(Post)totalitarian Legacies, Civil Society, and Democracy in Post-Communist Poland, 1989-1993

Grzegorz Ekiert and Jan Kubik

Institute for European Studies

October, 1997

Abstract

The paper argues that a robust and assertive civil society has emerged in post-communist Poland during the first few years following the fall of state socialism. Civil society is defined as a specific social space and a set of specific social organizations. The most important factors shaping the character of this renewed civil society are the patterns of its institutionalization after 1989, the predominance of organizations inherited from the old regime, and the marginality of anti-systemic groups. The institutional patterns are shaped by the sectoral composition of the new civil society, the relationships among its various organizations, and by these organizations' links to such collective actors/institutions as political parties and state agencies. These patterns influence the quality of political participation and democratic performance.

When civil society actors interact with the state, their interests and identities are defined, defended, and advanced through various forms of resistance and protest, which under certain conditions may destabilize and endanger newly established democratic polities. A detailed analysis of Polish protest politics reveals, however, that although Polish post-communist civil society was often contentious, this contentiousness was accepted by the majority of the populace, channeled through routine strategies, and coordinated by established organizations of civil society. The authors conclude that protest politics in Poland was well-institutionalized, indicating that Poles were mostly dissatisfied with the existing "conventional" channels of interest articulation (such as parties), but not with democracy itself.

The concept of civil society is enjoying a renaissance in contemporary social sciences. This is a direct result of political developments in East Central Europe over the past two decades, namely, the events leading to the destruction of the communist regimes and the formation of the new democracies. The 1980 Polish self-limiting revolution, the post-Solidarity political struggles, and the formation and growing influence of a new breed of political opposition in Czechoslovakia and Hungary, amounted to nothing less than "the creation of a post-bourgeois, democratic, civil society," according to Cohen and Arato. ₁ Rau addressed the urgent theoretical need to account for the emergence and survival of independent groups that conceptualized themselves as "civil society." "The totalitarian model - he argued - which implies a highly centralized system monopolizing all public activities, could not embrace the movements voluntarily arising from the ranks and creating an independent space beside the system. The first step of scholarship towards overcoming this deadlock was the introduction of the term 'civil society'." ₂ Thus, in the 1980s the concepts of the rebirth of civil society and the conflict between the state and civil society permeated the theoretical discourse of East European studies. As Pelczynski observed, "the subsumption of the history of Polish dissent, and Solidarity in particular, under the category of civil society is a truly remarkable intellectual development." ₃ Few social and political concepts, however, as he noted, "have travelled so far in their life and changed their meaning so much." ₄ These conceptual difficulties have been reflected in the surge of studies and debates over the meaning and empirical applications of the concept. ₅

Lockean or Hegelian definitions of this classic and highly contested concept are hardly suitable to deal with the complex political and social relations of modern societies. ₆ Moreover, the students of state-socialist societies tend to conflate two quite different phenomena. As Ash points out, "civil society" was used to describe:

(A) the entire range of social associations, ties, and activities independent of the state, from glee clubs to Charter 77, from samizdat to breviaries and from private farmers to homosexuals; (B) more narrowly, and more politically, the products of the strategy of 'social self-organization' which was, broadly speaking, adopted by the democratic opposition in Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia in the mid to late 1970's. For them, the reconstitution of 'civil society' was both an end in itself and a means to political change, including, eventually, change in the nature of the state. ₇

Using Ash's typology, type B civil society was much more developed in Eastern Europe before 1989 than type A, which is congruent with the Western experience. This is why the creation of a robust "type A" civil society has been considered a necessary precondition for the establishment of a stable and strong democracy in post-communist Eastern Europe. Yet, the (re)creation of this kind of civil society after decades of communist rule has been viewed as highly uncertain and difficult. Dahrendorf warned this could take three generations to accomplish; many others shared his gloomy prediction. ₈

The focus on civil society's role and strength in newly democratizing countries is due in part to the recent revival of neo-Tocquevillian theories of civil society, ₉ best exemplified by Robert Putnam's work. In his Making Democracy Work he asserts that "civil associations contribute to the effectiveness and stability of democratic government" and claims that "Tocqueville was right: Democratic government is strengthened, not weakened, when faces a vigorous civil society." ₁₀ Recent democratic transitions in East Central Europe provide an ideal setting for testing such claims.

In this paper we will examine the re-emergence of civil society in post-communist transitory regimes, using Poland as an example. We will argue that: first, we need a precise and empirically sensitive notion of civil society in order to conduct meaningful empirical research; second, we have to re-evaluate the sphere of associational life under state socialism and during the initial phases of democratic consolidation. Finally, we will refrain from offering blanket generalizations based on value judgments, concerning the desirability of a strong (or weak) civil society for the consolidation of democracy. Instead, we will describe the character of various organizations and groups that are the building blocs of modern of civil society and assess their specific role in the making of a democratic system.

Theoretical formulations and empirical evidence for this paper are derived from the research project "Strategies of Collective Protest in Democratizing Societies: A Comparative Analysis of Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and the former East Germany" directed by Grzegorz Ekiert and Jan Kubik. For the purpose of this discussion, we first offer a definition of civil society that is useful for describing varied modalities of civil society under state socialist regimes and during the post-communist transition; second, we briefly describe the re-configuration of civil society in Poland, following the 1989 transfer of political power; finally, we raise several issues concerning the role of civil society organizations in Poland's new democracy.

Our contention is that in post-communist countries the re-configuration of civil society has been swift. In the few years following the fall of state socialism, robust and assertive civil societies have emerged; they have been dominated though by organizations inherited from the old regime. Still, we argue that the most important factors shaping the character of civil society in contemporary cases of non-evolutionary and multiple (political, economic, and social) transitions, are the patterns of its institutionalization that dominate the early phases of democratic consolidation. These patterns are to be found in political and social cleavages as well as in the relationships among civil society organizations, and between them and such political actors as political parties and state agencies. The nature of these relationships influences the quality of political participation and democratic performance more decisively than do the internal characteristics of civil society organizations or such features as their organizational density or levels of popular participation. Finally, we will emphasize that when civil society actors interact with the state, their actions often turn competitive and contentious. In short, the interests and identities of civil society actors (individuals and organizations) are defined, defended, and advanced through various forms of resistance and protest, which under certain conditions may destabilize and endanger newly established democratic polities.

1. Civil society.

Civil society has been defined in a variety of ways. All these definitions can be grouped into three basic types; the first two are descriptive and analytical, the third is normative. First, civil society can be construed as a specific social space or sphere. It is a space between family (household, domestic society) and the state. "It excludes both stifling communalism and centralized authoritarianism"; ₁₁ it is a non-political public space. Geoff Eley, quoting Jurgen Habermas, offers the following formulation: "In a nutshell, the public sphere means 'a sphere between society and state, in which the public organizes itself as the bearer of public opinion'." ₁₂ Second, civil society can be defined as a set or system of specific social groups. Schmitter elaborates this definition with great precision:

"'Civil society' is defined as a set or system of self-organized intermediary groups:

1. that are relatively independent of both public authorities and private units of production and reproduction, i.e., of firms and families;

2. that are capable of deliberating about and taking collective actions in defense/promotion of their interests/passions;

3. but do not seek to replace either state agents or private (re)producers or to accept responsibility for governing the polity as a whole;

4. but do agree to act within pre-established rules of 'civil' or legal nature." ₁₃

Finally, civil society can be defined as a "normative project," a discourse, a collective dream, that mobilizes people to action against the oppressive state. ₁₄

For the purpose of empirical analysis, both analytical definitions of civil society, understanding it as a space and as a set of specific groups inhabiting this space, should be adopted. ₁₅ The space must be institutionally established, stabilized, and guaranteed usually, though not necessarily, by legal (particularly constitutional) regulations. The battle to create, enlarge, and protect such a space is carried out by organized groups constituting civil society in the second sense. It is however very important to remember that once such a space comes into existence it can be populated not only by its creators and protectors, but also by at least two other types of groups: enemies and free riders. The former use the institutional protections of civil society space to plot its destruction. Both communists and fascists employed this strategy during their ascension to power. ₁₆ Some contemporary "fundamentalist" Islamic political movements seem to follow this strategy as well. They enjoy the protections of civil society space, but are not going to advocate any extension or strengthening of its boundaries or defend it against danger.

