While Poland’s right-wing opposition faces a serious crisis following its loss of office, it retains many important political assets and most of the ferment is on the party’s fringes rather than at its core. But the situation is a dynamic one and further election defeats could bring things to a head. Law and Justice’s political ..read more

Poland’s bitter political and systemic conflict has been exacerbated by the fact that the two sides appear to increasingly operate within different legal orders. Although the government has resolved this legal dualism for now by using the state apparatus to enforce its will, such a stand-off could continue at least until the current President’s term ..read more

The dispute over Poland’s state-owned media has shown how problematic the new government’s project of elite replacement can be where legislation is required to shorten its predecessor’s appointees’ terms of office. Get-arounds that avoid possible presidential vetoes leave it open to accusations that it is undermining democracy and violating the ‘rule of law’. Sacking state ..read more

Poland’s ideologically diverse new government is prioritising ‘settling accounts’ with its right-wing predecessor and elite replacement. But Poles may quickly tire of this if they view it as ‘revenge politics’, and looking for get-arounds to avoid possible presidential vetoes and constitutional tribunal referrals leaves the new administration open to accusations that they are themselves violating ..read more

My 20-minute video blog on the challenges facing Poland’s new government: https://sussex.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=7fbb9122-0e45-418e-9b88-b0d800ba43aa ..read more

Although the left looks set to return to government after 18 years, its vote share actually went down in last month’s election and it risks being subsumed within a coalition dominated by more economically liberal and socially conservative groupings. The Polish left’s strategic dilemma remains that less well-off, economically leftist voters incline towards parties that ..read more

Poland’s opposition parties look set to form the next government because an eclectic liberal-centrist agrarian electoral coalition won over voters who wanted change but not a return to the pre-2015 status quo ante. The opposition benefited from an increase in support and turnout in larger towns and among younger voters, but less photogenic middle-aged electors ..read more

My 20-minute video blog on what I think happened in the Polish parliamentary election and what will happen next: https://sussex.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=8fc3e887-0de6-44bd-a258-b09f01805ac6 ..read more

My 15-minute video on the possible scenarios following Poland’s October 15th parliamentary election: https://sussex.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=29bcb47e-62d7-42e6-8d6b-b098016f09bf ..read more

Calling multiple referendums on the same day as the parliamentary election helped the right-wing ruling party seize back control of the campaign agenda and put the opposition on the backfoot. While media interest in the referendums has waned, they still provide the ruling party with an opportunity to steer election debate back on to its ..read more