Archives West Finding Aid

Pre-Solidarity

At the end of the 1970s the Polish People’s Republic (Polska Rzeczospolita Ludowa) was racked by crisis as it experienced the largest collapse of production seen in any postwar industrial country. Along with this collapse public corruption had become endemic. Popular belief was that the regime was at an all-time low. Food supplies were a constant source of difficulty; Poland was at the time the most polluted country in Europe; the women of Lodz suffered from the highest still birth rates in Europe. On 1 July 1980 a government spokesman announced that better cuts of meat would in the future be available only in the ‘free price’ shops. The announcement was the signal for a wave of strikes that rolled across most of Polish industry for the next six weeks, to reach its climax in the coastal cities of Gdansk, Gdynia and Szczecin in mid-August.

Early period (1980)

The Polish government enforced censorship, and official media said little about the "sporadic labor disturbances in Gdańsk"; as a further precaution, all phone connections between the coast and the rest of Poland were soon cut. Nevertheless, the government failed to contain the information: a spreading wave of samizdats (bibuła), including Robotnik (The Worker), and along with Radio Free Europe broadcasts that penetrated the Iron Curtain, ensured that the ideas of the emerging Solidarity movement quickly spread.

First Solidarity (1980-81)

Independent Self-governing Labor Union "Solidarity" formally was founded on September 22, 1980, when delegates of 36 regional trade unions met in Gdańsk and united under the name Solidarność (Solidarity). By early 1981 Solidarity had a membership of about 10 million people and represented most of the work force of Poland.

Martial law (1981-83)

On December 13, 1981, Jaruzelski imposed martial law in Poland in a bid to crush the Solidarity movement. Solidarity was declared illegal, and its leaders were arrested. The union was formally dissolved by the Sejm (Parliament) on October 8, 1982, but it nevertheless continued as an underground organization.

Underground Solidarity (1982-88)

Throughout the mid-1980s, Solidarity persevered as an exclusively underground organization. On May 1, 1982, a series of anti-government protests brought out thousands of participants—several dozen thousand in Kraków, Warsaw and Gdańsk. On December 9, 1982 the Security Service (Służba Bezpieczeństwa) carried out a large anti-Solidarity operation, arresting over 10,000 activists. On December 27 Solidarity's assets were transferred by the authorities to a pro-government trade union, the All-Poland Alliance of Trade Unions (Ogólnopolskie Porozumienie Związków Zawodowych, or OPZZ). On July 22, 1983, martial law was lifted, and amnesty was granted to many imprisoned Solidarity members, who were released. On October 5, Wałęsa (an active member of Solidarity and Polititian) was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. The Polish government, however, refused to issue him a passport to travel to Oslo; Wałęsa's prize was accepted on his behalf by his wife.

Second Solidarity (1988-89)

In March of 1985, power in the Soviet Union was assumed by Mikhail Gorbachev. The worsening economic situation in the entire Eastern Bloc, including the Soviet Union, together with other factors, forced Gorbachev to carry out a number of reforms, not only in the field of economics but in the political and social realms. Solidarity members and activists continued to be persecuted and discriminated, if less so than during the early 1980s. In the late 1980s, a rift between Wałęsa's faction and a more radical Fighting Solidarity grew as the former wanted to negotiate with the government, while the latter planned for an anti-communist revolution. On April 17, 1989, Solidarity was legalized, and its membership soon reached 1.5 million. The Solidarity Citizens' Committee (Komitet Obywatelski "Solidarność") was given permission to field candidates in the upcoming elections. Election law allowed Solidarity to put forward candidates for only 35% of the seats in the Sejm, but there were no restrictions in regard to Senate candidates.