Marxist criticism of Soviet-type society in Czechoslovakia: The political thought of Egon Bondy after 1968

The life and social context of Egon Bondy’s political criticism

In 1947 Bondy was a devoted follower of the politics of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ). In June 1947 he applied for membership and on 30 September became a member of the KSČ. ⁵ However, shortly after the February putsch of 1948 he began to adopt an increasingly critical approach to the regime, and approximately from the autumn of 1948 he adopted an openly anti-regime stance, which is confirmed by his texts from this period as well by the secret police files.

According to the archive of the State Security Service (StB), from 23 December 1949 a substantial file was kept on Bondy ‘for suspicion of Trotskyist activity’, in which he was investigated, among other matters, in connection with various criminal offences: crossing the border (in 1950 Bondy twice illegally crossed the border and reached Vienna), assisting other persons to cross the border, smuggling of goods, dissemination of Trotskyist literature, contact with Záviš Kalandra, who was later executed in the Milada Horáková trial, etc. In 1952 he was given only a suspended sentence. At the time he avoided longer imprisonment only by faking mental illness, and was interned several times in a psychiatric clinic. The file was placed in the archive in September 1954, with the justification that the individual was ‘mentally distressed’. (For more details see the Security Service Archive, Vol. 11135; Bondy, 1991a: 26, 2002c [1981] ⁶ : 25; Placák and Bondy, 2001: 30).

During the 1950s he developed a critique of Stalinism from a Marxist perspective. Two political texts from this time are significant: ‘The Dictatorship of the Proletariat’ and ‘2000’, both of which were written at the turn of 1949/1950 and published sometime later in the samizdat press Půlnoc [Midnight]. Půlnoc Press was very probably the first illegal samizdat press founded in Czechoslovakia after the Second World War. ⁷ It was founded by Egon Bondy and Ivo Vodseďálek. During the first half of the 1950s, Bondy published there his writings criticizing Stalinism. Most of these were poems, but some were political analyses.

In the second half of the 1950s, Bondy entered a period of relative calm. As regards his textual production, political themes retreated into the background and Bondy shifted his attention in particular to ontological issues and also to a systematic study of Indian and Chinese philosophy.

In 1957 he commenced his studies at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University. He graduated in 1961. In the same year he completed his book Otázky bytí a existence (Questions of Being and Existence), and one year later a further book, The Consolation of Ontology. In the 1960s he began to publish in academic journals. He published studies on Socratic schools (Fišer [Bondy], 1964a), Buddhist philosophy and ontology (Fišer [Bondy], 1963, 1964b), as well as on Maoism (Fišer [Bondy], 1967a). He also participated actively in the dialogical seminar held by Milan Machovec between Marxists and Christians. In 1967 and 1968 he was first able to publish in book form. Thus in 1967 he finally published his older works, Questions of Being and Existence (Fišer [Bondy], 1967b) and The Consolation of Ontology. On the Substantial and Nonsubstantial Models (Fišer [Bondy], 1967c), via the publishing house of the Academy of Sciences; one year later these were supplemented by Bondy’s monograph on Buddha (Fišer [Bondy], 1968a), in which he analysed the philosophical aspects of early Buddhism. Towards the end of the 1960s Bondy also began to appear as a playwright. ⁸ After the invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968 and the subsequent period of ‘normalisation’, the possibility for him to publish officially was once again closed off. At this time, the publication of Working Analysis (finished in September 1969) was impossible due to its sharply anti-Soviet stance. In 1970 Bondy (1993a [1970]: 147) was still hoping to publish his book dealing purely with ontological issues, Juliiny otázky (Julie’s Questions), but this hope proved to be illusory. For the next 20 years he would publish only in samizdat and exile.

However, the 1960s are also connected with political themes that again began to appear in Bondy’s work. This is linked partially with the internal political transformation in Czechoslovak society and partially with impulses and transformations on the international stage.

