
• In the second half of the 9th century, Great Moravia was established
• When it disappeared around 907 under the pressure of nomadic Hungarian tribes, the center of state development shifted to Bohemia

Přemyslid Dynasty

• The Bohemian rulers of the Přemyslid dynasty built a medieval Přemyslid state, also called the Czech state (Duchy of Bohemia, later Kingdom of Bohemia)
• From the turn of the 10th and 11th centuries, it formed part of the Holy Roman Empire
• From the time of Charles IV (1348), the term Lands of the Bohemian Crown was also used for the lands subject to the Bohemian king, which also included the Margraviate of Moravia and the Duchies of Upper and Lower Silesia

Habsburg Influence

• From 1526, the Czech lands were gradually incorporated into the Habsburg monarchy
• Habsburg rulers significantly limited the previous independence of the Kingdom of Bohemia
• The Lands of the Bohemian Crown, after 1749, remained crown lands of the Habsburgs until the end of World War I in 1918
• From 1804, the Habsburg monarchy had the official name Austrian Empire
• From 1867, the monarchy was called Austria-Hungary

Czechoslovakia

• After the dissolution of Austria-Hungary in 1918, Czechoslovakia was created as a unitary state with a republican government
• In 1938, as a result of the Munich Conference, the border regions of the present-day Czech Republic that were predominantly German-speaking were annexed to Nazi Germany
• In 1939, the rest of the territory was occupied by the German army, leading to the establishment of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia
• Czechoslovakia was restored in 1945
• From 1960, it had the official name Czechoslovak Socialist Republic

Federalization and Dissolution

• In 1969, Czechoslovakia was federalized, creating the Czech Socialist Republic, a formally sovereign national state
• This state, from an international law perspective, became the direct predecessor of the current Czech Republic
• The word "socialist" was removed from the name on March 6, 1990, after the fall of the communist regime
• In 1990, Czechoslovakia was renamed the Czech and Slovak Federative Republic
• At the end of 1992, Czechoslovakia was dissolved, and two new states were created: Czechia and Slovakia
• On January 1, 1993, the Constitution of the Czech Republic came into force, and the new state continued the statehood traditions of Czechoslovakia and the former Lands of the Bohemian Crown

International Recognition

• The existence of the Czech Republic as a subject of international law is recognized by all countries in the world
• Until September 8, 2009, when diplomatic relations were established, it was not recognized as an independent state by Liechtenstein
• Liechtenstein required Czech agreement to bilateral negotiations on property issues as a condition of recognition and the establishment of diplomatic relations

Ancient Settlement

• The territory of today's Czech Republic was inhabited by humans as early as 750,000 years ago
• Archaeological finds attest to settlement between 28,000 BCE
• From the 3rd century BCE, Celts (Boii) inhabited the area, and in the 1st century, Germanic tribes (Marcomanni and Quadi) arrived
• The first historically documented ruler in the Czech territory was the Marcomannic king Marobud

Slavic Settlement

• From the end of the 5th century, the first Slavs appeared in the territory of today's Czech Republic
• In the 7th century, Slavic tribes under the leadership of the Frankish merchant Samo formed Samo's Empire , although this was more of a supra-tribal union
• From 830–833, Great Moravia was formed under the rule of the Mojmír dynasty, which gradually included Bohemia (890–894), Silesia, Lusatia, Lesser Poland, and the rest of Hungary
• Great Moravia fully christianized with the help of the Byzantine mission of Cyril and Methodius, invited by the ruler Rostislav
• Under his successor Svatopluk I, the empire reached the peak of its power, but after his death, it quickly declined
• Bohemia seceded from Great Moravia in 894, and it was destroyed in 906 or 907 by the then still nomadic Magyars

Medieval Era

• The beginnings of the Czech state with its center in Prague date back to the second half of the 9th century
• Borivoj I, the first documented Czech prince from the Přemyslid dynasty, was baptized in Velehrad, the Moravian seat
• During the 10th and 11th centuries, the state consolidated, and the territory of Moravia was annexed, mainly by the prince Oldřich
• The Duchy of Bohemia gradually acquired the characteristics of a more or less autonomous medieval state, which was part of the Holy Roman Empire
• The Prague bishopric was founded in the 973, and Saint Wenceslaus became the main national saint

