The Police and Society in Poland. The Road to social Acceptance

Abstract

ObjectivesThe scope of the paper is to identify, confirm and describe the recent breaches in the mutual relation between the Police and society in Poland. The perspective is the clear and consequent road to social acceptance that the Polish Police undertook in 1990 and proceeded with success until recent events.Material and methodsThe authors desk research current sources of data regarding the Police relationship with and acceptance by the society in Poland: trust in Police surveys’ results; critical, publicly available opinions of authorities, statistical data regarding Police work during the Covid restrictions time and women’ protests in Poland (2020-2021).ResultsThe results show a decisive shake of the Police-society relationship and the negative impact of COVID-19 and women demonstrations’ handling by the Police on the formation’s image.ConclusionsThe critical circumstances of the pandemic were clearly a moment of testing to the Police-society trust and it gives the assumption to doubt the high levels of trust pre-pandemic. The threat of politicisation of the formation is also a major factor as well as the condition of state in general.