The article analyses the role of victim organisations in shaping memory laws in the Czech Republic and Germany after 1989. The study focuses on four key actors: the Confederation of Political Prisoners ( Konfederace politických vězňů ; KPV) in the Czech Republic and, in Germany, the Association of Victims of Stalinism ( Vereinigung der Opfer des Stalinismus ; VOS), the Association of Victims of Stalinist Persecution ( Bund der Stalinistisch Verfolgten ; BSV) and the Union of Victims’ Associations of Communist Tyranny ( Union der Opferverbände Kommunistischer Gewaltherrschaft ; UOKG). The present study examines the interests, strategies and interactions of the subjects with political elites and among themselves. This article employs the conceptual frameworks of transitional justice and the politics of victimhood. The analysis is structured around case studies of selected memory laws that illustrate key moments of interaction between political leaders and victim organisations. These include the judicial rehabilitation laws adopted in the early 1990s in both countries; the 2007 German law introducing the so-called Opferrente (pension supplement for victims of the SED dictatorship); and the 2011 Czech Act on Participants in the Resistance and Opposition against Communism. The findings demonstrate that the unified and influential KPV in the Czech Republic achieved considerable legislative success, while in Germany, fragmentation and rivalry among victim organisations served to limit their impact. The comparative perspective underscores that success is contingent on not only the suffering endured but also the capacity to construct a shared narrative, mobilise resources and capitalise on propitious political contexts.
Klára Pinerová (Thu,) studied this question.