Poland and the European Union

Karl Cordell

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2002
• Print ISBN: 9780415238854
• eBook ISBN: 9781134555208
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This authoritative volume assesses how the recently democratised political system in Poland is adapting to the challenges posed by the country's desire to "rejoin Europe". Its excellent panel of highly respected Polish academics considers various issues not generally well-known to the English-speaking world, but of great importance in the light of Poland's impending entry into the European Union.

1 Introduction
Aims and objectives

Karl Cordell

There are few countries in Europe whose history has been as turbulent and indeed sometimes tragic as that of Poland. The first Polish kingdom was founded in 966, but after having played an important and sometimes a decisive role in the politics of Europe, Poland disappeared from the political map at the end of the eighteenth century. Despite various uprisings and other more peaceful endeavours aimed at achieving national independence in the nineteenth century, it was not until 1918 that a Polish state was recreated. The new Poland which emerged at the end of World War One was a very different state from its predecessor. The old Poland had been a multiethnic monarchical commonwealth, in which the nobility had enjoyed great autonomy from the sovereign. The new Poland was forged in the crucible of modern nationalist doctrine and leaned to the principles of statecraft which had been popularised by the French Revolution.

As a result, the new state veered toward both centralism and chauvinism. In a country in which approximately one-third of the population was not in fact ethnically Polish, such policies were likely to be laden with danger. With so many of its citizens failing on ethno-linguistic and religious grounds to meet the criteria of the ‘true Pole’, internal tensions were bound to arise. Such tensions were exacerbated by a parlous economic situation and the related inability of either consensus politics or liberal democratic structures to take root. In effect between 1926 and 1939 Poland was run by the military, with parliament being reduced to an institution of marginal importance. Although the Sanacja (recovery) regime of the military kept the lid on internal tensions and foreign policy disputes it did not solve them. With the coming to power of Adolf Hitler in 1933, Poland’s already frosty relations with Germany took a decisive turn for the worse. The authorities in Warsaw proved to be either unwilling or unable to buy time with either Hitler or Stalin, and instead counted on speedy Anglo-French assistance in the event of an attack from either of its more powerful neighbours. In the event in September 1939, Hitler and Stalin launched their joint invasion. The British and French security guarantees proved to be hollow, Poland was overrun within days, and once again partitioned.

During the Second World War, the Nazis established a reign of terror aimed at destroying the Polish intellectual elite, and enslaving the large remainder of the population. In those areas which initially fell under their control, the policies of the Soviet Union were little better. The main victims in this situation were, of course, Poland’s Jews. Their status in the Polish Republic had never been assured, and now they found themselves to be at the mercy of Himmler’s death squads. The result was that around three million of them, or 90 per cent of the pre-war population Jewish population, met their deaths in the various extermination centres dotted around the eastern marches of the Großdeutsches Reich. When delivery from the Nazis appeared in 1944 and 1945, it came in the shape of the same Red Army which had helped partition Poland in 1939. Stalin was determined to restore the territorial gains made in 1939. He also realised that no section of Polish society including the communists, would tolerate such a situation unless Poland received territorial compensation from elsewhere. Therefore a decision was taken to compensate Poland at the expense of Germany. Poland was in effect shunted westwards. The large majority of the German population in these areas was then subjected to forcible expulsion by the new Polish authorities and their Soviet allies, and the ‘Recovered Territories’ as they became known, were re-populated by displaced Poles.

Given Cold War rivalries, fear of a vengeful Germany, habitual distrust of Poles, and his highly suspicious nature, Stalin decided that the only way to guarantee Polish allegiance to Soviet foreign policy goals was to ensure that a communist government came to power, by all available means. All internal opposition was crushed, where necessary by military force, and by 1949 the process of Sovietisation was all but complete. Stalin is alleged to have once said that attempting to install socialism in Poland would be like ‘trying to put a saddle on cow’. He was not wrong. The peasantry successfully resisted collectivisation, and although bloodied, the Catholic Church remained unbowed and retained the allegiance of the large majority of society. The years 1956, 1968, 1970, 1976 and in particular 1980 bear testimony to the resistance of ordinary people to a regime which most of them regarded as little more than a Soviet stooge. Although the communists, especially in the early years, took advantage of a popular demand for reform, they were never able to obtain the legitimacy they craved.