Civil society is internally diversified and composed of various sectors. Sectors of civil society are characterized by a great fluidity. Their size and internal diversity may increase or diminish according to the independence they are accorded within the legal framework of the regime and dominant political practices of the elites. Thus the characteristics of these sectors, their various degrees of institutionalization, and their mutual relationships depend on the type of polity within which they operate.

If civil society is defined as both a space and a set of groups or organizations, its rudimentary forms can be detected in non-democratic regimes. In authoritarian and post-totalitarian systems where there is no rule of law, civil society develops only within the confines of the arbitrary autonomy allowed either deliberately or inadvertently by the rulers. Totalitarian regimes allow no or very little autonomy; authoritarian systems are more open and often tolerate some independent associations, whose existence is however unprotected by the law and subject to arbitrary interference by the authorities. This situation can be called uninstitutionalized autonomy: civil society, as a set of groups, exists but it does not exist as an institutionally protected space. Moreover, some organizations may be arbitrarily protected by the authorities, while others are ruthlessly persecuted. Under state socialism the principle of uninstitutionalized autonomy allowed for the existence of three types of organizations: (1) pseudo-autonomous (for example official trade unions); (2) semi-autonomous (e.g., Roman Catholic Church in Poland); and (3) "illegally" autonomous (e.g., dissident groups, black-market networks). In authoritarian systems where the elite political actors reserve for themselves almost complete monopoly of "doing politics," any independent action of civil society, particularly its third sector, becomes inadvertently political. On the other hand, mobilization for action within dissident groups is unthinkable without the support of familial, kinship, and friendship networks. For these two reasons, the borders amongst political society, civil society, and domestic society are very porous. In fact, civil society cannot exist without a base in domestic society: Gellnerian "cousins" are not civil society's greatest enemies, but rather its necessary benefactors.

In polities based on the rule of law the situation is different. First of all, law allows for the constitution and protection of civil society as an autonomous public space. Thus the vitality of civil society groups depends both on the comprehensiveness and durability of this autonomy, and on their degree of separation from traditional, illiberal communities (primary groups). ₁₇ It is a situation opposite to authoritarian systems, where civil society's strength depends on its interpenetration with traditional communities. Second, in lawful polities, the sectoral diversification of civil society is functional. All associations are formally equal, in the sense that they enjoy (more or less) equal expectations of institutional survival, as long as their actions remain within an existing legal framework. Such an institutionally guaranteed freedom of association produces a multitude of organized collective actors and civil society sectors, each characterized by different institutional structure, functions, and political influence. The configuration, relative strength and the institutionalization pattern of these sectors differ from country to country, producing various types of civil society.

In contemporary societies, large and centralized organizations tend to dominate associational life. Furthermore, the sectoral organization of civil societies varies from country to country. Without attempting to offer an exhausting and precise classification, we suggest that contemporary civil societies (as sets of groups) are composed of at least seven sectors. They include: 1. labor organizations, 2. traditional interest groups; 3. NGOs; 4. social movements; 5. youth organizations; 6. religious/ethnic associations; and 7. neighborhood and recreational associations. In Walzer's less formal enumeration, civil society "is the home ground of 'difference,' a realm of fragmentation made up of churches, ethnic groups, social movements, unions, professional associations, organizations for mutual aid and defence." ₁₈ Both the internal characteristics of these sectors (number and size of organizations, and the type of relations among them) and the relative importance of particular sectors accounts for variation of civil society forms.

Civil societies differ also in terms of their organizational density, which varies significantly across regions and social space. More importantly, however, they differ according to the way organizations relate to each other. They may form complex, collaborative, horizontal networks, often based on close social ties as well as active and personal participation. Or, they may compete for resources, members, and political access. In general, it is not the number of organizations but their character and size which matters more in determining the overall nature of civil society.

Finally, different civil societies can be dominated by liberal and democratic organizations or by civil society's enemies and free riders. Thus, the nature or character of civil society organizations as well as the type of links among them account for the differences between existing civil societies.

There are many routine modes of public participation within the realm of civil society which include membership and/or participation in neighborhood and local projects, organizational meetings, churches etc. These can be described as cooperative forms of public participation. When civil society actors interact with the state, their actions often become competitive and contentious. There are two basic forms of contentious collective action: resistance and protest. These two forms of participation roughly correspond to Charles Tilly's distinction between reactive and proactive collective action. ₁₉ In short, whenever civil society interacts with the state in a contentious mode, the interests and identities of civil society actors (individuals and organizations) are defined, defended, and advanced through various forms of resistance or protest. Under oppressive regimes, resistance in its many forms plays the dominant role. ₂₀ By contrast, in open political systems protest becomes a primary mode of civil society's contentious politics. Thus, existing civil societies operate in various institutional spaces, are structured by different sets of organizations, social networks, identities, principles of authority, and specific modes of public participation.

In the following section, we will analyze the re-configuration of civil society in Poland in the wake of state socialism's collapse, emphasizing the legacies of the old regime in structuring organizational characteristics and modes of action of civil society actors.

2. Re-configuration of civil society in Poland

Democratization theory acknowledges that the "revival," "resurrection" or "re-inventing" of civil society is essential for successful liberalization and democratization. It is also seen as a vital pre-condition for democratic consolidation. If so, East Central Europe has at least one of the ingredients of success, for -- despite claims to the contrary -- civil society has become a rapidly developing realm of the post-communist polities. ₂₁ This phenomenon should be, however, described as the resurrection combined with the re-configuration of civil society, since many organizations inherited from the old regime have become dominant players in the new public scene. Yet, even if significant organizational continuity has been maintained within civil society, the patterns of re-configuration and re-institutionalization within various sectors differ from country to country. This in turn shapes the role and character of civil society organizations and determines the types of collective actors who become most active during the political transition and consolidation of new democratic regimes in the region.

One of the understudied legacies of state-socialism is the dense network of organizations and movements, created during the consolidation of communist regimes in order to colonize public space and extend the party-state's penetration into all segments of society. These state-run organizations simulated the functions of organizations existing in democratic societies and performed vital political, ideological, and social tasks within the institutional design of the party-state. Especially during the earlier period of communist rule, they were nothing more than communist "fronts" with mandatory membership. As a result, the organizational density of state-socialist regimes was higher than in democratic countries: more people belonged to various formal organizations and movements (trade unions, youth and professional associations, etc.) than under any other type of political regime. Moreover, these organizations and movements provided their members with an entire range of benefits and services - the same as would be supplied by the market place, family or local civic organizations under most other regimes.

