© Agencja Gazeta/Adam Stepien via REUTERS

The outcome of Poland’s presidential election on July 12 will cause ripples not only in the country itself, but also in Europe. Formally, the Polish presidency is a mostly ceremonial post, though with the power to veto laws. Yet symbolically, the result of the election will shape whether Poland becomes more open or closed—and its role within the post-Brexit, coronavirus-era EU.

Since 2015, Poland has been governed by the Law and Justice (PiS) party, which combines social conservatism with a statist approach to the economy. While not opposed to Poland’s EU membership, it has adopted a more defiant attitude to the EU, similar to that of Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán. Its overhaul of the country’s judiciary, including the Supreme Court, has led to a drawn-out conflict with the European Commission, which has accused the PiS government of undermining the rule of law.

In this election, Poles will choose between Andrzej Duda, the PiS-backed president (he left the party after he was elected in 2015), and Rafał Trzaskowski, the mayor of Warsaw, who hails from the centrist Civic Platform (PO), the old party of Donald Tusk, who served as Polish prime minister before taking on the presidency of the European Council. Both of the candidates were born in 1972, have a background in academia, and served as members of the European Parliament. Politically, though, they are on opposite sides of the PO-PiS conflict that has dominated Polish politics for more than a decade.

PiS vs. PO, Reloaded

In the first round of the election on June 28, Duda came first with 43.5 percent of the vote, followed by Trzaskowski with 30.5 percent. The rest of the vote was split between several candidates: Szymon Hołownia, a liberal Catholic who ran as an independent, with 13.9 percent, far-right national Krzysztof Bosak, with 6.8 percent, agrarian candidate Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz with 2.4 percent, and center-left candidate Robert Biedroń. The other candidates got less than 0.3 percent. As no one candidate attracted over 50 percent of the votes, there will be a Duda-Trzaskowski runoff on July 12.

Despite the coronavirus epidemic, the health and economic situation has not figured prominently in the election campaign. Instead, Duda tried to mobilize socially conservative voters with homophobic rhetoric, calling LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) rights an “ideology” more destructive than communism. This was a direct attack on Trzaskowski, who signed an LGBT Declaration for Warsaw last year, after he was elected mayor.

Foreign policy hasn’t been much of a campaign issue, either, even though Poland’s president is the state representative in international affairs and commander-in-chief of the armed forced. At a basic level, this reflects the longstanding consensus in Polish politics, whereby Poland is firmly rooted in the EU and NATO. However, there are significant differences in emphasis between the two candidates.

A Visit to the White House

Duda has banked on relations with the United States. On June 24, four days before the first round, he made a last-minute visit to the White House to meet with President Donald Trump. Although no concrete decisions were made, the meeting was meant to show Poland’s close relationship with the US. The visit came with an apparent endorsement from Trump: “And I do believe he has an election coming up, and I do believe he’ll be very successful,” he said at the joint press conference with Duda in the Rose Garden. This raised eyebrows in Poland and beyond, with one European diplomat warning that Poland is taking a risk by being so close to such a controversial politician, who might not be re-elected later this year. Trzaskowski responded to Duda’s meeting Trump with a telephone conversation with former President Barack Obama the following week, during which they spoke about “the importance of Polish democracy within the EU and the significance of the US-Polish alliance.”

As president, Duda’s main foreign policy endeavor has been the Three Seas Initiative, a Polish-Croatian venture bringing together 12 Central European countries, including Austria, that seeks to improve cross-border energy, transport, and digital infrastructure in the region (its recent summits have been attended by representatives of the US and German governments). Although he is not against Poland’s membership in the EU, this has not stopped Duda from making disparaging statements about it. In 2018, for example, he called the EU an “imaginary community from which we don’t gain much …Of course we have the right to have expectations towards Europe—especially towards the Europe that left us to be the prey of the Russians in 1945—but above all we have the right to rule ourselves here on our own and decide what form Poland should have,” he said, speaking at an event in the town of Leżajsk, in the country’s south-east, which tends to be more pro-PiS. On another occasion, also in 2018, Duda likened EU membership to the partition of Poland, when the country was divided between Prussia, Austria, and Russia from 1795 until 1918. This kind of rhetoric reflects the wider tendency in PiS to speak of the EU in terms of “us” versus “them.”

An Active Role

In contrast, Trzaskowski—who served as Poland’s Europe minister from 2014 to 2015 in the PO-led government before PiS came to power—has tended to emphasize the active role Poland has to play in Europe, not least after Brexit. “We will not substitute Britain, but we can offer this young spirit, this dynamism, this openness and perspective,” he told me in an interview in Warsaw last year, in English (one of the several languages he speaks). “The partitions, the Second World War, then communism stifled the dynamism and now it’s out in the open, and that is why we crave those possibilities,” he added, explaining that Poland could channel this energy into Europe.

Asked about his first visit abroad if he is elected president during a televised Q&A with journalists on July 6, Trzaskowski said that he would first invite the French and German presidents to Warsaw, to “renew the Weimar Triangle” which consists of France, Germany and Poland.  His first visit abroad will be to Brussels, to “fight for as large a budget as possible for Poland.” The country “is truly strong when it is strong and influential in the EU,” he said, adding that he will seek to rebuild its position, after its marginalization by PiS.

With strengthening fundamental values, notably the rule of law, among the priorities of the six-month German presidency of the Council of the European Union, which began on July 1, 2020, a change in president in Warsaw would also affect the dynamics of the Polish government’s conflict with the European Commission over the courts. Trzaskowski announced this week that, as president, he would use his power of veto to block any decision by the PiS government that does further damage to Poland’s courts.

With the two candidates neck and neck in the opinion polls, Berlin, Paris, and other capitals are preparing for both scenarios. In broad terms, Duda’s re-election would mean a continuation of the status quo. Meanwhile, a Trzaskowski victory could offer new opportunities in bilateral relations and within the EU (such as strengthening the Weimar Triangle at the presidential level, as mentioned above). In the election on July 12, Poles will not only be casting a vote for the type of country they want to live in, but also its role in Europe.

The post The Fight for Poland’s Place in Europe appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

© REUTERS/Kacper Pempel

As expected, PiS won the Polish parliamentary elections on October 13, but not as well as it hoped to. “We received a lot, but we deserve more,” said party leader Jarosław Kaczyński after the exit poll was announced that evening. The party won 43.6 percent of the vote, which will give it 235 out of 460 seats in the Sejm, the lower chamber of parliament. This is enough for it to maintain its absolute majority and continue governing alone, but not by much.

After a disappointing result in the elections to the European Parliament in May, the opposition parties decided to run for the Sejm separately, as three blocs. The centrist Civic Coalition led by the Civic Platform (PO)—formerly headed by Donald Tusk until he left to become president of the European Council in 2014—won 27.4 percent of the vote, or 134 seats. The agrarians led by the Polish People’s Party (PSL) received 8.6 percent (30 seats), and the left 12.6 percent (49 seats). The fifth party to cross the electoral threshold of 5 percent was the far-right Konfederacja (“Confederation”), with 6.8 percent. It will have 11 seats.

