In 1803, the Supreme Court of the U.S. gave a judgment in the case of Marbury v. Madison. The 220th anniversary of this event is a good occasion to describe the Polish model of constitutional review in the context of the American-style model. Although most countries have written constitutions, their constitutional review models can vary significantly. This research study was conducted to illustrate similarities and differences between the American and European models of constitutional review. In the study, the model of constitutional review in the United States and Poland was analysed. The author’s result of analyses of respective provisions of constitution and case-law in these countries presented that there are significant differences between the discussed models with regard to their organisation and functioning

In Poland, women in need of termination of pregnancy are exposed, through the practice of application of law, to systemic abuse by public authorities and sometimes institutional abuse by healthcare providers. This results in the search for institutions outside of Poland to protect their reproductive rights. Therefore, it seems reasonable to draw attention to the multifaceted nature of the rationale that the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has indicated in its judgments on the legal and factual state of legal abortion in Poland. This paper is an attempt to synthesize the manifestations, indicated by the ECtHR, of Poland’s violations of the provisions of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in matters relating to the termination of pregnancy. An analysis of the content of the judgments of the ECtHR and other source texts is used in this paper as the primary research method.

This article investigates the transmission and influence of the idea of crusade in Bohemia and Poland, pivotal in shaping East Central Europe’s religious, cultural, and political landscape during the Middle Ages. Exploring cultural exchanges, political alliances, and ecclesiastical influences, it reveals the mechanisms of this ideology’s dissemination and absorption in the Piast realm. It examines the nuanced transformation in attitudes and policies following the reception of the idea of crusade, contributing to a deeper understanding of the interplay between ideology and regional dynastic dynamics and its enduring impact on the Christian world.

The Role of the Belt and Road Initiative in Balancing Trade Relations between Poland and China: An Input-Output Analysis

Trade relations between Poland and China remain asymmetric. The introduction of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and its related formats was intended to balance trade relations between China and its trading partners. The study aims to track the value-added flows between Poland and China. Two research questions were posed: 1) whether Chinese initiatives aimed at balancing trade relations are reflected in more balanced flows of added value between Poland and China; 2) whether the role of Poland as a supplier of added value to China is growing as a result of the introduction of BRI and related initiatives. The study used Inter-Country Input-Output in input-output models. The findings show that Poland’s position in global production links with China has deteriorated in many industries and plays a minor role in the Chinese industry. On the other hand, BRI had a very limited impact on balancing the value-added flows between China and Poland only in a few industries.

Mobility of young adults from Central and Eastern European countries – a Polish-Czech-Slovak-Ukrainian comparative study

The young generation is treated as the future of society. This generation’s size, skills and knowledge, as well as economic activity, socio-cultural involvement, marital intentions and family (procreation) plans determine the quality of society. Thus, an important issue is the outflow of young people who decide to migrate abroad. It is therefore important to recognize both the current experiences and the life plans of the young generation in this field. In post-communist countries, the fall of the communist system had a major impact on the increase in mobility. Political, sociocultural and economic changes have contributed to the emergence of new migration-related phenomena and the so-called fluid migration, characterized by free movement of labour, massiveness, diversity and plasticity. The surveyed youth from Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia have experiences related to functioning within open borders, unlike the youth from Ukraine, where the borders are closed. Wioletta Danilewicz notices the existence of the so-called migration culture, i.e. the acceptance (by the participants of migration processes) that these are phenomena constituting an inherent element of their lives, despite their awareness of the unfavourable co-occurring elements. The research results presented in the text indicate that the surveyed young adults do not fully follow this trend.

The Visegrád Group (V4) countries in the face of the war in Ukraine. Defense diplomacy during the first year of the war

Tense Russian-Ukrainian relations, sparked by the annexation of Crimea in 2014 and Ukraine’s pro-European and pro-NATO ambitions, led to a Russian invasion on the country, significantly undermining the sense of security in the region. Especially the countries in close proximity to Ukraine, including Visegrad Group states, felt the threat from Russia and took a series of actions to provide a solid and decisive response to Moscow’s neo-imperial actions. The support extended had a multidimensional character, encompassing political, diplomatic, military, financial, and humanitarian areas, playing a fundamental role in sustaining Ukraine’s functioning and its military capabilities, particularly in the initial period after the invasion. The aim of the article is to synthetically depict, from a Polish perspective, the engagement of Visegrad Group countries in implementing the ideas and tasks of defense diplomacy in the first year of the war in Ukraine, from February 24, 2022, to February 24, 2023.