The dependent status of these organizations, initially created as the de facto state agencies and instruments of control, changed over time. Since the 1950s, some of them were able to wrestle a degree of autonomy from the party-state bureaucracy, accumulate considerable resources, and secure ever-expanding benefits for their members. They also acquired various degrees of influence and power, which allowed them to represent corporate interests and to shape or even occasionally defy party-state policies. During political crises some of these organizations achieved full autonomy and were consequently purged or even dissolved and banned by the communist authorities. They were however usually replaced or restored under tighter supervision by the party-state authorities. Replacing old organizations often implied, however, granting the new ones some degree of autonomy in order to provide them with a modicum of credibility.

During the final years of communist rule, some of these organizations (at least in certain countries) gained considerable autonomy, initiating a process of internal pluralization and general liberalization. The collapse of state socialist regimes in 1989 left these organizations free and entirely responsible to fend for themselves. Some were significantly compromised by years of political servility and ideological rigidity while others enjoyed limited credibility due to their long-standing tradition of promoting specific groups' interests. Thus, there were those that disappeared almost instantaneously (e.g., the Society for the Polish-Soviet Friendship) whereas others swiftly adopted to the new situation. In fact, those that did adopt had distinct advantages over the newly emerging organizations and movements: they controlled the resources accumulated over the years, which could be sizeable, had legally defined functions, monopolized certain services, and had cadres of bureaucrats, organizers and activists. As a result, they became important building blocs of the new societal organization and, consequently, provided for a significant degree of organizational continuity in many sectors of post-communist civil societies. Old organizations changed their leaders, preserved their assets, and adopted quite successfully to a new democratic environment. Although they often lost a substantial number of members and had to down-size their organizational structures and personnel, they nonetheless were often more effective than new organizations which had to start from scratch.

In post-1989 Poland, thousands of new organizations and movements sprang up locally and nationally. By the end of 1994 there were 29,580 registered associations and 12,216 regional affiliates of these organizations. Moreover, there were 4,465 national level foundations and 775 local foundations. Altogether, civil society in Poland was comprised of 47,036 organizations, while before 1989 there were only several hundred large, centralized organizations. A comprehensive data base "Jawor" tracking the development of associations in Poland, listed 4,515 organizations in 1993. A year later "Jawor" listed 7,000 associations and 4,500 foundations and estimated that 2 million Poles were active in these organizations. They had some 53,000 full-time employees and 64 percent of their budget came from private and foreign sources while only 26 percent from the state budget. Their activities concentrated mainly in large urban centers (68%). ₂₂ New organizations were rapidly emerging in all sectors of civil society, especially where existing organizations were unsuccessful in adopting to the new conditions or where new spaces and issue-arenas opened after the collapse of the party-state. The dynamic of the numerical growth of civil society organizations is illustrated by the following graph (It includes only those organizations tracked by "Jawor").

Graph 1: Number of organizations by founding year ₂₃

Although the formation of new organizations peaked in 1991, their numbers have increased gradually since 1980 and this growth accelerated after 1987.

In general, three types of organizations comprise post-1989 civil society:

1. reformed organizations inherited from the communist period,
2. spin-off organizations, i.e., those who broke away from their communist-era parent organizations, and
3. newly formed organizations.

The organizational continuity of civil society in Poland was most noticeable in the sector of professional associations. In 1985, 14 organizations represented the Polish artistic community with a combined membership of 16.9 thousand. In 1992, the same 14 organizations remained unscathed with an increased membership of 19.3 thousand. Similarly, the Statistical Office listed 105 nation-wide scientific and professional associations which survived the regime transition intact. Although overall membership in these associations declined by some 50 percent (approximately one million members in 1987 and 404 thousand in 1993) the membership loses were confined to a few organizations which had artificially inflated its membership numbers in the past. ₂₄ Only those organizations that represented different professional groups of engineers had significant membership loses (on average 50 percent) due in part to the dramatic transformation of the Polish state industry. At the same time, a large number of new professional associations appeared, such as these organized under the auspices of the Church. Their membership was usually small, however, and they lacked the resources of the older, established associations.

The sector where organizational continuity was relatively weak were the youth organizations. There was an "exodus" of membership from the four monopolistic, official youth organizations in 1989. ₂₅ In 1990, the CBOS survey showed that 79 percent of high school graduates had no contacts with any political or social organization. At the same time, dozens of new youth associations and movements appeared after 1989. They have been, however, plagued by a lack of resources and support from the state authorities, local communities or other well established organizations. As a result, they failed to attract a larger membership and many of these organizations did not last. In 1992, there were some 80 youth organizations in Poland. ₂₆ This number did not include the myriad of ephemeral counter-cultural groups and movements as well as less formalized groups which formed across the country and distributed their own newsletters (so-called "fanziny"). The youth's rich informal activities contrasted sharply with their rejection of official organizations and their lack of trust in political elites and institutions. Among the social categories which did not participate in elections, the youth were the largest.

The NGO sector, supported by a variety of international organizations and foundations, expanded rapidly. New organizations raised many issues suppressed under the old regime; they included environmental problems, women's rights, and alternative life-styles as well as specific social problems. The number of registered foundations increased from 200 in 1989 to over 5,000 in 1994. The problems faced by NGOs are best illustrated by the environmental movement. In 1995, Poland had several hundred environmental organizations (700 by one count). There were several old well-established organizations, such as the Polish Ecological Club or League for Nature Conservation and hundreds of small new organizations, many with only a few members. The movement was plagued by political divisions and competition for resources; it was, however, becoming more professional and attempts were made to unite various organizations around specific causes and tasks. ₂₇ The women's movement was also internally divided and competitive. It was comprised of 30 separate organizations.

The dynamic growth of the NGO's sector is perhaps best illustrated by those organizations that represented people with disabilities. By the end of 1992 there were 866 organizations representing the disabled - 90 percent more than in 1980. They faced problems endemic to all sectors of civil society: fragmentation, competition for resources and members, and political divisions. As elsewhere, "old" organizations fared better than new ones. ₂₈

Rapid growth as well as continuity characterized the development of religious and ethnic minority organizations. In 1993, there were 58 churches and some 150 registered religious denominations with hundreds of organizations and charities. ₂₉ Among religious organizations, the Catholic Church has traditionally been a powerful social and political actor. Its position was solidified by a new law which granted the Church legal status and a number of other rights, approved on May 17, 1989. In 1993, the Church had 9,266 parishes, 15,081 churches, 25,187 priests. Almost 35 million Poles were baptized Roman Catholics. ₃₀ Catholic organizations had over 800,000 members. The Council of Catholic Movements united the 52 largest organizations. In addition, there were four other national federations of catholic organizations. All professional groups and business organizations had their own old or newly founded catholic organizations. ₃₁

The Church controlled nearly 1,000 newspapers published by various parishes, one national daily, 10 weeklies, 11 bi-weeklies, and 78 monthly publications. It also ran several dozen radio stations and was working to establish its own TV station. Despite major controversies and fierce political battles, the Church was successful in pushing through several major pieces of legislation, such as a ban on abortion and the introduction of the religious instruction into all public schools. Beginning in 1990, however, the Church's popularity suffered a major decline in public opinion polls.

The number of associations representing ethnic minorities increased rapidly. In 1993, there were 54 minority organizations with at least 50 members each. The majority of these organizations (33) represented Poland's German minority and had a combined total of 361 thousand members. All other minority organizations had some 30 thousand members combined. German minority organizations effectively established their own political presence: they ran their own candidates in parliamentary elections and in the 1993 elections won 3 seats in the parliament and one in the Senate. As Poland did not have any significant ethnic problems, these organizations focused primarily on cultural issues.