These results will change the political landscape in the Sejm, adding new voices from the social-democratic left and the far-right. The left, which failed to cross the electoral threshold in 2015 (as a coalition, it needed 8 percent), is back—rejuvenated. The old Democratic Left Alliance ran together with two newer parties, Razem (“Together”) and Wiosna (“Spring”), the party founded earlier this year by gay-rights activist and former mayor of Słupsk Robert Biedroń. Contrasting with PiS’s social conservatism, the left supports gay marriage and the right to abortion.

The other newcomer to the Sejm is Konfederacja, an alliance of nationalist parties formed ahead of the European Parliament elections, in which it finished slightly below the threshold. Openly euroskeptic, the party is even further to the right than PiS. This is bad news for the ruling party: it will face pressure from the right in the Sejm and stronger competition for nationalist voters, especially young people. According to the exit poll, Konfederacja got almost 20 percent of the vote in the 18-29 age group. It was also more popular among men than women.

The opposition’s main victory—practical and symbolic—is the Senate. Unlike in the vote for the Sejm, the three opposition blocs made a pact for the upper chamber of parliament, agreeing not to run candidates against each other. Together, they will have a slight majority of 51 out of 100 senators. In practical terms, this will allow it to slow down (but not completely stop) the legislative process by amending or rejecting bills proposed by PiS in the Sejm. The symbolic dimension is perhaps even more important: it shows what the opposition parties can achieve by working together.

Dominated by Domestic Issues

Since PiS came to power in 2015, politics has been dominated by the split between the party’s supporters and its opponents. Similarly, the election campaign was all about domestic issues. PiS successfully kept the focus on two main topics: its new welfare policies and so-called “LGBT ideology”, which it presented as a threat. Kaczynski positioned his party as the “protector of the Polish family” by creating what he calls the “Polish version of the welfare state” and shielding it against an “attack” by gay people.

European issues and the Polish government’s protracted dispute with the European Commission over the rule of law hardly featured in the campaign. The PiS leadership’s main reference to the EU, in the context of its economic policies, was to bringing “European standards of living” to Poland. In the run-up to the European elections earlier in May, the party had soften its rhetoric in response to the opposition’s accusations that it wants to lead Poland out of the EU. Its slogan in that election was “Poland heart of Europe.”

While its relations with Brussels and Berlin remained strained, the PiS leadership were keen to highlight Poland’s good relations with United States and, specifically, the Trump administration. On October 5, just before the elections, the US President Donald Trump announced that Poland had been formally nominated for the visa-waiver program that allows visa-free travel to US for up to 90 days, which Warsaw had wanted for a long time.

When the new government is appointed next month, this approach to foreign policy is likely to continue, while domestic politics will again dominate the agenda, as PiS focuses on implementing its welfare promises and fighting off the opposition. Politicians are already thinking about the next standoff between PiS and its opponents: the presidential election in 2020.

Despite the inward-looking tendencies in PiS, domestic and European politics will remain intertwined. Relations with Brussels will not improve overnight: the PiS government’s dispute with the European institutions over the rule of law remains unresolved. Moreover, with Brexit on the horizon, Poland will have to think once more about its place in Europe.

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© Krzysztof Miller/Agencja Gazeta/via REUTERS

In 12:08 East of Bucharest, a 2006 film directed by Corneliu Porumboiu, an alcoholic professor and a pensioner go on a local television show to debate whether or not there was a revolution in their city, Vasliu, in eastern Romania, in 1989. Over the course of the show, it turns out that history is rarely straightforward. The film’s original title in Romanian, “A fost sau n-a fost?”—roughly translated as “Was There or Wasn’t There?”—reflects a broader point about the memory of 1989 in Central and Eastern Europe. Thirty years on, there are still competing narratives about the events that brought down communism in the region. Today’s political disputes have been projected onto the anniversary, making it less about the past than about competing visions of the future.

This is very much the case in Poland. These days, there is little that Poles agree on, from gay rights to Donald Tusk, the president of the European Council, who served as Poland’s prime minister from 2007 to 2014. 1989 is one of these things, as this year’s milestone anniversary shows. From an outside perspective, this might seem surprising, given Poland’s role in the collapse of communism and its trajectory since then. For years, the country’s peaceful transition to democracy and reintegration with the West, culminating in joining the European Union in 2004, was regarded as a success story. Poland was held up as a model for countries further east, such as Ukraine. Yet rather than unite Poles, the 30th anniversary of 1989 has been subsumed in the political conflict between the ruling, right-wing Law and Justice party (PiS) and the centrist opposition led by the Civic Platform (PO), Tusk’s former party. Ahead of parliamentary elections this autumn, both sides have used the anniversary to attack their opponents and promote their vision of Poland.

This split was visible this summer on the 30th anniversary of the first partially free elections in Poland, held on June 4th 1989, which resulted in a government led by the Solidarity trade union. The opposition marked the date with celebrations in the northern city of Gdańsk, the home of Solidarity. In his speech there, Tusk, who was visiting from Brussels, drew parallels between the political struggles of the 1980s and those of today’s anti-PiS opposition. “You cannot let yourself be outplayed, even if you have lost the first match,” he said, alluding to the approaching elections in Poland. The government was not present; instead, it held its own muted ceremony in the parliament. A long-anticipated cabinet reshuffle was held that day, which some commentators interpreted as an attempt draw attention away from the opposition’s celebrations in Gdańsk.

Anti-Communist Roots

To be clear, neither side regrets the fall of communism; indeed, both PiS and PO have their roots in the anti-communist opposition of the 1980s. Rather, the dispute over 1989 has three dimensions: personalities, historical narratives, and worldviews.

First, the split is about the heroes of 1989. The central figure in this dispute is Lech Wałęsa, the legendary leader of Solidarity, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983 and went on to serve as president from 1990 to 1995. These days, the 75-year-old Wałęsa is a contested figure in Polish politics, amid allegations that he was a paid informant for the communist secret police in the early 1970s. For part of the population, he remains a hero; for others, he embodies what (in their view) went wrong in Poland’s transition from communism. Meanwhile, Wałęsa has positioned himself as a strong critic of the PiS government.

Second, the two camps have different narratives about Poland’s transition from communism. For years, PO has presented it as a success story: Poland went from Soviet satellite state to a democracy, a market economy and a member of NATO and the EU. However, PiS has challenged this narrative. Instead, it claims that the transition was stolen by former communists and crooks. In the past, PiS’s leader Jarosław Kaczyński has called for the Third Polish Republic established in 1989 to be replaced with a new, “fourth” one, which would represent the country’s political, moral and spiritual renewal.

