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The party was created on a wave of popularity gained by Lech Kaczyński while heading the Polish Ministry of Justice (June 2000 to July 2001) in the AWS-led government, although local committees began appearing from 22 March 2001.[3] The AWS itself was created from a diverse array of many small political parties.[3] In the 2001 general election, PiS gained 44 (of 460) seats in the lower chamber of the Polish Parliament (Sejm) with 9.5% of votes. In 2002, Lech Kaczyński was elected mayor of Warsaw. He handed the party leadership to his twin brother Jarosław in 2003.[citation needed]
In the 2005 general election, PiS took first place with 27.0% of votes, which gave it 155 out of 460 seats in the Sejm and 49 out of 100 seats in the Senate. It was almost universally expected that the two largest parties, PiS and Civic Platform (PO), would form a coalition government.[3] The putative coalition parties had a falling out, however, related to a fierce contest for the Polish presidency. In the end, Lech Kaczyński won the second round of the presidential election on 23 October 2005 with 54.0% of the vote, ahead of Donald Tusk, the PO candidate.
After the 2005 elections, Jarosław should have become Prime Minister. However, in order to improve his brother's chances of winning the presidential election (the first round of which was scheduled two weeks after the parliamentary election), PiS formed a minority government headed by Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz as prime minister, an arrangement that eventually turned out to be unworkable. In July 2006, PiS formed a right-wing coalition government with the agrarian populist Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland and the nationalist League of Polish Families, headed by Jarosław Kaczyński. Association with these parties, on the margins of Polish politics, severely affected the reputation of PiS. When accusations of corruption and sexual harassment against Andrzej Lepper, the leader of Self-Defence, surfaced, PiS chose to end the coalition and called for new elections.[citation needed]
In the 2007 general election, PiS managed to secure 32.1% of votes. Although an improvement over its showing from 2005, the results were nevertheless a defeat for the party, as Civic Platform (PO) gathered 41.5%. The party won 166 out of 460 seats in the Sejm and 39 seats in Poland's Senate.
The party won the 2015 parliamentary election, this time with an outright majority—something no Polish party had done since the fall of communism. In the normal course of events, this should have made Jarosław Kaczyński prime minister for a second time. However, Beata Szydło, perceived as being somewhat more moderate than Kaczyński, had been tapped as PiS's candidate for prime minister.[7][8]
The party opposes liberal democracy[9][10] seeing itself as inspired by Jozef Pilsudski's authoritarian Sanacja government.[11] It supported controversial reforms carried out by the Hungarian Fidesz party, with Jarosław Kaczyński declaring in 2011 that "a day will come when we have a Budapest in Warsaw".[12] PiS's 2015 victory prompted creation of a cross-party opposition movement, the Committee for the Defence of Democracy (KOD).[13] Law and Justice has Proposed 2017 judicial reforms, which according to the party were meant to improve efficiency of the justice system, sparked protest as they were seen as undermining judicial independence.[14][15][16][17][18] While these reforms were initially unexpectedly vetoed by President Duda, he later signed them into law.[19]European Council president Donald Tusk warned that the bill might push Poland out of the EU.[20] In 2017, the European Union began an Article 7 infringement procedure against Poland due to a "clear risk of a serious breach" in the rule of law and fundamental values of the European Union.[21]
The party has caused what constitutional law scholar Wojciech Sadurski termed a "constitutional breakdown"[22] by packing the Constitutional Court with its supporters, undermining parliamentary procedure, and reducing the president's and prime minister's offices in favour of power being wielded extra-constitutionally by party leader Jarosław Kaczyński.[10] After eliminating constitutional checks, the government then moved to curtail the activities of NGOs and independent media, restrict freedom of speech and assembly, and reduce the qualifications required for civil service jobs in order to fill these positions with party loyalists.[10][23] The media law was changed to give the governing party control of the state media, which was turned into a partisan outlet, with dissenting journalists fired from their jobs.[10][24] Due to these political changes, Poland has been termed an "illiberal democracy",[25][26] "plebiscitarian authoritarianism",[27] or "velvet dictatorship with a façade of democracy".[28]
The party won reelection in the 2019 parliamentary election. With 44% of the popular vote, Law and Justice received the highest vote share by any party since Poland returned to democracy in 1989, but lost its majority in the Senate.[citation needed]
Breakaways
In January 2010, a breakaway faction led by Jerzy Polaczek split from the party to form Poland Plus. Its seven members of the Sejm came from the centrist, economically liberal wing of the party. On 24 September 2010, the group was disbanded, with most of its Sejm members, including Polaczek, returning to Law and Justice.