Memory nodes. The issue of the Katyn massacre in Polish-Russian relations

The article focuses on discussing the impact of the conditions regarding the Katyn massacre on the current relations between Warsaw and Moscow. The history of these two countries is characterized by a long and difficult past, which is why numerous unresolved disputes, burdens and myths have arisen and are still visible today, negatively affecting bilateral contacts. In 1989, right after the fall of the communist system in Poland, the new political elites, coordinating the process of democratic changes in our country, made efforts to sort out the controversial threads in the common Polish-Russian history. Without a doubt, the most important of them was the Katyn massacre. For the political elites of the Third Polish Republic, explaining the overall circumstances of those events was the most important goal of diplomatic activities undertaken towards the Kremlin. In Warsaw’s opinion, untangling this knot of memory from the history of relations between the two countries was supposed to help free them from past burdens and negative accumulations and contribute to strengthening friendship in current times. Unfortunately, it quickly turned out that this topic soon became one of the main elements negatively burdening mutual relations.

Ukrainian political emigrants in Kalisz and Piotrków Trybunalski in the years 1920–1930 in the light of archival sources

In this article, the author considered the fate of Ukrainian political emigrants in the socio-economic life of Kalisz and Piotrków Trybunalski in the 1920s and 1930s. Apart from mentions in general works and articles about Ukrainian political emigration in Poland, there are several special studies devoted to Kalisz and Piotrków Trybunalski. This study was conducted primarily on the basis of documents processed by the author in the state archives of Lodz and Piotrków Trybunalski.

In 1951, the communist governments of Poland and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics concluded an agreement to exchange some territories. Poland transferred lands located in the Hrubieszów and Tomaszów counties in the Lublin Voivodeship in the upper Bug basin (the so-called Grzęda Sokalska). The USSR gave up the area in the Bieszczady Mountains east of the upper reaches of the San River, including the town of Ustrzyki Dolne. The mentioned areas were part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Areas of 480 km2 for each side were exchanged. Poland and the USRS had to evict their citizens from the ceded areas and take away their movable property. Soviet Ukraine resettled 32,066 people. Poland over 14 thousand its citizens. Both sides had to provide care and state assistance to the displaced population. However, the grief for the lost „small homelands” remained among Poles and Ukrainians. Only a few managed to return to their hometowns in the Bieszczady Mountains after 1957, including: to Łobozewo, Teleśnica Oszwarowa and Polana. The return involved a change of citizenship. The exchange of some territories is sometimes referred to as “Action H-T”, from the first letters of the names of the Hrubieszów and Tomaszów counties from which Polish citizens were expelled. In turn, the term “Action-51” appears in Ukrainian literature. The border change made in 1951 was the largest in the post-war history of Poland.

The process of settling accounts with the communist past is an answer to the question for countries that are leaving communism through peaceful negotiations with the authorities. In the case of the Polish control system, the first non-communist introduction by Tadeusz Mazowiecki, which is used as the socalled ‘thick line’, it leaked that the problem of lustration and decommunization had been postponed. In the subsequent years of the 1990s, verification tests among people performing the most important functions ended in failure. The most serious consequences occurred in the attempt to implement the lustration resolution by the Sejm in May 1992, which resulted from the failure of Jan Olszewski’s actions. The first lustration act was issued in Poland only in 1997.

Maritime policy and economy in the context of the activities of the Chinese-Polish Joint Stock Shipping Company

The article concerns the issue of Chinese-Polish economic cooperation in the maritime sector shown on the example of the Chinese-Polish Joint Stock Shipping Company. The article focuses on the factors that contributed to the establishment of business contacts and how the cooperation between the countries has developed over the more than 70 years of the company’s existence. It shows both the benefits that resulted from the cooperation and the political difficulties that the company’s existence generated. The article presents the operating principles of the company and the areas of joint activity are described in detail. In addition, the current state of Chinese-Polish economic relations is presented mainly through the prism of the company’s operation.

