Novotny was prepared to accept some and limited economic changes as a financial necessity. Furthermore he allowed "rehabilitation" of some of the imprisoned former political actors. But he refused to make political changes as he thought that would improve the Slovak's political influence. This resulted in a very strong alliance between the political reformers and the Slovaks. The battle between the conservative hard-liners came to its peak at the Central Committee of the Czechoslovak Communist Party's meeting in October 1967. The Slovak Alexander Dubcek opposed the hard-liners led by the current president Novotny. Dubcek managed to win the support of a majority of the CC members, and on January 5th 1968, Dubcek succeeded Novotny as General Secretary of the Communist Party. Novotny however, managed to retain the largely ceremonial position of President.

Within a short amount of time Dubcek started to loosen the repressive political ropes of the Novotny regime. New winds, winds of democratisation, started to blow throughout Czechoslovakia. Its name was Prague Spring. At a conference in the city of Brno on March 16th, Dubcek promised "widest possible democratisation" for the country and greater autonomy for the government, the courts, the trade unions and economic enterprises. Shortly afterwards, on March 22nd, Novotny was forced to resign as President. Ludvik Svoboda became the new President of Czechoslovakia.