ABSTRACT
This chapter highlights the importance of the notion of East from the current perspective of the Czech Republic. A guiding motive of Czech efforts to return to Europe was bound with the struggle to get rid of the burden of links with the East. The natural result of the transition to democracy was a rupture of asymmetric ties with the Soviet Union through the Warsaw Pact and the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and, in particular, the departure of Red Army units from Czechoslovakia. The initial vision of Europe promoted by Václav Havel and Jiri Dienstbier aimed at softening boundaries and European Democratic unity by common cultural values in all their diversity. Criticism from the West is taken very negatively by the Czechs. Besides analyses of the economic situation, there is often seen an evaluation of political culture and the condition of human rights in particular.
