For many, the turning point in the cold war was Pope John Paul II's visit to Poland in 1979. He went to lift the spirits of his weary countrymen, urging them to not despair or lose hope for change--indeed, to take charge of their lives and their society. Thus Solidarity was born, communism fell and in 1991 the first freely elected president of the new Poland, Solidarity leader Lech Walesa, spoke for his grateful nation: without the pope's work and prayers, he declared, there would have been "no victory for freedom."
The new pope goes to Poland this week, too. Like John Paul before him, Benedict's mission will be to lift Polish spirits, caught in another downward spiral. Not so long ago the country was a poster child for democratic and economic reform--the forward-looking star of the New Europe and one of the continent's fastest-growing economies. Warsaw and other cities gleam with new high-rise offices and shopping malls. Polish politicians played a key role in brokering a peaceful end to Ukraine's Orange Revolution, and Polish troops have been among Washington's most steadfast allies in Iraq.
Now a darker mood has settled over the country, one that has echoes across the world. Those left out of Poland's boom are increasingly vocal; those who have prospered are increasingly worried. Yes, the economy continues to grow at an impressive 4 to 5 percent annually. But joblessness is at 18 percent--and hits the young particularly hard. An estimated 200,000 young Poles have left for other EU nations since 2004, when Poland joined the European club. Another consequence: a new nationalist backlash, fueled by a xenophobic far right and a populist far left. Exacerbating all this is a round of internecine political feuding led by ex-Solidarity activists who, after losing out in earlier power struggles, recently emerged triumphant--and are now determined to settle old scores.
Their leaders are a pair of identical twins who swept to power last autumn. Jaroslaw Kaczynski's center-right Law and Justice Party won a plurality in parliamentary elections, and Lech Kaczynski followed by winning the presidency. While both men talk a tough game, their policies looked moderate enough at first. Now, however, they have opened the door to a more radical breed of politicians who have built their careers on incendiary rhetoric.
Part of the problem is simple electoral politics. Poles voting last autumn applauded the Kaczynski brothers' vows to crack down on corruption, which was widespread under both post-communist and post- Solidarity governments, and to stick up for Polish interests more forcefully within the EU. The general expectation was that they would form a moderate coalition with the second-largest party, the liberal-leaning Civic Platform. But when the two parties couldn't overcome their differences--and personal mutual antipathies--Law and Justice cut a deal with the blatantly demagogic leaders of two fringe parties, rewarding them with top government posts.
The leader of the League of Polish Families, new Education Minister Roman Giertych, has vowed to ensure that schools teach "patriotism" and remain free from "homosexual" influences. In fact, gay bashing has been his party's latest sport. A top aide suggested last week that gay-rights activists may have ties to "pedophile groups" and the "narcotics mafias."
This kind of vituperative rhetoric is echoed by Radio Maryja, a far-right Roman Catholic station headed by Father Tadeusz Rydzyk, a hard-line priest. Its broadcasts regularly berate Poland's "enemies" to its heavily rural, older listeners. After one of its commentators recently accused Jews of "trying to force our government to pay extortion money," the Vatican intervened, not for the first time, calling on Polish bishops to rein the station in. But while some Polish clerics and many lay Catholics regularly denounce Radio Maryja, others view it as a useful tool in mobilizing the faithful. Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who openly despises most of the Polish media, has gone out of his way to praise the station.
The government's other key appointment was of Andrzej Lepper, the pugnacious leader of Self-Defense, a farmers' protest movement. He's now Agriculture minister, and, like Giertych, a deputy prime minister. Unlike those in the ardently anti-communist, pro-American Law and Justice Party, Lepper has praised the communist era, ridiculed "the myth" that neighboring Belarus is a dictatorship and denounced Poland's participation in the war in Iraq. He has also been one of the most vociferous critics of EU integration. Asked to define his political philosophy, he calls himself a supporter of "a third way between communism and capitalism."
The Kaczynskis certainly don't subscribe to such long-discredited notions, and they have put the Finance Ministry in the hands of a liberal economist. But critics charge that they are joining forces with the extremists on a variety of fronts: in trying to chip away at the independence of Leszek Balcerowicz, head of the Central Bank and the architect of Poland's original economic reforms; in launching parliamentary investigations aimed at discrediting their political rivals, and by giving a new anticorruption agency sweeping powers that can easily be abused. Government officials deny this, arguing that they're only exposing wrongdoing, past and present. Now that their team is in place, they add, they can deliver on campaign promises to lower taxes and cut bureaucratic red tape.
