ABSTRACT
Both Czechoslovak and Soviet officials refused to see similarities between Gorbachev and Alexander Dubcek, the reformist leader of the Czechoslovak Communist Party. They said that the Prague Spring of 1968 had weakened socialism and the leading role of the party, thus clearing the way for a counterrevolution, whereas the Soviet efforts underway were to do the opposite. The basic components of Prague's course in 1968 and Moscow's in 1987 were the same: an economic reform resting on the belief that the market could exist under the control of a one-party government, and a less oppressive attitude toward the populace. The Prague Spring's reform program had been better thought-out than Gorbachev's and had also enjoyed greater popular support. The main foreign concern of the leaders of the Prague Spring had been the hostility of the Soviet bloc, fostered by Moscow soon after the reforms had started and avidly supported by Czechoslovakia's two influential neighbors, the GDR and Poland.
