Victims of Their Own Making

The Victim Complex

For a number of years now there has been a growing trend within right-wing Polish politics which is particularly perplexing. Right-wing politics is often equated with patriotic and nationalist sentiments, glorifying past (and present) achievements as well as demonstrating the greatness of one’s nation. However, attitudes within right-wing (and liberal) circles in Poland seem to be advocating a different approach. This approach reached its apex when Law and Justice (PiS) came to power in 2005.

The Christ Nation

Together with the far-right League of Polish Families (LPR) and populist Self-Defence (Samoobrona), this approach became entrenched and particularly visible in Polish foreign policy during the PiS years. Polish politics (heavily influenced by the Catholic church at the time) embraced an almost ‘Christic’ and/or ‘martyrological’ approach to their own history. Poland was seen by these politicians to be both the saviour and martyr of Europe, the ‘Christ’ of European nations.

The German Invasion

When arguing for Poland’s God-given right to have more votes in the EU’s then new system of voting, one of the Kaczyński brothers said that had it not been for World War II, Poland’s population would be greater and so they deserve more votes in the EU. This attitude continued throughout their term in office and continues today. Certain politicians feel Poland ‘deserves’ more because it suffered so much. This attitude of Poland being the ‘eternal victim’ is extremely dangerous for a number of reasons.

The Destruction of Self

Firstly, with it comes a large whiff of misplaced arrogance which, to the outside world, is particularly irritating when the only arguments that can be heard coming from the Polish camp are that Poland deserves more because it had to live though both Nazism and Communism. Secondly, when such a victim complex becomes entrenched its proponents begin to genuinely believe it. So much so that extolling the virtues of being a victim turns into a form of flagellation or even historical and political self-mutilation.

The New History

Recently, there has been much talk about historical revisionism. Russia particularly has been found guilty of practising the re-writing of history. However, is Poland’s victim status also a form of revisionism? Believing that Poland is forever Europe’s martyr is useful as it absolves the nation of crimes previously committed, such as Jedwabne or Operation Wisła. How can the victim have ever been the tormentor?

The End is Nigh

It’s been fun watching Poland’s politicians make complete idiots of themselves. This running saga of PiS attacks Self-Defence, Self-Defence counterattacks, PiS strikes LPR and LPR counter-strikes has become ridiculous.

The so-called coalition has hit an impasse and it’s difficult seeing a way out for either PiS or it’s baby brother LiS. To be honest, this farce has been going on for nigh on one and half years when the cracks first began to appear. For all their ridiculous ideas and policies, PiS is nowhere near as populist and anti-intellectual as they appear to be or as dictatorial as Self-Defence and LPR (LiS). The coalition was therefore always at risk with such a clash of cultures.

The art of politicking must surely rely on the skill politicians have in discussion and negotiation. This fact is most clearly lacking in the entire Polish parliament. Even Civic Platform (PO) was unable to reach an agreement with PiS two years ago and we have to remember that it takes two to tango…

So what will happen now? The invectives will probably continue for another week or two, perhaps longer until PiS decides all is lost and their standing in the polls starts plummeting. The problem (or not) is the fact that PiS’ standing in the polls isn’t dropping whereas LiS’ standing is. What is certain is that earlier elections depend entirely on PiS. Only when PiS is completely convinced that it can gain the maximum possible result will the PM declare the next elections.

Outfoxing Us All

When it comes to political consolidation and party alliances, this has got to be one of the classics. The League of Polish Families (LPR) and Self-Defence (Samoobrona) announced that they will be joining forces to create a super-party, what they call a grand alternative to Law and Justice (PiS).

Viable Alternative?
What makes the whole situation comical is the fact that both these parties – LPR and Self-Defence – are members of the ruling coalition and the fact they feel the need to create an opposition to PiS speaks volumes for the state of current Polish politics – bickering, squabbling and incessant in-fighting.

Ironic Attack
What is particularly amusing is the name of this newly-forming party – Liga i Samoobrona or LiS - which is most clearly a ironic jibe at PiS. In one way the choice of name obviously pokes fun at PiS, but it also shows the future direction of LPR and Self-Defence. They wish to create an alternative to PiS and clearly want to break free of the PiS shackles before they are consumed by their big brother and converted into the rank and file of PiS.

