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The
newborn democracy had enormous problems like large debt,
backward economy, lack of funds, corruption, and enormous
inflation. During the first years, the finance minister
Leszek Balcerowicz began the radical plan of reforms
which were to help in passing from planned economy to
market economy. These reforms based on privatization
and struggle with inflation turned out to be a success
but it cost the whole nation too much. The unemployment
exploded and prices skyrocketed. During Walesa's election
the political situation wasn't stable, Poland witnessed
no fewer than five governments with five prime ministers.
Most of governments collapsed after a very short term.
In 1993 the post communist party, SLD (Democratic Left
Alliance), won the elections to parliament, and in 1995
Walesa wasn't reelected and postcommunist candidate
Aleksander Kwasniewski became the president. Walasa's
presidency time was questioned by all political parties
and the electorate. Walesa was accused of being an autocrat
who didn't pay attention to anybody.
The
SLD, party of post communist which came to power in
1993 managed to keep the power till 1997. During this
period Poland became the fastest developing country
of all the countries of Eastern Europe but the general
direction of transformation of the political and economy
system slowed down. This time of giving up, particularly
in privatization domain and social reforms, brought
later deterioration of economy and financial situation
of the nation.
The
post communists were defeated in 1997 by the alliance
of about 40 small Solidarity parties, named the AWS.
Jerzy Buzek of AWS (Solidarity Electoral Action) became
prime minister, and the new government accelerated the
reforms. In October 1997 the new constitution replaced
the old one, Stalinist constitution from 1952. In 1999
Poland was included into NATO. It was a very important
moment because it meant that the Western countries had
realized that the world security needed newborn democracy
of Eastern Europe. Since 1990, Poland tried to be a
member of the European Union, and it was a scheme according
to which Poland was to join European Union in 2003.
Despite
of the international successes, the AWS party made a
lot of bad political and economy decisions which cost
them loss of the power in 2001. AWS's leaders were also
accused of corruption. Back again the postcommunists
won the power but in contrast with the year 1997, in
2001 the social and political turmoil was on a high
level. Last elections showed that the populist parties
like Samoobrona (Self Defence) under the charismatic
leader Andrzej Lepper and LPR (Polish Families League)
acquired quite large support of electorate.
During
the days of 7 - 8 June 2003 dream of many Poles came
true, because during the referendum, 80 % of Poles decided
to join the European Union in May, 2004.
The
beginning of 2005 brought corruption affairs including
members of government and even president, Kwasniewski.
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