On 4 November 2011, MEPs Zbigniew Ziobro, Jacek Kurski, and Tadeusz Cymański were ejected from the party, after Ziobro urged the party to split further into two separate parties – centrist and nationalist – with the three representing the nationalist faction.[31] Ziobro's supporters, most of whom on the right-wing of the party, formed a new group in Parliament called Solidary Poland,[32] leading to their expulsion, too.[33] United Poland was formed as a formally separate party in March 2012, but has not threatened Law and Justice in opinion polls.[34]
Like Civic Platform, but unlike the fringe parties to the right, Law and Justice originated from the anti-communist Solidarity trade union (which is a major cleavage in Polish politics), which was not a theocratic organisation.[35] Solidarity's leadership wanted to back Law and Justice in 2005, but was held back by the union's last experience of party politics, in backing Solidarity Electoral Action.[3]
Today, the party enjoys great support among working class constituencies and union members. Groups that vote for the party include miners, farmers, shopkeepers, unskilled workers, the unemployed, and pensioners. With its left-wing approach toward economics, the party attracts voters who feel that economic liberalisation and European integration have left them behind.[36] The party's core support derives from older, religious people who value conservatism and patriotism. PiS voters are usually located in rural areas and small towns. The strongest region of support is the southeastern part of the country. Voters without a university degree tend to prefer the party more than college-educated voters do.
Regionally, it has more support in regions of Poland that were historically part of western Galicia-Lodomeria and Congress Poland.[37] Since 2015, the borders of support are not as clear as before and party enjoys support in western parts of country, especially these deprived ones.[citation needed] Large cities in all regions are more likely to vote for more liberal party like PO or .N. Still PiS receives good support from poor and working class areas in large cities.[citation needed]
The party supports a state-guaranteed minimum social safety net and state intervention in the economy within market economy bounds. During the 2015 election campaign, it proposed tax rebates related to the number of children in a family, as well as a reduction of the VAT rate (while keeping a variation between individual types of VAT rates). In 2019, the lowest personal income tax threshold was decreased from 18% to 17%.[47] Also: a continuation of privatisation with the exclusion of several dozen state companies deemed to be of strategic importance for the country. PiS opposes cutting social welfare spending, and also proposed the introduction of a system of state-guaranteed housing loans. PiS supports state provided universal health care.[48] PiS has been also described as statist,[49][50][51]protectionist,[52][53][54]solidarist,[55] and interventionist.[56] They also hold agrarianist views.[57][58][59][60][61]
National political structures
PiS meeting on National Independence Day
PiS has presented a project for constitutional reform including, among others: allowing the president the right to pass laws by decree (when prompted to do so by the Cabinet), a reduction of the number of members of the Sejm and Senat, and removal of constitutional bodies overseeing the media and monetary policy. PiS advocates increased criminal penalties. It postulates aggressive anti-corruption measures (including creation of an Anti-Corruption Bureau (CBA), open disclosure of the assets of politicians and important public servants), as well as broad and various measures to smooth the working of public institutions.
PiS is a strong supporter of lustration (lustracja), a verification system created ostensibly to combat the influence of the Communist era security apparatus in Polish society. While current lustration laws require the verification of those who serve in public offices, PiS wants to expand the process to include university professors, lawyers, journalists, managers of large companies, and others performing "public functions". Those found to have collaborated with the security service, according to the party, should be forbidden to practice in their professions.
Diplomacy and defence
The party is in favour of strengthening the Polish Army through diminishing bureaucracy and raising military expenditures, especially for modernisation of army equipment. PiS planned to introduce a fully professional army and end conscription by 2012 (in August 2008, compulsory military service was abolished in Poland). It is also in favour of participation of Poland in foreign military missions led by the United Nations, NATO and United States, in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq.