Opposites Attract
LiS (Polish ‘fox’) wants to outwit and outsmart PiS and are ready to polarise the political scene once again. As PiS moved further to the right, LPR were worried that their electorate was gradually been swallowed up. Following the Lepper/CBA scandal (see previous post), Self-Defence realised that it was facing an outright attack on its leadership. The result is an odd union. LPR is an ultra-catholic, right-wing party whereas Self-Defence is a left-wing, peasant-backed party. No analogies intended – this brings to mind two European tyrants – one was a left-wing communist, the other a right-wing nationalist…

Poland Comes First
What do the two have in common? Extremist, populist policies; dogmatic, authoritarian leaders. The first announcement by the two LiS leaders (Giertych and Lepper have to share power, of course) is that they will oppose any future ratification of an EU Constitution. What’s more LiS will be focused on the creation of a powerful nation. The Foxes (!) have made it clear that their priority is ideology over the economy and finances. Well, what a surprise…

Booking Hell

Roman Giertcyh, Minister of Education has done it again. He’s got himself into yet another pickle thanks to the ridiculousness of his ideas. Well done, Roman!

Deputy Roman
Giertych is of course Deputy PM and leader of the League of Polish Families (LPR), an extremist catholic party intent on slapping their right-wing ideas on the whole nation regardless of whether the nation agrees with these ideas or not. The LPR currently has around 4% in the opinion polls which means the party will, in all likelihood, not get into parliament at the next election.

Roman the Educator
Wanting to flex a bit of political muscle and show the world he really is a big, powerful man, Roman Giertych has decided to change the obligatory reading list for school kids and do away with some of the biggest names in Polish literature in an effort to impose his idea of ‘canon’ on Poland’s youngest readers.

Roman the Wise
For the first time ever, a Minister of Education has made this decision single-handedly without consulting it with any school teachers, head teachers, literary experts or specialists in education. Roman has decided that the poets Jan Lechoń and Kazimierz Wierzyński are not good enough for Poland’s school children and has also forced out Maria Konopnicka, Bruno Schulz, Witold Gombrowicz and Stanisław Lem – all literary pillars, veritable heavyweights of the Polish literary canon.

Roman the Bold
Like a school boy ready to prove a point and ready to show he’s in control, Giertych has been quick to elbow his way into the nation’s collective consciousness eagerly sticking his hand up with slogans like, “Miss, Miss, there’s too much violence in our schools”. Or, “Miss, Miss, we need to re-think our moral values”. Oh yes, when it comes to conservative, right-wing slogans, Roman’s yer man.

Roman the Cunning
However, when it comes to the reading list, commentators are a little worried. They’ve put two and two together and realised there’s more to this controversy than Giertych simply finding Gombrowicz too difficult or Lem a little over his head. It seems that each and every one of the authors of these Index-ed books is of Jewish descent or, in the case of Konopicka, fought ardently for the Jewish cause.

Hmm…

Foot in Mouth Disease

I have a theory that the level of a country’s cultural development and civilisation can be gauged by the standard of its public toilets. Obviously, everything is relative but take a look at service station bogs in Sweden, Holland or Germany and take a look at the holes in the ground you find in Northern Africa, for example. Everything else comes somewhere in the middle and in this way we can establish where a county can be found on the cultural continuum.
Well, I think it’s a good theory…

My other theory is that you can gauge the state of a country’s political culture/development/class by the amount of absurdity contained in the country’s legislation or by the amount of surreal decisions announced by its politicians. Which brings me to Ewa Sowińska, Poland’s controversial Children’s Rights Ombudsman.