The party has successfully appealed to Poles who feel excluded from the country’s spectacular growth since 1989, including the elderly and people outside the big cities—groups that felt neglected by the PO government. According to a poll after the European elections in May, almost three-quarters of voters with only a primary education voted for PiS. Among voters with a university degree, the PO-led opposition coalition was well ahead of PiS. Geographically, PiS’s support base is in the country’s more rural, traditional east, which is less connected with western Europe. “If it could, Warsaw would fill it with forest,” a trade-union activist in Lublin told me shortly before the 2015 elections, referring to the PO government’s attitude to eastern Poland. This kind of resentment among parts of the population, rooted in a sense of social injustice, propelled PiS to power that autumn.

No End to History

This also explains PiS politicians’ dismissive attitude toward 1989. On June 4 last year, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki tweeted that the 1989 elections were “boycotted by many Poles, only partly free, with rules changed during them to save the national list and Communist Party candidates.” In a second tweet that day, he added that “the road to freedom was long and winding, so let’s appreciate the fact that today we can enjoy life in a democratic and safe country.” This echoes the party’s narrative that Poland owes its position and growing prosperity to PiS rule, rather than decisions made by successive governments throughout the 1990s and 2000s.

Third, the split over 1989 reflects a deeper difference in worldview. Even though PO and PiS both have their roots in the anti-communist movements of the 1980s, today they represent different visions of Poland and Europe. Since coming to power in 2015, PiS has countered the mild, pro-European liberalism of the previous, PO-led government with a populist nativism, which echoes that of Viktor Orbán in Hungary. At home, it has presented refugees from the Middle East and gay people as a “threat.” Internationally, it has emphasized “sovereignty,” which has been visible in its more confrontational attitude to Brussels and Berlin. Speaking on stage together in 2016, PiS chairman Kaczyński and Orbán pledged to wage a “cultural counter-revolution” to reform the EU after Brexit.

More fundamentally, PiS has challenged the idea of 1989 as “the end of history.” In his famous article published that year, Francis Fukuyama suggested that the end of the Cold War means “the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.” In Poland, PiS has rejected this vision of Western liberal democracy as the end-point. Instead, it has been rebuilding the political system on its own terms, which includes a tighter grip on the public media and judges. Economically, PiS has sought to counter the more market-led policies of previous governments with a more statist approach, including an emphasis on social justice. This includes new welfare policies; its flagship program offers families 500 złoty (€120) per child per month. Mateusz Morawiecki, the prime minister (and a former bank CEO), has described his government’s vision as “a social capitalism, pro-social but also creating good living conditions for entrepreneurs and companies.” According to PiS’s supporters, “liberal-leftists” are to blame for Poland’s and Europe’s problems. Shortly after PiS won the elections in 2015, a government minister told me: “I grew up in a socialist democracy, then we had liberal democracy. Now I just want democracy without adjectives.”

As the trajectories of Poland, Hungary and Russia show, 30 years after the end of the Cold War, liberal democracy is not the only game in town. The elections in Poland this autumn will be between its supporters and opponents.

Despite the fraught political situation, limited agreement between Poles about specific events in 1989 may be possible. Almost two-thirds of Poles consider the elections of June 4,1989 a success, according to a recent poll (one-quarter of respondents see them as a failure). Even among PiS voters, the figure is 40 percent, with 40 percent holding the opposite view. Yet as long as there are elections to win, politicians in Poland and beyond will continue to talk past each other and use history for their own purposes—much like the characters in Porumboiu’s film.

The post Who Gets to Claim History? appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

In remembrance of Sylke Tempel, our sister magazine INTERNATIONALE POLITIK and Women in International Security (WIIS) this year launched The Sylke Tempel Essay Prize for Young Women. The inaugural winner is Warsaw-based journalist (and BERLIN POLICY JOURNAL contributor) Annabelle Chapman. We are documenting the original English version of her essay.

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In the academic literature, there has been a growing interest in the subject of gender and nationalism in recent years. Gendering Nationalism, a 2018 book edited by Jon Mulholland, Nicola Montagna, and Erin Sanders-McDonagh, examines the intersections of nation, gender, and sexuality with case studies from around the world. Other academics have studied the historical connection between manhood and nationhood, with men as the defenders of the fatherland and women as exalted mothers serving the nation.

Yet this gender dimension is overlooked in coverage of the new populist nationalism in Europe and the United States. Of all the articles on contemporary nationalism in the international press, few pause to consider its distinct appeal to men. Even fewer compare the attitude of nationalists in different countries toward women’s rights and motherhood. This essay argues that, although it is certainly not the only one, the gender dimension is vital to studying, understanding, and responding to the resurgence of nationalism in our societies.

For the purposes of this essay, “nationalism” encompasses both extreme-right nationalist movements and mainstream populist parties with nationalist elements, such Hungary’s ruling party, Fidesz. No longer on the fringes of European or American politics, nationalism has been mainstreamed and normalized.

Men and Nationalism

On November 11, 2018, Poland celebrated the 100th anniversary of the restoration of its independence. Nationalist groups with anti-immigration slogans marched through the capital, Warsaw, in a centenary rally supported by the Polish government. Red flares blazed above the crowd. Although there were women at the march, its tone and imagery were aggressively male. Poland’s centenary celebrations were a nationalist show of force, rather than a celebration of the country’s achievements in areas such as education and science. In contrast, Finland had marked the centenary of its independence in 2017 with a new public library in Helsinki.

In an article published in The Guardian in 2018, Cas Mudde, a Dutch specialist on political extremism in Europe and the United States, asked the simple question “Why is the far right dominated by men?” This domination is visible at nationalist events—from the march in Warsaw to the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in 2017. In Poland, most of the far right’s support comes from men—specifically, young men. A recent poll found that almost 30 percent of Polish men aged 18-30 supports the nationalist far right. This differs markedly from the political attitudes of women in the same age group, the majority of whom support the left or center. In the European elections in May 2019, the polls revealed similar support patterns for the Konfederacja nationalist alliance. This is no accident: as the head of a Polish polling firm put it, Konfederacja’s politicians target men who are “skeptics of women.”

Nationalism’s allure to men, rather than women, seems to come less from economic problems than from shifting cultural norms. It offers them a sense of belonging in a rapidly-changing, globalized world in which they are unsure of their place—as inhabitants of a small town in South Carolina or Saxony, but also as men. In many countries, traditional male roles have declined. Economically empowered and often better educated, women no longer need a man to live comfortably or even to have a child. This has led to a backlash in which nationalism and masculinity are intertwined. Russia, where traditional male roles crumbled after the collapse of the Soviet Union, has seen the emergence of what writer Natalia Antonova calls the “New Russian Masculinity” in recent years under President Vladimir Putin, fuelled by the annexation of Crimea in 2014. Meanwhile, in the United States, Germany, and Sweden, white nationalist groups have wielded masculinity to recruit members, as American sociologist Michael Kimmel shows in his book Healing from Hate.

