Michaela Bakala in Nora Fridrichová’s Studio

The topic that has occupied Michaela most in recent months is the founding of [y]nitiative, an organization focused on supporting women in public life. The project comes at a time when, as she puts it, brutality and degradation directed at women simply for being women has made an uncommon return to public discourse.

“Attacks on women operate on several levels. She’s a woman — does she even belong here? Shouldn’t she be home taking care of her children? And if she doesn’t have children, that’s also held against her. Does she have enough strength, courage, experience? She’s too young, too old, too pretty, not pretty enough... Women are still up against doubts that I thought by 2026 would no longer be a topic. But they have come back, and they have come back hard,” Michaela Bakala says.

For more than twenty years, she has been a patron of the TOP Women of the Czech Republic survey, and together with the editorial team at Hospodářské noviny, leading Czech business daily, she has worked to inspire other women in their own careers and ambitions. “We celebrated our 20th edition. We have many accomplished, strong women who influence the Czech economy and have succeeded internationally. But what has not changed — if anything, it has gotten worse — is the crude treatment of women in public life,” she says.

The problem, she notes, is not limited to the online space and social media, even if that is where it is most visible. It extends to politics, business, and everyday situations. “Women in business still have experiences where they walk into a meeting and someone asks if they wouldn’t mind taking the notes. That still happens.”

At the time of the interview, the selection process for talented Czech students who will receive scholarships to prestigious international universities through the family foundation was also in its final stages. The intent is clear: to provide sustained, systematic support for young talent, give them international experience and perspective, and enable them to contribute to Czech society and the economy after they return.

The interview did not shy away from the sensitive subject of the Bakalas ending their role as strategic partner of the Václav Havel Library after 22 years. Why now?

“Rules that had been set at several levels of governance were not being honored in the way that had originally been agreed. After a certain point, you realize: let’s make room for those who see things differently,” Bakala explains.

She is clear, however, that Václav Havel’s legacy will endure regardless of what the institution looks like going forward. “His values are unquestionably timeless. Over 22 years, an enormous body of work was produced: the archive, the educational programs, the documentation of recent history. That, I believe, will not be lost.”

Michaela Bakala does not limit herself to philanthropy. In the interview, she names what she considers one of the defining civilizational problems of our time: the collapse of a shared information space.

"Nobody today knows how to communicate professionally and maintain control over their public presence. What lands on my screen will almost certainly differ from what lands on yours. We are governed by algorithms, and no one really knows what to do about it." Politicians shoot reels as a substitute for actual political work, the media has lost its role as an arbiter of credibility, and Donald Trump, in her view, represents something more dangerous than a single political tendency: the questioning of everything the United States has contributed to civilization since World War II — in security, democracy, and innovation.

“Continual conflict will, over time, produce even more conflict — not resolution. I am deeply convinced of that.”

The full interview is available as a podcast on HeroHero: herohero.co/nora.