Pavel Žáček (born 1969) is a Czech academic and politician who served as the first Director of the

Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes The Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes ( or ÚSTR) is a Czech government agency and research institute. It was founded by the Czech government in 2007 and is situated at Siwiecova street, Prague- Žižkov (the street is named after ...

, the Czech

government agency A government agency or state agency, sometimes an appointed commission, is a permanent or semi-permanent organization in the machinery of government (bureaucracy) that is responsible for the oversight and administration of specific functions, s ...

and

research institute A research institute, research centre, or research organization is an establishment founded for doing research. Research institutes may specialize in basic research or may be oriented to applied research. Although the term often implies natural ...

tasked with investigation of the crimes of the

Communist regime A communist state, also known as a Marxist–Leninist state, is a one-party state in which the totality of the power belongs to a party adhering to some form of Marxism–Leninism, a branch of the communist ideology. Marxism–Leninism was ...

Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

that was declared to be criminal in 1993. In 2017, he was elected to the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourb ...

and serves as a Civic Democratic MP.

Education and early career

He holds an M.A. (1992) and a PhD (2001) in Mass Communication from

Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University The Faculty of Social Sciences (FSS) () is one of the newest faculties of Charles University. The Faculty was founded in 1990, shortly after the Velvet Revolution. It soon became a regional centre of teaching and research in area studies, econo ...

. He worked for the

Office for the Documentation and the Investigation of the Crimes of Communism The Office of the Documentation and the Investigation of the Crimes of Communism (, abbrev. ÚDV) is the Czech police subdivision which investigated criminal acts from 1948 to 1989 which were unsolvable for political reasons during the Czechoslov ...

from 1993, where he was appointed Deputy Director in 1998. From 1999 to 2006, he was Senior Researcher at the Institute of Contemporary History,

Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic The Czech Academy of Sciences (abbr. CAS, , abbr. AV ČR) was established in 1992 by the Czech National Council as the Czech successor of the former Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences and its tradition goes back to the Royal Bohemian Society of ...

Career

He was a member of the Czech Television Council 2001–2003. He is a founding signatory of the

Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism The Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism was a declaration which was initiated by the Czech government and signed on 3 June 2008 by prominent European politicians, former political prisoners and historians, among them former ...

. In 2010, he was succeeded as Director by

Jiří Pernes Jiří Pernes (4 July 1948 – 21 May 2025) was a Czech historian. Life and career From 1984 to 1990, he was the director of the Historical Museum in Slavkov u Brna (Austerlitz), and from 1990 to 1992, he was director of the Moravské zemské ...

. He served as adviser to Daniel Herman who was elected director of the Institute in August 2010. After a dispute about Herman's removal in April 2013, Pavel Žáček was fired by the new director Pavla Foglová. A collection of Žáček's papers, including transcripts of interrogations of Czech secret police personnel and documents about

Václav Havel Václav Havel (; 5 October 193618 December 2011) was a Czech statesman, author, poet, playwright, and dissident. Havel served as the last List of presidents of Czechoslovakia, president of Czechoslovakia from 1989 until 1992, prior to the dissol ...

, is held in the collection of the

Hoover Institution The Hoover Institution (officially The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution, and Peace and formerly The Hoover Institute and Library on War, Revolution, and Peace) is an American public policy think tank which promotes personal and economic ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zacek, Pavel 20th-century Czech historians Czech civil servants 1969 births Charles University alumni Living people Civic Democratic Party (Czech Republic) MPs Members of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic (2017–2021) Members of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic (2021–2025) 21st-century Czech historians