Abstract

This is how the Russian logician and writer Alexander Zinoviev (1922-2006) characterized the "program" of the dissident movement in the Soviet Union: "The authorities must respect the letter of Soviet law, fulfill the obligations they have undertaken, put an end to the persecution of those who think differently and really want to enjoy the civil liberties they proclaim. If we were to use the term "program" here, taken in a somewhat informal sense, we would have to speak of a negative program. As for a positive program (a program in the precise sense of the term), a program for reforming Soviet society that would realize the aspirations and slogans of the dissidents, the dissident movement has none". This applies not only to dissidence in the Soviet Union, as Zinoviev thought, but more generally to most human rights groups in the Soviet bloc, and in particular to Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia. In its documents, from its founding manifesto of January 1, 1977 onwards, Charter 77 constantly repeats that it does not want to serve as a basis for opposition, that its aim is not to draw up a program of reforms, and that it wishes to engage in constructive dialogue with the powers that be.