According to Samuel Valenzuela, labor movements always occupy a special place among the forces of civil society. He argues that "the labor movement has a greater capacity for extensive and effective mobilization at critical moments than any other social group." This special role and capacity of the labor movements comes from the fact that: 1. "it has an organized network through its more or less permanently established unions;" 2. "the labor movement can disrupt the economy directly through work stoppages;" 3. "Labors' demands can not be lightly ignored." ₃₂ The legacies of 1980-1981 political crisis brought labor organizations and especially Solidarity into the forefront of regime transition in Poland. It was the only state-socialist regime in the region where the labor organization became a main partner in negotiating the country's exit from communism. Moreover, in contrast to other post-communist societies, Poland began democratic consolidation with decentralized, relatively autonomous and pragmatic labor organizations. In December 1988, there were 138 national labor federations coordinated by the post-communist All-Poland Alliance of Trade Unions (OPZZ) with some 6,8 million members; by the end of 1989, their number increased to 144. ₃₃

In 1989, as a result of the "Round Table Agreements," Solidarity was re-legalized in its trade union formula. The OPZZ and Solidarity became the two major competitors within a highly pluralistic, competitive, but politically divided trade union sector. Solidarity had 1,7 million members, while the OPZZ boasted a membership of around 4 million; it was, however, a decentralized organization with both largely independent industrial/professional unions and regional structures (WPZZ). The OPZZ lost some 2 million members since 1989 and several unions left the organization, including the powerful Federation of Miner Unions with some 350 thousand members. Yet, it was a member of the post-communist coalition and its activists ran in the parliamentary elections on the ticket of SLD (Union of Democratic Left). In sum, the new post-communist labor sector, that emerged as a result of organizational competition and several splits of old and new organizations, ₃₄ is the best example of the continuity with the communist past.

During the first few years of democratic consolidation, Solidarity was not able to regain its pre-1989 status and strength. Its membership was a fraction of what it had been in 1980/81 and its staff were mainly newcomers. In the National Committee, only 30 percent of the members had been trade union activists in 1980/81 and those who had were mostly at the factory level. Solidarity was organized in 38 regions, 16 national industry secretariats, and nearly 100 industry branch secretariats. There were a number of smaller and usually more radical federations such as Solidarity '80 with approximately half a million members. The smaller, newly-funded unions were critical of both Solidarity and OPZZ for their cooperation with the state agencies and became more prominent in organizing protest actions in Polish industry.

Even though the Polish labor sector was dominated by two powerful federations, it too was fragmented. In 1993, there were 1,500 trade unions and some 200 nation wide federations. Polish trade union law adopted in June 1991 set the framework for preserving a fragmented and decentralized union structure. ₃₅ It was not unusual for the employees of one factory or firm to be represented by more than 10 different union organizations. For example, Polish State Railroad (PKP) employed 260 thousand people who were represented by 16 trade unions. The biggest union (Federation of Trade Unions of PKP Employees) had 91.5 thousand members while Solidarity had only 60 thousand. PKP by law paid the salaries of nearly 1,000 union activists. Trade unions fought against all attempts to reduce employment (PKP has the highest number of employees among European railroads) and defended all special benefits and social programs inherited by the firm from the past (housing complexes, day-care centers, health services, sport clubs, vacation centers, etc.). Another example of high fragmentation is provided by the mining sector. Polish miners were represented by 19 unions.

Fragmentation leads to competition. In turn, the competition between unions for new members, resources, and influence often entails higher militancy and an escalation of protest actions because, as Sidney Tarrow points out, organizations in competition for the same constituency "try to outbid their competitors for support with more radical tactics." ₃₆ In a similar vein, Valenzuela argues that "a mobilization followed by restraint sequence would be more probable if union organizations and collective bargaining were highly centralized" and concludes that "if the union organizations are decentralized and/or the union leadership highly divided for political and ideological reasons, the likelihood of a sharp rise in labor conflictuality which does not readily decline in order to secure the transition is very high." ₃₇ Thus, the militancy of the Polish unions owed as much to their historical-political importance as to the general pattern of labor movement institutionalization (fragmentation) and the failure of the Polish government to enforce an effective bargaining system based on the tripartite principle. ₃₈

In short, the trade union movement:

1. was highly fragmented and decentralized, by comparison with other East European states;

2. was highly competitive and politically divided on both national and local levels;

3. had a mixed organizational form, with inter-locking regional and industrial structures.

This overview illustrates the speed and intensity of the recovery of Polish civil society from 1989 to 1993, after four decades of communist rule. Across all sectors of civil society there emerged significant organizational continuity with the past as well as serious fragmentation, political divisions and intense struggle for resources and members. Moreover, civil society's organizations and actors played an increasingly visible and vocal role in the country's politics, often confronting both the parliament and the government. The most striking feature of this new civil society was its lack of systematic linkages with the party system. As the "Klon-Jawor" data base demonstrates, relationships of civil society organizations with political parties were much worse than their relationships with any other institutional sector.

Table 1: Relationships between civil society organizations and other actors of the public scene

	willingness to establish contact	no contact	sporadic contact	mutual assistance	cooperation
Government	21	30	23	9	15
Voivodship	18	13	29	17	22
Local government	12	5	21	27	35
Political parties	4	41	12	3	5
Church	6	14	26	15	34
Business	34	6	13	38	9
Local communities	14	9	16	28	31

In conclusion, during the examined period the re-configuration of civil society was well underway, but the new institutionalization pattern foretold a highly contentious and fragmented domain, strongly separated from the emerging party system and confronting state policies by a variety of protest actions. As a result, many organizations of civil society were themselves politicized although they faced serious identity dilemmas related to their unclear role in the country's politics. ₃₉ If fragmentation, competition, and political exclusion accompanied by divisions lead to an increase of protest activities, we should expect that the most militant and protest-prone sectors of civil society will include the labor movement, youth organizations, and social/political movements. This contention is supported by comprehensive data on protest activities collected during the 1989-1993 period. ₄₀

3. Collective protest and civil society in Poland

After the fall of state socialism, civil society became the most rapidly developing realm of the Polish polity; its dynamic growth was paralleled by the high level of contentious politics. During the time of our study, collective protest in Poland was intense. Protest actions ranged from single isolated strikes to nation-wide protest campaigns involving hundreds of schools, hospitals, and enterprises as well as thousands of workers and public sector employees. They included hour-long warning strikes as well as protracted and desperate strike campaigns that lasted for months. The repertoire of protest was diverse. It consisted of violent and non-violent street demonstrations, a variety of strike forms, including dramatic huger strikes and rent strikes, huge rallies, boycotts, occupation of public buildings, blockades of roads and public spaces, and various forms of symbolic protest. Protest activities spread to all regions of the country and involved all social groups and categories, with workers, public sector employees, peasants and the youth as the most active participants. Our research shows that Poland had the highest intensity of protest among all the East Central European countries we studied. ₄₁

Table 2: Post-1989 protest events in East Central Europe

	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	1994	Total
Poland	314	306	292	314	250		1476
Slovakia		50	82	116	47	40*	335
Hungary	122	126	191	112	148	44*	743
East Germany	222	188	291	268	283	183*	1435