PiS is eurosceptic,[62][63][64] although the party supports integration with the European Union on terms beneficial for Poland. It supports economic integration and tightening cooperation in areas of energy security and military operations, but is sceptical about closer political integration. It is against the formation of a European superstate or federation. PiS is in favour of a strong political and military alliance between Poland and the United States.
The party strongly promotes itself as a pro-family party and encourages married couples to have more children. Prior to 2005 elections, it promised to build three million inexpensive housing units as a way to help young couples start a family. Once in government, it passed legislation lengthening parental leaves.
In 2017, the PiS government commenced the so-called "500+" programme under which all parents residing in Poland receive an unconditional monthly payment of 500 PLN for each second and subsequent child (the 500 PLN support for the first child being linked to income). It also revived the idea of a housing programme based on state-supported construction of inexpensive housing units.
Also in 2017, the party's MPs passed a law that bans most retail trade on Sundays on the premise that workers will supposedly spend more time with their families.
The party is anti-abortion and supports further restrictions on Poland's abortion laws which are already one of the most restrictive in Europe. PiS opposes abortion resulting from foetal defects[85] which is currently allowed until specific foetal age.
In 2016 PiS supported legislation to ban abortion under all circumstances, and investigate miscarriages. After the black Protests the legislation was withdrawn.[86]
In October 2020 the Constitutional Court ruled that one of three circumstances (foetal defects) is unconstitutional. However, many constitutionalists argue that this judgement is invalid.
In April 2018, the PiS government announced a PLN 23 billion (EUR 5.5 billion) programme (named "Accessibility+") aimed at reducing barriers for disabled people, to be implemented 2018–2025.[87][88]
Also in April 2018, parents of disabled adults who required long-term care protested in Sejm over what they considered inadequate state support, in particular, the reduction of support once the child turns 18.[89][90] As a result, the monthly disability benefit for adults was raised by approx. 15 per cent to PLN 1,000 (approx. EUR 240) and certain non-cash benefits were instituted, although protesters' demands of an additional monthly cash benefit were rejected.
The party opposes LGBT rights, in particular same-sex marriages and any other form of legal recognition of same-sex couples. In 2020, Poland was ranked the lowest of any European Union country for LGBT rights by ILGA-Europe.[91] The organisation also highlighted instances of anti-LGBT rhetoric and hate speech by politicians of the ruling party.[92][93] A 2019 survey by Eurobarometer found that more than two-thirds of LGBT people in Poland believe that prejudice against them has risen in the last five years.[94]
On 21 September 2005, PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński said that "homosexuals should not be isolated, however they should not be school teachers for example. Active homosexuals surely not, in any case", but that homosexuals "should not be discriminated otherwise".[95] He has also stated, "The affirmation of homosexuality will lead to the downfall of civilization. We can't agree to it".[96] Lech Kaczyński, while mayor of Warsaw, refused authorisation for a gay pride march; declaring that it would be obscene and offensive to other people's religious beliefs.[97] He stated, "I am not willing to meet perverts."[98] In Bączkowski and Others v. Poland, the European Court of Human Rights unanimously ruled that the ban of the parade violated Articles 11, 13 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The judgement stated that "The positive obligation of a State to secure genuine and effective respect for freedom of association and assembly was of particular importance to those with unpopular views or belonging to minorities".[99]
In 2016 Beata Szydło's government disbanded the Council for the Prevention of Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Intolerance, an advisory body set up in 2011 by then-Prime Minister Donald Tusk. The council monitored, advised and coordinated government action against racism, discrimination and hate crime.[100][101]
Many local towns, cities,[102][103] and Voivodeship sejmiks[104] comprising a third of Poland's territory have declared their respective regions as LGBT-free zones with the encouragement of the ruling PiS.[105][102] Polish President Andrzej Duda, who was the Law and Justice party's candidate for presidency in 2015 and 2020, stated that "LGBT is not people, it's an ideology which is worse than Communism."[106][107] During his 2020 successful election campaign, he pledged he would ban teaching about LGBT issues in schools[108] and he proposed changing the constitution to ban LGBT couples from adopting children.[109]
