Poland in transition

Poland in transition Russell Osborne On 6 February the historic round-table talks between the Polish government and Solidarity began in Warsaw. Speaking on Soviet television the previous day, premier General Wojciech Jaruzelski announced that the Polish Communist Party would tolerate opposition forces provided they respected the party's leading role.' Addressing the 57 round-table delegates, minister of internal affairs General Czeslaw Kiszczak promised a return to trade union pluralism. In return the opposition would have to accept a government package of economic and political reforms and agree to participate in 'non-confrontational clections to the sejm, the Polish parliament.? Discussions are proceeding in three major working groups on the economy, trade union pluralism and political reform. The US state department welcomed the round-table as a potentially important process!? While bureaucrats and oppositionists throughout Eastern Europe were closely observing the progress of Jaruzelski's initiative, 2500 miners at Belchatow revealed the scepticism of the Polish working class by going on strike for higher wages.4 Today, East European countries-the Comecon bloc and Yugo- 1. Crisis in slavia—face major economic problems and serious social unrest.

Eastern Europe The origins of the current instability lie in chronic economic stagnation under the Stalinist system and in the lack of legitimacy of the regimes that were imposed under Soviet domination in the immediate post-war period. From the start, Eastern Europe's Stalinist regimes were regarded as alien by the 39

local population. Whereas the Soviet bureaucracy managed to develop a substantial social base in the Soviet Union, Stalin's clones never achieved this in Eastern Europe. The fifties and sixties were marked by a cycle of revolt and repression: the German Democratic Republic in 1953, Poland and Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968.

East European bureaucracies attempted to secure their position by importing Western technology and raising living standards. They hoped to neutralise popular discontent and safeguard their monopoly on political power through taking advantage of the expansion of the world capitalist economy However, the onset of recession in the early seventies restricted the scope for trade with the West. The bureaucracies could no longer offer economic benefits as consolation for the lack of political rights. Since then, every party Icadership has been conducting a holding operation.

The quest for survival forced East European bureaucracies to experiment. In Hungary they tinkered with limited market solutions so-called "Goulash socialism'. And in Poland the regime attempted a rapprochement with Solidarity in the early eighties. Today, as a new phase of recession approaches, East European holding operations are reaching their limits.

Every country is burdened with massive debts and falling living standards. The prospects of an upturn in the world cconomy, stimulating a revival in the Eastern bloc, appear bleak Failure to satisfy the higher expectations aroused in the sixties and seventies has provoked intense popular resentment throughout Eastern Europe and a surge of support for opposition movements. In Eastern Europe the form that opposition takes is determined by the relationships between the bureaucracy, the petit bourgeoisie and intelligentsia, and the working class. Of these strata it is the petit bourgeoisie and the intelligentsia that provide the main social base of the opposition. This sector has been most squeezed by the economic decline of the past decade and, unlike the working class, lacks the collective muscle to fight back. The middle classes resent the bureaucracy because of the way the Stalinist system condemns them to economic insecurity and denies them a voice in running public affairs. However, most entrepreneurs, professionals and intellectuals are constrained in their desire for reform because they fear the potential strength and militancy of the working class and generally approve of the bureaucracies plans to introduce economic reforms and restruc- 40 turing programmes at workers expense.

Workers have traditionally been suspicious of intellectuals, I to and stayed outside of their organisations, because of the in's intensely anti-working class prejudices of most East European and dissidents. But, in recent months, workers and the middle class the intelligentsia have come together to form opposition movements y in on issues of nationalism, the environment and religion.

