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14 Ania Krok-Paszkowska and Jan Zielonka concessions on the part of the state and society. This reflected a general lack of understanding and appreciation of the political agenda of European integration, and perhaps even the failure of EC institutions and member states to project a clear message to Eastern European publics. However, with the passage of years public perceptions began to change under pressure from various internal and external factors. First, post cold war democratic and economic reforms have left large segments of the population disadvantaged and frustrated. For instance, real wages fell more than 25 per cent in the first years of transition. 26 Unemployment rose 16 per cent between 1990-1994 and nearly half of those unemployed were young people. 27 This could not but undermine the public enthusiasm concerning the return to a Europe of capitalist and democratic nations. And although successive governments supported European integration, they often blamed the EU for imposing painful reforms on Poland. For instance, the parallel introduction of four major reforms by the Buzek government in 1999 was justified on the grounds that it was a prerequisite for EU accession. 28 This was only part of the story. In reality, the reforms were needed for domestic reasons: the existing welfare system in particular was simply unsustainable. Nevertheless the Union has confronted Poland with a long list of conditions, among them some 80,000 pages of detailed procedures and regulations comprising the so-called acquis communautaire. Adopting the acquis was not only costly, but also tarnished the idealised vision of the EU as an agent of Western civilisation and prosperity. The contrast between the EU and NATO became apparent: NATO has handled its enlargement in a political rather than technical fashion, and so the US and EU have increasingly been contrasted. 29 The EU has been portrayed by its critics as a bureaucratic, selfish and not very democratic entity. As Andrzej Lepper, a radical Polish politician argued: “The EU is another kolhoz, one had its headquarters in Moscow, the other has its headquarters in Brussels. Nothing has changed.” 30 The EU and Western Europe also became an object of criticism on ideological grounds. The most severe criticism came from Catholic and nationalist circles associated with Radio Maria and the daily Polish Thought (Polska Myśl). Radical conservative or populist parties such as the League of Polish Families (Liga 26. D. VAUGHAN-WHITEHEAD (ed.), Paying the Price. The Wage Crisis in Central and Eastern Europe, Macmillan, London, 1997, p.22 and chapter 7. 27. (GUS) GŁÓWNY URZĄD STATYSTYCZNY (Polish Official Statistics) at www.stat.gov.pl. 28. The four reforms were: local government and administrative reform, education system reform, healthcare reform, and pension system reform. See J. HAUSNER and M. MARODY, et al. (eds.), Trzy Polski: potencjał i bariery integracji z Unia Europejska. EU-monitoring 3, Fundacja Ericha Brosta przy Fundacji im. Friedricha Eberta, Warszawa, 1999. See also L. KOLARSKA-BOBIŃSKA (ed.), Cztery reformy. Od Koncepcji do realizacji, Instytut Spraw Publicznych, Warszawa, 2000. 29. J. KUCHARCZYK (ed.), Europa - Ameryka. Transatlantycki wymiar reform Unii Europejskiej, Instytut Spraw Publicznych, Warszawa, 2002; C. LEWANOWICZ, Kategorie członkowstwa w elastycznej Europie, in: Polska w Europie, Ośrodek Studiów Międzynarodowych i Fundacja “Polska w Europie”, 37(September 2001), pp.27-38. 30. PAP [Polska Agencja Prasowa], 14/02/2000.
Poland’s Road to the European Union 15 Polskich Rodzin) and Self-Defence (Samoobrona) also adopted an anti-EU stance. 31 Less radical parties such as the Polish Peasants Party (Polskie Stronnictwo Ludowe) and Law and Justice (Prawo i Sprawiedliwość) also openly expressed negative views on Poland’s accession to the EU. 32 They challenged the initial assumption that joining the Union and re-building the Polish state were compatible if not mutually reinforcing processes. They argued that Poland’s sovereignty would be curbed by joining the Union. Western Europe has been accused of being too liberal, cosmopolitan and secular. It was fiercely argued that entering the Union and reuniting the two halves of Europe would prevent Poland from cultivating its national and religious traditions. 33 An editorial in ‘Polish Thought’ put it as follows: “An understanding of Europe as a [cultural] space rooted in antique civilization and in Christianity, whose symbols were Aachen and Rome - this Europe is simply non-existent. Our contemporary Europe is a Europe of legal homosexual marriages and pornography, [the practice of legal] killing of unborn children, and defending murderers against capital punishment, the [Europe of] rap-music and hamburgers, the cult of earning money at any cost and empty churches, contempt for national traditions and developing preferences for the New Age, for sects and Judaism in Christianity, ‘children's rights’ and parents deprived of power over their own children”. 34 The above-mentioned factors clearly had an impact on Polish public opinion: public support for joining the EU fell from over 80 per cent in the early 1990s to no more than 50-55 per cent in the year 2000. 35 Lower support was said to reflect very diffuse motivations from more realistic cost-benefit analyses of membership, fear of economic costs of enlargement, fear of loss of identity or national sovereignty, to a rejection of the political elites in Poland who were consistently in favour of membership. 36 With the prospect of enlargement getting closer, people gradually 31. H. KUBIAK, La rhétorique anti-européenne des partis politiques polonais. Le cas de Samoobrona (Autodéfense) et de la Ligue des familles polonaises (LPR), in: J.-M. DE WAELE (ed.), La Pologne et l'intégration européenne, éditions de l'Université de Bruxelles, Bruxelles, 2003. 32. E. NALEWAJKO, Le débat polonais sur l'intégration. Les partis politiques anti-européens et leurs dirigeants, in: J.-M. DE WAELE (ed.), op.cit. 33. It should be mentioned that the threat of foreign models and ideas to weaken Polish traditions and morals, leading to apostasy and a loss of national identity has been a recurring theme among broader sectors of Poland’s population. J. JEDLICKI, op.cit. 34. Quoted in I. KRZEMIŃSKI, The National Identity and European Consciousness of Poles, in: P. DRULAK (ed.), National and European Identities in EU Enlargement. Views from Central and Eastern Europe, Institute of International Relations, Prague, p.64. Such are the views of the religious right associated with the radical Catholic nationalist broadcaster Radio Maryja. However, the Polish Catholic Church hierarchy has broadly endorsed EU membership and in the run-up to the accession referendum exerted considerable pressure upon Radio Maryja to tone down its rhetoric. The pope’s support for Polish accession was also made clear on a number of occasions. 35. See CBOS opinion polls at www.cbos.pl/ENGLISH/cbos_en.htm. 36. L. KOLARSKA-BOBIŃSKA (ed.), Before the Great Change. Polish Public Opinion and EU Enlargement, Institute of Public Affairs, Warsaw, 2001; A. SZCZERBIAK, Polish Public Opinion: Explaining Declining Support for EU Membership, in: Journal of Common Market Studies, 39:1(2001), pp.105-122.
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Page 7 and 8: 5 Introduction Anne Deighton This v
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