The democratic deficit

Poles don't like voting, which the forthcoming local elections will confirm. A Swedish research institute that studies electoral patterns revealed that Poles are the least enthusiastic voters not only in Europe, but are also bottom of the league everywhere in the eastern and central regions. Behavioral psychologists believe this antipathy to the ballot box may date from the botched transition to democracy stemming from the flawed Round Table Agreement. It was certainly a sober affair in Poland, while everywhere else the communist dominoes tumbled, the people partied. In Prague, democracy swung in with Vaclav Havel and Frank Zappa; the east Germans tore the wall down with their bare hands; and the Bulgarians torched the party headquarters. Once the Poles had sabotaged the parliamentary list cooked up to safeguard the party's leading role, they retired to get on with their lives minus any further preoccupation with politics.
Little has happened in 12 years to rekindle faith in democracy. Wałęsa's tragic presidency further devalued the coinage, as did the elaborate fiction of Solidarnoœć as a movement of the right, when by birthright it was always a union-driven vehicle of the left, lurching between two polar extremes. To the scrutiny of public opinion, the activities of some politicians suggested that most of them were preoccupied by personal gain rather than selfless dedication to the national interest.

Turnout in Polish general elections hovers around 43% of those entitled to vote. The consequence is a series of governments lacking a clear mandate to run the country and beyond that, an absence of clear and stable forces to offer tough and spirited opposition to the government of the day. The absence of a clearly defined political force of the right, strongly identified with the virtues of the free market and the concerns and demands of the business community, is a peculiar phenomenon as Poland stands at the gates of the European Union.
To no small extent, Solidarnoœć is to blame for acting as a roadblock these past 12 years to frustrate the emergence of a coherent, business-friendly right, simply because the movement, trading on its anticommunism, hijacked the credentials of the center-right. The Freedom Union, that rib cut from the body of Solidarnoœć, expired because it could not spread the gospel of capitalism with a human face among working folk, least of all under the cerebral leadership of Professor Balcerowicz.

In its place we have the anaemic Citzens Platform, a sitting target inviting further cannibalistic assaults which are the speciality of the shark-infested right and the Law and Order party, whose fortunes are attached by a bungy rope to the fortunes of the Kaczyński twins. And there is another factor that contributes to the strangeness of the Polish political landscape. The sheer dreary sameness of the political scenery. Nearly all the principal characters have been on stage now since 1989, and some, including the president and the prime minister, are vintage performers from Jaruzelski's government. Kwaœniewski alone has emerged with class and stature. He has made the presidency his own, a figure transcending the sterile quarrels of Polish politics. And for that alone, he will prove an immensely challenging act to follow.
For the rest, Poles are presented at election times with a ritual procession of stage acts they have seen too many times before. There is no longer even a polite ripple of applause.
Little will change until a new generation of confident young businessmen and women - a demanding class of professionals attached to European values and aspirations, which presently eschew politics as smutty and irrelevant - are finally driven by a sense of civic outrage to challenge the old guard. At that moment, Poles will finally celebrate the Liberation.

The Right to No
A Business Journal reporter went to the offices of the Sejm this week, eager to obtain a press pass for the remainder of the parliamentary season. He was turned away empty-handed on the grounds that no more would be issued until next year. In Poland, it appears that access to the wisdom of our legislators is strictly rationed.
Over to you, Pan Marshal of the Sejm.