Charles Tilly in his studies of collective action in France and Britain convincingly demonstrates that over the last two centuries organizations of civil society were the typical vehicle of protest behavior. ₄₂ This observation applies to post-communist countries as well. We expected, however, that in Poland many protest actions would be organized by newly formed and weakly institutionalized organizations; furthermore we hypothesized that we would find many organizations formed as a result of collective protest actions. None of these hypotheses was confirmed. As Table 3 demonstrates, most of the protest actions were sponsored or led by the "old" well-institutionalized organizations. Our data reveal also that protest actions were organized predominantly by the organizations belonging to civil society, such as labor unions, peasant organizations, and social and political movements. The number of protest for which our coders were not able to determine organizers was small (11.3%). One of the most interesting findings of our study was the very low involvement of political parties in protest activities; it was much lower than in Hungary, Slovakia, and former East Germany. ₄₃

Table 3: Organizations sponsoring or leading protest in Poland, 1989-1993

Sponsoring Organizations	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	Total
none	25 8.0%	27 8.8%	48 16.4%	28 8.9%	39 15.6%	167 11.3%
political parties	22 7.0%	29 9.5%	6 2.0%	20 6.4%	12 4.8%	89 6.0%
labor unions	95 30.3%	84 27.4%	162 55.5%	205 65.2%	163 65.2%	709 48.0%
peasant/farmer organizations	6 1.9%	16 5.3%	12 4.1%	24 7.6%	22 8.8%	80 5.4%
interest groups	16 5.1%	24 7.9%	21 7.1%	17 5.5%	13 5.2%	91 6.2%
social/political movements	56 17.8%	65 21.3%	38 12.9%	37 11.8%	32 12.8%	228 15.5%
data unavailable	158 50.3%	88 28.8%	48 16.4%	47 15.0%	14 5.6%	355 24.1%
N = all protest events	314	306	292	314	250	1476

During the period 1989-1993, of all civil society organizations, trade unions were the main driving force behind collective protest (see Table 4). Among trade union federations, Solidarity was most active. During the 1991-93 period, we noticed however a significant increase in protests organized by other trade unions. This can be explained by the competition among the growing number of union organizations that emerged in Poland during that period. As has been noted by other scholars, for small emerging unions, protest was the most readily available strategy for increasing their social and political visibility and attracting members and resources. This institutional explanation works well when we compare Poland with Hungary, Slovakia, and the former East Germany. There were more strikes in Poland than in any of these other states. Assuming that strikes are the main "weapon" of labor unions and that during the analyzed period Poland had the most pluralistic and competitive union sector in Eastern Europe, we conclude that the high number of strikes in Poland is, at least partially, explained by the inter-union competition.

Table 4: Labor unions as protest organizers

	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	total
Solidarnosc	49 51.6%	52 61.9%	90 55.6%	93 45.3%	95 58.3%	379 53.5%
Solidarnosc 80	30 31.6%	13 15.5%	32 19.8%	33 16.1%	14 8.6%	122 17.2%
OPZZ	1 1.1%	7 8.3%	10 6.2%	33 16.1%	18 12.2%	69 9.7%
other labor unions	15 15.8%	12 14.3%	30 18.6%	46 31.2%	36 22.1	139 19.6%
N=number of protests sponsored by unions	95	84	162	205	163	709

Reviewing the data we collected on the number of organizers involved in each protest action, we discovered the following pattern: in 1990, 12.7% protest events were sponsored by two or more organizations; in 1991, this number rose to 14.7%; in 1992 it was 17.8%; and in 1993 it was even higher: 19.6%. We believe this growing inter-organizational coordination of protest activities indicates an increasing routinization of protest, i.e., its growing significance as a mode of interaction between the state and its citizenry or amongst various actors of the public sphere.

The above claim can be substantiated by examining the targets of protest actions. As Table 5 illustrates, the state institutions (the government, parliament and the president) were targeted by protesters more often than any other groups or institutions. Moreover, the frequency with which the state institutions were targeted (particularly the government and ministries) rose considerably during the examined period. Given the predominance of the economic demands, this finding indicates that protest actions responded to the state's continuing and substantial involvement in the economy. The increasing targeting of state institutions may also signify that the "us-versus-them" conceptualization of politics inherited from the state socialist past, in which the "state" is seen as the main antagonist of the "society" was re-gaining its popularity after a short decline in 1989.

Table 5: Targets of protest actions in Poland, 1989-1993

Ultimate targets of protest	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	total
President	3 1.0%	7 2.3%	20 6.8%	26 8.3%	36 14.4%	92 6.2%
Parliament	28 8.9%	43 14.1%	46 15.8%	81 25.8%	49 19.6%	247 16.7%
Government	95 30.2%	163 53.2%	192 65.8%	237 75.5%	220 88.0%	907 61.5%
local government	17 5.4%	50 16.3%	42 14.4%	27 8.6%	41 16.4%	177 12.0%
Management/Boards of Directors	95 30.2%	54 17.6%	69 23.6%	45 14.3%	59 23.6%	322 21.8%
Domestic and Foreign owners	1 .3%	0 0%	0 0%	9 2.9%	5 2.0%	15 1.0%
Data unavailable	130 41.4%	88 28.85	59 20.2%	90 28.7%	22 8.8%	389 26.4%
N = number of protest events	314	306	292	314	250	1476

Table 5 illustrates also an intriguing phenomenon: the growing number of protests targeted at all branches of the government. At the same time, the number of protests directed against management fluctuated without any appreciable growth or decline and protests against domestic or foreign owners were infrequent. The protestors seem to have been driven by an expectation shaped by the old regime, that the state is responsible for all aspects of economic and social life and, therefore, should solve all problems. Finally, we suggest that the increased targeting of state institutions may be also interpreted as a symptom of the growing politicization of protest.

A detailed analysis of our data allows us to summarize the main features of protest in post-1989 Poland in the following way:

1. During 1989-1993, collective protest was widespread and used by various groups and organizations to press for a variety of economic and political claims.

2. Protests were not organized by marginal groups; rather it was the members of "mainstream" social categories such as workers and state employees who were most likely to engage in protest activities.

3. Protest organizers came most often from civil society. Labor unions were the most active. Political parties engaged in protest infrequently. Thus, relying on our own data and other available sources of information, we conclude that Polish civil society was not demobilized after the downfall of the old regime. If so, either Schmitter and Karl are wrong in claiming that demobilization "of various mass publics" during democratic consolidation is "the almost universal fact," or Poland constitutes an exception to such a regularity. ₄₄ More importantly, the whole discussion on the weakening or strengthening of civil society during the transition process may be the result of a definitional confusion: civil society under communism and civil society in a democracy are two different entities. The role or meaning of civil society in the political process simply changed. Whereas under state socialism civil society (i.e., various illegal and semi-legal groups and networks) was simply coterminous with political society (oppositional parties, political movements), during democratic consolidation the public domain underwent a rapid bifurcation. Two separate (at least in Poland) domains emerged: a vibrant and growing domain of civic associations and organizations and a more torpid and elitist domain of political parties and "political" interest groups.

4. Our data base does not provide much evidence for our initial hypothesis that through protest actions people would forge new identities and set up new organizations. The decisive majority of protest actions were organized by existing organizations, mobilizing people in the name of existing identities. The only exception were youth protests which spawned a large network of "counter-cultural" organizations.

5. The repertoire of protest was stable and predominantly non-violent. Violent strategies were rarely used. The dominant form of protest were strikes and strike alerts.

6. Demands were predominantly economic and reformist. Radical demands, such as calls for the abolition of the whole post-1989 order, were infrequent. Only a small minority of protestors turned to the highly polarized symbolism of militant populism, but most of them engaged in strikes and demonstrations to put forth demands related to their everyday (mostly "economic") concerns. For them, it seems, collective protest was a mode of civic action based on an acceptance of the existing order and intended to correct the governmental -- mostly economic -- policies.

