Czechoslovak Communist who led the trade-union central council, became prime minister after February 1948 and president in 1953
He helped build the Communist Party and its unions, became premier after its 1948 takeover, and succeeded Gottwald as president in 1953, serving until his death in 1957.
A stonemason from Zákolany in Bohemia, he came from the Social Democrats to help found the Communist Party. Arrested under the German occupation, he was held in Pankrác prison and Dresden and from 1940 in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Back home after liberation he became chairman of the Central Council of Trade Unions and a member of the Communist presidium, and briefly chaired the Constituent Assembly in 1946. He succeeded Gottwald as prime minister in June 1948 when Gottwald became president, and became president himself on Gottwald’s death in 1953. He favoured a more humane rule but was outflanked by Novotný.
Career timeline
- 1921Helped found the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and organize its press, trade unions, and cooperatives.
- 1929–1939Served as secretary-general of the Communist Trade Unions.
- 1945Became chairman of the postwar Revolutionary Trade Union Movement.
- 1948Became a member of the political secretariat and prime minister after the Communist takeover.
- 1953–1957Succeeded Gottwald as president and served until his death.
Pro-Soviet Social Democrat and first post-liberation premier who sided with the Communists in 1948 and merged his party into theirs
During the Communist coup of February 1948, he led the Social Democratic push for union with the Communists; the merger later that year brought his party into the one-party system.
A diplomat from Olomouc, he served as envoy to the Netherlands, Romania, the United States, Switzerland and Austria and, as the exile government’s ambassador in Moscow during the war, grew close to the Soviet Union. Prime minister of the Košice government from April 1945, he led the National Front government until June 1946. As Social Democratic leader he advocated close co-operation with the Communists, and when the non-Communist ministers resigned in February 1948 he stayed and openly backed the Communists. After the coup he merged the Social Democrats into the Communist Party and held high office under the regime.
Career timeline
- 1945–1946Prime minister of the Košice government and post-liberation Czechoslovakia.
- 1946–1947Chairman of the Czech Social Democratic Party; in November 1947, party members ousted him for being too submissive to the Communists.
- 1948After the February coup, he led the merger of the Social Democrats with the Communists and joined the Communist Party Central Committee.
- 1948–1953Served as deputy prime minister.
- 1951–1953Minister of the State Office for Religious Affairs.
- 1953–1964Chairman of the National Assembly.
- 1968Supported the Prague Spring reforms and protested the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
A diplomat who turned international law into a language of civic rights
At the United Nations in 1968, he protested the Soviet invasion as an “occupation.”
Jiří Hájek was a Czechoslovak politician and diplomat who experienced both the reform promise of the Prague Spring and its defeat. After calling the Soviet-led invasion an occupation at the United Nations in 1968, he lost his offices and Communist Party membership, demonstrating the limits and possibilities of invoking international commitments against state power. In 1977, with Václav Havel and Jan Patočka, he became one of Charter 77’s first spokespeople, presenting the human-rights provisions of the Helsinki Final Act as a basis for civic responsibility.
Career timeline
- 1939–1945Imprisoned by Nazi Germany
- 1945–1948Czechoslovak Social Democratic MP and labor movement official
- 1950–1953Rector of the University of Political and Economic Sciences
- 1955–1958Ambassador to the United Kingdom
- 1958–1965Deputy foreign minister and representative to the United Nations
- 1965–1968Minister of Education and Minister of Foreign Affairs
- 1977–1979First spokesperson of Charter 77
- 1988–1990Founder and chair of the Czechoslovak Helsinki Committee