Despite coming together in opposition movements, tensions osistill exist between the intelligentsia and working class. The anbureaucracies aim to take advantage of these tensions by afesupporting some of the demands in the hope of winning a layer ing of support. However, the bureaucracy in each country remains my. far from united about the way forward. Some bureaucrats arc cted looking for closer links with the West, others want to improve I no c of ties with Eastern bloc entrepreneurs while many are primarily concerned with their own agricultural and manufacturing een interests. In the long term the burcaucracies options are limited: they es to can either revert to traditional Stalinist repression or they can rket attempt to achieve a controlled transition to a different form of the society, along the lines of Gorbachev's perestroika and glasnost arly policies in the Soviet Union. Let's look more closely at how this East latter project is taking shape in Poland.

ling orld 2. The The current talks take place in the context of major change in the eak. political climate in Poland. General Jaruzelski, the man who kties bureaucrats and introduced martial law to smash Solidarity in 1981, now the round-table ughtion presents himself as a crusading reformer and as Gorbachev's most ardent follower. There is now little official censorship and little fear of government repression. Numerous new political eterorganisations have sprung up and are tolerated. The governpetit ment conducts a permanent dialogue with the church, and the hese Pope has visited twice since the days of martial law. Few that political prisoners remain in jail. It is significant that the - has relaxation in state coercion survived through the two major cade strike waves which shook the regime to its foundations in 1988.

fight Now there is even talk of the Polish Communist Party (PUWP) f the ceding its traditional "leading role' in Polish society."

urity The PUWP is in serious trouble. Though foreign debt most continues to grow, government attempts to introduce economic ed in ngth changes have met with widespread scorn. A referendum on restructuring at the end of 1987 met with massive electoral if the abstention as Poles voted with their feet.• Nobody wants to join tructhe party any longer and the PUP youth section is almost 41

defunct. As the radicalism of the opposition grows, even Solidarity itself looks like losing its long-held monopoly of resistance.? The regime hopes to use the round-table to legalise Solidarity and set up machinery for its representation in parliament. Free elections to a new upper house may also be allowed. The government wants to use the legalised Solidarity to help legitimise its policies of economic restructuring. The regime also hopes that through demonstrating a new-found liberalism and respect for political pluralism it might win additional Western help to bail out the economy.

There is considerable scope for the expansion of capitalist market forces in Poland. Uncharacteristically, the Stalinist bureaucracy never pushed for wholesale collectivisation of Polish agriculture after the war. Today, more than 75 per cent of farming is still private, but small scale and very backward. There are 400 000 small craftsmen and 1000 private enterprises. The private sector has expanded to such an extent that it is estimated that between 38 and 45 per cent of personal income is now derived from private sources.* With such a high proportion of economic activity already outside the sphere of state control.

an enlarged role for the market is possible. To achieve its restructuring plans the government is banking on foreign and private sector assistance.?

Discussions at the PUP central committee plenum in December and January, and at a special national theoretical and ideological conference in February, revealed the bureaucracy's growing approval of political reform.!° While the plenum insisted on the primacy of the party in public life, members favoured legalising Solidarity under Lech Walesa in the hope of preventing the emergence of a more radical opposition.

Politburo member Marian Orzechowski declared that the PUWP will not surrender its leading role, but conceded that it does not wish to and cannot implement this role as it has in the past?!! Party leaders hope that legalisation, together with an anticipated renaissance' within the party, will enable them to exploit Solidarity's status to execute their own programmes.

They hope that they might be able to diffuse responsibility for the conduct of public affairs without significantly devolving their power. The strength of support for the legalisation of Solidarity emerged in a heated debate. While a hardline 20 per cent of the leadership voted against a motion introducing pluralism, few dared to vote against Jaruzelski's liberalising 42 stand in a final vote of confidence.!?

