Change of strategy in Solidarity

The new leaders of Solidarity have loosened ties with Poland’s Law and Justice party and are organising demonstrations, hoping to radicalise members and influence the Polish government. They have also said they will focus on representing workers’ interests and move away from purely political activity. These actions suggest that the strategy of Solidarity, under new President Piotr Duda, is to regain the militant character that the workers’ movement had in the early 1980s.

Background

The trade union movement in Poland is composed of three big representative unions and a large number of small unions.

The main single union is the Independent and Self-Governing Trade Union Solidarity (NSZZ Solidarność), currently representing about 800,000 members, and there are two big confederations: the All-Poland Alliance of Trade Unions (OPZZ) with around 800,000 members and the Trade Unions Forum (FZZ) with 350,000 members.

Solidarity has its roots in an anti-communist movement, while the other two stem from the union movement, which was moderately loyal to the communist authorities. Opinion polls demonstrate that the majority of Solidarity members declare a right-wing ideological orientation, while most OPZZ members are traditionally left-wing. Forum has no definite orientation.

After 1989, Solidarity became a working class organisation as well as a political formation. Its leaders traditionally supported right-wing parties and even helped create a political party, the Solidarity Election Action (AWS), which won the election in 1997 and was in power from 1997 to 2001.

Up until 2010, Solidarity supported the conservative Law and Justice party (PiS), which ran the ruling coalition in 2005–2007 and now is the main opposition to the Civic Platform government (PO). PO is a liberal party stemming from a market-oriented group of former Solidarity members, and is the first ruling party since 1989 that is not connected to any trade union.

Change in strategy in Solidarity

From 1989 to 2010, the same leaders were repeatedly elected onto the National Commission of Solidarity, and pursued similar policies. But in 2010 this changed.

Piotr Duda, an ex-steel worker and former leader of the Upper Silesia Solidarity region, was elected the new leader of the trade union.

Previous Solidarity leaders believed there was little chance of motivating union members and the Polish working class to take industrial action, and therefore unions should mainly seek to defend their interests through parliament; by supporting conservative parties and benefiting when they came to power.

However, Piotr Duda changed the strategy of Solidarity. He said the authorities would only acknowledge trade unions if the latter were able to mobilise workers to picket and strike. For this reason, he declared that a bold and daring trade union should be rebuilt, focused on defending the interests of the working class, not political activity.

Previous leaders and Solidarity members accused Mr Duda of excessive pragmatism and weakening the conservative ethos of Solidarity.

Solidarity organises strike actions

The union organised the first protest action, under the motto: ‘Your power – our poverty’, on 25 May 2011 in all 16 regions of the country, in front of local government buildings. Attendance was low, with around 40,000 participants across the country, 3,000 of them in Warsaw. Other trade unions were invited to join the demonstrations, but only as participants, not co-organisers. Because of this, few unions belonging to OPZZ and Forum took part.

During the protest, the leader announced that Solidarity would organise another action in Warsaw on 30 June, the eve of Poland taking over presidency of the European Union.

Solidarity invited other trade unions to join in and they reacted in the same way as in May. If they had been asked to be joint organisers of the demonstration they might have been more enthusiastic. But even that is not certain, since sources close to the leadership of OPZZ declared the confederation did not want to upset the government’s work the day before it was due to take over the EU presidency.

Solidarity, however, planned to organise a large-scale demonstration, gathering 50,000 union members in Warsaw. In the event, only around 20,000 Solidarity members attended.

Commentary

The change in strategy in Solidarity is more significant for the upcoming parliamentary elections than for industrial relations and social dialogue. If the change lasts, then disputes between political parties will influence relations between trade unions less than before.

Juliusz Gardawski, Warsaw School of Economics, Institute of Public Affairs