Sowińska recently made the news by writing a letter to the Pope claiming that the forces of darkness (in the guise of certain independent media) were closing in on Poland and Poland’s church hierarchs and were attempting to bring down Holy Mother Church through defamation, criticism and a consolidated attack on Archbishop Wielgus who was set to become Archbishop of Warsaw but had to step down after it was found that he had collaborated with the communist Secret Police (see previous blog entry). When asked why on earth the Children’s Rights Ombudsman was writing an official letter to the Pope on government headed paper she replied that the good Archbishop spent many hours teaching children and this was, therefore, a matter for the Ombudsman. Hmm…

Anyway, this time Sowińska – of the far-right League of Polish Families - has excelled even herself. She has expressed concerns about the sexuality of Tinky Winky of the Teletubbies who, she believes, is quite obviously gay. She came to this conclusion upon noticing that dear old Tinky has a penchant for carrying handbags. Sowińska is so intent on pursuing her anti-gay crusade that she is currently in consultation with psychologists about this matter. If convicted, charged and found to be gay, Tinky Winky will be banned from Polish TV as this is a blatant case of the promotion of a gay lifestyle which is abhorrent to all God-fearing League of Polish Family members.

I wonder if she’s ever seen Little Britain…

Five reasons to worry (Part I)

Should Polish people start panicking? Law and Justice (PiS) together with Samoobrona (Self-Defence) and the League of Polish Families (LPR) created the euphemistically-termed ‘rich and varied’ coalition whose aim it was to re-build Poland, or rather build Poland anew. It seems their plans haven’t quite gone the way they wanted them to go.

I’m not one for doom and gloom but following the political turmoil here in Poland, it’s hard to keep a positive outlook on life. Several days ago Poland (together with Ukraine) won the right to host the 2012 European Championships. The mood has changed somewhat…

Political commentators and observers have been quick to point out that things seem to be going awry for Poland’s ruling elite. PiS, headed by the Kaczyński twins, has been dead set on creating a ’new’ Poland, a kind of utopia in which only the pious and God-fearing reside. Some say they’re building castles in the sand, others believe the ideas are worthy but their methods are questionable. Others still maintain that the PiS government is simply a grandiose house of cards which may look sturdy on the outside but has begun to creak and is ready to fall.

I’ve isolated five reasons why it may be time for Poles to start worrying and strangely enough all five points seem to have come to the fore this week.

Firstly (political zeal), the much-maligned Vetting Act which aimed at weeding out all ex-communists and Secret Police (SB) collaborators has been found to be a spectacularly bungled legislative experiment. So much so that a whole host of journalists and former Solidarity activists have decided to ignore the legal necessity of submitting so-called vetting declarations. The two most controversial cases being that of Bronisław Geremek, former advisor to Lech Wałęsa and Tadeusz Mazowiecki, Poland’s first non-communist Prime Minister since World War II. According to the Kaczyński twins, both Geremek and Mazowiecki have lost their respective posts in the European Parliament and in the Order of the White Eagle. The BBC makes reference to the Geremek case, while Poland.pl briefly discusses Mazowiecki’s predicament. What is worrying is the government’s complete lack of elasticity in creating legislation which not only seeks to eliminate the ‘wrong-doers’ but also inadvertently targets eminent and distinguished activists such as Geremek and Mazowiecki.

Secondly (intolerance), Poland the Polish government seems to be increasingly in the firing line with regards to homophobia. The Guardian notes how the European Parliament has decided enough is enough and will be investigating claims that the Polish government is openly using anti-gay propaganda. The BBC also discusses this controversial issue. In fact, PM Kaczyński only recently talked about the obvious benefits of lowering the number of gay people in society.

Thirdly (lack of integrity), the suicide (reported in USA Today) of Barbara Blida, former Left Democratic Alliance (SLD) member and Construction Minister, has cast a dark shadow on the Internal Security Agency (ABW) and the methods employed by Messieurs Zbigniew Ziobro and Zbigniew Wasserman, respectively Ministers of Justice and the Secret Services. Blida shot herself after members of the ABW raided her house. It was thought Blida was going to be arrested on charges of corruption. Rather than express remorse and sorrow through a public show of sympathy, Wasserman was quick to wash his hands of the whole affair and in effect laid the blame on the head of the ABW who did the honourable thing and handed in his resignation. In a parliamentary address that shocked many commentators, Wasserman indicated that no innocent person would have shot themselves in such a situation and he suggested that Blida must have been guilty to have done so. What is troubling is Wasserman’s lack of integrity and honour in such a tragic situation.