At the national party conference in January members enen dorsed their leader's new approach by supporting political and of trade union pluralism and by committing the party to internal democratisation in preference to 'bureaucratic centralism. The new line caused some confusion among ordinary party memree bers. Motions stressing the need to return to the party's roots he were variously interpreted as referring to the young Marx, elp Lenin, former president Gomulka and even Western-style social Iso democracy. Once again, politburo member Orzechowski put and them straight. He urged the adoption of a market economy, ern separation of party and state and the introduction of parliamentary democracy. Two slogans, socialist parliamentary list democracy' and 'socialist civil society' were unveiled to describe nist the 'new era' of Speaking on Radio Warsaw, party ideologist Jerzy Wiatr It of argued that the adoption of new concepts reversed established tere interpretations of Marxism. The Polish leadership now re The pudiated the way the party had idealised the state while negating t is the importance of civil organisations, legally guaranteed rights he is and forms of property that could protect the individual from tion encroachment by the state. 14 The common factor behind all the trol. proposals to redefine the party's role was, as a prominent party its academic put it, fears for the party's existence, for the existence and of the group to which we belong!!s In the wake of the plenum and party conference, support for n in the free market has become, ironically, a sign of both rebellious and ness and government orthodoxy. This demand is on Walesa's acy's shortlist for discussion at the round-table as well as being a key num part of the regime's recipe for economic renewal. One governbers ment official told a British reporter that he believed that a pe of process of privatisation of state enterprises or 'co-operisation would start very soon." Bureaucrats who run industry are the already making private deals as they search for a role in the at it growing market. Large-scale corruption has resulted. The idea n the seems to be that party members should be able to compensate h an with new clout in the market for what they are losing ir m to political power. Imes. If all goes well at the round-table there will be an agreement y for which will allow elections to the sejm in the near future, anc Iving some kind of controlled democracy: The PUP and its allies in of would command a guaranteed majority of seats with the 0 per opposition allowed about 40 per cent. However, it is the element ucing at the centre of the whole deal, the market, which poses mos ising problems. Introducing a real market poses difficulties for the 43

bureaucracy and working class.

The government hoped the Western powers would be so impressed by its reforming zeal that they would rush to provide economic assistance. But given the size of Poland's foreign debt Western investors have become increasingly unenthusiastic and the anticipated upturn in trade with the West has not taken place.!? Jaruzelski may have steamrollered his new policies through at the plenum but there is still a hard core of resistance among party hardliners, particularly from bureaucrats in the official trade union confederation.!s 3. Solidarity In its proposals to the round-table the Solidarity leadership under pressure demanded the restoration of the market and the abolition of state economic monopolies, together with calls for its own legal recognition, for free assembly, independent courts and frec access to the mass media, 1° Yet Walesa is coming under growing pressure from militant trade unionists who do not share the market enthusiasm of his middle class advisers and reforming bureaucrats. Walesa has been forced to push for wage indexation to keep up with inflation which is now running at around 50 per cent. However, Solidarity has shifted away from its traditional support for workers' self-management to endorse the view of government experts that tough management policies are necessary to rescue the economy.2° As a result, Walesa is now regularly branded a 'sell-out for his collaboration in the roundtable talks and Solidarity is rapidly losing its control of opposition to the regime.

In a wave of protest demonstrations in recent months, Walesa has come under mounting criticism from young radicals. When he spoke at a 3000-strong rally in Gdansk in January he was denounced by youths shouting 'down with the traitor and no talks with murderers. More than 1000 took to the streets later, throwing stones and firecrackers at the police.?1 In similar incidents over the past three years young demonstrators have clashed violently with Zomo riot police. Clashes occurred in October and December last year in Warsaw and Gdansk. The paper Homek, published by the anarchist Alternative Society Movement, advocates beating up Zomo police to limit their impunity and self-confidence'?

Solidarity has been quick to dissociate itself from militant resistance against the state apparatus. Despite growing police brutality, spokesman Janusz Onyszkiewicz stated: Solidarity 44 has always stood for non-violence. Those who took part acted

against the interests of Solidarity. 23 However, the union has been strongly criticised for its position. The opposition press and even Solidarity's own supporters have warned of the danger of the movement becoming compromised with the regime and losing touch with the militants.

