Martial Law in the Collective Polish Memory Following the Collapse of Communism

Abstract

Political transformation can influence the mechanisms of collective memory in various ways. In Poland, following the collapse of communism, no universally accepted interpretation of events from the recent past was formed, and martial law imposed in Poland on December 13, 1981, by the communist powers as a reaction to the emergence of the independent trade union Solidarity remains a deeply controversial subject. In collective memory we can observe overlap in the autobiographic memory of the events' witnesses and the memory of members of the younger generations based on accounts passed down by the media and the education system. Martial law made its most lasting mark in the memory of those approximately fifteen to thirty-five years old when it was imposed, with the lowest level of recollection observed among the youngest respondents. In the opinion of most Poles, martial law and the years that followed were a bad time for the country and its citizens. Yet despite the bad memories, during the fifteen years since the collapse of communism, approximately half of the Poles invariably believe martial law to have been justified, with one quarter holding the opposite opinion and another quarter with no opinion. There are also very evident links between one's current political stance and one's attitude toward the decision of 1981: left-wing views today are conducive to acceptance of the historical decision, while rightwing views favor the opinion that the imposition of martial law was unjustified. Judgment of the decision to impose martial law is connected to how one perceives the motives behind it. Various surveys have revealed that avoiding aggression from the Soviet Union is the strongest argument appealing to Polish society, and the one explaining most suggestively the validity of placing the country under martial law. This theory's persuasive power comes from the combination of two factors: First, it derives from so-called hypothetical history, thus making it very difficult to verify; and second, it is deeply rooted in the states of fear evoked in Polish society during the years of communism.