What was the meaning of the term "Velvet Revolution"?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Gorbachev's policy of perestroika expanded to include the idea that European communist nations could choose for themselves whether or not they wished to remain in the communist system. This was essentially, an admission that communism had failed and that the Brezhnev doctrine would no longer be applied from Moscow. Following in the example of Poland, a number of eastern European nations began to demonstrate opposition to those remaining under communism, but were met with repression from the individual governments, who viewed the resistance as a threat to their own power and authority. Old hardliners were transitioned to younger, more modern thinking leaders. Peaceful activism followed in the example of solidarity, with Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia establishing a unified protest. Seeing no intervention from Moscow (as had been the case in earlier moves way from hardline communism in Hungary and Czechoslovakia as in the Hungarian Rebellion and the Prague Spring, respectively) more and more eastern Europeans began to flee the east and repudiate communism. In Czechoslovakia, just months after the fall of the Berlin Wall, students began massive demonstrations that were repressed by the police. However, popular protest continued, and in late November to early December of 1991, almost half a million peaceful protestors took to the streets. This time there was no reaction from the government, and in a "soft" transition without significant violence, Václav Havel was elected president at the end of December.