Protecting the Nation

Today’s nationalists claim to protect their countries against threats, real or imagined. Some leaders, like Donald Trump or Viktor Orbán in Hungary, present themselves as the defenders of “Western” or “European civilization.” They mobilize supporters using fear of “outsiders,” who include (depending on the country): refugees, economic migrants, people of color, Jews, Muslims, feminists, gay people, and EU bureaucrats.

Nationalist leaders are adept at stirring up anti-refugee or anti-migrant sentiment, while presenting themselves as the only ones capable of halting the uncontrollable wave of foreigners. Trump has done so with Executive Order 13769, his ban on travelers to the US from several Muslim-majority countries, and with his pledge to build a wall along the border with Mexico. In the United Kingdom, it was partly anger at migrants from other EU countries that led people to vote for Brexit. In Hungary and Poland, politicians have spread fear of refugees from the Middle East, with Jarosław Kaczyński, the chairman of the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, warning that migrants carry “parasites and protozoa.”

These general messages carry a gender subtext, implicitly appealing to men’s traditional role as protectors and providers. The subconscious message is: if a foreigner takes your job, you will be unable to feed your family. Or worse: if the refugees come in and take our women, you will be unable to find a wife at all (note the dubious reference to “our” women, which implies ownership). This imagery was very present in right-wing coverage of migration in Europe, especially after the New Year’s Eve attacks in Cologne at the end 2015. A few weeks later, wSieci, a Polish pro-government weekly, ran a cover on the “Islamic rape of Europe” showing a white woman being grabbed from different directions by dark, manly arms. Yet rather than expressing concern about women’s safety, this type of imagery was addressed to men, asserting their entitlement to the women in their country. A Polish journalist who covered the refugee story says that she received threats from men on social media along the lines of “you should be raped by a refugee.” Sadly, this combination of anti-immigration nationalism and verbal violence against women is not uncommon.

Having created a sense of threat, nationalist leaders appeal to men to protect their nation. This involves what feminist scholars call “militarized masculinity,” the idea that real men are those who defend the fatherland. The examples from different countries vary, but they share a fixation on military heroism and national virility. In Russia, militarism has been rekindled under Putin. In Finland, a far-right group called the “Soldiers of Odin” founded in 2015 has been caught intimidating immigrants. Meanwhile, investigative journalists in Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary have drawn attention to the “militarization of patriotism” in their societies through nationalist paramilitary groups and historical reconstructions. In Poland, “militarized masculinity” is supported by the government’s official historical policy. This includes the cult of anti-communist resistance fighters from the 1940s known as the “cursed soldiers” (mostly male), who have been presented as a model for young Poles to emulate.

Perpetuating the Nation

Earlier this year, Hungary’s Prime Minister Orbán, announced a low-interest loan of 10 million forints (around €30,000) to women under the age of 40 who are marrying for the first time. Mothers of at least four children would be exempt from income tax. The aim of these measures, Orbán explained, was to “ensure the survival of the Hungarian nation.”

If, from nationalists’ perspective, men’s role is to protect the nation, then women’s role is to perpetuate it. With Europe experiencing low birth rates, some governments have been encouraging people to have children. In countries like Hungary, which has an aging population and a fertility rate below the EU average of 1.59 births per woman, policies that help people have children (if they so wish) might make sense. In Poland, which also has a low fertility rate, the PiS government has combined natalism with generous welfare policies since coming to power in 2015. Its flagship policy is a monthly payment of 500 złoty (around €120) per child. “Children and the family are the foundation of Poland,” said Beata Szydło, the country’s deputy prime minister, announcing further policies to encourage women to have children last year. “We must ensure … that more and more children are born in Poland.”

The problem with this rhetoric is that it frames the decision to have children in terms of national survival, rather than women’s rights, choices, and aspirations. At worst, it reduces women to vessels for producing the next generation. Women who have at least four children are “rewarded” for their heroic efforts—with the tax exemption in Hungary and a state pension in Poland. Meanwhile, there is a lack of serious discussion about men’s responsibilities as fathers or, indeed, how the government could help citizens combine fruitful careers with their roles as parents.

This natalism is underpinned by social conservatism on a range of issues, from women’s right to a safe abortion to gender roles. In May, Alabama became the latest US state to move to restrict abortions, including in cases of rape or incest. Under pressure from the Catholic Church, Poland’s ruling party mulled a similar tightening of the country’s restrictions on abortion, but backed down temporarily following widespread protests by women. At the same time, the party has terminated public funding for in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment. It has championed families, but only of the traditional sort. In Germany, the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) has opposed what it calls “gender mainstreaming”— policies that it sees as undermining “traditional gender roles.” Similarly, the Polish religious right has long viewed the English word “gender” with suspicion, using it as a catch-all term for everything from feminism to gay rights. Ahead of the European Parliament elections this year, the ruling Law and Justice party sought to mobilize voters by presenting gay people as a threat to the family.

The underlying theme in nationalist populists’ attitude to women is the control of their bodies, which is not limited to childbirth. Despite the outcry against them, Trump’s comments about women (“Grab them by the pussy”) have validated misogynist and predatory attitudes in some circles. Verbal violence against women can easily lead to physical violence. Yet violence against women, especially in the privacy of their homes, is often met with silence. In 2017, Russia decriminalized domestic violence, scrapping prison sentences for beatings that cause “minor harm.” In Poland, PiS politicians have criticized the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence, which the country’s previous president ratified in 2015.

How We Can Respond

Male-driven nationalist populism has resulted in a backlash. Over the past year, the #MeToo campaign has spread beyond the US. In Poland, widespread protests by women halted plans on the conservative right to tighten the restrictions on abortion. Slowly, a new generation of progressive women leaders is emerging, from Alexandria Ocasio Cortez in the US to Zuzanna Caputova, who was elected president of Slovakia this year.

For all these successes, nationalism requires a broader response that addresses its allure to certain groups, especially young men. The nationalists’ simple solutions to global economic, social, and demographic challenges cannot be fought off with clever one-liners on Twitter. Nor can citizens’ fears be brushed aside. Although they are exploited by nationalist leaders, some of them nevertheless reflect genuine concerns. Instead, the challenges themselves must be addressed at the local, national, and, where applicable, the European level.

As this essay has shown, there is a complex relationship between nationalism and gender is an important topic that warrants further research by sociologists, psychologists, and economists, with data-driven studies on specific countries. For now, there are three general ways in which governmental and, where necessary, non-governmental actors should respond:

Firstly, women’s rights should be protected where they are threatened by nationalist-minded leaders and policies. Childbearing should always be a choice, rather than a national duty expected of women.

