Location

• Palachovo náměstí 723/1, 625 00 Brno, Czech Republic
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Languages

• Czech

Name of collection

• Collection of Jaroslav Šabata

Provenance and cultural activities

• Jaroslav Šabata was a former member of Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and a spokesperson of Charter 77. Šabata worked as an assistant in the Department of Psychology of Masaryk University in Brno beginning in 1951, which was gradually transformed into the Institute of Marxism-Leninism. In 1968 he became the head of the department. In his own words, from the very beginning of his active political activities, he attempted to form an oppositional anti-Stalinist orientation in the Communist Party. In July 1968 he became the secretary of the Regional Committee of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in Brno. At the Vysočany Congress of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, on August 31, 1968, he expressed a positive attitude towards the capitulation of the Czechoslovak political representation lead by Dubcek and Svoboda. In 1969, his membership in the Communist Party was suspended, and he moved from his political position to a doing manual labour on the railway. In November 1971, he was arrested and accused of subverting the Republic and sentenced to six and a half years in prison. He became one of the leaders of the opposition. In the early 1970s, a group called "Communists in Resistance" was formed around him. Šabata was conditionally released in December 1976. Shortly after the release, he signed Charter 77 and in 1978 became its spokesman after Jiří Hájek. He was arrested again on October 1, 1978, when he tried to meet Polish dissidents at the Czech-Polish border. He was imprisoned until December 1980. He actively entered politics after 1989.

  The collection was created in the private archives of Jaroslav Šabata during his lifetime. Šabata kept his papers safe at his summer cottage in Dolenice. After his death, this estate passed into the possession of his descendants. His son Jan, in agreement with his daughter Anna, decided to dedicate the entire estate, which was neither elaborated nor systematized, to the Moravian Provincial Archive in Brno. Although the National Archive of the Czech Republic had interest in the Fund, Jan Šabata decided to donate the fund to the Moravian Provincial Archive in Brno. He did so because he felt that Brno was always closer to his father and that he would have wanted it that way.

  The personal archive of Dr. Jaroslav Šabata was handed over on August 27, 2012 to the Moravian Provincial Archive in Brno by his grandson Petr Šabata. According to the donation contract, there were 17 boxes of documents from the years 1985 to 2012. After being taken into the register, the scope of the fund was specified as 41 registration units (14 cartons and 27 parcels). The submitted files also included Šabata´s special library, which, after gross classification, consisted of seven archival boxes. A substantial part of the library consists of unsaleable publications of the Office for Documentation and Investigation of the Crimes of Communism from 1998 to 2004 and various, mostly short-term, journals from the 1990s. These books and magazines were not included in the archive collection.

  In 2014 and 2015, Petr Šabata brought another estate, which was found at the summer residence of Jaroslav Šabata, and these materials were included in the fund.

Description of content

• The fund includes two detailed biographies of Jaroslav Šabata, one of which is written in terms of his nationality (his father was Czech, his mother was German). Both were written by Šabata himself. The following materials can also be found in the collection: the press releases of August 1968, reports on Šabata’s dissent activity, Charter 77, summaries and protests against imprisonment, Impuls 99, which called for European integration, documents on Šabata´s relations with political figures, documents on his activities at the Office of the Government and political developments after 1990, his writings and teaching materials from the Faculty of Social Studies, sociological studies following the teaching process, and more.

  The collection also contains rare papers, such as the theme of the TV programme Josef Platz: The Diaries of Máselná Lhota, which discussed Šabata's leaflet event in 1971, about which he wrote in 1996. Among the most interesting materials are the interviews with Jaroslav Šabata about the situation from 1963 to 1968, his study of August 1968, "August Break, Why Alexander Dubcek Broke," and "The Breaking Moment of the Prague Spring." Also Šabata's reflections on political development, and other Charter 77 statements. Included as well is a statement from Květa Šabatová, Jaroslav Šabata´s wife, in which she protests against the fact that Václav Havel called Jaroslav Šabata a political intriguer.

Content

• grey literature (regular archival documents such as brochures, bulletins, leaflets, reports, intelligence files, records, working papers, meeting minutes): 10-99
• manuscripts (ego-documents, diaries, notes, letters, drafts, etc.): 10-99
• publications (books, newspapers, articles, press clippings): 10-99

Operator(s)

• Moravian Provincial Archive in Brno

Owner(s)

• Moravian Provincial Archive in Brno
• Šabata, Jaroslav

Topics

• democratic opposition
• human rights movements
• party dissidents (outcasts from the party)

Founder(s)

• Šabata, Jaroslav

Creator(s) of content

• Šabata, Jaroslav

Collector(s)

• Šabata, Jaroslav

Important events in the history of the collection

• Donation of Collection of Jaroslav Šabata to Moravian Provincial Archive in Brno

Featured items

• Jaroslav Šabata's Study: The Breakthrough Moment of the Prague Spring

Access type

• parts are closed to the public

Publications

• None

Author(s) of this page

• Vrtálková, Anna

References

Pažout, Jaroslav. Výbor na obranu nespravedlivě stíhaných: politická perzekuce, opozice a nezávislé aktivity v Československu v letech 1978-1989 : sborník grantového projektu. Č. 3. 2009.

Jaroslav Šabata: Vždycky někdo vyhraje a někdo prohraje | Archiv Plus. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.rozhlas.cz/plus/archivplus/_zprava/jaroslav-sabata-vzdycky-nekdo-vyhraje-a-nekdo-prohraje--1733018

Petr Keller. (n.d.). Odsouzení Jaroslava Šabaty v souvislosti se setkáním československých a polských disidentů na československo-polských hranicích v roce 1978. Retrieved from http://www.vons.cz/data/pdf/sbornik_vons_1/vons_keller.pdf

Zemřel disident Jaroslav Šabata – Novinky.cz. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.novinky.cz/domaci/270431-zemrel-disident-jaroslav-sabata.html

Růžičková, Michaela , interview by Vrtálková, Anna , June 01, 2017. COURAGE Registry Oral History Collection