7. The most popular targets of protest actions were top state institutions, such as the government, parliament and the presidency. During the examined period they were targeted with increased frequency. There was no increase in protest actions directed at management. Domestic and foreign owners were hardly ever targeted.

8. Protestors' identities were predominantly particularistic, although the invocation of the more general identities (such as "nation" and "society") increased. Collective protest did not acquire an "oversymbolized" form, but rather a more pragmatic one; demands remained primarily economic throughout the whole period. Nor did the increased magnitude of protest manifest itself through the intensification of protest-sponsorship by political parties. It occurred, first of all, through the generalization of protestors' identities and through the growing "seriousness" of the addressees (or targets) of their actions. In brief, as the years went by, the protestors acted more often on behalf of "the whole society" and targeted the country's highest authorities with increasing frequency.

   We have recently begun studying the regional distribution of protest activities and their relationship to the variable density of civil society. Although this work is far from complete, the preliminary results are intriguing. In Table 6 we present a comparison of ten voivodships ranked on the basis of their socio-economic development: five that were rated high and five that were rated low. ₄₅ For each voivodship we give information on the number of civil society organizations registered by the regional court and those tracked by the "Klon-Jawor" database. ₄₆ The table also presents the number of protest events that occurred in the given voivodship between 1989 and 1993.

Table 6: Density of organizations and protest activities in ten Polish voivodships

Voivodship	Rank	Klon	Court registry	Protest activity (1989-93)	Population (thousandsin 1992	CS density: Klon (organizations per 100,000	CS density: courts (organizations per 100,000	Protest per 100,000 population
Warsaw	1	898	2868	357	2420	37	119	15
Katowice	2	166	1704	132	4007	4	42	3
Gdansk	3	279	1140	73	1439	19	79	5
Wroclaw	5	200	848	47	1131	18	75	4
Szczecin	7	60	718	73	976	6	74	7
Siedlce	37	44	757	3	654	7	115	.4
Radom	41	85	614	15	753	11	82	2
Sieradz	45	44	443	5	409	11	108	1
Przemysl	46	22	402	9	408	5	98	2
Tarnow	47	58	616	12	675	9	91	2

The data collected in Table 6 provide contradictory evidence as to whether there exists a positive correlation between the level of socio-economic development on the regional level and the number of civil society organizations. The "Klon" data support a generalization that the highest ranking regions, which are also highly urbanized, have a significantly greater number of registered associations. Thus, well-developed urban centers seem the most hospitable ground for the proliferation of civil society organizations. But the data we collected from regional courts suggest the opposite conclusion: the level of socio-economic development does not correlate systematically with the density of civil society. In fact, less developed regions have more developed civil societies, measured as a number of organizations per capita. This is a truly remarkable finding, for it directly challenges Putnam's argument from his celebrated Making Democracy Work. Another intriguing finding that should be tested in further studies is the positive correlation between the level of socio-economic development and the level of contentious collective action: the more advanced regions have more contention. Finally, the table provides confirmation for one of the more important results of our earlier studies: there seems to be a positive correlation between the number of organizations active in a given region and the number of protest actions. That would confirm a consensus among the students of protest that contentious collective actions are rarely spontaneous; they are rather prepared and carried out by existing (civil society) organizations.

4.Conclusions

The fall of state socialism opened political space for the restoration of civil society, the formation of new party systems, and a redefinition of the state's power and functions. In this paper we have presented an overview of the re-configuration of civil society in post-1989 Poland. We have argued that Poland quickly developed a robust and assertive civil society, despite serious doubts that this would ever happen. Our research indicates that the development of civil society proceeded faster and more successfully than the transformation of other realms of the polity. The Polish state actually grew in terms of employees and central state agencies; yet it was less efficient than before and frequently unable to fulfil its functions or citizens' expectations. The development of the party system produced weak and fragmented parties, incapable of attracting a large and stable following. Despite a gradual stabilization and consolidation of the country's political elites and the growing clarity of political cleavages, the gap between the newly formed party system and Poland's electorate in 1993 was still as wide as it had been in 1989. In this context the numerical growth and organizational robustness of civil society is indeed a remarkable phenomenon.

Another important conclusion is that the new civil society in post-communist Poland was not built from scratch. Despite the emergence of many new organizations, there was a significant organizational continuity in all sectors of civil society. The majority of organizations existing under the old regime survived and adopted successfully to the new democratic environment. Moreover, because of their resources and experienced personnel they have become dominant players in several sectors (particularly trade unions and professional associations) and their influence in the country's politics has been growing. Newly founded organizations were more likely to be small; they faced organizational difficulties due to the lack of resources and professional experience, and were short on influential allies and supporters. Thus, the post-communist civil society represents a complex amalgam of old and new organizations and is often characterized by considerable fragmentation and political divisions.

From 1989 to 1993, civil society's organizations and actors have played an increasingly visible and vocal role in Poland's politics, often confronting both the parliament and the government. The institutionalization of Polish civil society produced a highly contentious and fragmented domain that had to co-exist with a weak party system and an inefficient state. As a result, many organizations of civil society struggled with serious identity dilemmas related to their unclear role in the country's politics. Fragmentation, competition, and separation from other political actors (especially political parties) led to an increase of protest activities, which became a major form of public participation. Such a prominence of contentious collective action in the activities of civil society organizations combined with weak linkages to other political actors and the low responsiveness of political institutions could have serious destabilizing consequences for a newly established democratic regime.

Sheri Berman concluded in her study of the Weimar Republic that a vibrant, contentious civil society destabilized democracy, an ominous sign for Polish post-communist politics. As she argued:

"the vigor of German civil society actually developed in inverse relation to the vigor and responsiveness of national political institutions and structures. Instead of helping to reduce social cleavages, Germany's weak and poorly designed political institutions exacerbated them; instead of responding to the demands of an increasingly mobilized population, the country's political structures obstructed meaningful participation in public life. As a result, citizens' energies and interests were deflected into private associational activities ... The vigor of civil society activities then continued to draw public interest and involvement away from parties and politics, further sapping their strength and significance." ₄₇

The German predicament indicates that a dense and vigorous civil society is not always beneficial for democracy and its excessive robustness may even constitute a deadly threat to a democratic system. It should be remembered, however, that when it comes to the civil society's impact on the political system, its nature is as important as its "density," if not more so. The nature of civil society depends on the normative orientation of its actors, its sectoral composition, intra-sectoral fragmentation and competition, and a broader institutional context. A strong civil society is populated by organizations that are devoted to its protection and shun revolutionary ideologies that could undermine its stability. It also has well-developed "functional" sectors that are able to attend to the various needs of the citizens and cooperate with each other as well as with the state agencies, political parties, and economic organizations.

In order to determine whether Poland in fact faces "weimarization," all these factors should be systematically compared. Here, we will merely comment on two elements. An obvious shortcoming of Polish civil society has been its very unsystematic and weak cooperation with political parties. But on the other hand, extreme, "revolutionary" (or "anti-civic") organizations, whose goal is to undermine democracy, have been marginal. For example, we have determined that from 1989 to 1993 the percentage of violent protest actions in Poland oscillated around 6-8 percent a year, whereas in the former East Germany it was 26 percent of all protest actions in 1993 and 41 percent in 1991!