Secondly, democratic participation should be encouraged among all members of society, with a special focus on young people, including young men in disadvantaged areas. This will help their voices be heard through public channels and democratic elections, making them less likely to turn to aggressive or underground nationalist organizations. Children should be taught that there are many ways to be a good citizen, from helping others to picking up rubbish in the park, which do not involve dressing up as soldiers or shouting nationalist slogans.

Thirdly, the root causes of nationalism must be addressed calmly but seriously. There are few easy solutions, but they should include addressing the economic and demographic changes in Europe and the US, with special attention given to vulnerable groups such as young men who might seek solace in nationalism.

Ultimately, this is not a battle between nationalists and their opponents, or between men and women, but about creating societies in which all people feel safe and welcome, and where nationalism is no longer appealing.

N.B. The German version of this essay can be found here.

The post Where Gender Meets Nationalism appeared first on Berlin Policy Journal - Blog.

Artwork © Dominik Herrmann

The mayoral election in Warsaw on October 21, 2018, was really between two candidates: Rafał Trzaskowski and PiS’s candidate Patryk Jaki, a bold 33-year-old deputy minister of justice. Despite Jaki’s energetic campaign, Trzaskowski won with over 56 percent of the vote, compared to Jaki’s 28 percent. That Warsaw chose the more liberal candidate is itself not surprising. Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, the city’s mayor since 2006 who decided not to run for a fourth term, was also a member of the liberal Civic Platform (PO) party. Yet the scope of Trzaskowski’s victory was unexpected; earlier, polls had suggested that he would need a second round two weeks later to beat Jaki.

His victory was greeted as a sign that PiS has reached a limit, at least in urban areas. PiS came first in the country’s sixteen regional assemblies, ahead of the PO-led centrist coalition. Yet it did poorly in the major cities, including Warsaw.

“A certain type was stopped,” Trzaskowski told Berlin Policy Journal in an interview, speaking English (one of his many languages) with an American accent. “People thought that PiS is indestructible, so this gave people a sense of empowerment, a sense that their vote counts. There was an incredible mobilization.”

Indeed, the voter turnout in Warsaw was almost 67 percent, compared to 47 percent in the previous local elections in 2014, and 54.8 percent of voters in Poland overall. That means that 250,000 more people voted this time. This record turnout reflects the sharp polarization between PiS and PO and the high stakes in Warsaw, both practical and symbolic. After the president, the post is the most high-profile directly elected post in Poland. Indeed, Lech Kaczyński—the late twin brother of PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński—served as mayor of Warsaw from 2002 until 2005 before being elected president of Poland.

A Warsaw native, Trzaskowski grew up in an intellectual household in the city’s Old Town. His father, Andrzej Trzaskowski, was a jazz composer, and his great-grandfather Bronisław a 19th century linguist. The young Trzaskowski studied English and International Relations at Warsaw University. After a Masters at the College of Europe’s branch in Natolin, Warsaw, he worked as a lecturer and wrote his PhD on the European Union. In the run-up to Poland’s EU accession in 2004, he was an adviser to the secretary of the European Integration Committee’s Office and then to PO’s delegation to the European Parliament.

High Achiever

His political debut came in 2009, when he was elected as an MEP. He stepped down in 2013 to become a minister in Tusk’s government, responsible for administration and digitization. When Tusk left for Brussels in 2014, Trzaskowski became deputy foreign minister for European affairs. But one year later, PiS won the parliamentary elections, forcing Trzaskowski and PO into opposition. While PiS busied itself overhauling the Polish public media and judiciary, Trzaskowski found that he could now do relatively little as an MP.

“My decision to run for mayor of Warsaw was simple. I was in parliament for three years. It was incredibly frustrating, with the government just disregarding the opposition,” he says. “I am in politics because I want to change the reality. I’m not there just to wander around the corridors or be on TV. So, I decided that if you want to change reality, you’ve got to be where the fight is.”

As mayor, Trzaskowski plans to focus on twelve areas, from free nurseries for all children in the Polish capital to fighting smog via better public transport and more greenery. “My program is about quality of life in Warsaw, focusing on the disabled, senior citizens, education, and sustainable growth. There is so much to be achieved,” he says.

For Trzaskowski, this represents a shift away from Gronkiewicz-Waltz’s emphasis on large infrastructure projects, toward smaller tweaks that make the city more liveable and inclusive. In 2019, Warsaw will have a budget of over 18 billion złoty (€4.2 billion), including a record 4.4 billion for education―though Trzaskowski is hoping for EU funds to help expand the city’s metro network. He also plans to appoint a representative for women’s affairs and to work with the local LGBT community.

“Islands of Freedom”

“With PiS governing Poland, there are these islands of freedom that you can develop against the prevailing trend,” he adds, referring to how urban voters have pushed back against PiS’s social conservatism and disregard for judicial independence.

As an expert on EU politics in both theory and practice, Trzaskowski is critical of how the Polish government has handled its dispute with the European Commission over its reform of the Supreme Court, which officials in Brussels warn undermines the rule of law.

“The problem with them is that they are so unprofessional. They are losing battle after battle because there is no sense of ownership. The prime minister is not the one making the final decision, it’s Kaczyński,” he explains, referring to PiS’s chairman, who is considered Poland’s real leader. “If you want to be effective in the EU, sometimes you have to build coalitions, propose things, cooperate with others. They still think in terms of ‘us’ versus ‘them’.”

Although PiS figures, including Kaczyński, say they oppose a “Polexit,” Trzaskowski warns that the government’s behavior will marginalize Poland in the EU. “They do not understand that unless you build a community together, sooner or later you will be out of it, either formally or in reality,” he explains.

Cheer to the Opposition

As Poland gears up for parliamentary elections in late 2019, Trzaskowski’s victory has cheered up the opposition, though PiS continues to lead in country-wide polls. At a PO gathering with journalists at a restaurant in Warsaw in late November, the mood was optimistic. In 2015, winning the presidential election helped PiS win the parliamentary elections that autumn. Similarly, if PO does well in the European elections in May 2019, it could pick up the momentum needed to win the parliamentary elections that autumn, senior party figures suggested. After that, they hope that Tusk will run for president in 2020 and defeat the PiS-allied incumbent, Andrzej Duda. Tusk’s term as president of the European Council ends in late 2019, but he has so far not said whether he plans to return to Polish politics.

Ahead of its next confrontations with PiS, what has PO learned from the Warsaw mayoral elections? “Above all, that it’s very important to work a lot and mobilize,” Trzaskowski replies, referring to the high turnout in Warsaw and more generally. “You must focus on what you really want to achieve and not be distracted by the media or the Twitter bubble.”

Long branded an expert in politics rather than a politician, has Trzaskowski emerged from the Warsaw mayoral race now as the real thing? “I became a politician a long, long time ago, when I found that it is impossible to be an expert in politics,” he shrugs. “Even as an MEP, I found out that you cannot be half-pregnant. If you are a politician, you have to fully be a politician.”