As regards Czechoslovakia, a significant aspect is the fact that a certain liberalisation of society occurred, culminating in the Prague Spring, under which it was possible to air opposing political opinions. This enabled Bondy to become actively engaged in 1968 (although understandably outside of official politics). One of the manifestations of these activities was the foundation of the Association of Leftist Opinion (Názorové sdružení levice) in 1968. ⁹ This association, the founder and defining personality of which was Egon Bondy himself (the second prominent figure was Petr Uhl), affiliated approximately 100–150 people from various radical left-wing intellectual currents. The Association promoted the conception of self-governing socialism (in opposition to the technocratic conception being discussed within the framework of the economic reforms in preparation), international solidarity, and expressed support for national liberation struggles and anti-imperialist politics in the Third World. It had a radical Marxist, though naturally anti-Soviet, orientation, holding lectures and publishing the journal Informační materiály [Information Materials]. ¹⁰

In this journal Bondy (1968b, 1968c, 1968d) published his important text ‘Dělnické samosprávy a revoluční strana’ (Workers’ Self-Government and the Revolutionary Party) and ‘Stanovisko’ (Statement). We will not deal further with these texts here since their main ideas are elaborated upon in greater detail in Working Analysis. During this period Bondy (1967a) also presented his lecture at the Czechoslovak Oriental Society entitled ‘Marxism in Mao Tse-Tung’. He subsequently lectured on Maoism, for example in December 1968 at the Faculty of Arts in Brno and at Easter 1969 at a three-day seminar of the New Left (Pečínka, 1999: 55). It is precisely this turn toward Maoism, which Bondy (1991a: 26; 2001c [1986]: 33; 2013a: 252–4) welcomed with enthusiasm (analogously with some similarly oriented philosophers in the West, such as Louis Althusser, ¹¹ Alain Badiou and Jacques Rancière), that forms the background to his contemplations on politics in the period of the 1960s. These are then summarised in Working Analysis from 1969, which forms Bondy’s most comprehensive analysis of the political system of the time.

The analysis of the origin of the ‘new ruling class’ and ‘state capitalism’

Working Analysis is valuable above all because it presents a historical and systematic analysis of the origin of class society in the Soviet Union. Here it analyses the process of the formation of the economic-technical management which soon takes on the character of an economic-technocratic management; it examines its ambivalent relationship toward the political elite with which on one hand it is joined by a common interest, while on the other hand there exists a certain antagonism between the two controlling elites, in which one attempts to subordinate the other. It also analyses the progressive formation of the group interest of both of these elites and the subsequent formation of a group identity, which eventually culminates in these elites positioning themselves above society and starting to control it. ¹² In this work Bondy contemplates the objective factors that condition this development, the objective antagonisms and tensions inherent in this system, and thematises the risks in connection with an erroneous addressing of these antagonisms. Bondy then analyses the process of the transformation of these elites into the form of the new ruling class, and the re-establishment of class relations, leading to an order which he refers to as ‘state capitalism’. Bondy (2017 [1969]: 83) characterises this as an order in which:

nominal private ownership of the means of production ceases to be eo ipso the basis of allegiance to the ruling class, which begins to take on an entirely new profile, and the process culminates where the means of production are nominally transferred into state or ‘public’ ownership, though are not at the disposal of the direct producers but of a narrow ruling oligarchy, which need not even be hereditary. The key to determining the character of such a society is the degree to which the means of production and the end product are within the hands of the immediate producers.

In later parts of the book, Bondy analyses the relationship between the systems of the Eastern and Western Blocs, and examines the immanent dynamic of both of these systems and the dynamic of their mutual relationship. The conclusion of his examination – which Bondy (2001a [1977]: 86–94; 2001c [1986]: 62) maintained also throughout the 1970s and 1980s – is that between both systems a certain convergence is taking place, which shall continue to an increasing extent in future. This will be manifested in an economic convergence, as well as of the political structures of both systems (Bondy, 2017 [1969]: 185): state capitalism on the one hand and a monopoly capitalist system on the other. In this respect Bondy joins the ranks of the convergence theorists such as J. Tinbergen, P. Sorokin and J. K. Galbraith et al.

The theory of convergence of monopoly capitalism and state capitalism

If we take a look at Bondy’s view of the development of capitalism, on the economic level we can see a process which is ‘manifested in ever more rapid tendencies toward the liquidation of the liberal capitalist relations of small private enterprise, with their origin entirely in the laws of the free market and subject to them’ until a centralisation and monopolisation of capital eventually takes place, followed by a direct amalgamation of monopoly capital and the state (Bondy, 2017 [1969]: 68, 138).

