About us
The Institute of Contemporary History (USD) is an integral part of the Czech Academy of Sciences. Its function is to undertake primary research into post-1938 Czech and Czechoslovak history in the international context. Within this overall objective, the thrust of the enterprise has changed over time with the main focus of enquiry shifting from the study of key events in the political history of Czechoslovakia during the period of communist dominance, which was paramount in the first years of the Institute’s existence, to a multilayered exploration of contemporary history, which includes the sociological, the everydayness and mundane, as reflected in the lives and thoughts of the ordinary man or woman in the street, the economic and, as already mentioned, the international. The Institute is now structured thematically into three departments.
Part of the Institute’s remit is to organize international conferences, specialized seminars, and workshops. Its scholars serve on commissions, and on the field and academic councils of many universities, academies and other institutions. Likewise, when called upon, the Institute cooperates with organs of state and regional administrative bodies. In terms of its role with the universities, the most extensive cooperation is with the Institute of International Studies of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Faculty of Humanities and Department of Political Science of the Faculty of Arts (all Charles University in Prague), with each of which the Institute has embarked on long-term joint projects. In addition, the Institute works in tandem with similarly oriented foreign institutions, with some of which indeed it has long-term cooperative agreements.
The Institute has its own unique library, which is open to the public and contains a wide collection of documents relating to contemporary history. This resource base is constantly being added to, particularly as far as post-1989 records are concerned. The Institute also brings out sets of books periodically, either at its own expense or in collaboration with commercial publishers. In 1993, the Institute started publishing the academic journal Soudobé dějiny (Soudobé dějiny / Czech Journal of Contemporary History since 2021). It publishes studies in Czech, Slovak and English and appears in print as well as electronically (Open Access – CC BY-NC license) three times a year (two issues in Czech and one in English). Since 2021, the journal has been indexed in the Scopus database.