Opposition writer Dawid Warszawski has blamed Solidarity as well as police violence for the street riots. He points out that the union no longer serves as a channel for the 'ambitions and fears...hopelessness and despair' of young people. Warszawski observes that there is increasing evidence...that the emphasis of Solidarity's policy seems to be shifting away from fighting [government policy] and towards compromise with those responsible for it: In his view it now risks a loss of support from the most militant youth', the very force that had broken the stalemate during the 1988 strikes and forced the government to talk to Walesa. Warszawski warns that if Solidarity loses control over the radicals, its bargaining power will be severely diminished*24 Gdansk anarchists have been even more forthright. They have proclaimed that Solidarity has 'nothing to offer to young people...It talks a lot and does little. And when it does act, all it does is extinguish people's fervour. Solidarity was right to call itself the "self-limiting revolution"-because it will limit itself out of existence even without help from the authorities.2 Though the views of the anarchist youth are not typical of the Polish opposition, one dissident publication recently warned the authorities that it was incorrect to assume that the Polish miracie of non-violence will go on for ever"26 Some of Walesa's harshest critics are to be found within Solidarity itself. On a recent visit to the industrial city of Lodz for a meeting with 5000 supporters to explain the round-table, Walesa ran into a full-blown row. Supporters of Andrzej Slowik, former local leader, objected to Walesa's appointment of his own man in the city by less than democratic means. Slowik is part of a vocal internal opposition in Solidarity, the working group, led by Andrzej Gwiazda. The working group is scornful of Walesa's overtures to the authorities and his collaboration with the church. The recent announcement that postal workers were leaving to set up their own independent union revealed the extent of internal tensions within Solidarity.27 The greatest threat to the carefully constructed deal between the bureaucracy and the respectable opposition lies in working class militancy. Workers, particularly the worse off younger generation, have little respect for Walesa's style of diplomacy.

45 Just the day after the round-table started, government spokes-

man Jerzy Urban held a press conference to complain that militancy was out of control. Complaining of a 'pay psychosis.

Urban listed 173 pay-related protests and 39 strikes in January alone. He attacked the striking Belchatow miners for seeking to undermine economic reform.2* Walesa quickly dispatched Solidarity executive member Alojzy Pietrzyk to Belchatow to try to end the strike.? Whatever happens at the round-table, it is clear that significant changes are taking place in the Polish economy. Value relations are achieving increasing importance and the state is consciously adopting the black market as an economic model Growing involvement by the "nomenklatura' in "grey areas of the economy is likely to have important consequences for the role played by state-controlled enterprises. The regime has just announced that foreign currency bank accounts held by Poles will now be legal. A significant layer of the population now has access to real values and does its business deals in foreign currency. 30 For many in Poland today the only way forward lies through institutionalising a new set of social relations dominated by the market and legitimised through political pluralism. The bureaucracy is trying to make changes through collaboration with Solidarity before a more radical opposition takes off. The bureaucrats hope that the legalisation of Solidarity will help to contain the process of radicalisation. They desperately need a mediating layer to soften the impact of the massive changes that are required to save the bureaucrats' own necks.

4. Conclusion The limits to change in Poland and elsewhere in Eastern Europe depend to a large extent on the international balance of forces.

Poland hopes for closer links with a new dynamic in Europe in the run-up to the creation of a 'single European market in 1992 that might give an impetus to its own faltering economy. Yet.

