Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter

In Poland, public funding is given to those threatening liberal democracy

Justyna Kajta 26th July 2021

Right-wing, conservative and nationalist magazines were the primary beneficiaries of funds recently allocated by the country’s Ministry of Culture.

Poland,far right,Ordo Iuris
Justyna Kajta

Public financing is contributing to the rise of the far right in Poland. In May 2021 the country’s Ministry of Culture, National Heritage and Sports announced the results of a competition for funding cultural and scientific periodicals. More magazines with a right-wing, conservative, nationalist or Catholic stance receiving funds than left-wing or liberal-oriented ones. One of the beneficiaries is Poland’s National Social Institute, which publishes ‘National Politics’ (Polityka Narodowa), described by Press magazine as ‘a quarterly journal of nationalists associated with the National Movement and All-Polish Youth’.

The National Social Institute also received funds from the Civic Organisation Development Programme, organized by another public institution, the National Freedom Institute—Centre for Civil Society Development. The latter presents itself as the first executive agency in the history of Poland responsible for supporting civil society, public benefit activities and volunteering, and is dedicated to supporting non-governmental organisations, civic media, think-thanks and watchdog organizations in the realisation of their aims and development strategies.

Catholics and nationalists were among the beneficiaries of the programme, with financial support provided to various institutions affiliated with the Catholic Church and foundations focusing on patriotic education, promoting Polish values or a right-wing narrative of Polish history.

In the framework of the programme, two organisations connected with the annual Independence Day marches, a nationalist event organized every year on November 11th, also received public funds: Youths of the Independence Day March received almost 700,000 złoty (€152,000) for ‘institutional and missionary development’, while Independence Day March received almost 200,000 złoty for the development of a Warsaw branch of the nationalist portal, National Media (Media Narodowe).


Our job is keeping you informed!


Subscribe to our free newsletter and stay up to date with the latest Social Europe content. We will never send you spam and you can unsubscribe anytime.

Sign up here

Organisations connected with the Independence Day marches received additional funds from another programme, the Patriotic Fund, co-ordinated by another public institution established by the Ministry of Culture and Sports, the Institute for Legacy of Polish National Thought, announced in June 2021. The March of Independence and the National Guard, as well as All-Polish Youth, collectively received more than three million złoty from the Patriotic Fund.

Ordo Iuris

A relatively new foundation, Education for Values (Edukacja do Wartości), established by the presidents of the ultra-conservative legal group Ordo Iuris, also received public funding. Ordo Iuris is an important, professionalised and influential actor within the illiberal segments of Polish civil society. It is known for its involvement in a campaign against the Istanbul convention and, according to the European Humanist Federation, ‘opposes abortion in all cases, same-sex marriage and civil partnerships and sexual education’.

In 2016, Ordo Iuris drafted the anti-abortion bill that was submitted by the Stop Abortion coalition as a citizens’ initiative and considered by the Polish parliament for scrutiny. As a result, a massive mobilisation against the bill began in Poland and temporarily stopped the legislation—until October 2020, when the Constitutional Tribunal decided to ban abortion in the country. The decision was noted by Ordo Iuris as its success and, on the day before the verdict, it announced that it had sent a ‘friend of the court’ opinion to the tribunal.

That opinion was signed by a number of international organisations—such as the Slovak Association for Life and Family, the Free Society Institute from Lithuania and the American Center for Family & Human Rights (C-Fam)—highlighting the international scope of Ordo Iuris’ network. Even though its Brussels office has already been closed twice, Ordo Iuris continues to lobby the European Parliament and European Commission.

The group is well-connected with the Polish governing Law and Justice (PiS) party and its representatives can be found in state institutions, such as the Polish Supreme Court, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs or the aforementioned National Freedom Institute. Earlier this year, the Polish government even formally nominated the former president of Ordo Iuris, Aleksander Stępkowski, as one of Poland’s candidates for the European Court of Human Rights. The Council of Europe committee on the election of judges rejected his candidacy.

Ordo Iuris’ efforts have not stopped. In May, it announced the establishment of the Collegium Intermarium, a new university with a mission ‘to build a platform of co-operation between academics from the countries of the Intermarium region’. According to the founders, the initiative is a response to ‘the deepening crisis of academic life’ and ‘a space of free debate and courageous search for truth’.

This corresponds to recent statements by the Polish minister of education and science, Przemysław Czarnek, who has promised to fight the ‘dictatorship of left-liberal views’ which, in his view, has dominated higher education. One of his initiatives, the Academic Freedom Package, aims at the protection of conservative voices in universities, guaranteeing that ‘one cannot be held disciplinary responsible for expressing their ideological beliefs’.

It can be expected that this shared worldview will strengthen the co-operation between the ministry, the new university and Ordo Iuris representatives, and can be interpreted as part of a broader process of making public education more conservative, nationalist and Catholic.


We need your support


Social Europe is an independent publisher and we believe in freely available content. For this model to be sustainable, however, we depend on the solidarity of our readers. Become a Social Europe member for less than 5 Euro per month and help us produce more articles, podcasts and videos. Thank you very much for your support!

Become a Social Europe Member

Illiberal transformation

The shift towards an ultra-conservative, nationalist discourse is noticeable in Poland, in civil society and public state institutions. The recent state support for NGOs and institutions promoting right-wing ideology is just another facet of the illiberal transformation that is happening not only in Poland but in other central European countries, too.

With serious economic challenges caused by the pandemic, far-right groups such as Ordo Iuris are appealing to identity to gather more popularity and power through cultural hegemony. Education is an important means to achieve this goal and, with increased financial resources at their disposal and growing transnational connections, they are quickly doing so—not only in Poland.

