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The Polish Party in Crisis, 1980–1982

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

David S. Mason
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Extract

Over the last three years, the Polish United Workers’ Party has suffered a major crisis, the most substantial crisis of any Communist party in any Communist party state. The disintegration of the party was at least partly responsible for both the development of Solidarity in the summer of 1980 and the imposition of martial law in December 1981. The lack of trust in the party and its authoritarian and unrepresentative character led the workers to demand an institution more responsive to their own needs. But the growth of Solidarity during 1981 and the continuing disintegration and fragmentation of the party led the military to preempt the leading role of the party in 1982.

The collapse of the party in 1980 and 1981 was due to a number of factors. The party leadership had to bear the burden of the economic failures of the late 1970s and the consequent decline in the standard of living. The party itself had grown rapidly in size during that period, even though the influence of ordinary party members and local party organizations declined in the face of increasing tendencies toward centralization in the second half of the decade. This development led to problems of morale even within the party and to the growth of horizontal barriers between the membership and its leaders. The population at large was increasingly annoyed and disgusted with the failure of the party to improve the economic situation and to allow a more honest and open discussion of Poland's problems. The dissatisfaction was compounded by the widespread perception that the elite was increasingly looking after its own interests only and that benefits and privileges were accruing only to those in power.

Type
Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 43 , Issue 1 , Spring 1984 , pp. 30 - 45
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1984

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References

The author thanks the International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX) for supporting research in Poland in 1982 that contributed to this article. This study is part of a larger work in progress, Public Opinion and Political Change in Poland, 1980-1982.

1. For an excellent treatment of party developments leading up to 1980, see Jack Bielasiak, “The Party: Permanent Crisis,” in Abraham, Brumberg, ed., Poland: Genesis of a Revolution (New York: Vintage, 1983), pp. 10–25 Google Scholar.

2. Darrell Hammer, “The Dilemma of Party Growth,” Problems of Communism, 20, no. 4 (July-August 1971): 16-21.

3. Jerzy Drążkiewicz, “Udział klasy robotniczej w aktywnos'ci spolecznej,” in Jan, Malanowski, ed., Nierówności spoleczne w Polsce w świetle badań empirycznych (Warsaw, 1975), p. 21 Google Scholar.

4. David S. Mason, “Membership of the Polish United Workers’ Party,” The Polish Review, 27, nos. 3-4 (1982): 138-53.

5. Życie Partü, February 1980.

6. George Kolankiewicz, “The Politics of ‘Socialist Renewal,'” in Jean, Woodall, ed., Policy and Politics in Contemporary Poland: Reform, Failure, Crisis (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1982), p.59 Google Scholar.

7. From a survey of 1000 adult males in the city of Łódź in the fall of 1980, conducted by the Institute of Sociology of the University of Warsaw and the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences (hereafter Łódź 1980).

8. The survey, “Społeczne zaufanie do instytucji politycznych, spolecznych i administracyjnych,“ was conducted in May 1981 by the Center for Public Research of Polish Radio and Television (Ośrodek Badania Opinii Publicznej).

9. Solidarity's poll, among its own members, was conducted by the Center for Social Research (Ósrodek Badarń Spolecznych) of Solidarity's Mazowsze region: “Członkowie Związku o bledach krajowych władz Związku” (Warsaw: November 1981). For results of these two polls, see David S., Mason, “Solidarity, the Regime and the Public” Soviet Studies, 35, no. 4 (October 1983): 538 Google Scholar.

10. Zbigniew Sufin, ed., Społeczeństwo polskie w drugiej połowie lat siedemdziesiqtych: raporty z badań (Warsaw: Instytut Podstawowych Próblem6w Marksizmu-Leninizmu, 1981), p. 21.

11. Mason, “Solidarity, the Regime and the Public.“

12. Magdalena Gadomska, “Świadomość’ nierówności,” Przeglqd Techniczny, May 24, 1981, pp. 19-21.

13. Poland Today: The State of the Republic, comp. by the “Experience and the Future Discussion Group” (White Plains, N.Y.: Sharpe, 1981), p. 57.

14. Jacek Kurczewski, “W oczach opinii publicznej,” Kultura (Warsaw), March 21, 1981, p. 9.

15. “The Directions of the Operations of Solidarity in the Current Situation of the Country,“ Glos Pracy, April 14,1981; translated in Radio Free Europe Research, Background Report no. 210 (July 22, 1981).

