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Full profile page: Bc. Tereza Lukášová

Introduction I chose the topic of the expulsion of Czech Germans after World War II for my bachelor's thesis because it is still a living topic. The alternating statements on the one hand of various Sudeten German expatriate associations and on the other hand of representatives of Czech society and the state must be registered by anyone who regularly reads newspapers and watches TV news. The debatable phenomenon of collective guilt and the even more debatable right to its collective punishment, the historical context of the so-called Beneš decrees, the dispute over the use of the term "expulsion", the obligation reminded by both parties of dealing with the past, they repeat in these statements. It is clear that the expulsion of the Sudeten Germans to World War II. marked not only the lives of the generations he was directly affected by it, but also the political and economic context of the years to come and, in the context indicated above, our presence.

1. Common history of Czechs and Germans in Bohemia and Moravia The first ethnically known inhabitants in the territory of today's Bohemia and Moravia were the Celtic Buoys. They attracted to this territory during the great migration of the Celts, which took place around 400 BC. About three hundred years later, they were expelled by the Germanic Marcomanni. During the migration of peoples, the Slavs settled in Bohemia. Due to the fact that they focused on agriculture, they chose mainly fertile areas in the interior of the Czech basin.

2. Displacement of the Sudetenland on the basis of decrees of the President of the Republic Edvard Beneš In connection with the Second World War, two ethnic movements based on ethnic principles took place on the territory of the Czechoslovak Sudetenland. The first was the transfer of the Czechs originally living here to the interior of the republic after the Munich Agreement and the occupation of this territory by the Third Reich in 1938. The second was the expulsion of Sudeten Germans to Germany after World War II.

3. Settlement of the Sudetenland An integral part of the expulsion of the Germans was the settlement of the border with new inhabitants. These were mainly Czech citizens or Slovak nationalities from the interior, which were to a lesser extent supplemented by Czechs coming from abroad, but also foreigners. There were certain Czech enclaves in the inhabited area, which persisted even during the occupation period. It was 10-12% of the total population of the Sudetenland.

4. Economic consequences of the expulsion of Sudeten Germans on the economy of the given areas The expulsion of the German population had a huge negative impact on Czechoslovak industry. In some industries, predominantly Germans worked before the war.

Conclusion In my bachelor's thesis I tried to describe to a given extent the story of the historical coexistence of Czechs and Czech Germans in a common state and the outcome of this coexistence into a tragic collision during and after World War II. The relationship between the two ethnic groups built for centuries did not survive the dramatic crossover of the territorial expansion of a united Germany and the re-search resp. the search for the state-sovereign identity of Czechs and Slovaks as directed by the Central European area of the 20th century.

I chose the topic of the expulsion of Czech Germans after World War II for my bachelor's thesis because it is still a living topic and fed by many. The alternating statements on the one hand of various Sudeten German expatriate associations and on the other hand of representatives of Czech society and the state must be registered by anyone who regularly reads newspapers and watches TV news. The debatable phenomenon of collective guilt and the even more debatable right to its collective punishment, the historical context of the so-called Beneš decrees, the dispute over the use of the term "expulsion", the obligation reminded by both parties of dealing with the past, they repeat in these statements. It is clear that the expulsion of the Sudeten Germans after World War II. marked not only the lives of the generations that was directly affected, but also the political and economic context of the years to come and, in the context indicated above, our presence.