PiS opposed the quota system for mass relocation of immigrants proposed by the European Commission to address the 2015 European migrant crisis. This contrasted with the stance of their main political opponents, the Civic Platform, which have signed up to the Commission's proposal.[130] Consequently, in the campaign leading to the 2015 Polish parliamentary election, PiS adopted the discourse typical of the populist-right, linking national security with immigration.[131] Following the election, PiS sometimes utilised Islamophobic rhetoric to rally its supporters.[132]
Examples of anti-migration and anti-Islam comments by PiS politicians when discussing the European migrant crisis:[133] in 2015, Jarosław Kaczyński stated that Poland can not accept any refugees because "they could spread infectious diseases."[134] In 2017, the first Deputy Minister of Justice Patryk Jaki stated that "stopping Islamization is his Westerplatte".[135] In 2017, Interior minister of Poland Mariusz Błaszczak stated that he would like to be called "Charles the Hammer who stopped the Muslim invasion of Europe in the 8th century". In 2017, Deputy Speaker of the Sejm Joachim Brudziński stated during the pro-party rally in Siedlce; "if not for us (PiS), they (Muslims) would have built mosques in here (Poland)."[136]
Structure
Internal factions
Law and Justice is divided into many internal factions, but they can be grouped into three main blocs.[137][138][139][140][141]
*Currently 16: Zdzisław Krasnodębski is elected from the PiS register, but not a member of the party, Mirosław Piotrowski left PiS (08.10.2014), Marek Jurek is a member of Right Wing of the Republic.
Democratic Party of Korea - The party is a liberal party, ideologically different from the Law and Justice, but there is a controversy that the two parties use anti-Japanese (DPK) and anti-German (PiS) sentiment politically.[143]
^During the 2008 Polish Independence Day celebrations, Lech Kaczyński said in his speech during the visit to the city of Elbląg that "the state is a great value, and attachment to the state, to one's fatherland, we call patriotism – beware of the word nationalism, as nationalism is evil!"[117] On the same day during the celebrations in Warsaw, L. Kaczyński again stated: "patriotism doesn't equal nationalism."[118] In 2011, Jarosław Kaczyński criticised pre-war Polish nationalism for "its intellectual, political and moral failure" by emphasising that the movement "did not know how to deal with and solve the problems of Polish minorities."[119]
Citations
^"onet.pl" (in Polish). Retrieved 1 February 2020.
Fomina, Joanna; Kucharczyk, Jacek (2016). "Populism and Protest in Poland". Journal of Democracy. 27 (4): 58–68. doi:10.1353/jod.2016.0062. S2CID152254870. The 2015 victory of Poland's Law and Justice (PiS) party is an example of the rise of contemporary authoritarian populism... the PiS gained a parliamentary absolute majority; it has since drawn on this majority to dismantle democratic checks and balances. The PiS's policies have led to intensifying xenophobia, aggressive nationalism, and unprecedented polarisation that have engendered deep splits within Polish society and have given rise to social protest movements not seen in Poland since 1989.
^ abcdTworzecki, Hubert (2019). "Poland: A Case of Top-Down Polarization". The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 681 (1): 97–119. doi:10.1177/0002716218809322. S2CID149662184. Lacking the two-thirds of majority needed to change the constitution outright, as Hungary's government had done several years earlier, PiS sought to accomplish the same goal through ordinary legislation. When the Constitutional Tribunal objected, its rulings were ignored until it could be packed with government supporters, some of whom were sworn in by the president—a strong partisan of PiS himself, who made no effort to stand in the government's way—in a rushed, middle-of-the-night ceremony. The national legislature was likewise turned into a rubber-stamp body through routine side-stepping of parliamentary procedure.
^Karolewski, Ireneusz Paweł (2016). "Protest and participation in post-transformation Poland: The case of the Committee for the Defense of Democracy (KOD)". Communist and Post-Communist Studies. 49 (3): 255–267. doi:10.1016/j.postcomstud.2016.06.003.
^Moberg, Andreas (2020). "When the Return of the Nation-State Undermines the Rule of Law: Poland, the EU, and Article 7 TEU". The European Union and the Return of the Nation State: Interdisciplinary European Studies. Springer International Publishing. pp. 59–82. ISBN978-3-030-35005-5.
^Sadurski, Wojciech (2019). Poland's Constitutional Breakdown. Oxford University Press. ISBN978-0-19-884050-3.