Model of Civic Education in the Republic of Austria

Civic education (politische Bildung) is one of the pillars of a democratic state. Austria, following German solutions, has created its own model of political education. The first part of the article outlines terminological issues in the light of Polish and German literature. Next, the conditions, goals and assumptions of civic education in Austria will be presented, with particular emphasis on its role in shaping civic competences. Further analysis of the Austrian model will allow the formulation of conclusions and recommendations, which may be impulses for further discussion in the face of the internationalization of science and transnational transfer of knowledge and competences, as well as for the implementation of innovative systemic solutions in the field of civic education.

The subject of research presented in the article is the system of government in Poland. The considerations concern the relationship between the normative solutions defined in the Constitution of the Republic of Poland of 1997 and the influence of the EU on the modification of political solutions in Poland. It was hypothesized that after Poland’s accession to the EU, the system of government in Poland changed in terms of political practice. It has been shown that functioning in the EU resulted in a departure from the characteristic rationalization of the system of government and brought it closer to the parliamentary model. The research was based on the following methods: institutional-law, systemic and comparative.

The legal platform for combating terrorism in Poland

This article addresses the issue of terrorism and its counteraction in Polish legislation. Its aim is to demonstrate how Polish law is prepared to prevent terrorist incidents and which agencies and authorities are responsible for these actions. The article applies the method of institutional-legal analysis. Based on it, conclusions can be drawn that Polish legislation is relatively well-prepared to combat terrorism.

To green Ukraine and to those green meadows... The Eastern borderlands of the Second Polish Republic as an object of sightseeing interest for Poles – an attempt at a summary

This article is an attempt to look at selected factors accounting for the popularity among Polish tourists a few years ago of the area known as the Eastern borderlands of the Second Polish Republic (Pol.: Kresy). Methodologically, the autoethnographic study involves an analysis of desk research (the 2019 CBOS survey and the observations made by other researchers). Starting from the CBOS quantitative data recording the scale of Poles’ trips in this direction, the author looks at selected qualitative circumstances which may, to some extent, be behind the preferences diagnosed in the survey, but also behind the broader interest in these sites. The considerations include the (geo)political reality, specific (Eastern borderland-like) experiences, Polish traces, literature, film and Galician and migration myths – assigned to three main thematic areas (Europeanization versus a good national self-sense, Polish traces, and literature, films and myths). Although the essence of the considerations seems to favour Ukraine, the “question of priority” was left – as it is the case in quantitative research – open, focusing on broadening the context of the whole issue.

The possibilities of archaeology and its input in research on the history of the Teutonic Order. The latest research achievements

The article presents the latest archaeological research related to the Teutonic Order. The main objects of the studies are castles and the obtained materials are the basis for cultural studies. An interest has been developed in everyday life, including the funeral rite. Within the last several years, there has been a significant increase of e interest on the part of Polish archaeologists in the Teutonic Knights. This has involved frequent examination of castles both well preserved and in poor condition, or virtually invisible. The researches have studied buildings of different ranks; the range of the performed works varied. The resource materials from the field works have often served as the starting point for studies of the material culture of the Teutonic Order. The scholars focused on various every-day-life issues like the use of ceramic dishes and the preferred diet. The continuation of the research on the field where the Battle of Grunwald took place provides new materials for further studies, and the discovery of burial sites of the alleged Grand Masters in Kwidzyn gave an impulse for investigation on the funeral rite in the Order.

The central claim of the paper is that the European Union, understood through the concept of Normative Power Europe, is a sui generis global actor that will not be successful in achieving its international goals unless it upholds its foundational values at home. Internal disputes among Member States over fundamental and core values weaken the organisation’s international standing, which may lead to the risk of the European Union losing its comparative strength that differentiates it from other global powers and that gives it a unique place in international politics. This is particularly important in the times of constant change in global politics and new security, political and economic challenges, such as the role of China, democratic backsliding in the Global South countries and the Russian aggression against Ukraine. All these call for a strong and effective European Union, which, we argue, will not be possible, unless the organisation is able to keep internal disputes at check by ensuring compliance with the values it is based on. Based the case study of Poland, the paper demonstrates that it may be difficult, if not impossible, for the European Union to effectively uphold the respect for its fundamental norms, principles and standards among its members. This in turn will impede the Normative Power Europe status.