This first appeared on openDemocracy

Poland,far right,Ordo Iuris
Justyna Kajta

Justyna Kajta is a senior fellow at the Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right (CARR) and a postdoctoral researcher in the Institute of Sociology at the University of Wrocław.

You are here: Home / Politics / In Poland, public funding is given to those threatening liberal democracy

Most Popular Posts

Russian soldiers' mothers,war,Ukraine The Ukraine war and Russian soldiers’ mothersJennifer Mathers and Natasha Danilova
IGU,documents,International Gas Union,lobby,lobbying,sustainable finance taxonomy,green gas,EU,COP ‘Gaslighting’ Europe on fossil fuelsFaye Holder
Schengen,Fortress Europe,Romania,Bulgaria Romania and Bulgaria stuck in EU’s second tierMagdalena Ulceluse
income inequality,inequality,Gini,1 per cent,elephant chart,elephant Global income inequality: time to revise the elephantBranko Milanovic
Orbán,Hungary,Russia,Putin,sanctions,European Union,EU,European Parliament,commission,funds,funding Time to confront Europe’s rogue state—HungaryStephen Pogány

Most Recent Posts

reality check,EU foreign policy,Russia Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—a reality check for the EUHeidi Mauer, Richard Whitman and Nicholas Wright
permanent EU investment fund,Recovery and Resilience Facility,public investment,RRF Towards a permanent EU investment fundPhilipp Heimberger and Andreas Lichtenberger
sustainability,SDGs,Finland Embedding sustainability in a government programmeJohanna Juselius
social dialogue,social partners Social dialogue must be at the heart of Europe’s futureClaes-Mikael Ståhl
Jacinda Ardern,women,leadership,New Zealand What it means when Jacinda Ardern calls timePeter Davis

Other Social Europe Publications

front cover scaled Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship
Women Corona e1631700896969 500 Women and the coronavirus crisis
sere12 1 RE No. 12: Why No Economic Democracy in Sweden?

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

The winter issue of the Progressive Post magazine from FEPS is out!

The sequence of recent catastrophes has thrust new words into our vocabulary—'polycrisis', for example, even 'permacrisis'. These challenges have multiple origins, reinforce each other and cannot be tackled individually. But could they also be opportunities for the EU?

This issue offers compelling analyses on the European health union, multilateralism and international co-operation, the state of the union, political alternatives to the narrative imposed by the right and much more!


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

The macroeconomic effects of re-applying the EU fiscal rules

Against the background of the European Commission's reform plans for the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP), this policy brief uses the macroeconometric multi-country model NiGEM to simulate the macroeconomic implications of the most relevant reform options from 2024 onwards. Next to a return to the existing and unreformed rules, the most prominent options include an expenditure rule linked to a debt anchor.

Our results for the euro area and its four biggest economies—France, Italy, Germany and Spain—indicate that returning to the rules of the SGP would lead to severe cuts in public spending, particularly if the SGP rules were interpreted as in the past. A more flexible interpretation would only somewhat ease the fiscal-adjustment burden. An expenditure rule along the lines of the European Fiscal Board would, however, not necessarily alleviate that burden in and of itself.

Our simulations show great care must be taken to specify the expenditure rule, such that fiscal consolidation is achieved in a growth-friendly way. Raising the debt ceiling to 90 per cent of gross domestic product and applying less demanding fiscal adjustments, as proposed by the IMK, would go a long way.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ILO advertisement

Global Wage Report 2022-23: The impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power

The International Labour Organization's Global Wage Report is a key reference on wages and wage inequality for the academic community and policy-makers around the world.

This eighth edition of the report, The Impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power, examines the evolution of real wages, giving a unique picture of wage trends globally and by region. The report includes evidence on how wages have evolved through the COVID-19 crisis as well as how the current inflationary context is biting into real wage growth in most regions of the world. The report shows that for the first time in the 21st century real wage growth has fallen to negative values while, at the same time, the gap between real productivity growth and real wage growth continues to widen.

The report analysis the evolution of the real total wage bill from 2019 to 2022 to show how its different components—employment, nominal wages and inflation—have changed during the COVID-19 crisis and, more recently, during the cost-of-living crisis. The decomposition of the total wage bill, and its evolution, is shown for all wage employees and distinguishes between women and men. The report also looks at changes in wage inequality and the gender pay gap to reveal how COVID-19 may have contributed to increasing income inequality in different regions of the world. Together, the empirical evidence in the report becomes the backbone of a policy discussion that could play a key role in a human-centred recovery from the different ongoing crises.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ETUI advertisement

The EU recovery strategy: a blueprint for a more Social Europe or a house of cards?

This new ETUI paper explores the European Union recovery strategy, with a focus on its potentially transformative aspects vis-à-vis European integration and its implications for the social dimension of the EU’s socio-economic governance. In particular, it reflects on whether the agreed measures provide sufficient safeguards against the spectre of austerity and whether these constitute steps away from treating social and labour policies as mere ‘variables’ of economic growth.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound webinar: Making telework work for everyone

Since 2020 more European workers and managers have enjoyed greater flexibility and autonomy in work and are reporting their preference for hybrid working. Also driven by technological developments and structural changes in employment, organisations are now integrating telework more permanently into their workplace.

To reflect on these shifts, on 6 December Eurofound researchers Oscar Vargas and John Hurley explored the challenges and opportunities of the surge in telework, as well as the overall growth of telework and teleworkable jobs in the EU and what this means for workers, managers, companies and policymakers.


WATCH THE WEBINAR HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube