British historian who coined 'refolution' to define the peaceful revolutions of 1989
Meeting Václav Havel in a Prague basement pub on 23 November 1989, he offered this prediction: 'In Poland it took ten years, in Hungary ten months, in East Germany ten weeks: perhaps in Czechoslovakia it will take ten days!'
British historian, Oxford professor of European studies, and Guardian columnist who has chronicled the contemporary history of Central and Eastern Europe and the collapse of communist regimes. As an eyewitness to the revolutions of 1989 in Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin, and Prague, he recorded the unfolding of civil resistance in The Magic Lantern (1990) and coined the term 'refolution', a fusion of reform and revolution, to characterize the peaceful, negotiated nature of these systemic transitions. Called a 'historian of the present' by George Kennan, he has spent four decades writing on European freedom and democracy; his 2017 Charlemagne Prize and other international honours reflect work that has shaped both scholarly debate and policymaking.
Career Timeline
- 1980First Western journalist to report from the Gdańsk Lenin Shipyard strike; met Lech Wałęsa
- 1986–1987Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
- 1989Witnessed the 1989 revolutions in Warsaw, Budapest, Berlin, and Prague; wrote The Magic Lantern (1990)
- 2000–Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University
- 2004–Professor of European Studies, Oxford; Guardian international affairs columnist
- 2017Awarded the Charlemagne Prize for services to European unity