Two Sides of the Same Coin

The publication Two Sides of the Same Coin presents outcomes of research carried out by a team of authors who have been interested in the field of education under socialism in Slovakia, and at the same time, it is an outcome of the project VEGA No. 1/0106/20 Freedom versus Unfreedom in Education in Slovakia in 1948–1989, supported by the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic. On one hand, the publication analyses official education, which is always subject to the ruling power in totalitarian regimes and it is one of the most important tools of dissemination of its ideology and a space for education of a “new man”, “new generation”. The publication, however, reflects also “the other side of the coin” - various forms of unofficial education and educational activities that were initiated by anti-regime groups. We have roofed these groups under the term dissent, which, however, was not homogeneous but had several segments (Christian, civic, creative, literary dissent, etc.). Dissent began to be more active especially after suppression of the Prague Spring, in the period of so-called normalization, i. e. from the 1970s.