Bent Boel

"Western Gross Root Contacts with Eastern
European Dissidents and Helsinki: the French Case"

The Helsinki Final Act is often credited with an emboldening impact on dissidents in Eastern Europe - and some scholars see the "Helsinki Effect" as a major factor in ending the Cold War peacefully in 1989/91.
One important aspect of the Helsinki process was that not only the Western governments, but also many citizens and NGOs became aware of Eastern Bloc dissidence and some got actively engaged in supporting and dialoguing with Eastern European dissidents. While it is pretty clear that the Helsinki process was the direct cause of many Eastern European citizens' initiatives, the development in the West is less charted. My paper will discuss the impact of the Helsinki process on Western European grass-root support for the dissidents by
(1) uncharting the pre-history, i.e. Western support for dissidents before 1975,
(2) analysing the development of Western grass-root support for the
dissidents during the period 1975-77 and, finally,
(3) trying to evaluate the impact of the Belgrade conference on Western European grass-root support for the dissidents.