Feature-Havel Loved Abroad, Weak At Home 10 Years On
The dissident playwright jumped on the world stage when he and a band of Bohemian artists led hundreds of thousands on Prague's streets into a bloodless coup: "The Velvet Revolution". Thrust from a prison cell to Prague Castle in a matter of weeks, Havel called for a "Civil Society" built on individual responsibility, political consensus and moral leadership. His words resonated from Wenceslas Square to Washington.
But 10 years on, as Czechs tire of his idealistic style of leadership, Havel has been widely declared to be yesterday's man in Prague, while the Communists have survived to fight on. Opinion polls show trust in Havel dipping below 50 percent, down from 90 percent early in the decade.
Cynicism about the system runs deep - the cabinet and parliament are trusted by less than a third of the people. No other figure has clear support to replace Havel.
Aged 63 in October and relatively robust after three brushes with death in as many years, Havel, no longer a chain smoker, has spent much of his time recently ensconced in his private villa or official country chateau. His successful battles against a cancerous lung tumour in late 1996, then a ruptured intestine and life-threatening pneumonia, brought sympathy, but his power waned even more. His marriage to actress Dagmar Veskrnova less than a year after his first wife and dissident partner Olga died from cancer in early 1996 sat poorly with many in the country.
Last week, on the cusp of the revolution's 10th anniversary, parliament gave preliminary approval to a plan which would strip Havel of the few powers he has left before his final term ends in 2003 - to name the prime minister and central bank members.
The author of ironic plays on the nature of communism and the peaceful dissident's 1978 handbook the "Power of the Powerless", Havel has now found himself all but powerless.
"I imagine the Czechs tend to forget how lucky they are to have Havel. I think there is a tendency to take him too much for granted," said University of London lecturer on Eastern European politics Kieran Williams. "If you take a grand view of Czech politics Havel has been unquestionably a good thing. Has he been as visionary as he could have been? Probably not."
THE PITFALLS OF NON-POLITICAL POLITICS
Many point to Havel's decision in the early 1990s to remain above the fray of politics, what he called "non-political politics", as his largest mistake. He declined to use his vast popularity then to organise a party and compete for votes.
Elected four times to the presidency by parliaments with no other choice of personality matching his stature, he was given constitutional powers which were almost purely ceremonial. Havel sought to persuade 10 million Czechs by rhetoric alone to look more to the moral than the material in post-Communist life - with limited success.
"This was a choice Havel made - he was not going to play party politics," said Williams. "That has been his biggest political shortcoming. It handicaps him, there is just no way around it in liberal democracy."
Michael Zantovsky, Havel's former spokesman and ambassador to Washington who went on to lead a small right-wing party, said the defining moment of the Havel presidency came in 1991.
"In the presidential office...in late 1991, we had a quite lively debate... I was one who advocated a direct role (for Havel)," Zantovsky told Reuters. "I think he now regrets, at least in part, staying outside politics. If he wanted to shape the system and society more than he's done - and he's certainly done his share - there was no avoiding a direct role in politics, and he opted out."
ANOTHER VACLAV FILLS THE VOID
Vaclav Klaus, a firmly confident finance minister, quickly filled the vacuum left by Havel in the early 1990s, forming the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) based on the style of former Conservative British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
Klaus impressed many with smart suits, an aggressive western approach and promises of a rapid but relatively painless transformation to capitalism without the "shock therapy" bankruptcies and selloffs seen in Poland and Hungary. His plan to privatise communist-era industries but keep them in Czech hands through a vouchers-for-stock scheme helped make him prime minister when his ODS topped elections in 1992.
Klaus became the pragmatist to Havel's idealist. He arranged the peaceful 1993 split of Czechoslovakia against the will of Havel. "It turned out to be much easier to stand against something (in the revolution), than to actually do something about it," ODS vice-chairman Ivan Langer, a student leader in 1989, told Reuters, explaining his decision to join ODS.
Klaus's privatisation system spawned wealthy individuals and investment funds and gave him a solid and loyal political base, but did little to bring capital and know-how to troubled firms. The system also became tainted by corruption and a frequent practice Czechs started to call "tunnelling" when new owners used their stakes to strip companies of better assets.
Klaus was shoved out of office after his economic experiment began to crumble along with the country's currency in 1997. Days later, Havel blasted Klaus's government "not so much for any concrete flaw... (but) an apathetic, or almost hostile attitude, toward everything that bears even a distant resemblance to civil society or that which would create it."
But Klaus continued to set the political agenda. His party again has been topping opinion polls, holding a minority Social Democratic government by a thread in a fractious parliament. Meanwhile the Communists, little reformed from 1989, have begun to challenge the ODS as the most popular party.
HAVEL'S LEGACY
Despite the frustration, Havel achieved one of his top political goals, membership in NATO, in a remarkably short time when the Czechs joined with the Poles and Hungarians last March. Diplomats said Havel's moral authority and handling of a long-delayed post-war reconciliation with Germany paved the way. And despite warnings that the political paralysis could cost Prague an early seat in the European Union, analysts still widely expect the Czechs to join by the middle of next decade.