while there are growing trade rivalries in the West, Comecon countries are perversely restricting exports to one another in what one commentator has called a Western trade war turned upside down" There is no currency convertibility within Comecon and it seems highly unlikely that there can be a wholesale opening up of its moribund economies to the world market. A wave of new agreements is now pending between individual EEC and Comecon countries and this is encouraging expectations of an 46 important upturn in East-West trade. However, as one British

observer recently lamented, while central planners remain the at allocators of all goods and services, no Westerner in his right mind would want to hold East European currency as, given that гу there is no market, claims on goods and services embodied in money cannot be freely exercised. It is proving difficult enough lifor European Community countries to achieve genuine con- 10 sensus and unity harmony with the East looks almost impossible. 11- The Polish regime's emphasis on the separation between party and state is more than just an attempt to impress Poles with a 15 brand new democratic constitution." It is also evidence of a real process of differentiation within the bureaucracy. The barely stifled differences at the central committee plenum show that the PUWP is developing in conflicting political directions, in ast relation both to the growth of market relations at home and to les links with the West. The leadership needs to achieve a balance 1as between maintaining bureaucratic control and encouraging gn differentiation in its ranks. It has to find new means to institutionalise political conflict before it is too late. However, as igh the past few months have shown, working class volatility is the the really intangible factor and Solidarity wields less and less tUith influence over it. Poland's leaders are engaged in a desperate race for social and he economic change. The pace of change is limited by the threat to the internal stability of the bureaucracy itself and by the danger 1 a of provoking a major working class revolt. If they succeed, hat capitalist restoration is a real possibility. However, if perestroika, Polish-style, is a failure and the regime is destabilised in the process, we cannot rule out furtner Soviet intervention. The real intangible and the real hope for the future is an increasingly intransigent and militant working class movement.

es. : in 192 let. in sed 1. Jaruzelski speaking on Soviet television, 5 February 1989.

F it Notes 2. Radio Free Europe, Press Review: 10 February 1989.

3. Ibid. ew 4. Ibid. ind S. J Lloyd. Financial Times, 3 March 1989.

an 6. See R Osborne. 'Solidarity then and now, the next step.

ish 47 20 May 1988.

1. For criticisms of Solidarity's attack on youth demonstrations see Tygodnik Mazowsze, No 275.

14 December 1988: and Przeglad Wiadomosci Agencinch, No 43, 23 December 1988.

8. See T Szulc, "Poland's path' in Foreign Policy, No 73, Fall 1988; and T Garton Ash, The opposition' in New York Review of Books 13 October 1988.

9. Lloyd, op cit. 10. Radio Warsaw. 2 February 1989 and 4 February 1989.

1. Ibid. 12. Ibid. 13. Ibid. 14. Ibid, 2 February 1989.

15. Ibid, 4 February 1989.

16. Lloyd, op cit, quoting Andrej Olechowski, director of the West European department of the Polish ministry of forcign trade. 17. Ibid. Andrej Wrobleski, Polish finance minister, and Dominik Jastrzebski, foreign trade minister, 'complained that Western governments, which had embargoed further loans because of the imposition of martial law in 1981, had not yet woken up to Rakowskis liberalisation", See also D Buchan. Financial Times, 10 January 1989.

18. Radio Warsaw, 2 February 1989.

19. Radio Free Europe, Polish Situation Report No 3.

6 February 1989. 20. Solidarity spokesman quoted in Lloyd, op cit.

21. Radio Free Europe, Press Review, 10 February 1989.

22. No 2. May 1985. 23. Tvgodnik Mazowsze, op cit.

24. "Polities goes on to the streets", in Przeglad Wiadomosci Agencvinych, op cit. 25. Quoted in "Tomorrow's generation —youth and the opposition", in Przekaz, No 2, September 1987.

26. Przeglad Wiadomosci Agencyjnych, op cit.

27. See material on the Solidarity Working Group in *Solidarity Gdansk information agency report, 5 January 1989. 28. Radio Free Europe, Press Review, 10 February 1989.

29. Ibid. 30. C Bobinski. Financial Times, 15 March 1989.

31. Buchan. Financial Times, 16 January 1989.

32. Ibid. 33. Radio Warsaw reports on the tenth PUWP plenum, 16- 18 January 1989 and the national theoretical and ideological conference, 2-4 February 1989. Party spokesmen called for a separation of powers between party 48 and state and moves towards parliamentary democracy.

Hungary: the party that