If civil society is dominated by free riders and "anti-civic" enemies who use protest to challenge the legitimacy of the political system (as was increasingly the case in the Weimar Germany), the entire independent public sphere and democracy are in jeopardy. If, by contrast, civil society's organizations use protest as a means of bringing forward demands for reforms and do not aim to challenge the legitimacy of the government (their methods are predominantly non-disruptive and their goals moderate), civil society thrives and contributes to the strengthening of democracy. Our research indicates that such is the case with Poland: Polish post-communist civil society was often contentious, but this contentiousness was accepted by the majority of the populace, channeled through well-known strategies, and coordinated by established organizations. In brief, Polish post-communist contentiousness was well-institutionalized, indicating that Poles were mostly dissatisfied with the existing "conventional" channels of interest articulation (such as parties and the Parliament), but not with democracy itself. ₄₈

Footnotes

Note 1: Andrew Arato and Jean Cohen, "Social Movements, Civil Society, and the Problems of Sovereignty," Praxis International 4,3 (1984): 266-283. Back.

Note 2: Zbigniew Rau, "Same Thoughts on Civil Society in Eastern Europe and the Lockean Contractarian Approach," Political Studies 35 (1987): 574. Back.

Note 3: The state-civil society distinction was initially employed to analyze the phenomenon of Polish self-limiting revolution (see Andrew Arato, "Civil Society against the State: Poland 1980-81," Telos 47 (1981): 23-47; Andrew Arato, "Empire vs Civil Society: Poland 1981-82," Telos 50 (1981/82): 19-48; Arato and Cohen, "Social Movements, Civil Society, and the Problem of Sovereignty;" Zbigniew A. Pelczynski, "Solidarity and 'The Rebirth of Civil Society'," in Civil Society and the State, ed. John Keane (London: Verso, 1988), 361-381) and new opposition movements in East Central Europe (see Michael H. Bernhard, The Origins of democratization in Poland (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993); Jacques Rupnik, "Dissent in Poland, 1968-78: the End of Revisionism and the Rebirth of the Civil Society," in Opposition in Eastern Europe, ed. Rudolf L. Tokes (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979), 60-112; Ivan Szelenyi, "Socialist Opposition in Eastern Europe: Dilemmas and Perspectives," ibid.; Vaclav Havel, et al., The Power of the Powerless: Citizens against the State in Central-Eastern Europe, ed. John Keane, (Armonk: Sharpe, 1985); Gordon H. Skilling, Samizdat and an Independent Society in Central and Eastern Europe, (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1988); Tony R. Judt, "The Dilemmas of Dissidence: The Politics of Opposition in East-Central Europe," 2, 2 (1988): 185-241). Recently the notion has been extended to all aspects of independent or semi-independent social life under state-socialist regimes. Back.

Note 4: Pelczynski, ibid., 363. Back.

Note 5: See, for example, John Keane, Democracy and Civil Society (London: Verso, 1988); John Keane, ed. Civil Society and the State (London: Verso, 1988); Jean Cohen and Andrew Arato, Civil Society and Political Theory (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1992); Adam B. Seligman, The Idea of Civil Society (Princeton: Princeton University Press 1992); Ernest Gellner, Conditions of Liberty. Civil Society and Its Rivals (Allen Lane/the Penguin Press, 1994); Keith Tester, Civil Society (London: Routledge, 1992); John Hall ed., Civil Society: Theory, History, Comparison (Cambridge: Blackwell, 1995). Back.

Note 6: The conceptual difficulties generated by this classical distinction are aptly analyzed by Keane, who argues that its contemporary applications can be understood in at least three different ways: as an analytical approach; as a political calculation; and as a normative project (J. Keane ed., Civil Society and the State, London: Verso, (1988): 1-33). Within the analytical dimension some scholars try to apply one or another classical approach to contemporary societies (see Z. Rau, "Some Thoughts on Civil Society in Eastern Europe and the Lockean Contractarian Approach," Political Studies 35,4 (1987): 573-592, for an application of the Lockean approach to state-socialist regimes), or to assess the usefulness of traditional approaches in a contemporary social context (see Jean Cohen, Class and Civil Society. The Limits of Marxian Critical Theory, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983) for the critique of the Marxist theory of class and civil society). Pelczynski discusses a synthesis of Marxian and Hegelian elements in Gramsci's reformulation of the state-civil society relation arguing that a version of new-Gramscian conceptualization "has been found theoretically fruitful...in order to conceptualize historical developments and to map out a programme of what is sometimes called the 'de-totalization' of socialism" (Pelczynski, "Solidarity,": 365). Back.

Note 7: Timothy Garton Ash, "The Opposition," New York Review of Books, 35,15 (1988): 3. Back.

Note 8: Ralf Dahrendorf, Reflection of the Revolution in Europe (New York: Random House, 1990). Back.

Note 9: See Sheri Berman, "Civil Society and the Collapse of the Weimar Republic," World Politics 49 (April 1997): 401-29. Back.

Note 10: Robert Putnam, Making Democracy Work. Civic Traditions in Modern Italy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993): 89 and 182. Back.

Note 11: Ernest Gellner, Conditions of Liberty: 12. Back.

Note 12: Geoff Eley, "Nations, Publics, and Political Cultures: Placing Habermas in the Nineteenth Century," in Habermas and the Public Sphere, ed. Craig Calhoun (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1992): 290. Back.

Note 13: Philippe Schmitter, "Some Reflections about the Concept of Civil Society," paper presented at the Conference on "Civil Society Before Democracy," Princeton University, October 6-7, 1995: 4-5. Back.

Note 14: See, John Keane, "Introduction" in Civil Society and the State. New European Perspectives (London: Verso, 1988): 25-29; Laura Engelstein, "The Dream of Civil Society in Tsarist Russia: Law, State, and Religion," paper presented at the Conference "Civil Society Before Democracy," Princeton University, October 6-7, 1995; Piotr Ogrodzinski, Piec tekstow o spoleczenstwie obywatelskim (Warsaw: ISP PAN, 1991): 70-72. Back.

Note 15: Marcia A. Weigle and Jim Butterfield utilize a similar conceptualization. They distinguish between civil society as a specific legal framework (institutional base) and as specific "identity of the social actors and the goals toward which their activity is directed." See their "Civil Society in Reforming Communist Regimes. The Logic of Emergence," Comparative Politics (October 1992): 3. Back.

Note 16: See, for example, William Sheridan Allen, The Nazi Seizure of Power. Revised Edition, New York: Franklin Watts, 1984. Back.

Note 17: In Gellner's words: "we must first of all distinguish it [civil society] from something which may in itself be attractive or repulsive, or perhaps both, but which is radically distinct from it: the segmentary community which avoids central tyranny by firmly turning the individual into an integral part of the social sub-unit," Conditions of Liberty: 8. Back.

Note 18: Michael Walzer, "The New Political Ideologies," The Economist, September 11-17 (1993): 50. Back.

Note 19: According to Tilly, reactive collective action "consist of group efforts to reassert established claims when someone else challenges or violates them." Proactive collective action "asserts group claims which have not previously been exercised" (From Mobilization to Revolution (New York: Random House, 1978), 145-146). Tilly gives here an example of strikes for higher wages or better working conditions. Back.

Note 20: See James C. Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990). Back.

Note 21: See Michael Bernhard, "Civil Society after the First Transition: Dilemmas of Post-communist Democratization in Poland and Beyond," Communist and Post-Communist Studies, 29,3 (1996): 309-330. Back.

Note 22: Jawor 1993, Civic Dialogue NGOs, Warsaw 1993. According to another source, by the end of 1992, there were more than 2,000 nation-wide voluntary associations registered in the Warsaw District Court a majority of which existed before 1989 (Polska '93 (Warsaw: Polska Agencja Informacyjna, 1992), 148. This number did not include associations whose activities were limited to the regional or local level and were registered by provincial courts. See Grazyna Prawelska-Skrzypek, "Citizen Activism in the Life of Local Communities: Polish Experiences during the Period of Transformations," unpublished manuscript. Back.