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© Dominik Herrmann

Poland’s first openly gay city mayor, Robert Biedroń, is a fresh face on Poland’s political scene. He is well-traveled, multi-lingual, and secular, with human rights and sustainability as favorite subjects. While Poland has shifted to the right in recent years, Biedroń has been emerging as an icon of the liberal left. For the last three years, he has headed the administration of Słupsk, a city of 90,000 inhabitants on the Baltic coast of Poland. Now, the 41-year-old is tipped as a possible presidential candidate in the next election in 2020.

Biedroń’s popularity comes amid rising disillusionment among Polish liberals. Halfway through its parliamentary term, the governing Law and Justice Party (PiS) remains in the lead. One poll in October put support for the right-wing populist party at a record 47 percent, compared to 22 percent for the two main opposition parties combined. Meanwhile, many Polish liberals feel frustrated by the opposition’s lack of a convincing leader. Some hope that a “Polish Macron” will emerge to save Poland from the populist right. If Biedroń manages to capture those hopes, he could play a major role in Polish politics in the years ahead.

For all his urban image, Biedroń knows small-town Poland well. He was born in 1976 near Krosno, in the country’s rural, conservative southeast – now a PiS stronghold. As a gay teenager in the 1990s, he initially hid his sexual orientation, including at home. Visiting Berlin in 1995, he sought out Mann-O-Meter, an organization that provides help and advice for gay men. That trip spurred a lasting commitment to LGBT rights. In 2001, Biedroń founded his own organization, Campaign Against Homophobia. It now has branches in cities across Poland. Over the years, he has held a range of related roles in Poland and internationally, including general rapporteur on the rights of LGBT people at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

His Heart Beats on the Left

Politically, Biedroń says his heart beats on the left, a bold admission in today’s Poland, where “leftist-liberal” is a common insult on the right. He first got involved with the social democratic party while studying political science at university. His breakthrough came in 2011, when he was elected to parliament through a left-wing party led by eccentric businessman Janusz Palikot. Three years later he ran for mayor of Słupsk, now as an independent. He won 58 percent of the vote in the second round, beating the candidate from the Civic Platform, one of Poland’s main opposition parties. His campaign centered on local issues; his private life did not play a role.

These days, many Poles’ primary association with Słupsk is Biedroń. As mayor, he has cultivated his image as a progressive by focusing on sustainable development: One of his advisers is a former leader of the Polish Green party. His development strategy envisions Słupsk as a “green city of the new generation.” Biedroń has made headlines with a series of animal-friendly gestures as well, for example preventing a circus with animals from performing in town. He is also known for cycling to work. Biedroń admits this kind of behavior might not raise eyebrows in a country like Sweden; in Poland, though, it still makes news.

From Słupsk, Biedroń has been a firm critic of the PiS government. The governing party is locked in a protracted dispute with the European Union, which is accusing Warsaw of undermining the rule of law. For Biedroń, the antidote to PiS’s power grab is to bolster civil society. “Whatever happens in public life ought to interest us, because that public life – politics – will sooner or later knock on our door,” he said at a popular music festival this summer. While he remains upbeat about Poland’s political future, he is aware that PiS’s controversial changes will not be reversed overnight. “Poles need to be told that normality will not return at once,” he warned in an in-depth interview published last year, suitably entitled Pod Prąd (Against the Current). “What has been damaged over the years cannot be rebuilt in a few months.”

On the Fringes, for Now

Meanwhile, he has kept his distance from Poland’s centrist opposition, which remains split between two main parties – the Civic Platform (PO), Donald Tusk’s former party, and Nowoczesna, a more liberal party founded in 2015. In Pod Prąd, Biedroń did not mince words about Poland’s previous PO-led government: During its eight years in power, PO “invested in cement, but did not crush mental cement,” he said. This reflects political differences between Biedroń and the two opposition parties, including their reluctance to stand up for LGBT rights. There is a tactical element as well: By guarding his independence, Biedroń remains untarnished by the opposition’s shortcomings. In a recent radio interview, he urged the leaders of PO and Nowoczesna to get their acts together and present an attractive alternative to PiS. “I invite them to Słupsk – I’ll show them how it’s done,” he quipped.

For now, Biedroń has remained on the fringes of Polish national politics, focusing on tangible changes in Słupsk. Yet many hope that he will take a stand when the right time comes. When Andrzej Duda, the PiS candidate, was elected president in 2015, Biedroń posted on Facebook: “Today modern Poland lost. […] The president of the future will be chosen in five years’ time. We’ll manage!” More than 50,000 people liked the post; Biedroń’s supporters urged him to run in 2020.

A Presidential Hopeful?

Polls already place him among the top three favorites for president after Duda and Tusk. A poll this summer put Biedroń in third place, with 16 percent, behind current president Andrzej Duda, who had 36 percent, and Tusk with 21 percent. With Duda just halfway through his term, many questions remain. The biggest is whether Tusk will run for president, as his supporters hope. His second term as president of the European Council ends in November 2019, too late to lead PO in the parliamentary elections due that autumn, but in time to launch a presidential campaign.

For now, Poland is gearing up for local elections in late 2018. Biedroń says he wants to win a second term in Słupsk, despite earlier speculation on the left that he might be a good candidate for the mayor of Warsaw. Biedroń has not yet committed to running for the presidency either. Yet polls like the one that put him clearly ahead of Poland’s struggling left-wing parties indicate that he does have broader appeal.

Following the presidential election in France this summer, Biedroń posted a meme on Facebook featuring photos of Macron and himself on their bikes side by side. “Supposedly similar,” his caption read. Again, the comments below the post were enthusiastic.

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© REUTERS/Kacper Pempel

As it grapples with Brexit, the European Union faces another challenge in its east: two member states that are not leaving, but are increasingly unwilling to play by the rules. These are Hungary and Poland, with Viktor Orbán and Jarosław Kaczyński at the helm. These two men are rolling back the gains of the countries’ paths to democracy after 1989, steadily undermining pluralism, checks and balances, and the rule of law. Orbán’s attack on the Central European University (CEU) in Budapest this spring is the latest embodiment of this tendency. This jars with the EU’s founding values, listed in Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union, which include democracy as well as respect for human rights and rule of law. European officials are getting fed up; Budapest and Warsaw want EU money, but not its values, some of them say. Yet they are not sure how to proceed.

The parallels between Hungary and Poland are not accidental. In recent years, the hard right in both countries has embraced the legend of a historical Polish-Hungarian friendship. Hungarian nationalists attend the annual Polish Independence Day march in Warsaw; Polish nationalists have made pilgrimages to Hungary. Poland’s Law and Justice party (PiS), which has been in power since late 2015, has long admired Orbán for his ability to win elections and get things done. When PiS previously lost the parliamentary elections in 2011, Kaczyński told supporters that he was “deeply convinced that the day will come when we will have Budapest on the Vistula,” the river running through Warsaw.