Part II to follow…

Politician Speak with Forked Tongue

The world is full of politicians who deliberately (or even unwittingly) try and effect language. Historians give countless examples of witless (or even intelligent) political schemers who have made their mark on language. Either through the coining of new compounds, bizarre collocations, alternative set phrases and mixed metaphors or through commentary about politicians by observers are we forever introduced to a variety of odd constructions that sometimes bubble and sink in the linguistic melting pot or float to the top like unwanted excrement refusing to disappear.

Poland’s politicians are no different and are busy at work trying to stamp their authority on the Polish language. I was filled with linguistic glee (whatever that is!) when I learned that Roman Giertych, of ultra-catholic, right-wing fame, won his battle for the re-introduction of uniforms in Poland’s primary and high schools because of the fact that some people have begun calling these uniforms Giertyszki or Romanówki - a great example of Polish’s delightful penchant for possessive-diminutives. This also reminds me of Borówki (which also means ‘berries’) referring to the team of people closely associated with Marek Borowski, leader of the SDPL.

However, what really drew my attention to the linguistic shenanigans of Poland’s political classes was Transubstantiation in which we find the following examples of political gobbledygook:

łże-elity,   bure suki,   lumpen liberałowie,   wykształciuchy

All these words are usually uttered with venom (or bile, take your pick) and are generally always directed at politicians of the ‘liberal persuasion’ (don’t say it out loud – this is Poland) by members of Law and Justice (PiS). Anyone who belongs to any sort of elite, intellectual grouping, academic team or is a liberal (struck out to make it less offensive) can be classed as one of the above.  As Transubstantiation tells us (but with additional commentary of my own) łże-elity are the ‘lying elite dogs’; bure suki is another subtle reference to dogs and it generally means ‘drab dogs/bitches’ (how nice!); lumpen liberałowie is a classic and shows the disdain with which PiS views liberalism – these are the ‘lowly liberals’, the ‘uber-scum of Poland’; the final one wykształciuchy is a brilliant perversion of the word ‘educated’ giving it a contemptuous coating. I’ve heard it used to refer to academics and journalists who refuse to be vetted by government authorities.

Whatever you think, you can’t say that politicians don’t have the gift of the gab. Yes, they’re ill-mannered, unfriendly and unethical, but they have the ability to make me smile when I hear the verbal garbage they use. The phrase that seems to have the greatest political (and statistical) currency in Poland at the moment is IV RP which has nothing to do with Received Pronunciation but is an abbreviation of czwarta Rzeczpospolita or ‘Fourth Republic’, a fantasy utopia coined by Poland’s President Lech Kaczyński to imply a new state that aims to cut all ties with the (post-communist) ‘Third Republic’ (1989 and onwards). The idea is interesting but has met with little support outside government circles leading to the even newer concept of the ‘Fifth Republic‘ put forward by Lech Mażewski.

We certainly do live in interesting times.

Constitution Unchanged, Speaker Resigns

My, my, what a kerfuffle! Friday the 13th was a truly tainted day for the Polish government yesterday. The Polish political scene has been bubbling for the past few weeks after members of right-wing LPR (League of Polish Families) decided to put forward proposals for an amendment to Articles 30 and 38 of the Polish Constitution. In their view, Articles 30 and 38 should be amended to protect the rights of the unborn child as well as elderly people. Their proposals would in effect put a complete ban on all forms of abortion and euthanasia.

LPR began shoring up support amongst Catholic members of their coalition partners PiS (Law and Justice) and Samoobrona (Self-Defence) as well as Catholic members of the more liberal-minded PO (Civic Platform). The public debate that ensued resembled a political mud-slinging match with right-wing politicians asking their fellow parliamentarians to decide whether they were pro-death or pro-life. The discussion basically became an debate on abortion. The liberals in Poland’s Sejm including most of PO and SLD (Democratic Left Alliance) were all adamant that the present Constitution regulates this issue satisfactorily.

