The Power of the Powerless
The 1978 essay on the greengrocer who puts a slogan in his window, and what would happen if he simply stopped.
Havel’s 1978 essay begins with a greengrocer who puts a party slogan in his shop window, not because he believes it but because it is easier. Everything follows from asking what would happen if he stopped: the essay’s answer, that living in truth is itself a political act, circulated in samizdat and reached Poland, where Solidarity read it closely.
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Timothy Snyder
The answer is that for an individual there would be very nasty consequences. But the open question of the essay is, what if everyone took all of the signs down? Havel is suggesting that if possible one ought to try to live authentically. That authenticity – not lying to oneself, even little lies such as the sign on the window – is the first step towards individual freedom.
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