Communist Party of Czechoslovakia in the context of "1948 Czechoslovak coup d'état"

The Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, (Czech and Slovak: Československá socialistická republika, ČSSR) known from 1948 to 1960 as the Czechoslovak Republic (Československá republika), Fourth Czechoslovak Republic, or simply Czechoslovakia, was the Czechoslovak state from 1948 until 1989, when the country was under communist rule, and was regarded as a satellite state in the Soviet sphere of interest.

Following the coup d'état of February 1948, when the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia seized power with the support of the Soviet Union, the country was declared a "people's democratic state" when the Ninth-of-May Constitution became effective. The traditional name Československá republika (Czechoslovak Republic), along with several other state symbols, were changed on 11 July 1960 following the implementation of the 1960 Constitution of Czechoslovakia as a symbol of the "final victory of socialism" in the country.

The Polish United Workers' Party (Polish: Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza [ˈpɔlska zjɛdnɔˈt͡ʂɔna ˈpartja rɔbɔtˈɲit͡ʂa], PZPR) was the communist party which ruled the Polish People's Republic as a one-party state from 1948 to 1989. The PZPR had led two other legally permitted subordinate minor parties together as the Front of National Unity and later Patriotic Movement for National Rebirth. The Polish United Workers' Party had total control over public institutions in the country as well as the Polish People's Army, the UB and SB security agencies, the Citizens' Militia (MO) police force and the media.

The falsified 1947 Polish legislative election granted the Communist Polish Workers' Party (PPR) complete political authority in post-war Poland. The PZPR was founded forthwith in December 1948 through the unification of the PPR and the Polish Socialist Party (PPS). From 1952 onward, the position of "First Secretary" of the Polish United Workers' Party was de facto equivalent to Poland's head of state. Throughout its existence, the PZPR maintained close ties with ideologically-similar parties of the Eastern Bloc, most notably the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, Communist Party of Czechoslovakia and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Between 1948 and 1954, nearly 1.5 million individuals registered as Polish United Workers' Party members, and membership rose to 3 million by 1980.

Czechoslovakia (/ˌtʃɛkoʊsloʊˈvæki.ə, ˈtʃɛkə-, -slə-, -ˈvɑː-/ CHEK-oh-sloh-VAK-ee-ə, CHEK-ə-, -⁠slə-, -⁠VAH-; Czech and Slovak: Československo, Česko-Slovensko) was a landlocked country in Central Europe created in 1918 when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland became part of Nazi Germany. Between 1939 and 1945, the state ceased to exist, as Slovakia proclaimed its independence and Carpathian Ruthenia became part of Hungary, while the German Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was proclaimed in the remainder of the Czech Lands. In 1939, after the outbreak of World War II, former Czechoslovak president Edvard Beneš formed a government-in-exile and sought recognition from the Allies.

After World War II, Czechoslovakia was re-established under its pre-1938 borders, with the exception of Carpathian Ruthenia, which became part of the Ukrainian SSR (a republic of the Soviet Union). The Communist Party seized power in a coup in 1948. From 1948 to 1989, Czechoslovakia was part of the Eastern Bloc with a planned economy. Its economic status was formalized in membership of Comecon from 1949 and its defense status in the Warsaw Pact of 1955. A period of political liberalization in 1968, the Prague Spring, ended when the Soviet Union, assisted by other Warsaw Pact countries, invaded Czechoslovakia. In 1989, as Marxist–Leninist governments and communism were ending all over Central and Eastern Europe, Czechoslovaks peacefully deposed their communist government during the Velvet Revolution, which began on 17 November 1989 and ended 11 days later on 28 November when all of the top Communist leaders and Communist party itself resigned. On 31 December 1992, Czechoslovakia split peacefully into the two sovereign states of the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

On 20–21 August 1968, the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic was jointly invaded by four Warsaw Pact countries: the Soviet Union, the Polish People's Republic, the People's Republic of Bulgaria, and the Hungarian People's Republic. The invasion stopped Alexander Dubček's Prague Spring liberalisation reforms and strengthened the authoritarian wing of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ).

About 250,000 Warsaw Pact troops (rising afterwards to about 500,000), supported by thousands of tanks and hundreds of aircraft, participated in the overnight operation, which was code-named Operation Danube. The Socialist Republic of Romania and the People's Republic of Albania refused to participate. East German forces, except for a small number of specialists, were ordered by Moscow not to cross the Czechoslovak border just hours before the invasion, because of fears of greater resistance if German troops were involved, due to public perception of the previous German occupation three decades earlier. 137 Czechoslovaks were killed and 500 seriously wounded during the occupation.

The Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren (ECCB; Czech: Českobratrská církev evangelická, ČCE) is the largest Czech Protestant church and the second-largest church in the Czech Republic after the Catholic Church. It was formed in 1918 in Czechoslovakia through the unification of the Protestant churches of the Lutheran and Calvinist confessions.

In 2019, the church reported 69,715 baptized members in more than 260 local congregations, which are broken down into 14 seniorates (presbyteries) throughout the Czech Republic. Its membership peaked in 1950 with 402,000 members. Since the end of Communist rule, the Czech Republic's censuses have recorded 203,996 members in 1991, 117,212 in 2001, and 51,936 in 2011.

The Second Czechoslovak Republic (Czech and Slovak: Druhá Česko-Slovenská republika), officially the Czecho-Slovak Republic (Czech and Slovak: Česko-Slovenská republika), existed for 169 days, between 30 September 1938 and 15 March 1939. It was composed of Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia and the autonomous regions of Slovakia and Subcarpathian Rus', the latter being renamed Carpathian Ukraine on 30 December 1938.

The Second Republic was the result of the events following the Munich Agreement, where Czechoslovakia was forced to cede the German-populated Sudetenland region to Germany on 1 October 1938. After the Munich Agreement and the German government made clear to foreign diplomats that Czechoslovakia was now a German client state, the Czechoslovak government attempted to curry favour with Germany by banning the country's Communist Party, suspending all Jewish teachers in German educational institutes in Czechoslovakia, and enacted a law to allow the state to take over Jewish companies. In addition, the government allowed the country's banks to effectively come under German–Czechoslovak control. On 2 November, by the First Vienna Award, the southern parts of Slovakia and Subcarpathian Ruthenia were ceded to Hungary.

The Third Czechoslovak Republic, officially the Czechoslovak Republic, was a sovereign state from April 1945 to February 1948 following the end of World War II.

After the fall of Nazi Germany, the country was reformed and reassigned coterminous borders as its pre-war predecessor state, First Czechoslovak Republic; it likewise restored the predecessor's international recognition. Due to the rise of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (KSČ), Czechoslovakia fell within the Soviet sphere of influence, and this circumstance dominated any plans or strategies for post-war reconstruction. Consequently, the political and economic organisation of Czechoslovakia became largely a matter of negotiations between Edvard Beneš and the Communist Party members exiled in Moscow.

Parliamentary elections were held in Czechoslovakia on 26 May 1946. The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia emerged as the largest party, winning 114 of the 300 seats (93 for the main party and 21 for its Slovak branch) with 38% of the vote. The Communist vote share was higher than any party had ever achieved in a Czechoslovak parliamentary election; previously, no party had ever won more than 25%. Voter turnout was 94%. The national results also determined the composition of the Slovak National Council and local committees.

This was one of only two free nationwide elections held in the Eastern Bloc, the other having been held in Hungary a year earlier. Two years later, the Communists staged a coup d'etat and forced President Edvard Beneš to appoint a Communist-dominated government. As a result, the 1946 election was the last free and fair election held in Czechoslovakia until 1990.