Playing the Law: The Attitude of Polish Dissidents towards Post-Stalinist and International Law before the Period of Solidarity

Abstract

This article shows how dissidents in the latter half of the 1970s “played the law” in the Polish People’s Republic. Laws established by an undemocratic government, and thus theoretically lacking democratic legitimacy, were used by the opposition to delegitimize the government. The author describes the goals of the opposition and the lines of argument it employed, and how the Communist party—the other player in this peculiar game—made reciprocal efforts to exploit the law in order to weaken the opposition. The article discusses the specific international and Polish legal documents referenced by both sides of this game—the opposition and the government. The law was an important resource for both sides. This analysis nuances and demythologizes popular claims about the “Helsinki effect” by illustrating the role and legal context of the Helsinki Accords against the backdrop of local laws and the strategies undertaken by both actors. Furthermore, it describes the important institutional setting that influenced the types of actions undertaken by the protest movement in communist Poland.