Another quite possibly apocryphal quote which encapsulates this ongoing struggle is alleged to have been uttered in the Gdansk shipyard in 1980 by an unemployed electrician who said to his former employers: ‘Do you remember me? I used to work here’. The electrician was of course Lech Walesa. The movement he helped found and came to dominate was Solidarity. This trades union cum mass movement for reform gripped the imagination of the developed world as it began its titanic struggle with the authorities in Warsaw and Moscow. Despite the imposition of martial law in 1981, and years of harassment, the government was no more able to crush the opposition than it was able to institute effective political, social and economic reform. Eventually, in 1988, in the light of Mikhail Gorbachev’s reforms in the Soviet Union, the communist party and their military backers in effect abandoned the notion of one-party rule, and agreed to talk to Solidarity. The result of these ‘Round Table’ negotiations was an agreement by government and opposition to share power. Semi-free elections were held in 1989 which resulted in the humiliation of the communist party. No longer able to rely on the military might of the Soviet Union, and in fact for the most part now desirous of reform, the communist party agreed to relinquish power. The end of communist rule in Poland presaged the fall of communism throughout the Eastern bloc and eventually in the Soviet Union itself. However, it did not of itself signal instant prosperity.

Although the Warsaw Pact and Comecon were in their death-throes, a majority of both the new political class and the general public were of the opinion that Poland could not and should not stand alone in Europe. Rather, the consensus was that the road to economic recovery and the institutionalisation of liberal democracy lay through membership of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the European Community/ Union (EC/EU). In the euphoria which surrounded the defeat of communism and in part due to mutual misperception, it was blithely assumed that integration with the ‘West’ was a given and could be speedily achieved. However, as this book demonstrates, as the scale and nature of the differences between Poland and even the least wealthy of EU member-states became clearer, such early hopes proved to be misplaced. Neither should we forget that although for years the EC/EU had proclaimed its desire to one day embrace East-Central Europe, it had never had to evolve policies aimed at dealing with that eventuality. Given that neither a policy of exclusion nor the creation of an EU Mark-2 was on the cards, the EU had little alternative but to develop a vision of accession.

Throughout the 1990s, successive Polish governments found themselves in something of a cleft stick with regard to the EU. On the one hand and particularly in the early 1990s, they operated within a climate of rising expectations, to which politicians of all almost all stripes had contributed. On the other, with the EU itself, they faced an organisation which now had to match its rhetoric with concrete fact, and which sometimes gave the impression that it was trying to fight shy of the whole issue. As this volume demonstrates, in recent years common sense has prevailed on both sides. Polish expectations have been dampened and EU member-states have realised that pursuing a policy of exclusion could result in the destabilisation of the continent.

In the past few years both sides have been engaged in substantive talks aimed at securing Polish admission sometime between 2003 and 2006. The terms of membership have been laid down explicitly or otherwise in a variety of documents and fora. They include the Amsterdam Treaty, and the Dublin, Copenhagen and Luxembourg summits. Poland, along with Hungary, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Cyprus and Slovenia, is now locked into a process which, barring last-minute disasters, will lead to full accession. The enormity of this task cannot be understated, especially as it is the current government’s avowed aim to prepare Poland not only for EU membership, but also for early accession to the Euro zone. Certain of the problem areas are well known, even to those with only a passing interest in the area. They include the restructuring of Polish heavy industry, and the design of a programme of environmental regeneration, particularly in the former industrial powerhouse of Upper Silesia. Most famously, there is the issue of how to reform Polish agriculture. Indeed from the perspective of a variety of Polish conservatives and traditionalists, the question is one of whether the agricultural sector is actually in need of substantive reform. Poland’s communist rulers found to their cost that Polish peasants could be tenacious to the point of bloody-mindedness. The question today is one of whether Poland’s farmers, well-served by pursuing such a stance when dealing with the EU, which unlike the Soviet Union in the 1940s and 1950s is not possessed of a ‘Polish complex’, could in extremis simply walk away. It should not be forgotten that some EU governments are wary of Polish membership, precisely because subsidies paid to inefficient Polish industries and farmers would mean less money for them.