Kingdom of Bohemia

• The Kingdom of Bohemia was not established until 1198 when the German king recognized the Czech royal title as hereditary
• This was confirmed by Emperor Frederick II of Hohenstaufen in 1212 with the Golden Bull of Sicily issued to the Bohemian king Přemysl Otakar I, including other privileges of the Bohemian kingdom
• The Czech monarch was henceforth exempt from all obligations to the Holy Roman Empire except for participation in imperial diets
• Wenceslaus I, and in particular, his son Přemysl Otakar II, then built an extensive dominion
• Wenceslaus II also turned his attention to the north and east, where he managed to acquire territory across Poland to the Baltic Sea and temporarily acquired the Hungarian royal crown for his ten-year-old son Wenceslaus III
• After the assassination of Wenceslaus III in Olomouc, the Kingdom of Bohemia fell into chaos, but the election of John of Luxembourg as Czech king enabled a new upswing, which culminated during the reign of John's son Charles IV (1316–1378)
• In the years 1319–1329, Upper Lusatia was annexed to the Kingdom of Bohemia, and in 1335 also the city of Wroclaw, to which a significant part of Silesia adjoined
• After 1348, Brandenburg was temporarily annexed

Religious Reform

• Already during the reign of Charles IV, the beginnings of the Czech reform movement can be seen, which strove to deepen personal piety and to redress the secularized church
• Religious disputes escalated during the reign of Charles' son Wenceslaus IV
• After the burning of Master Jan Hus in 1415 in German Konstanz, the tension between Hus's supporters and his opponents turned into open hostility and events culminated in the Hussite Wars
• Radical Hussites founded the town of Tábor, which became the center of the Hussite revolution
• Jan Žižka of Trocnov and Prokop Holý then defeated all four crusades to Bohemia
• The wars were ended by an agreement between the Council of Basel and moderate Hussites
• In the person of George of Poděbrady, the country even elected a moderate Hussite as king
• However, external pressure forced King George to cede the Czech throne to the Jagiellonian family for tactical reasons
• When the second Jagiellonian on the Czech throne, Louis, fell in the battle of Mohács (1526), the Habsburgs acquired it, who, together with the subsequent Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty, ruled the country for almost another 400 years

Modern Era

• In 1526, Ferdinand I of Habsburg was elected to the Czech throne, starting the Habsburg dynasty
• The dynasty gradually incorporated the country into the Habsburg monarchy
• Ferdinand's grandson Rudolf II (as the last Habsburg) chose Prague as his seat and, although Catholic, was partially tolerant of Czech Protestantism
• However, his death ended of tolerance, and religious tension rose again
• In 1618, an armed uprising of Czech Protestant estates broke out against the Catholic ruler
• The defenestration of the imperial governors in 1618 also marked the beginning of the Thirty Years' War
• The army of the Czech estates was defeated in 1620 at White Mountain, and the leaders of the estates were publicly executed in Prague

Religious Intolerance

• A forced re-Catholicization of Czech Protestants began
• The vast property of the Czech exiled nobility and intelligentsia fell to loyal supporters of the Habsburgs
• By the middle of the 17th century, the population in Bohemia and Moravia had declined by nearly 30% to about 1.75 million

Enactment of New Constitution

• In 1627, the Renewed Land Ordinance was issued for Bohemia, by which the Habsburgs acquired the Czech royal title in perpetuity, Catholicism was declared the only permitted religion, and the German language was formally equated with Czech, but in fact, it was preferred
• The administrative reforms of Maria Theresa in 1749 de facto united the Lands of the Bohemian Crown with Austria into a unitary state, but Czech kings continued to be crowned within the Bohemian kingdom
• The famine of 1770–1772 killed at least 250,000 people, leading to widespread serf unrest
• Religious tolerance and the abolition of serfdom were brought about by the reforms of Joseph II in 1781
• Joseph also increased the emphasis on the centralisation of the monarchy
• This centralisation was aided by the preference for the German language in state and ecclesiastical administration
• In response to the Germanization of the nation and its culture, the Czech national revival began in the Czech lands at the end of the 18th century
• This involved efforts to renew Czech culture and language and later to gain political power by parties representing the interests of the Czech ethnicity

Austria-Hungary

• In the second half of the 19th century, during, the long reign of Emperor Franz Joseph I, Bohemia experienced significant economic development
• Most (about 70%) of the industry of Austria-Hungary was concentrated in the Czech lands, including areas settled by Germans
• Czech political elites, especially František Palacký and František Ladislav Rieger, came to the conclusion that a federalized and largely democratically organized Austria could be the most advantageous living space for the Czech nation and other Slavic nations of Central and Southern Europe
• This called Austroslavism
• The empire was to be a protection against powerful states in the west and east, namely against Germany and the Russian Empire

