Antonín Josef Novotný was a Czechoslovak politician, known as the president of Czechoslovakia from 1957 to 1968. He was First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia from 1953 to 1968. An ardent hardliner, Novotný was forced to yield the reins of power to Alexander Dubček during the short-lived reform movement of 1968.

The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia was a communist and Marxist–Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992. It was a member of the Comintern. Between 1929 and 1953, it was led by Klement Gottwald. The KSČ was the sole governing party in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic though it was a leading party along with the Slovak branch and four other legally permitted non-communist parties. After its election victory in 1946, it seized power in the 1948 Czechoslovak coup d'état and established a one-party state allied with the Soviet Union. Nationalization of virtually all private enterprises followed, and a command economy was implemented.