The National Minorities in the Polish Politics. The Past and the Present (original) (raw)
Related papers
2020
The division of Europe into east and west as a consequence of World War II lasted half a century. It allowed societies in Western Europe to revert to their prewar political structures, but it also brought Central and Eastern Europe under the Soviet sphere of influence. As a result of the decisions taken by the major powers, many countries in the region had to change their geographical shape. In compensation for the loss of her prewar eastern borderlands to the USSR, Poland was rewarded with western German provinces. The international decisions reached at that time did not encourage rapid political and social stabilisation, especially in the eastern part of Europe, whose countenance was affected by ethnic cleansing, including deportation, resettlements and segregation of the population. Centralist political regimes appeared, propagating a national ideology and calling for a new order 1. In Poland, which had particularly suffered through the years of occupation and ethnic conflicts, the concept of 'nation' assumed jagged contours. Opinions became more radical, and the idea of 'nation' was treated on a par with the Polish raison d' état, which was occasionally used to justify brutal action. As Timothy Snyder has written, Stalin wanted to make Poland the centre of an ethnically pure zone 2. Rapid demographic changes occurred, including the suppression of minorities. Non-Polish nationals were considered a threat to the state and the actions taken against them extended to entire communities. Ethnic purges took place in the border areas: Germans in the west and Ukrainians in the southeast of Poland were subjected to resettlement. However, not everyone could immediately be categorised in terms of nationality. The situation in the eastern German territory annexed to Poland was especially difficult. Here there was the problem of the indigenous (autochthonic) population. Kashubians, Masurians, Vistulans and, the most numerous groups, Silesians, approached the issue of national-state identity with scepticism. Their regional culture and places they regarded as home were more important markers of collective identity. The life of the (multi-national) Second Republic formed
Trimarium, 2023
The end of World War I brought the collapse of three multina- tional monarchies, Russia, Austria-Hungary and Germany, in Central and Eastern Europe, which offered the societies living in the region a chance to organize their own state structures. In Poland, the political elites agreed that the western border would be demarcated at the Paris Peace Conference, while chances for a more independent resolution were seen in the east. There were two competing notions of the Polish presence in this area: the incorporationist view, promoted by nationalists and advocating the division of the so-called partitioned terri- tories between Poland and Russia, and the federal view, under which socialists and Pilsudski supporters championed the establishment of independent Lithuania, Ukraine and Belarus, which were bound to it by alliances, on the eastern fringes of the Republic. Although the final decisions at Riga were closer to the former, the territory of Poland that was outlined in both concepts raised objections from Ukrainians and Lithuanians. Germany reacted similarly to demands that Pomerania, Greater Poland and Upper Silesia be annexed to Poland, and Czechs opposed the annexation of Cieszyn to Silesia. These demands were only moderately strengthened by the ethnic predomi- nance of Poles in these areas, but the final decisions were influ- enced by the pressure of uprisings and the goodwill of France. The borders postulated by the nationalists and the Pilsuds- kiites corresponded with their vision of policy toward national minorities. The nationalists believed that Slavic minorities, who were denied the right to a separate state, should be assim- ilated. The Pilsudskiites, on the other hand, advocated state assimilation: they allowed religious, cultural and linguistic separateness of national minorities on condition of loyalty to the Polish state. Ultimately, however, the Second Republic failed to develop a long-term and consistent policy towards national minorities, as well as towards Poles living abroad.
National and Ethnic Minorities in Poland-the Legal Problem of Definition
Acta Juridica Hungarica, 2004
The Polish Constitution adopted on 2 April 1997, for the first time after the war, contains a provision dedicated exclusively to protecting national and ethnic minorities, however without a definition of those two categories. The legislator extended the rights of national and ethnic minorities beyond those identified in the Article 35. The extension of such rights also results from international agreements. Thus far there is no statute regulating in a comprehensive and complete manner the situation of national and ethnic minorities (the Constitution does not make its adoption mandatory), the legal regulations concerning these issues are dispersed. The problem of legal definition of the national minority appeared in connection with the initiative of the formal recognition of the Union of People of Silesian Minority. Its application has been rejected by Polish courts for the reason of non-existence of such a minority and for the attempt of abuse of the electoral privilege granted to national minorities. The Supreme Court's position has been confirmed by the Chamber and then by the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights. However the 2002 national census revealed a new phenomenon of the Silesian minority: 3% of the inhabitants of the region declared their affinity to Silesian nationality.