^Zawadzka, Z (17 December 2018). "Polish Productions about Polish Problems". In Robson, Peter; Schulz, Jennifer L. (eds.). Ethnicity, Gender, and Diversity: Law and Justice on TV. Lexington Books. p. 123. ISBN978-1-4985-7291-0. On January 7, 2016, the amendment of the Radio and Television Act of December 29, 1992 was signed into law, enabling the conservative government to control the state media.; "Poland". RSF. Reporters without borders. Retrieved 27 September 2020. Partisan discourse and hate speech are still the rule within state-owned media, which have been transformed into government propaganda mouthpieces. Their new directors tolerate neither opposition nor neutrality from employees and fire those who refuse to comply.; Surowiec, Paweł; Kania-Lundholm, Magdalena; Winiarska-Brodowska, Małgorzata (2020). "Towards illiberal conditioning? New politics of media regulations in Poland (2015–2018)". East European Politics. 36 (1): 27–43. doi:10.1080/21599165.2019.1608826. S2CID164430720.
^Łukasz Warzecha (20 April 2018). "PiS, Czyli Populizm i Socjalizm" [PiS means Populism and Socialism] (in Polish). Retrieved 29 May 2019.
^Vasilopoulou, Sofia (2018). "The Radical Right and Euroskepticism". In Rydgren, Jens (ed.). The Oxford Handbook of the Radical Right. Oxford University Press. ISBN978-0-19-027455-9.
^Guerra, Simona (2020). "The Historical Roots of Euroscepticism in Poland". Euroscepticisms: The Historical Roots of a Political Challenge. Brill. ISBN978-90-04-42125-7.
^Henceroth, Nathan (2019). "Open Society Foundations". In Ainsworth, Scott H.; Harward, Brian M. (eds.). Political Groups, Parties, and Organizations that Shaped America. ABC-CLIO. p. 739.
^Krzyżanowska, Natalia; Krzyżanowski, Michał (2018). "'Crisis' and Migration in Poland: Discursive Shifts, Anti-Pluralism and the Politicisation of Exclusion". Sociology. 52 (3): 612–618. doi:10.1177/0038038518757952. S2CID149501422.
^Henceroth, Nathan (2019). "Open Society Foundations". In Ainsworth, Scott H.; Harward, Brian M. (eds.). Political Groups, Parties, and Organizations that Shaped America. ABC-CLIO. p. 739.
^Krzyżanowski, Michał (2018). "Discursive Shifts in Ethno-Nationalist Politics: On Politicization and Mediatization of the "Refugee Crisis" in Poland". Journal of Immigrant & Refugee Studies. 16 (1–2): 76–96. doi:10.1080/15562948.2017.1317897. S2CID54068132.
^Żuk, Piotr (2018). "Nation, national remembrance, and education — Polish schools as factories of nationalism and prejudice". Nationalities Papers. 46 (6): 1046–1062. doi:10.1080/00905992.2017.1381079. S2CID158161859.
^Żuk, Piotr; Żuk, Paweł (2019). "Dangerous Liaisons between the Catholic Church and State: the religious and political alliance of the nationalist right with the conservative Church in Poland". Journal of Contemporary Central and Eastern Europe. 27 (2–3): 191–212. doi:10.1080/25739638.2019.1692519. S2CID211393866.
^Hloušek, Vít; Kopeček, Lubomír (2010), Origin, Ideology and Transformation of Political Parties: East-Central and Western Europe Compared, Ashgate, p. 196
^Nordsieck, Wolfram (2019). "Poland". Parties and Elections in Europe. Retrieved 28 November 2019.
italic font – electoral alliances and/or popular fronts *: Zbigniew Ajchler **: Piotr Adamowicz et al., ***: Marek Biernacki ****: not currently registered as a party
listen), PiS) is a right-wing populist and national-conservative political party in Poland. Its chairman is Jarosław Kaczyński.
![Anti-PiS poster during the October 2020 protests in Kraków (five stars represent a common profanity, three represent the party name).[84]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e6/02020_0679_Protest_against_abortion_restriction_in_Krak%C3%B3w%2C_October_2020.jpg/440px-02020_0679_Protest_against_abortion_restriction_in_Krak%C3%B3w%2C_October_2020.jpg)
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