The immanent movement of capital upsets the original relations of small competing units, and by creating monopolies impairs the functioning of the free market to such an extent that it sometimes finds itself on the boundary of state capitalism. This movement on the political level leads to a gradual ‘liquidation of the original bourgeois liberal postulates’, since the actual conditions from which these postulates emerged have disappeared, and an adequate political structure is formed which ‘fundamentally restricts democratic political freedoms and maximally secures the political monopoly of the ruling class’ (Bondy, 2017 [1969]: 199). According to Bondy, the shift from ‘monopoly capitalism’ to ‘state capitalism’ need not take place violently or even perceptibly (democratic institutions may even remain formally preserved), but simply so that the economic elite whose influence on the state has hitherto been only indirect begins to control the state directly. In Bondy’s view this is taking place in the countries of the Western bloc, where ‘modern capitalism is heading ever increasingly towards a direct unification of economic and political state government’ (Bondy, 1968c: 4). Bondy contemplated this possibility already in his text ‘The Dictatorship of the Proletariat’ from the turn of 1949/1950: ‘The existing ruling class will take the state directly into its own hands’ (Bondy, 2016 [1949/1950]: 837).

The democratic institutions of the Western world according to Bondy (2017 [1969]: 199) exist rather only in a formal sense, since ‘the people do not have any real influence whatsoever on actual political and economic issues’ (Bondy, 2017 [1969]: 199). ‘The powerless residues of the so-called political freedoms in these countries are then used by the ruling class in a similarly monopoly manner [as in the Eastern bloc], because in electoral and other farces it has in its hands practically all of the competing political subjects, so it can easily alternate them “according to the democratic will of the people”’ (Bondy, 2017 [1969]: 91). Bondy (2017 [1969]: 190) thus denies the democratic nature of the Western world or its alleged meritocratic character, which in his view is merely an ‘official demagogic myth’ which fulfils a function of legitimation. As we shall see, in the 1970s and 80s Bondy’s critique of the existing order in the Western bloc became the main point of dispute between him and certain representatives of Charter 77.

It is precisely this dispossession of the possibility to decide democratically on fundamental social matters that is one of the features in which Bondy sees the tendency of the systems of monopoly capitalism to converge with the state capitalism that exists in the Eastern Bloc. ¹³ Although institutions such as elections, parliament, etc., existed here, everybody knew that in reality these matters were merely a formality. According to Bondy, even if it is not so evident upon first glance, a similar tendency exists also in Western countries, since in his view the actual decision-making subject is the economic elite (oligarchy), which allows itself to be represented by the political elite. However, the economic elite tends to sooner or later remove this mediating link, and over the course of time will take over government itself. In other words, the economic elite will therefore become also the political elite. In the Czech Republic an example of this trend is the billionaire and Premier Andrej Babiš, in Italy Silvio Berlusconi, in the United States Donald Trump, and it is possible to expect that the list of politician-billionaires will increase in future and that this tendency will continue to rise. In the 1990s and after the year 2000 this characteristic of social development, the growing power of the financial oligarchy, becomes one of the main themes of Bondy’s political texts (Bondy, 1997a, 1998, 2005).

With the integration of both systems, Bondy argues that there shall also be a transformation in the relationships of both ruling classes (American and Soviet), in a direction away from antagonism and towards a certain ‘peaceful coexistence’ and an interconnection of their interests in the international field. Although in international politics they will compete for resources and spheres of influence, in principle their behaviour will be analogous and to a certain extent even symbiotic.

The process of convergence of both systems will in Bondy’s view be accompanied by an ever greater international economic interdependence of individual countries, which will be drawn into the international monopoly or state capitalist system (in which countries of the Third World are systematically exploited by the developed countries). Bondy analyses this process, which he terms ‘imperialist integration’, and contemplates its potential consequences. What he is dealing with here is what we today refer to as economic globalisation and its consequences in a situation in which the individual countries are characterised by a high degree of inequality, and in which this globalisation takes place within the framework of a capitalist system based on an endeavour to attain the greatest profit, while disadvantaging the weaker players (countries) which are drawn into this process whether they like it or not.

The critique of liberalism and Charter 77

After Bondy came to the painful realisation towards the end of 1969 and around the beginning of the 1970s that the explosive emancipatory endeavours of the end of the 1960s had not met his expectations and had essentially failed (Bondy, 1997c [1972/1973]) (at least for a long time to come), he entered a period in which for him ‘no kind of political resistance genuinely comes into consideration’ and ‘in reality there was nothing to attach the slightest hope to’ (Placák and Bondy, 2001: 41; Bondy, 1991a: 26). In this situation he shifted his attention to literary work, to cultural issues, and became one of the ideologically creative figures of the Czechoslovak underground. He was now concerned to ‘show people that they have the possibility to stand on their own two feet and find their generational cultural identity’ (Placák and Bondy, 2001: 41). To show that people could, even under the conditions of the day (Husak’s ‘normalisation’), find fulfilment and live life to the full. To show ‘how to live within our actual conditions persistently and to preserve human and cultural values, without which a man is not a man’ (Bondy, 2001c [1986]: 66).