End of Empire

• The language decrees of April 1897, which equated Czech with German, led to the fall of the government and to ethnic unrest between Czechs and Germans
• The electoral law of 1907 introduced universal suffrage for men
• The Czech nation experienced an era of all-round expansion in the areas of politics, economy, culture, and education within Austria-Hungary
• This ended with the outbreak of World War I in July 1914
• The Viennese politicians initiated this destructive conflict after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria in Sarajevo
• They wanted to turn a war against the small Serbian kingdom into a seemingly powerful Austria-Hungary
• Other powers quickly joined the war, and Austria-Hungary gradually became a mere appendage of the German Empire
• The dream of Austroslavism ended
• The war ended in disaster and the disintegration of Austria-Hungary

First Czechoslovak Republic

• During World War I, 1.5 million men conscripted from Czech districts fought
• Of them, 138,000 fell on the side of the monarchy and about five and a half thousand in the Czechoslovak Legions on the other side of the war rivalry
• More than 90,000 volunteers formed the Czechoslovak Legions in France, Italy, and Russia, where they fought against the Central Powers (including their native Austria-Hungary
• After the defeat of Austria-Hungary, on October 28, 1918, the Lands of Bohemian Crown, parts of the Kingdom of Hungary, including Carpathian Ruthenia, were united into a new state, Czechoslovakia
• Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk was elected as its first president
• He had worked for Czech, i.e., Czechoslovak independence in the Entente countries and in Russia starting in 1914, with the support of Edvard Beneš and Milan Rastislav Štefánik
• From the founding of the state until its demise, the so-called First Republic (officially the Czechoslovak Republic) was a unitary state and remained the only truly democratic state in Central Europe after 1933

National Character

• Despite its declared national character, based on Czechoslovakism, Czechoslovakia was a multi-ethnic state
• There lived 6,747,000 Czechs, 3,124,000 Germans, 2,014,000 Slovaks, 745,000 Hungarians, 462,000 Ruthenians, 181,000 citizens of Jewish nationality, and 76,000 Poles

Border Conflicts

• After the declaration of independence, border conflicts with Poland and Hungary, as well as unrest in the German areas of the country
• Czechoslovakia, especially Minister of Foreign Affairs Edvard Beneš, sought to solve system through alliance with France and from 1935 also with the Soviet Union
• The Sudeten Germans, living mainly in the border areas adjacent to Germany and Austria, became radicalized as a result of: the Great Depression, massive unemployment (which, however, affected all nationalities), and intensive Nazi propaganda and began to demand secession from Czechoslovakia
• These efforts were represented Sudeten German Party led by Konrad Henlein

Munich Agreement

• Under pressure from Germany and European powers France, the United Kingdom, and Italy in September 1938, Czechoslovakia was forced by the Munich Agreement to cede extensive border areas to Germany. The Munich Agreement is also referred to as the Munich Betrayal or Munich Dictate, as representatives Czech parties were not invited to the meeting and Nazi Germany threatened a military invasion of Czechoslovakia
• The valid military alliance of Czechoslovakia with France proved to be completely ineffective
• In addition to the gradual occupation of the Sudeten areas by Germany, the southern areas of Slovakia and Carpathian Ruthenia with a Hungarian-speaking population fell to Hungary
• A small part of the territory of Czechoslovakia, especially the Těšín region, was annexed by Poland
• The name of this truncated state began to be written with a hyphen, Czech-Slovakia
• The term Second Republic was used for the remaining short period from the Munich Agreement until the complete dismemberment of Czechoslovakia in March 1939

Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

• On March 14, 1939, Slovakia declared independence, and after the occupation by German troops, the rest of the Czechoslovak territory (i.e., in Bohemia without the Sudeten, annexed to Germany in 1938, and the eastern part of Czechoslovakian Těšín, annexed in the same to Poland) was declared the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia on March 15, 1939
• President Edvard Beneš organized a government-in-exile in London
• The German occupation of Czechoslovakia met with massive resistance from the inhabitants of the country and groups supported from abroad (especially Operation Anthropoid)
• The Nazis responded with terror
• During World War II, the Nazis implemented a policy of total deployment of Czech labor in Germany, as well as the liquidation of the Jewish diaspora
• According to research published by Gustav Hajčík's and Jaroslav Voleník in 1956, 360,000 Czechoslovaks died during that time
• The Nazis also planned to liquidate, Germanize, and displace members of five Slavic nations to create living space for German residents