The problem is not new. Orbán and his Fidesz party have been eroding democracy in Hungary since he became prime minister in 2010. Upon coming back to power, Kaczyński’s PiS set out to emulate his changes. Critics were quick to spot signs of Orbánization in Poland.

Breakneck Speed

PiS’s first targets – the constitutional tribunal and the public media – seemed to be straight from Orbán’s rule book, implemented at breakneck speed. The tribunal, which is supposed to strike down unconstitutional laws, was paralyzed. The public television broadcaster became a mouthpiece for the government. In Hungary, the pluralism of the private media has suffered too. Poland still has a vibrant, though highly polarized, media landscape, but liberal publications fear that PiS will try to suffocate them economically, citing Hungary as an example.

Hungarian and Polish leaders also share suspicion of NGOs, especially ones linked to George Soros, the Hungarian-American philanthropist. Orbán, himself a CEU graduate, has waged a long campaign against foreign-funded NGOs, accusing staff of harboring “paid political activists who are trying to help foreign interests here.” The Polish government has been working on plans to introduce a National Center for the Development of Civil Society, which would allocate state funds for NGOs. Organizations working on women’s and LGBT rights fear that it would help PiS redirect funds to conservative ones.

The result is that Budapest and Warsaw have emerged as an illiberal front within the EU, to use Orbán’s own phrase. PiS, which shares his hostility toward refugees and appetite for one-party rule, has done nothing to dissociate itself from these associations. One PiS minister told me that after “socialist democracy” in his youth followed by “liberal democracy,” he simply wants “democracy without adjectives.” More recently, one of his colleagues explained that there are different “flavors” of democracy across the EU, contrasting the one in, say, the Netherlands to that embodied by PiS.

Orbán and Kaczyński have gone so far as to call for a “cultural counter revolution” in the EU. Despite the difference in age and language, their joint appearance at a forum in the Polish mountain resort of Krynica last autumn looked like it had been rehearsed beforehand.  “There is a saying in Hungary that if you trust somebody, ‘you can steal horses together,’” said Orbán. At that, Kaczyński retorted that there is a “particularly large [stable] called the EU, where we can steal horses with Hungarians.”

The EU’s Dilemma

The growing illiberalism in Hungary and Poland has not gone unnoticed abroad. International human rights and press freedom defenders have sounded alarm bells. Freedom House, the American watchdog, entitled its 2017 report on democracy in the former Eastern Bloc “The False Promise of Populism,” singling out the situation in Hungary and Poland. Their example is a reminder that democratization is reversible, even in countries that are now members of the EU. Some observers fear that Orbán and Kaczyński will spur on populists in the region and beyond. In an interview with Polish daily Rzeczpospolita in the run-up to the French election, Marine Le Pen indicated that she views the duo as allies. “If I am president tomorrow, I will start a debate with Orbán on what seems impermissible in the EU,” she said. Kaczyński would receive the same offer, she added.

EU officials have been watching, too, unsure how best to respond. Brussels has long lost the leverage it had in the 1990s, when Budapest and Warsaw were prepping for membership. These days, it can fall back on the rule of law framework adopted by the European Commission in March 2014, in response to developments in Hungary and elsewhere. If dialog with the member state fails, there is the last resort Article 7 procedure, which can be activated if there is a “clear risk of a serious breach” of rule of law. At its most severe, it suspends a member state’s voting rights.

The past year has shown that the Commission is still learning to wield its new tool. The procedure was launched in January 2016 in response to PiS’s actions toward the constitutional tribunal. Since then, Warsaw and Brussels have been engaged in an awkward dance, adapting their steps as they go along. The Commission has trod carefully, fearful of provoking an anti-EU backlash in Poland. The Polish government has responded with more defiance, pushing on with its revolution at home, with no sign of slowing down.  Sovereignty is the mot du jour. In a speech in parliament after the Commission issued a negative opinion on the tribunal last May, Prime Minister Beata Szydło used the word 20 times in 23 minutes. Overall, Brussels’ hesitation has emboldened the leadership in Warsaw and Budapest, as the latest incident with CEU shows.

Orbán is in a better position than Poland’s leaders, though. For all his talk, he is well connected in Europe. His party is a member of the European People’s Party (EPP), along with Donald Tusk, Jean-Claude Juncker, and Angela Merkel. PiS, which is in the smaller European Conservatives and Reformists Party, cannot tap into this broad European network. PiS party chief  Kaczyński – he holds no office in the government – may be a skilled politician, but that stops at Poland’s borders. He rarely travels abroad and lacks Orbán’s charm. This difference was apparent as the European Parliament debated the situation in Hungary on April 26, 2017. Orbán, who had traveled to Strasbourg, defended his position articulately. It is difficult to imagine Kaczyński defending PiS’s actions like that.

Reluctance to Rock the Boat

In the Hungarian case, the EPP probably has the most clout. Stripped of its place in this mainstream political club, Fidesz would be significantly more vulnerable. There have been calls for the big European players in the EPP to put pressure on Orbán through credible threats. So far, though, they have appeared reluctant to rock the boat.

Meanwhile, as it focuses on Brexit, the EU may end up leaving the Polish government to its own devices. Warsaw and Brussels are playing a longer-term game. Some observers suggest that, rather than punish PiS, the Commission should simply wait for PiS to lose in elections, perhaps even in late 2019, when the next ones are scheduled to take place. This carries risks of its own, though. Even if the opposition wins then, PiS may have caused lasting damage to Poland’s institutions, which will take years to repair. Credibility may be difficult to rebuild, too, even with a new team in charge. Moreover, Warsaw’s growing isolation within Europe may have taken its own toll.

The past few weeks have highlighted cracks in the Polish-Hungarian friendship, which PiS banked on in the past. Its foundations were always shaky; the two countries differ on Russia, with Warsaw uncomfortable with Orbán’s chumminess with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Now the myth has been shattered by the debacle over Donald Tusk’s reappointment as president of the European Council in March. When the Polish government attempted to block it, Orbán sided with the other member states, unwilling to lose face himself.

Even if commissioners hold their breath on Poland, Europe will not. In the run-up to Brexit, EU leaders are mulling the bloc’s future. This may involve a version of the two-speed Europe, long feared by Poland, which, like Hungary, remains outside the eurozone. If PiS sulks, integration could continue without it. Polls in Poland since the Tusk debacle show the centrist Civic Platform (PO), his former party, catching up with PiS. This suggests that voters are realizing how badly PiS could damage Poland’s position in Europe and want to prevent it while they can.

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The PiS government is refiguring Poland’s foreign policy, even if much of its stressing Polish “sovereignty” is for domestic consumption. With Brexit looming, however, old and new questions need answers.