These and related topics form part of the backdrop to this volume, and are referred to as and when occasion demands it. However, we are more concerned with changes to Polish political behaviour, culture and political institutions than we are with analysing specific areas of domestic public policy. Thus our analysis commences with an assessment of changes to the basic contours of Polish foreign policy since the late 1980s. As a result, it is to be hoped that the reader will become familiar with elements of both continuity and change in this area, the rationale which lay behind changes to strategies employed, and the goals sought by successive Polish governments. One thing that will become immediately clear is that in the early 1990s, EU membership was thought of as simply constituting one of a number of alternatives which were available to Poland. Yet due to combination of circumstance and necessity, by the mid-1990s, it had become the sine qua non of Polish foreign policy. Having so established these facts, the book moves on to an examination of the relationship between changes in public perception, and the process of negotiation itself. Within this context, three key groups have a significant role to play. They are the general public, the political parties, and the Catholic Church. It is noticeable that as the realisation that the EU was neither a piggy bank to be placed at Poland’s disposal, any more than it was an entity that looked upon Poland as the prodigal son, so attitudes among ordinary Poles began to change. A majority of the general public still favours Polish entry, but there is a vociferous anti-EU lobby at work, and even those who remain in favour possess an enthusiasm which is tempered by reality. Similarly, the attitude of the major political parties has become clearer over the past few years. In Poland, nationalist and chauvinist elements tend to embrace both the far left and the right. As such they have always been sceptical of the benefits of exchanging Soviet tutelage (in the case of the right), or really existing socialism (in the case of the left) for inclusion in a supranational institution which will submerge Polish traditions within an alien ‘Euroculture’. What the reader may actually find surprising is that, as in the United Kingdom, such fears embrace significant sections of the Polish right, and are by no means confined to the fringes of domestic politics. As various contributors show, such attitudes are very often linked to age, education levels, residence and socioeconomic status, and they cannot be ignored. Similarly, the attitudes of the Catholic Church must be taken into account. Despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of Poles are baptised Catholics, we should be wary of assuming that Polish society forms a homogeneous unit with regard to religion. Neither should we assume that the clergy itself moves and thinks as one. Although some of the most reactionary elements in Polish society are to be found in the ranks of the Catholic Church, there is little sign that they are able to turn this notoriety into mass support at election times. The clergy nevertheless remains a significant player, and its opinions are important. The Church, following the lead of the pope is by and large in favour of Polish entry into the EU. Yet, it is also wary of embracing values which it sees as being both negative and alien to the Polish experience. It should be noted that its concerns are not solely or even primarily to do with areas of private morality.

The volume also considers the growth of civil society in Poland, changing notions of citizenship and the extent to which liberal democratic values have permeated Polish society. Such an analysis in turn facilitates those sections of the volume which deal with the nature of political competition in Poland, and the extent to which it differs from that which is to be found in EU states. These points are important. If we wish to understand why Polish politics functions in the way in which it does, and why it differs from Western European patterns, we have to beware of glib explanations which account for disjunctures solely by reference to over forty years of communist rule. By necessity we must examine the nature of Polish society, its cleavages, the nature of its parties, party alliances and the like. We must also be able to account for the roots of these contemporary patterns and structures. In so doing we are better able to understand why certain groups of parties exhibit the attitudes they do toward such issues as the EU, whom these parties seek to represent, and the extent to which they have been influenced by North American and West European campaigning styles.

Moving on, another area of reform which this volume covers is that of changes to the organisation of the machinery of government. In order to render itself compatible to the EU’s acquis communitaire, Poland along with all other applicant states has been obliged to take a long hard look at the organisation of both its central administrative structures and those of sub-national government. As is shown in the volume, this has necessitated defining and re-defining the roles of the cabinet, the prime minister, numerous re-organisations of ministries and attempts to restructure the senior civil service. Bold though these initiatives may be, those undertaken in the field of sub-national government have been even more comprehensive, and to some extent have been designed to render sub-national government in Poland compatible with the idea of a Europe of the regions, should such an entity ever come about. Thus the pattern of centralised, or indeed over-centralised, government which has characterised Poland since the creation of the modern state has at last been overcome. Yet, we should note that the debate over reform stirred quite fundamental emotions concerning whether or not Poland should pursue the path of decentralisation, and in whose interests such plans were.

This leads us into another important theme with which this volume deals. Poland has often suffered from uncertainty, annexation and invasion due to its exposed geopolitical position and it being unable to secure efficient working relationship with at least some of its more powerful neighbours. Throughout the course of history, Germany and Russia have of course been the most powerful of these neighbours. At present, the Kaliningrad enclave to one side, Russia has been removed from the equation.

Germany, however, remains, and moreover the united Germany, no matter how reluctantly, is the major player in European politics. As the volume shows, in the 1990s German-Polish relationships improved immeasurably. That such an improvement was possible, bears no small testament to the endeavours of a courageous group of prominent public figures in Poland, who were prepared to confront the post-war stereotypes, face history honestly, and admit that German-Polish relations had not been characterised by centuries of unremitting aggression by Germany against Poland. In return, Germany agreed to act as Poland’s ambassador to Brussels, and has proven to be Poland’s main partner in the process of post-communist reconstruction. The progress of recent years has been remarkable. However, the honeymoon period is at end, and as is demonstrated in the text, as the date of accession looms, some uncomfortable shared historical legacies will have to be overcome once and for all.

