1948 and 1989 were turning points in Czech society. In forty years under communism, men and women were equalized by the regime's totalitarianism and egalitarianism. I argue that these forces, as well as concomitant changes in the public and private spheres, dictate that women's situation should not be interpreted in terms of patriarchy. Women's issues and the problem of patriarchy, which under communism seemed irrelevant in Czech society, may now come to the fore because the postcommunist period requires women to undertake an essential rethinking of their identity.
In the Czech Republic the issue of the political participation of women has particular significance as the question that has opened up public discussion of the public status of women, perceived by the general public as the most conspicuous area of gender inequality of opportunity since 1989. The absence of discussion of the question under the communists meant that post-1989 debate has had to start 'from scratch', and so the article analyses the role of various categories of intelligentsia in establishing the terms of public discourse as well as considering specific and general perceptions of the gender dimension of Czech politics and gender stereotypes in the context of politics. The source materials are articles explicitly dealing with the subject in the major Czech dailies and selected magazines, and the article presents a typology of the attitudes embodied in these articles and classification of their authors in terms of profession, sex, age and political affiliations. This research confirms that media workers are weak in their response to public opinion and use of experts, and are principally aligned with attitudes directly derived from the sphere of politics. In relation to the issue of the political representation of women, the media has affected public discourse by both opening it and, paradoxically, blocking it. Nevertheless, gender stereotypes themselves have been undergoing special modifications in the context of political representation.
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