This aspect is in fact one of the main motifs of his prose work Invalidní sourozenci (Invalid Siblings) (2002a [1974]), and is also the main axis and background of Bondy’s activity within the underground movement. These moods were appositely expressed by Ivan Martin Jirous in the programmatic text ‘Report on the Third Czech Musical Revival’: ‘If the world is never to look any different, it is not necessary to distract ourselves by waiting for salvation. We have to find a home in the existing world, so that we can live in it cheerfully and with dignity’ (Jirous, 2012 [1975]: 25). And it was precisely Jirous (1988: 14–15; 2012 [1975]: 29, 23) who highlighted Bondy’s key significance in forming the principles of the underground.

Bondy’s emphasis on developing a parallel culture, independent of the establishment, is repeatedly expressed in his prose works from the 1970s and 80s (besides the aforementioned Invalid Siblings, especially in Afghanistan, 677 and Nameless). At this time Bondy became one of the leading figures, and in fact could be referred to as the guru, of the Czechoslovak underground. During this period he also published in samizdat and exile periodicals (e.g. Vokno, Revolver Revue, Svědectví – Testimony, Pater noster, Proměny – Transformations, et al.), presented clandestine lectures, and his poems were set to music and performed by the groups The Plastic People of the Universe, Garáž, etc.

Despite his conviction concerning the impossibility of ‘political resistance’ at the given time, as mentioned above, Bondy remained in his own words ‘a Marxist, and a very militant Marxist’ (Bondy, 1991a: 26). And it was from these standpoints that he formulated a critique of Charter 77 (although he had originally signed the Charter himself) and Václav Havel. This critique appeared as early as in his novel 677 from 1977, and later more sharply in his novel from 1986, Bezejmenná (Nameless).

In Bondy’s critique of Charter 77, which he considers to be a merely liberal opposition, we can see a certain continuity with his previous critique of liberal standpoints from 1969. This appears, for example, in the chapter ‘On the Liberal Opposition in Eastern Europe’ from Working Analysis. Here he characterises this opposition as a ‘“pro-Western” oriented intellectual and bourgeois opposition’, which, even if it declares itself to be a ‘decisive enemy of “totalitarianism” and the sole “freedom fighter”’, is in reality ‘allied with the repressive pro-Soviet leadership of its countries in an ideological and practical battle against the revolutionary movement’ (Bondy, 2017 [1969]: 299).

Bondy’s view on this matter persisted also during later years, and as we have stated, has its continuation in the critique of the Charter and especially its leadership. Here Bondy accuses it of depicting Western societies as the embodiment of humanity, freedom and democracy, while glossing over the fact that ‘the American capitalist ruling class is just as exploitative as any other’. According to Bondy (2001a [1977]: 49), the Charter 77 ‘fails to capture the essence of the reality in which we live, does not reveal the root of evil and rather obfuscates it further. If the existing society is founded upon exploitation, no human rights can be attained.…[Charter 77] is very carefully written so as to ensure that there is not a single mention of actual evil, of a society of exploitation.’

In Bondy’s view, the ruling class protects its interests through ideological indoctrination of the population, and defends its legitimacy by proclaiming that it is protecting the population against an ‘“enemy ruling class” – American against Soviet, Soviet against American’ (Bondy, 2001a [1977]: 90). As Bondy (2001a [1977]: 90) writes, this ‘monstrous lie’ is used to defend ‘not only military targets, but principally the very hegemony of the ruling class’, and is in fact ‘the heaviest weapon used by the ruling class, by which it has so far succeeded in destroying the solidarity of all those who are exploited’. According to Bondy, 2001a [1977]: 49), the leadership of the Charter does not criticise this situation and essentially does not reflect upon it whatsoever: ‘not once does Charter 77 mention a single word about the actual exploitative class character of Soviet power’. The main point of Bondy’s criticism is thus that the Charter in fact demands a mere ‘replacement of the ruling class’, or even a ‘mere share in governance’: ‘After all, if you read it carefully, it offers nothing else’ (Bondy, 2001a [1977]: 49).