© REUTERS/Kacper Pempel

Last November Poland’s new prime minister spoke to the press in front of a row of flags – just Polish ones, as the EU flags had been removed. Beata Szydlo of the right-wing Law and Justice party (PiS), which had won the parliamentary elections a month earlier, explained that from now on her press conferences would be held “against a backdrop of the most beautiful white and red flags.” This gesture was largely forgotten in the months that followed, yet it set the tone for the new Polish government’s foreign policy, with its newfound emphasis on “sovereignty”. As the EU heads toward Brexit and potential reform, this is the word Poland’s partners in Europe can expect to hear…

Read more in the Berlin Policy Journal App – September/October 2016 issue.

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In the wake of Brexit, all eyes are on the President of 
the European Council. There is speculation that 
he – rather than European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker – will be the one to lead negotiations 
in Britain’s “divorce” with the EU. He would be a 
trusted ally for German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose weariness of hasty steps toward further European integration he shares.

© Artwork: Dominik Herrmann

Known for his pragmatism, Donald Tusk nevertheless responded to the result of the British referendum with emotion. “The day after Brexit, I felt as if someone very close to me had left our home, and in the same second I felt also how dear and precious this home was to me,” the president of the European Council, the group of the EU’s heads of state or government, told reporters in Brussels, pointing out that the decision involved feelings – not just procedures. His language echoes the idea of Poland’s EU membership as a “return to Europe,” or homecoming from behind the Iron Curtain.

Still, in the run-up to the referendum, Tusk’s view was more sober than that of others in Brussels. Speaking almost a month before the vote, he criticized EU leaders for their “utopian” illusions of a united Europe. “Obsessed with the idea of instant and total integration, we failed to notice that ordinary people, the citizens of Europe, do not share our euro-enthusiasm,” he said.

Tusk’s pro-European pragmatism has its roots in his career in Polish politics, which reaches back to the fall of communism in 1989 and beyond. He was born in Gdansk, on Poland’s Baltic coast, in 1957. While studying history at the university there, he become involved in the Solidarity movement. After a decade of political activity in the 1990s, he co-founded the center-right, pro-European Civic Platform (PO) party in 2001. In 2007 PO won the parliamentary elections, forming a coalition with the agrarian People’s Party (PSL) that would govern for eight years. This win marked the start of a string of electoral victories for PO, brought to an end by the election of Andrzej Duda of the right-wing Law and Justice party (PiS) as president in May 2015.

“Warm Water in the Tap”

As prime minister from 2007 to 2014, Tusk became known for his practical approach to governing, embodied in what he called the policy of “warm water in the tap.” This involved focusing on gradually raising living standards for Poles, with the help of EU funds, rather than pursuing grand ideological projects. After two years of unpredictable rule by PiS in 2005-07, Tusk’s party offered the promise of stability. In foreign policy, this involved pursuing a more pragmatic, less confrontational policy towards Berlin and Moscow, led by Radosław Sikorski, Tusk’s foreign minister.

The appeal of “warm water in the tap” had its limits, though. The PO-led coalition was re-elected in 2011, with Tusk staying on as prime minister. Yet as the years went by, critics accused PO of increasingly scaring voters with the prospect of PiS’s return, rather than attracting them on its own merits. PO’s vagueness, originally an asset, came to be seen by observers as more of a weakness. Its ratings slid, and in October 2015 the party, led by Tusk’s successor Ewa Kopacz, was ousted by PiS, which won enough seats to become the first party in Poland since 1989 to govern alone.

By then, Tusk was in Brussels, where he moved in late 2014 to take up his current job as president of the European Council, tasked with forging consensus between the leaders of the 28 member states. The second person to hold the job, he succeeded former Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy. The race narrowed down to Tusk and Helle Thorning-Schmidt, the center-left prime minister of Denmark at the time. Though Thorning-Schmidt was viewed favorably by both British Prime Minister David Cameron and Angela Merkel, the German chancellor ended up voicing her support for Tusk, with whom she had developed a good relationship during his years as prime minister.

Steep Learning Curve

In Brussels, Tusk was something of a novelty: an outsider from beyond the EU bubble, from a country that had joined the EU in 2004 and was not a member of the eurozone. It was a steep learning curve, with his first year on the job dominated by crises, in particular Greek debt and migration. Amid these challenges, Tusk has shown himself to be a pro-European realist. This can be seen in a speech he gave at the Bruegel think tank in Brussels a year ago, when he said that “we should defend Europe here and now, the Europe that exists in reality, and not as an ideal appearing in the dreams and visions of ultra-European ideologists.” European leaders should improve the system that exists, rather than fall back on “revolutionary thinking and sudden system changes,” he explained.

This year Tusk has also faced the dispute between Poland and the European Commission, which in January launched a formal review into whether PiS’s changes to the Constitutional Tribunal violate the rule of law. Tusk has kept his distance, warning early on that a heavy-handed response by Brussels could further damage relations with Poland’s right-wing government. Meanwhile, Warsaw is speculating about Tusk’s political future, namely whether PiS will back Tusk for a second term starting in mid-2017. The dilemma boils down to whether it is better for PiS to sabotage Tusk’s career in Brussels or have him conveniently out of Poland until after the next parliamentary elections, due in October 2019. A second term would still give him time to run for president of Poland in 2020 – as some in his old party, PO, hope he will.

For PiS, Brexit has been the latest opportunity to lash out against Tusk, whom its leadership also blames for the Smolensk plane crash in 2010, which killed then-president Lech Kaczyński and 95 others. The party’s leader Jarosław Kaczyński (Lech’s twin brother) has said that Tusk is “directly responsible” for the result and ought to “disappear from European politics.” While Kaczyński affirmed that Poland’s place is in the EU, he added that the referendum shows the need for deep reform of the EU, perhaps including a new treaty.

Looking Ahead to Brexit

The result of the British referendum is a regrettable setback for Tusk – for whom keeping Britain in the EU was a priority when taking over as president of the European Council. Yet his reaction has been marked by humility and a willingness to learn. For the EU, this should be an occasion to reflect on its future, he has said. Meanwhile, he has not adopted the abrasive approach of some European leaders, aware that – like in the conflict between the Polish government and Brussels – that could be counterproductive. In this way, his approach is closer to Merkel’s, who warned that the EU should not rush to conclusions from the British referendum that could deepen divisions.

Choppy waters are ahead. It is still unclear when Britain will invoke Article 50 to leave the EU. In the intervening months, Tusk will continue to play the role of crisis manager, dealing with both London and the 27 other member states. In the face of these daunting challenges, he has put on a stoic face. “I always remember what my father used to tell me: what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger,” he said as the results came in on the morning of June 24. And in these times of unprecedented uncertainty for the EU, Tusk’s old policy of “warm water in the tap” may yet hold considerable appeal.

Read more in the Berlin Policy Journal App – July/August 2016 issue.

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