2. From 1944 to 1989 Poland remained
under the influence of the Soviet
Union and was ruled by one
dominant communist party. Its
representatives did not respect the
dissatisfied voice of the Polish
society.
It led to numerous protests against
the ruling government throughout
the whole peroid.The most
important events and uprisings took
place in Poznan in 1956, in 1968 in
Warsaw, in 1970 in Pomerania and
in 1980 in Gdansk. All the resistance
movements were the sign of the
Polish society’s disagreement with
the imposed regime and they
gradually led to the fall of
communism in 1989.
3. The Poznan June was the first protest against
the Soviet-imposed communist government
that was established at the end of the 2nd
WorldWar in Poland.
On June 28 in 1956, workers began
demonstrations at Poznan Cegielski Factories
demanding better conditions at work as well
as better pay and protesting against a recent
rise in taxes and higher work quotas.
Over 100,000 people gathered at the Imperial
Castle in Poznan where the communist city
officials and the secret political police had
their headquarters. However, a peaceful
protest soon turned violent.Tanks, armoured
cars, field guns and lorries full of militia troops
surrounded the city and began to take
detainees for often brutal interrogations
which would leave 746 people detained until
August.The regular fights between the armed
protestants and the communist military forces
lasted for two days on the streets of Poznan.
In the end, the rebellion was brutally crushed,
with estimated casualties between 57 and 100
dead and 500 to 600 wounded.
4. Poland in March 1968 had a political crisis
connected with the major student and intellectual
protest action against the existing communist
government.
At the end of January 1968 the performance of a
classic play by Adam Mickiewicz “Dziady” written
in 1832 was banned from being played at the
PolishTheatre in Warsaw on the grounds that it
contained russophobic and anti-socialist
references. The play had only been performed 14
times, the last time in January 1968.
As a result of this, a crowd of 1500 students
protesting at Warsaw University on March the 8th
was met with attacks by the riot police (ZOMO).
Within four days the protests spread to other
Polish academic centers all over Poland. Despite
the fact that different communist militia forces
kept attacking the students at the university halls,
mass student strikes continued to take place in
the next days and even a call for a general strike in
Poland was issued fromWarsaw on 13th March.
However, the government cut off the possibility of
any negotiation and further student protests,
strikes and occupations of university halls were
met with mass academic expulsion of thousands
of participants. At least 2 725 people were
arrested for participating.
5. OnWednesday the 16th December 1970 there
was a general strike in the north of Poland,
near the coast of the Baltic Sea.The protest
turned really violent, its participants were
brutally bitten by the riot police.
The communist authorities got worried about
the chaos in the city. On the 17th December in
the morning, when the workers were
commuting to the Gdynia Shipyard, riots
broke out again in a train station near the
shipyard. Soon after that, a march of
protestants was formed in the centre of
Gdynia.The militia forces intervened and the
fights started.The march dispersed but it
quickly gathered again.That time, they were
carrying the body of a dead worker – 18-year-
old Zbyszek Godlewski on a door.Thousands
of protestants joined the march and they
continued fighting with the police and other
armed troops.
The army used its full power and the riots
ended with many casualties – 16 people dead
and many injured.
6. The protests started in major factories in
Silesia in the south-west of Poland and
on the coast of the Baltic Sea in the
north.
The leader of the strike in Lenin
Shipyard in Gdansk was Lech Walesa, an
electrician. Unlike before, this time the
negotiations with the pro-communist
Polish government were taking place all
the time and no fights emerged. As a
result, a Polish trade union federation
called Solidarity was founded under the
leadership of Lech Walesa. In the 1980s
Solidarity became the first independent
labour union in a soviet-bloc country.
Solidarity movement gave rise to a
broad, non-violent, anti-communist
social activity all over the country and in
contributed greatly to the fall of
communism in 1989 in Poland.