Bondy’s critique originates from 1977, thus from the period shortly after the birth of Charter 77. Over the course of time it was intensified, and evidently reached its apex in the book Nameless from 1986. Here Bondy (2001c [1986]: 68) continues his criticism of Václav Havel and the leadership of the Charter for being concerned de facto with a mere replacement of the ruling class (Soviet ruling class to American), and therefore the restoration of capitalism. Bondy even refers to the leadership of Charter 77 as a ‘shadow establishment’ (Bondy, 2001c [1986]: 68). According to the testimony of the writer Jáchym Topol, Bondy even stated as early as ‘in 1979 or 1980 [that] Charter 77 is a shadow establishment, the Charter 77 wishes to take over the government and Havel has power-hungry ambitions etc’ (Niubó, 2000).

Such an attack on Václav Havel, not from the standpoints of the official propaganda but from an author banned by the regime, was unprecedented in the 1980s, and Bondy’s Nameless became the target of sharp criticisms in the samizdat press, above all from Alexandr Vondra ¹⁴ and Ivan Lamper, figures close to Václav Havel. ¹⁵ An account of this dispute is provided briefly by Trencsényi et al. (2018: 171), Machovec (2001: 140–1) and by Bondy himself (Bondy, 2001c [1986]: 134–9).

As regards the legitimacy of Bondy’s criticism that Václav Havel uncritically ‘paints the First World as a world of freedoms, human rights and the future of humanism and the liberty of all people’ (Bondy, 2001c [1986]: 62), I believe that in many respects Havel’s subsequent development is symptomatic, specifically the direct steps he took after becoming President of Czechoslovakia on 29 December 1989. Characteristic in several aspects is Havel’s speech in Congress upon his first visit to the USA (as has been mentioned several times by Noam Chomsky) which took place immediately following

the murder of six Jesuit Salvadoran intellectuals whose brains were blown out, and their housekeeper and her daughter murdered, by an elite Washington-armed and -trained battalion that had already compiled a record of bloody atrocities. […] Immediately after the murders, Vaclav Havel visited Washington to speak at a joint session of Congress, where he received a standing ovation for praising the ‘defenders of freedom’ – who, he and his audience surely knew, had armed and trained the assassins of the six leading Latin American intellectuals, while leaving a bloody trail of the usual victims. (Chomsky, 2004: 50–51)

As regards Bondy’s criticism that the leadership of Charter 77 was in fact endeavouring to restore capitalism, with hindsight this also does not appear unjustified, even if Havel, for example, as late as December 1989 (one month after the Velvet Revolution) declared that the allegation that he was an ‘enemy of socialism’, or that he wished to ‘restore capitalism’, ‘are lies, as you shall soon see for yourselves.’ ¹⁷

The analysis of the causes of the collapse of the Soviet Union

Bondy’s critique of Charter 77 (as we have seen from the 1970s onwards) and its intensity was conditioned by one further significant factor, namely the fact that (unlike the great majority of the dissidents of the time) he regarded the possibility of the impending collapse of the USSR and the subsequent restoration of capitalism as entirely realistic. For example, as early as in 1971 Bondy (2015 [1971]: 349) stated that ‘the Soviet Union will not survive the 1980s’. Three years later, in 1974 he even shortened this time to ten years, up to 1984 (Bondy, 2015 [1974]: 694). However, he did not systematically elaborate upon this hypothesis and the causes of the potential collapse of the Soviet Union until the mid-1980s. His critique from Nameless (from 1986) was formulated two years after his work Disordered Monologue (1984), in which he analysed the system of the time in the countries of the Eastern Bloc and outlined the causes of its possible future collapse.

In this work Bondy incidentally revises a range of his original conclusions from Working Analysis: above all, his view is now that it is not possible to consider the social system in the countries of the Eastern Bloc as state capitalism, and that ‘the new ruling class is not a state capitalist ruling class, but a ruling class of a new type’ (Bondy, 2002b [1984]: 60). It is necessary to state here that, according to Bondy, within the Eastern Bloc a ‘ruling class’ in the true sense of the word had been established only in the USSR, whereas the rulers in the other countries, even if they had the possibility of a certain autonomy and exploitation, belonged to the ranks of a ‘directly subservient’ elite which in decisive matters would implement the directives of the ruling class. If this elite ever showed a tendency to emancipate itself or stray from the path of obedience, it could be easily replaced by the ruling class, as was the case in Czechoslovakia in 1968 (Bondy, 2001a [1977]: 90, 2017 [1969]).

According to Bondy (2002b [1984]: 59–69), this regime does not constitute state capitalism above all because exploitation does not take place via the category of profit, and profit is not the main criterion and the reason for production. Furthermore, the character of products as goods is suppressed, labour power is also not an unproblematic commodity, and the role of the market as a mediating element in exploitation is suppressed, etc.

This then links also to his rationale for the causes of the collapse of the entire system. In Bondy’s view, the acquisition of surplus value does not take place in a capitalist or quasi-capitalist manner, but by means of a category he terms ‘plunder’. Bondy later summarises his conclusions from this analysis partially in the subsequent postscript of Disordered Monologue, and partially in the postscript of the post-revolutionary edition of Nameless.

Bondy’s assertion is that the:

new method of production of a new ruling class (that has been established in the USSR) is simply plunder. […] The new ruling class, the core of which is formed by the economic-technocratic management […] simply plunders all, from the surplus value wrung from the labour force to the natural resources of the country, and thus acts absolutely uneconomically and irrationally, steering the entire state towards a rapid collapse, and once there is nothing left that can be easily plundered, it will simply ‘sell off the remaining bankrupt’s assets’. And it will do so even at the cost of the destruction or surrender of statehood. (Bondy, 2001c: 138)

Conclusion

Here we have briefly characterised the development of Egon Bondy’s political thought. With regard to the fact that his philosophy is not generally known, we have intentionally concentrated primarily on a presentation of its main features, on outlining the fundamental themes and we have intentionally avoided a more systematic comparison with authors of a similar persuasion beyond the Czecho-Slovak environment, even if Bondy’s work would naturally allow such a comparison. Here in the conclusion we only point to certain traits, a comparison of which in the future would be desirable, and at the same time underline some of Bondy’s theoretical conclusions and approaches that would be worth highlighting.

If we keep to a more or less chronological approach, worthy of emphasis above all is the fact that at the turn of the 1940s and 50s Bondy analysed the Soviet Union from Marxist standpoints, and highlighted its class character and the formation of a qualitatively new type of class structure. Even if related analyses had emerged within the framework of Marxist thought in the West a number of years previously, in Czechoslovakia at the turn of 1949/1950 such a critique was unique. If we take a look at Bondy’s work from the broader contexts of the then Eastern Bloc, we see that even in the Eastern Bloc as such, similarly oriented analyses began to appear somewhat later (Djilas’s celebrated book The New Class was not published until 1957 – even if individual texts by Djilas appeared a number of years before this publication). In terms of their content and systematic nature, Bondy’s analyses rank among pioneering works which, in my opinion, bear international comparison. For example, in the foreword to the Czech new edition of Djilas’s The New Class, a reference is made to several analogies between The New Class and Bondy’s Working Analysis (Stehlík, 2018: 15–16, 21–22).

From a theoretical perspective, his analyses of the class structure of the USSR from 1949/1950 ¹⁸ and his later theory of state capitalism are worthy of comparison with similarly oriented analyses penned by authors such as F. Pollock, R. Dunayevskaja, B. Péret, C. L. R. James, T. Cliff, et al. ¹⁹ As regards his opinion concerning the convergence of both social systems of the then divided world, a comparison understandably offers itself with other convergence theorists (in particular J. Tinbergen, P. Sorokin and J. K. Galbraith). His support and analyses of the concept of social self-government, as well as his concrete proposals, can again be compared in all kinds of respects: for example, with the approaches of Jacek Kuroń and Karol Modzelewski, to whom Bondy also occasionally refers, as well as with theorists of economic democracy and market socialism.

Also interesting, as well as unique within the environment of Czech dissent and in many respects also prescient, is his critique of Charter 77 and its liberal position, in which Bondy represented one of the few voices within the opposition movement criticising Charter 77 from Marxist standpoints.

These themes areas undoubtedly warrant a more detailed analysis and comparison in the future. In conclusion, we can merely reiterate that although it would certainly be possible to consider one or another of Bondy’s analyses to be controversial, in our view he indisputably ranks among the best within the tradition of Central European Marxism, in which he occupies an irreplaceable position.