Turning eastward, we find that with Russia (temporarily) removed from the equation, Poland’s relationship with Ukraine is of utmost importance. For the first time ever, Poland shares the bulk of its eastern border with an independent Ukraine. Polish-Ukrainian relations have often been complex, not least since the rise of modern nationalist doctrine in the nineteenth century, and the engendering of consequent ethno-territorial disputes. Today, in some respects, Poland’s eastern border is in effect the EU’s eastern border. The objective of both Warsaw and Kiev at the moment is to as far as possible to replicate Warsaw’s current relationship with Berlin, so that Poland may eventually come to act as Ukraine’s unofficial ambassador to Brussels much in the same way that in recent years, Germany has for Poland.

The authors of this book do not pretend to have provided a definitive account of every single issue which confronts Poland as it seeks to join the European venture. However, we do hope that most of the key features have been analysed in an informative and erudite manner. That being the case, we are convinced that the reader of this volume will better appreciate the problems which face this remarkable country as it enters both the new millennium and a new political venture.

2 Contemporary government attitudes towards the European Union

Teresa Los-Nowak

Historical contexts and antecedents

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the entire Eastern bloc between 1989 and 1991, just about the only certainty with regard to Poland was its geopolitical position. In many respects Poland was in a paradoxical situation. Although the country was now free from Soviet tutelage, its room for manoeuvre was constricted by its lack of capability in various fields such as the economy, finance and technological development. In theory, Poland now had freedom of choice in determining the contours of its foreign policy and alliance strategy. As we shall see, the choices made were in reality consequent upon past experience and (perception of) contemporary realities.

Throughout the 1980s the majority of Poles had called into question both the authenticity and legality of the communist regime. With the downfall of communist hegemony in 1989, prima facie conditions were created for Poland’s smooth entry into the political and military organisational structures of Western Europe. However, from the very beginning of this process of transformation, difficulties emerged concerning the ability of the Polish polity to adapt Poland’s economic and political structures to the Western European integrational framework. To be blunt, the expectations of both Polish decision-makers and Polish society at large were manifestations of a somewhat pretentious attitude and, on occasion, irrational expectations of what such membership would bring. Unfortunately, space does not permit of any detailed analysis of the circumstances which facilitated the growth of such views. Suffice it to say that this mentality had arisen partly as a consequence of short-term political experiences, and partly through a misperception of how the remainder of the continent viewed Poland.

It is self-evident that the ideological factors prevailing in the foreign and internal policies of Poland during the period of communist rule ended with the fall of the Polish United Workers Party (PZPR). Although it was recognised that many obstacles still existed, the new situation, which provided the opportunity for Poland to take part in West European integrative structures, was perceived as being relatively unproblematic. It was taken as given that membership of a range of organisations would in fact be automatic, and that the only issue was that of the modalities of entry. As it has turned out, especially with regard to the European Community/ Union (EC/EU), the construction of a strategy which met the requirements of all interested parties had first of all to be based upon a sober analysis of the facts. Such an analysis includes a reliable analysis of the economy and a prognosis of the consequences upon the domestic environment of joining supranational institutions.

What seems to have been forgotten in the post-communist euphoria is that the east-west division of the continent pre-dated the rise of the communists to power, and that this division was not likely to disappear in the space of a few years. Consequently, there were drawbacks and difficulties...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Illustrations
• Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Series Editor’s Preface
• 1. Introduction: Aims and Objectives
• 2. Contemporary Government Attitudes Towards the European Union
• 3. Polish Perceptions of the European Union In the 1990s
• 4. Emergent Democratic Citizenship In Poland: A Study of Changing Value Patterns
• 5. Political Competition In Poland: Traditionalisation or Westernisation?
• 6. Parties and the Polish Party System: The Process of Structuring the Political Space
• 7. The Marketing of Political Parties In the 1990s: A Comparative Study
• 8. The Europeanisation of Government In Poland In the 1990s
• 9. The Reform of Polish Local Government, and the Europe of the Regions
• 10. Poland, Die Vertriebenen, and the Road to Integration With the European Union
• 11. The European Union and Ukrainian-Polish Relations
• 12. Conclusion