Note 23: Source: Urszula Krasnodebska, Joanna Pucek, Grzegorz Kowalczyk and Jan Jakub Wygnanski, Podstawowe statystyki dotyczace dzialan organizacji pozarzadowych w Polsce (Warsaw: Program PHARE-Dialog Spoleczny, styczen 1996), 9. Back.

Note 24: A comparison of the 1987 and 1993 GUS data on professional organizations shows that the Federation of Regional Clubs Technology and Technical Improvement lost 118 thousand members, Polish Economics Association lost 37 thousand members, Association of Management and Organization lost 21 thousand and Polish Association of Nurses with 60 thousand members in 1987 disappeared from the list. Back.

Note 25: Polish Scouting Union (ZHP) which had over 2 million members in 1987, had only 450 thousand in 1993. Still this was the biggest and most successful youth organization. After 1989 several new scouting organizations were founded, but with only about 21 thousand members they did not pose a serious challenge to the ZHP. Back.

Note 26: See Robert Lipka, "Nowe organizacje polskiej mlodziezy," in Raport o mlodziezy, ed. Barbara Fatyga and Michal Szymanczak (Warsaw: Interpress, 1992), 200-213. Back.

Note 27: See Piotr Glinski, Polscy zieloni. Ruch spoleczny w okresie przemian (Warsaw: IFiS PAN, 1996); P. Glinski, "Environmentalism Among Polish Youth," Communist and Post-Communist Studies, 27,2 (1994): 145-159. Back.

Note 28: For an excellent analysis of organizations working for the disabled see Tomasz Czajkowski, Michal Fedorowicz and Anna Iwanowska, "Srodowisko ludzi niepelnosprawnych w perspektywie spoleczenstwa obywatelskiego," in Droga przez instytucje, ed. Michal Fedorowicz (Warsaw: IFiS PAN, 1994), 181-213. Back.

Note 29: Rocznik Statystyczny 1991 (Warsaw: GUS, 1991), 57-58. Back.

Note 30: The Orthodox Church was comprised of 410 churches, 259 priests and 570,000 members in 1993. Protestant churches had 1,110 congregations with 150,000 members (Rocznik Statystyczny 1994 (Warsaw: GUS, 1994), 69-70. Back.

Note 31: See Jerzy Slawomir Mac, "Kosciol poziomy," Wprost 26 (June 25, 1995): 30-32. Back.

Note 32: Samuel Valenzuela, "Labor Movements in Transitions to Democracy. A Framework for Analysis," Comparative Politics (July 1989): 447. Back.

Note 33: This was approximately half of the size of trade union movement before martial law was imposed in December 1981. Solidarity as well as all other unions were dissolved and during the 1980s the Polish regime gradually re-established union organizations to regain control over workers. See George Kolankiewicz, "Polish Trade Unions 'Normalized'," Problems of Communism 36, 6, (1987): 57-69 and David Mason, "Poland's New Trade Unions," Soviet Studies 39, 3, (1987): 489-508. Back.

Note 34: See Kazimierz Kloc, "Polish Labor in Transition (1990-1992)," Telos 92 (Summer 1992): 139-148; Piotr Marciniak, "Polish Labor Unions: Can They Find a Way Out," Telos 92 (Summer 1992): 149-157; Radzislawa Gortat, "The Feud Within Solidarity's Offsprings," in Parties, Trade Unions and Society in East Central Europe, ed. Michael Waller and Martin Myant (Portland: Frank Cass, 1994), 116-124; Kazimierz Kloc, "Trade Unions and Economic Transformation in Poland," in the same volume. Back.

Note 35: The law stipulated that as few as 10 employees could found the union and apply for its registration. In the enterprise where there are 150 or more union members, the enterprise had to finance one full-time union position. Back.

Note 36: Sidney Tarrow, "Struggle, Politics, and Reform: Collective Action, Social Movements, and Cycles of Protest," Western Societies Program Occasional Papers, No. 21 (Ithaca: Cornell University, 1991), 20. Back.

Note 37: Samuel Valenzuela, "Labor Movement in Transitions," 454 and 457. Back.

Note 38: See Jerzy Hausner, "Organizacje interesu i stosunki przemyslowe w krajach postsocjalistycznych," Przeglad Socjologiczny 43 (1994): 9-26. Back.

Note 39: See Michal Sewerynski, "Dylematy i perspektywy zwiazkow zawodowych w krajach postkomunistycznych," Przeglad Socjologiczny 43 (1994): 111-131; Michael Waller, "Political Actors and Political Roles in East-Central Europe," in Parties, Trade Unions and Society in East Central Europe, ed. Michael Waller and Martin Myant (Portland: Frank Cass, 1994), 25-26. Back.

Note 40: See Grzegorz Ekiert and Jan Kubik, "Collective Protest and Democratic Consolidation in Poland, 1989-1993," Pew Papers on Central and Eastern European Reform and Regionalism, Center of International Studies, Princeton University, 1996. Back.

Note 41: For the preliminary presentation of the results of our four-country study see Grzegorz Ekiert and Jan Kubik, "Contentious Politics in New Democracies: Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, and Former East Germany Since 1989," Working Paper Series No. 41, Program on Central and Eastern Europe, Center for European Studies, Harvard University, 1997. Back.

Note 42: See Charles Tilly, Louise Tilly, and Richard Tilly, Rebellious Century, 1830-1930 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1975); Ch. Tilly, Repertoires of Contention in America and Britain, 1750-1830, in The Dynamics of Social Movements, ed. Mayer Zald and John D. McCarthy (Cambridge: Winthrop, 1979); Ch. Tilly, The Contentious French (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1986). Back.

Note 43: Political parties (co)sponsored or (co)led 35.5% of protest actions in Hungary; 29.6% in Slovakia; and 23.3% in former East Germany. Back.

Note 44: Terry Lynn Karl and Philippe C. Schmitter, "From an Iron Curtain to a paper Curtain: Grounding Transitologists or Students of Postcommunism?," Slavic Review 54, 4, (1996): 976. Back.

Note 45: Source: Business Central Europe, February 1995. Ranking based on quality of market infrastructure, industrial base, business environment, degree of economic transformation, quality of life, and unemployment. Back.

Note 46: We included only these voivodships for which we had full information. The "Klon-Jawor" database was compiled on the basis of self-reporting by various organizations. In order to be included in the database a organization has to fill up a complex questionnaire designed to present a detailed picture of the organization and its activities. Information from the voivodship court registries was collected by Grzegorz Ekiert with the help of Anna Grzymala-Busse. These numbers do not include trade unions that are also registered by regional courts. Back.

Note 47: Sheri Berman,"Civil Society and the Collapse of the Weimar Republic," World Politics 49 (April 1997): 424. Back.

Note 48: For the elaboration of these points see Grzegorz Ekiert and jan Kubik, "Collective Protest and Democratic Consolidation in Poland, 1989-1993," Pew Papers on Central and Eastern European Reform and Regionalism, Center of International Studies, Princeton University, 1996 and Jan Kubik, "Institutionalization of Protest During Democratic Consolidations in Central Europe," In A Movement Society? Contentious Politics for a New Century, ed. David Meyer and Sidney Tarrow (Boulder, CO: Rowland and Littlefield, forthcoming). Back.