Czechoslovakia in 1945-1992

• In May 1945, the liberation of Czechoslovakia by the Allies was completed, formally restoring a democratic state
• The period 1945–1948 is sometimes called the Third Republic
• About 140,000 Soviet soldiers died during the liberation of Czechoslovakia
• About 11,700 Czechoslovaks, members of the 1st Czechoslovak Army Corps, commanded Ludvík Svoboda, also died alongside them
• This army corps distinguished itself in the battles of Sokolovo and Kyiv and bled cruelly in the Carpathian-Dukla operation, one of the aims was to help the Slovak National Uprising
• 66,495 Romanians, 1,302 Poles, and 351 Americans also died during the liberation of Czechoslovakia
• Czech May Uprising also helped in the liberation of Czechoslovakia
• The most famous part of the world was the Prague Uprising
• After the liberation of Slovakia, the Red Army advanced to Czech territory from Ostrava and Bratislava
• Later, Prague Offensive of the Red Army from the north to Prague was launched, in which units of the Romanian and Polish armies also participated
• Soviet troops advanced to the agreed demarcation line with the U.S. Army and liberated about two-thirds of Bohemia
• The rest of the Czech territory west line Karlovy Vary – Pilsen – České Budějovice was liberated by the U.S. Army

Post-War Czechoslovakia and Communist Takeover

• The full democratic state was not restored in the period from 1945 to February 1948
• The expulsion of Germans from Czechoslovakia to Germany and Austria took place, during which frequent crimes and injustices occurred, mostly never punished
• The Potsdam Conference approved the expulsion of Germans in 1945
• Limited party competition was a problem
• Only four left-wing and center-left government political parties and no opposition parties were allowed in the Czech lands
• The heavy industry, power industry, film industry, banks, insurance companies, larger construction companies, etc., were nationalized
• The Communist Party Czechoslovakia won the 1946 parliamentary elections
• These elections are considered the last free democratic elections for more than forty years
• In February 1948, the communists seized power in a coup and eliminated the remnants of the democratic system
• Seriously ill President Edvard Beneš abdicated and died later in 1948
• Communist leader Klement Gottwald replaced him

Totalitarian Rule

• The country became a totalitarian state and part of the Eastern Bloc under the domination of the Soviet Union
• Freedoms and structures of civil society were suppressed, starting with the abolition of self-governing lands (1949) and the suppression of free association and economic life
• A wave of people emigrated to non-communist countries
• Collectivization of agriculture and currency reform (1953) deprived millions of citizens of their property
• Thousands of citizens fell victim to political trials, often judicial murders
• After Gottwald's death in 1953, Antonín Zápotocký became president
• After his death Antonín Novotný was assigned in the 1950s and 1960s
• Liberalization culminated in 1968
• At the beginning of 1968, President Novotný resigned, and army general in retirement Ludvík Svoboda became his successor
• Alexander Dubček chosen First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
• The Prague Spring liberalization movement was suppressed military invasion by troops of the Soviet Union
• The federalization remained a permanent constitutional consequence of the Prague Spring
• Formally altered unitary state to a federation of two sovereign nations by January 1, 1969
• About 100,000 mostly educated people emigrated after Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia
• Which intensified economic decline
• Territory of Czechoslovakia was occupied by Soviet Army
• Regime tried to resist Charter 77
• President of Czechoslovakia in years 1975 to 1989 was Gustáv Husák

Velvet Revolution and Dissolution

• The Velvet Revolution, which began on November 17, 1989, overthrew the communist regime and allowed the restoration of democracy and free enterprise
• Dissident Václav Havel was elected president of the republic on December 29, 1989
• The social transformation also caused a dramatic increase in social inequality, significant indebtedness of the state, and a deepening of federalization leading to the collapse of the common state of Czechs and Slovaks
• Federalization, which had been formally in effect since 1969, but had been largely frozen, was belatedly implemented from 1990
• Tensions grew rapidly the division and states
• Czechoslovakia peacefully dissolved by December 31, 1992
• The existing national republics took over the legal order of the dissolved federation and divided its assets and liabilities

Independent Czechia

• The Czech Republic became a subject of international law on January 1, 1993, with the dissolution of the federation
• It joined the Western European political structures
• Accepted into NATO on March 12, 1999, and joined the European Union on May 1, 2004
• Joined the Schengen Agreements in 2004 becoming part of the Schengen area on December 21, 2007
• Key figures were President Václav Havel
• Leading representative of the value-oriented Václav Klaus of the right-wing
• Prime ministers was economic transformation.
• Miloš Zeman of left wing the ODS under opposition agreement
• Prague received the largest influx of refugees in its history following the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine

Explore Czechia's journey from Czechoslovakia to an independent republic in 1993. Discover its parliamentary, democratic government structure with a President, bicameral Parliament, and executive Government. Learn about its developed market economy.