But 10 years on, as Czechs tire of his idealistic style of leadership, Havel has been widely declared to be yesterday's man in Prague, while the Communists have survived to fight on. Opinion polls show trust in Havel dipping below 50 percent, down from 90 percent early in the decade.
Cynicism about the system runs deep - the cabinet and parliament are trusted by less than a third of the people. No other figure has clear support to replace Havel.
Aged 63 in October and relatively robust after three brushes with death in as many years, Havel, no longer a chain smoker, has spent much of his time recently ensconced in his private villa or official country chateau. His successful battles against a cancerous lung tumour in late 1996, then a ruptured intestine and life-threatening pneumonia, brought sympathy, but his power waned even more. His marriage to actress Dagmar Veskrnova less than a year after his first wife and dissident partner Olga died from cancer in early 1996 sat poorly with many in the country.
Last week, on the cusp of the revolution's 10th anniversary, parliament gave preliminary approval to a plan which would strip Havel of the few powers he has left before his final term ends in 2003 - to name the prime minister and central bank members.
The author of ironic plays on the nature of communism and the peaceful dissident's 1978 handbook the "Power of the Powerless", Havel has now found himself all but powerless.
"I imagine the Czechs tend to forget how lucky they are to have Havel. I think there is a tendency to take him too much for granted," said University of London lecturer on Eastern European politics Kieran Williams. "If you take a grand view of Czech politics Havel has been unquestionably a good thing. Has he been as visionary as he could have been? Probably not."
THE PITFALLS OF NON-POLITICAL POLITICS
Many point to Havel's decision in the early 1990s to remain above the fray of politics, what he called "non-political politics", as his largest mistake. He declined to use his vast popularity then to organise a party and compete for votes.
Elected four times to the presidency by parliaments with no other choice of personality matching his stature, he was given constitutional powers which were almost purely ceremonial. Havel sought to persuade 10 million Czechs by rhetoric alone to look more to the moral than the material in post-Communist life - with limited success.
"This was a choice Havel made - he was not going to play party politics," said Williams. "That has been his biggest political shortcoming. It handicaps him, there is just no way around it in liberal democracy."
Michael Zantovsky, Havel's former spokesman and ambassador to Washington who went on to lead a small right-wing party, said the defining moment of the Havel presidency came in 1991.
"In the presidential office...in late 1991, we had a quite lively debate... I was one who advocated a direct role (for Havel)," Zantovsky told Reuters. "I think he now regrets, at least in part, staying outside politics. If he wanted to shape the system and society more than he's done - and he's certainly done his share - there was no avoiding a direct role in politics, and he opted out."
ANOTHER VACLAV FILLS THE VOID
Vaclav Klaus, a firmly confident finance minister, quickly filled the vacuum left by Havel in the early 1990s, forming the Civic Democratic Party (ODS) based on the style of former Conservative British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
Klaus impressed many with smart suits, an aggressive western approach and promises of a rapid but relatively painless transformation to capitalism without the "shock therapy" bankruptcies and selloffs seen in Poland and Hungary. His plan to privatise communist-era industries but keep them in Czech hands through a vouchers-for-stock scheme helped make him prime minister when his ODS topped elections in 1992.
Klaus became the pragmatist to Havel's idealist. He arranged the peaceful 1993 split of Czechoslovakia against the will of Havel. "It turned out to be much easier to stand against something (in the revolution), than to actually do something about it," ODS vice-chairman Ivan Langer, a student leader in 1989, told Reuters, explaining his decision to join ODS.
Klaus's privatisation system spawned wealthy individuals and investment funds and gave him a solid and loyal political base, but did little to bring capital and know-how to troubled firms. The system also became tainted by corruption and a frequent practice Czechs started to call "tunnelling" when new owners used their stakes to strip companies of better assets.
Klaus was shoved out of office after his economic experiment began to crumble along with the country's currency in 1997. Days later, Havel blasted Klaus's government "not so much for any concrete flaw... (but) an apathetic, or almost hostile attitude, toward everything that bears even a distant resemblance to civil society or that which would create it."
But Klaus continued to set the political agenda. His party again has been topping opinion polls, holding a minority Social Democratic government by a thread in a fractious parliament. Meanwhile the Communists, little reformed from 1989, have begun to challenge the ODS as the most popular party.
HAVEL'S LEGACY
Despite the frustration, Havel achieved one of his top political goals, membership in NATO, in a remarkably short time when the Czechs joined with the Poles and Hungarians last March. Diplomats said Havel's moral authority and handling of a long-delayed post-war reconciliation with Germany paved the way. And despite warnings that the political paralysis could cost Prague an early seat in the European Union, analysts still widely expect the Czechs to join by the middle of next decade.
