Husák's ascent to the party leadership marked an immediate change in Czechoslovak politics. Even under him, however, normalization was an arduous process, lasting another twenty months, of bringing the media into line, purging the party and state, and resubmitting society to centralized direction. As this period deserves separate, detailed treatment, I will touch only briefly on four noteworthy aspects: the decision to purge the party, the role of members of the original reform coalition in Husák's normalization, the Soviet view, and the general problem of collaboration and resistance.

The purge of the party

Evidence emerges from new materials to suggest that Husák originally did not wish to carry out the thorough, devastating purge with which he is now historically associated. Operating at first through the narrower Secretariat rather than the Presidium, Husák initially tried to apply the experience acquired while serving as party leader in Slovakia after August 1968. The key to his normalization of Slovakia was its legitimation by the Slovak party congress. Although Husák had tried from Moscow to prevent it, and had only limited success in controlling its outcome after his return, the election of a new, uncompromised Slovak Central Committee bestowed enormous authority on his subsequent efforts to control society through persuasion and limited surgical interventions, without a massive purge of institutions or deep censorship.