16. Zbigniew Sufin, ed., Diagnozy spoleczne w okresie narastajqcego kryzysu (Warsaw: Instytut Podstawowych Problemow Marksizmu-Leninizmu, 1981), p. 221.

17. Kurczewski, “W oczach.“

18. Poland Today, p. 173.

19. Sufin, Diagnozy, pp. 209-30.

20. Jacek Tarkowski, “Władze terenowe po reformie,” in Jerzy Wiatr, ed., Władza lokalna u progu kryzysu (Warsaw: 1983), pp. 23-76.

21. “Program NSZZ Solidarność#\” Tygodnik Solidarnote, October 16, 1981.

22. Sufin, Diagnozy.

23. Łódi 1980, and similar survey conducted in the same city in 1976 (hereafter Łódź 1976). See n. 7.

24. “Directions of the Operations of Solidarity.“

25. Polacy ‘80 was a national representative sample of about 2500 Poles, conducted in November and December of 1980 and reported in Polacy ‘80: wyniki badań ankietowych (Warsaw: Polska Akademia Nauk, Instytut Filozofli i Socjologii, 1981). Polacy ‘81 was a similar survey conducted at the end of 1981 and reported in an in-house publication: Polacy ‘81 (Warsaw: IFIS PAN).

26. Polacy ‘81.

27. Ibid.

28. “Program NSZZ Solidarność.“

29. Rzeczpospolita, February 9, 1982.

30. Christian Science Monitor, January 28, 1981.

31. Polacy ‘80 and Lodz 1980.

32. Jadwiga Staniszkis, “The Evolution of Forms of Working-Class Protest in Poland,” Soviet Studies, 33, no. 2 (April 1981): 229.

33. “Informator Biuletynu MKZ, NSZZ Solidarność” (East-Central Regional Organization of Solidarity, Lublin), January 30, 1981.

34. Rzeczpospolita, February 25, 1982.

35. For a thorough discussion of internal party debates on the renewal, see George, Sanford, Polish Communism in Crisis (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1983)Google Scholar.

36. Radio Free Europe Research Reports, April 13, 1981.

37. Życie Partii, April 1981.

38. Radio Free Europe Research Reports, April 13, 1981.

39. Ibid., June 19, 1981.

40. These figures were derived from the Polacy ‘80 survey but were not published in Poland. There were claims in the official press, however, that “two-thirds” of party members were believers, and a lively debate over the meaning of these claims ensued.

41. The party's program adopted at the Ninth Congress is translated in Roman Stefanowski, comp., Poland: A Chronology of Events February-July 1981 (Munich: Radio Free Europe, 1982), pp. 171-86.

42. Życie Partii, September 2, 1981.

43. The Katowice forum statement appeared in the official Sztandar Mlodych, May 29-30, 1981; Radio Free Europe Research, June 1-1, 1981.

44. “List Komitetu Centralnego KPZR do Komitetu Centralnego PZPR,” Nowe Drogi, July 1981, pp. 29-32.

45. Radio Free Europe Research, June 19, 1981.

46. Polacy ‘81.

47. Alain Touraine, Solidarity: The Analysis of a Social Movement (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1983), p. 59.

48. Washington Post, January 10, 1982.

49. Richard Spielman, “Crisis in Poland,” Foreign Policy, no. 49 (Winter 1982-83): 32.

50. Rzeczpospolita, February 25, 1982.

51. Vrybuna Ludu, February 19, 1982.

52. Życie Warszawy, April 6, 1982.

53. Ibid., April 14, 1982.

54. David Lane, The Socialist Industrial State (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1976), p. 81.

55. Witold Morawski, “O żródłach i naturze kryzysu 1980-1981 w Polsce,” Literatura, September 24, 1981, p. 6.

56. Frank Parkin, Marxism and Class Theory: A Bourgeois Critique (New York: Columbia University Press, 1979).

57. David S. Mason, “Solidarity and Public Opinion,” Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies, Washington, D.C., October 1982. 58.Andrzej szczypiorski, The Polish Ordeal: The View from Within (London: Croom Heim, 1982), p. 146.

59. Jack Bielasiak, “The Evolution of Crises in Poland,” in Jack, Bielasiak and Maurice, Simon, eds., Polish Politics: Edge of the Abyss (New York: Praeger, forthcoming)Google Scholar.