Jiří Horák

Jiří Horák ( born April 23, 1924 in Hradec Králové, Czechoslovakia, † July 25, 2003 in Englewood, Florida, United States) was a Czechoslovak dissident and Czech politicians.

Life

Horák was first a member of the Social Democratic Party Československé sociální demokracie and went in 1951 after the merger in 1948 with the Communist Party to Komunistická strana Československa into exile in the United States. Subsequently, he studied political science at Columbia University in New York, where he was later a lecturer in political science and constitutional law. In the U.S., he was 1961-1971 Chairman of the Council for a Free Czechoslovakia (Council of Free Czechoslovakia ), an umbrella organization of exiled Czechoslovaks. In 1967 he became a professor of political science at Columbia University.

After the revolution of 1989 and the collapse of communism in 1989, he returned back to Prague and helped re-establishment of Československé sociální demokracie, whose chairman he was from 1990 to 1992. Successor as party chairman was Miloš Zeman. In 1993 he returned to the United States.

For his contribution to democracy in 2000 he was awarded by President Václav Havel with the class Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk Order - 3.