Польська партійна система в період пострадянської модернізації

Abstract

The current socio-political situation in the European region and in the world is characterized by profound and qualitative changes. The party system of the Republic of Poland is also undergoing significant transformations, objectively related, first, to the logic of the political party system in the country with the beginning of democratization in 1989-1990 and the functioning of political parties, on the other - to European features of political and party systems. For Ukraine, the experience of transformations and peculiarities of the development of the Polish party system is relevant and useful due to the similarity of political, economic, and socio-cultural situation at the beginning of the development of party systems and opportunities to adapt the Polish experience to Ukrainian realities. The object of research is Polish political parties, and the subject of research is the peculiarities of the transformation of the Polish party system. The chronological boundaries of the study cover the period from 1989-1990, when the country began the process of modernization of the party system, to 2019, when the last parliamentary elections took place in the country. The analysis of current publications related to political transformations in Europe and the problems of the Polish political party system shows an active academic discussion about the functioning of the Polish political party system and the factors influencing its functioning. As a result of our research, we have made a number of important conclusions. The transformation of the Polish party system took place in a cycle of modernization - the institutionalization of parties - return to power of the left parties - return to power of the right parties. Voters' sympathies for left-wing parties are explained by the social guarantees they promise to the electorate. The consequence of the institutionalization of the Polish party system is a tendency towards bipartisanship, at least the functioning of large, mass parties, as well as active party competition of political parties for power. The process of building a party system in post-communist Poland was a competition between communist and liberal-democratic forces. The dualistic principle of party division, which is based on the division into "left" and "right", was one of the reasons why the two most dominant political parties in Poland today are the «Civic Platform» and «Law and Justice». It has been established that today's Polish party system is in a cycle of sympathy for the right-wing forces. The victory of the political party "Law and Justice" in the 2015 and 2019 elections and the formation of a majority government, without coalitions with other political forces, led to the destruction of the relative political balance provided by coalition agreements between political parties. Also in the functioning of political parties was found widespread use of manipulative technologies: in intra-party relations, during election campaigns and community service.