Decision time came yesterday when the Sejm got down to business. Five amendments to the Constitution were put forward – each concerning one or both of Articles 30 and 38, each in some way restricting abortion (which is currently illegal in Poland anyway). Marek Jurek, the Speaker of the House and part of the extreme Catholic wing of PiS (former ZChN member) opened proceedings in sombre mood urging MPs to search their conscience and do the right wing thing. He had previously stated that this vote was the litmus test of Poland’s moral compass and he laid all his cards on the table.

Before the vote, fault lines had already begun to appear in the ruling coalition. All LPR members wanted a complete ban on abortion and euthanasia whereas many PiS members were unsure. Voting began. The first proposal was thrown out. The second proposal also fell at the final hurdle. LPR began to panic and in the recess one of its members started distributing copies of a letter a Polish bishop had written on the evils of abortion leaving them on all the seats of the Sejm. Marek Suski, a PiS politician was so disgusted with the agitation of his coalition colleagues he began collecting the leaflets and ripping them up. The coalition cracks had begun to appear.

Following the recess voting began. The third proposal of amending the Constitution was thrown out, the fourth also fell. PM Jarosław Kaczyński of PiS appealed to members to do the right thing and deputy PM Roman Giertych of LPR also felt the need to say his bit which, in the final analysis, probably consolidating the more liberal-minded PiS members to vote against the fifth proposal which was also thrown out. The fissures were now visible to all.

Soon after voting finished, the Speaker Marek Jurek (of the right-wing PiS faction) called a press conference and announced he would be resigning as Speaker. He had made his non-objective views clear to the House prior to voting. All his eggs were in one basket and all his eggs were broken.

What happens next will be interesting. Experts believe a split within PiS is imminent. Others believe very little will take place as the main opposition party PO does not have the energy to turn PiS’s setback into political weaponry. One thing is clear – LPR’s Roman Giertych has become the undisputed leader of Poland’s right-wing hardcore.

What next for Poland?

Envisage a panic-stricken teacher, dishevelled and unkempt hastily writing a report for one of his more tiresome students. However, this is no ordinary report and this is no ordinary pupil. The pupil is the Republic of Poland and the report is the image that the local (Polish) and international press have created.

The usual clichéd formulas come to the teacher’s mind: must do better, talks too much, never does his homework, bullies other students. These can be roughly understood as Poland’s incapability and unwillingness to reform its economic policy and make life easier for business people; its predilection for bickering, in-fighting and divided politics; its lack of preparation and common sense on the international stage; and finally, its penchant for bigoted and intolerant views.

These are not my opinions but the opinions of the majority of the world’s press. As part of my love of corpus linguistics, I decided to collect text examples of articles that use the word Poland or Polish. I’m not even near completing this gargantuan project but I have already noted a marked difference in the content of articles written up to the year 1989, those written after the fall of the Berlin Wall and prior to EU enlargement and those written after the borders opened to Poland’s eager workers coinciding nicely with the ascension to power of the Holy Trinity Coalition of Law and Justice (PiS), Self-Defence (Samoobrona) and the League of Polish Families (LPR).

Generally speaking, Poland’s reputation has plummeted like a stone. Up to 1989, attitudes oscillated between pity and ignorance; after 1989 these feelings were more akin to hope and fascination; now these attitudes are of astonishment, disgust and desolation. To many, Poland seems to be undoing what it so valiantly managed to achieve after one hundred and twenty-three years of alien occupation, two devastating world wars and fifty years of communism. The freedom that was won through blood, sweat and tears is being seriously challenged not by an alien power but by internal forces focused on nationalism, bigotry, pseudo-Catholicism and a thirst for blood.

The words that seem to most frequently correlate with the words Poland and Polish are quite often neutral but there is a dangerously high number of negative words which also cluster around Poland and Polish. Such words are witch-hunt, inspecting, vetting, scandal, European Commision (nearly always used negatively), immigrants, secret to name just a few. This gives us a linguistic (or more precisely, a semantic) map of the views of the world press, a mind map of sorts.

Below are some examples of the texts that I’ve found:

The Financial Times tells us: “A law that comes into force today will compel board members and managers of listed companies to confess if they had been informants for communist-era secret police. Executives who refuse to co-operate … or who are caught lying about their past would be banned from working for public companies for 10 years.”

The Economist: “The Polish government realises it needs a foreign policy, but doesn’t yet have one.”

The Sun: ”A LOOPHOLE means East European migrants living in Britain can claim child benefit – even if their kids don’t live here. Polish migrants alone have made 50,000 claims and thousands from other new EU countries are cashing in. Readers are furious this is being allowed.”

The European Voice: “The Polish have a ghastly history as Europe’s battlefield. Over the centuries the population has had a choice of viewing: oppression and exploitation from the east or the west. When the Germans and Russians can agree, it is from both east and west. Have the Poles learned anything from all this?”

An apt question for Poland’s ruling coalition might be the title of Henryk Sienkiewicz’s masterpiece Qvo Vadis, Latin for ‘where are you going?’

Poland’s Political Future

According to many political observers, Poland’s political elites and the voting public is close to some sort of an ideological revolution. I don’t particularly agree but it’s interesting looking at the problem and seeing how much currency these ideas actually have.

What’s being discussed? In most democratic states, political wars are often won and lost on the battleground that is the political centre. We might look at the USA’s Democrats and Republicans or Britain’s Conservative Party and Labour Party. In both cases we can see policies oscillating around a core of values shared by both sides of the political scene.

Poland is different in this respect as the political spectrum is much broader with extremist parties such as the League of Polish Families (Catholic Right) and Self-Defence (Peasant Right) dominating current politics, if not the opinion polls.

The League of Polish Families is a small party and easy enough to explain. It is quite simply a rightist party. Their main policies seem to be: the complete dominance of Catholicism in Poland, the inclusion of a ‘Christian’ element to the EU Constitution, the outlawing of abortion and rights for gay couples and the introduction of ‘patriotism’ classes in schools to name just a few.

Self-Defence interestingly bills itself as a party that defends Poland’s rights on the international scene (rightist), is generally anti-European and pro-national (rightist), yet supports policies of government subsidies and nationalism (leftist). Self-Defence finds itself in the rightist ruling coalition but at the same time sees itself as the only real alternative to Poland’s other leftist and peasant parties – the Democratic Left Alliance (with which it often cooperated when they were in power) and the Polish Peasant Party.

Western notions of right and left cannot feasibly be transferred to the politics of Central Europe and Poland. Square pegs in round holes.

The ruling Law and Justice party bill themselves as the mainstay of the right. However, they too have certain policies that are not always strictly right (in a Western sense) but are more akin to the policies of their coalition partners Self-Defence. We can, however, be sure of one thing – the Holy Trinity of Law and Justice, Self-Defence and the League of Polish Families are vehemently anti-liberal and anti-liberalising. Such is the ferocity of their criticism that to some the term ‘liberal’ has now become a dirty word. Even the liberal Civic Platform and Democratic Left Alliance are wary of using this word in public debates for fear of being labelled a ‘liberal’ (ugh!) party.

As odd as this state of affairs is, it means that the battle for Poland’s political (soft nougaty) centre has not yet been fought and is yet to be won by one party. Those that I believe have the most to gain from this battle are, of course, Poland’s citizens because it will, hopefully, mean a complete reversal of current extremist and populist politics. The real big guns of Poland’s political middle ground are two parties: (1) Civic Platform and (2) Left and Democrats (a new coalition made up of the Democratic Left Alliance, the Social Democratic Party of Poland, the Democratic Party and the Labour Union). No doubt, Law and Justice will also come into the equation.

Current opinion polls give us the following:

Civic Platform 30%
Law and Justice 27%
Left and Democrats 10%
Self-Defence 8%

If we include Law and Justice as a potential ‘centre’ i.e. non-extremist and populist party (which is not necessarily the case at the moment) it means that almost 70% of the voting population have given the centre a clear message: dump the extremists and let’s get to work on improving public finances and becoming a truly free market economy.