The long shadow of borders : the cases of Kashubian and Silesian in Poland
Eurasia Border Review, 2014
Poland was established as a nation-state in 1918. The state's administration embarked on the policy of ethnolinguistic homogenization in the interwar period, because one-third of the population was seen as ethnolinguistically non-Polish. The Polish borders and territory were dramatically altered as a result of World War II, and the country became a member of the Soviet bloc. The concomitant genocide and ethnic cleansing yielded an almost ethnolinguistically homogenous Poland. After the end of communism, the German minority, whose existence had as required, a system of minority rights protection. However, it did not cover contemporary Poland's largest minority, the Silesians. Additionally, the system was constructed in such a manner that the acknowledged linguistic difference of a similar group of Kashubs stopped short of recognizing them as a minority. It appears that in Poland the need provisions itself. In its de jure observance of minority rights provisions, de facto, the Polish state administration seems to endeavor to limit such provisions as much as possible, alongside the number of Polish citizens entitled to them. Hence, it may be proposed that the ongoing project of ethnolinguiustic homogenization continues to be the ideological backbone of national statehood legitimation in today's Poland.
Patterns of Prejudicre, 1999
Ethnic Cleansing in Silesia 1950–1989 and the Ennationalizing Policies of Poland and Germany (pp. 51–74). Patterns of Prejudice. Vol. 33, No. 2. The rise of nationalism in Central Europe in the nineteenth century haddire consequences for Silesia, the far-flung, multi-ethnic frontier region of Prussia/Germany, bordering on Austria-Hungary and Russia. The dividing up in 1921 ofUpper Silesia between Germany and the newly established Polish nation-state, andthe ensuing ennationalization of both regions, triggered off population movementsof 300,000 persons before 1939, when Berlin seized the whole of Upper Silesia andembarked on a policy of thorough Germanization. After 1945 this was succeeded byPolonization as Moscow granted most of the German territories east of the Oder-Neisse line (including almost the whole of Silesia) to Poland. In consequence, almostthe entire Lower Silesian population either fled, was evacuated in 1944-5 or expelledby 1948, and the region was repopulated by Poles. The same was true in UpperSilesia but to a more limited degree as Warsaw decided to retain most of the localpopulation: as ‘Poles’, they would ‘justify’ incorporation of the region into Poland,and they would continue to run the Upper Silesian industries so badly needed forthe country’s reconstruction. Although officially recognized as Poles, UpperSilesians were treated as second-class citizens. Whereas, by 1960, almost all of theremaining Lower Silesian Germans had been allowed to leave, this option was notavailable to Upper Silesians who, as a result, became more alienated, more German-orientated and even more deeply identified with their specific ethnic groups.Consequently, although Warsaw could not recognize them as non-Poles as it wouldcontradict the offical myth of the state’s ethnic homogeneity, an increasing numberwere allowed to leave for West Germany, especially after Bonn’s major concessionsto the Polish Communist regime in 1970 which had the dual effect of making hard-to-come-by goods more available for ‘real’ Poles, and of replenishing theconservative electorate in West Germany. On the other hand, those who stayedsuccessfully defied Poland’s ennationalizing policies by the establishment of variousGerman organizations. The emigration of 1950-89 was in fact an ‘ethnic cleansing’as it was originally set off by discrimination on ethnic grounds; the growingdisparity in living standards between West Germany and Poland was accompaniedof a similar gap in the granting of civil and human rights.
Studies into the History of Russia and Central-Eastern Europe, 2017
The article presents national projects which emerged in Polesie in the interwar period and sought to nationalise the local population. It briefly discusses the conditions from the end of World War I to the signing of the Treaty of Riga in March 1921, which significantly influenced the further attitudes of Polesians. The Polesie region within the borders of reborn Poland was the area of competition between several national movements: Belarusian, Polish, Russian and Ukrainian. The rivalry in Polesie clearly broke down at the turn of 1933. From then onwards, the Polesian voivode Wacław Kostek-Biernacki decisively combated all non-Polish undertakings in the region.
research material as well. The analysis and evaluation of theses source documents had an additional input in the matter of research on how the national minorities had affected the internal security of the Second Republic of Poland. The content provided suggests that the influence of many actions of the Ukrainian and German minorities actually destabilized the inner situation in the Second Republic. The nature of activities of the both minority groups, however, was fundamentally different. The Ukrainian minority often referred to the paramilitary operations and assistance of military organizations for spreading terror and political forcing of their demands. Whereas, the German minority benefited from measures of political propaganda and agitation inspired from Germany. Its political parties and various associations often smuggled anti-Polish contents, in the spirit of the German policy of revisionism.
Social Pathology and Prevention
The article presents the situation of national and ethnic minorities and foreigners in Poland in the context of legal and demographic changes that took place between the censuses in 2002 and 2011. There were many factors that affected the situation of minorities in Poland, among them: • the entry into force of new legislation (primarily the 2006 National and Ethnic Minorities Act), • activities of the Silesian Autonomy Movement, including the public hearing in the European Court of Human Rights concerning the refusal to register by the Supreme Court in Poland of the Association of Silesian Nationals, • change of census methodology, among others. By introducing the possibility of a declaration of dual national-ethnic identification, • increase in immigration in Poland, especially those from the eastern border, • these factors were presented in statistical and social terms-based on opinion polls in Poland.