Polish Domestic Politics Trapped in a Culture War
Poland is an economic success story, with three decades of uninterrupted growth. Domestically, however, the country is becoming increasingly paralysed by the confrontation between opposing political camps. There is a growing risk that the government will remain trapped in this state of paralysis until the parliamentary elections scheduled for next year.
Three years after the end of Law and Justice (PiS)'s eight-year rule, Poland's political situation is becoming increasingly contradictory. Donald Tusk returned to power in 2023 with a pledge to restore the rule of law, reverse the institutional changes introduced by the previous government, and bring the country closer to the European mainstream. Political change, however, has proved considerably more difficult than changing the government. Warsaw is now the scene of a protracted struggle for power and a deeply divided society.
The governing coalition's biggest problem is that its shared opposition goal – removing PiS from power – failed to create lasting agreement on the most important issues of social policy. Alongside Tusk's Civic Coalition, the Polish People's Party, Poland 2050 and the New Left make up the governing majority. However, the former electoral alliance, the Third Way, has since broken up, while Poland 2050 itself has split in two. Meanwhile, support for the coalition's smaller parties has fallen significantly. In an October CBOS poll, the Civic Coalition stood at 28.6 per cent, while none of the smaller governing parties managed to reach the five per cent parliamentary threshold on its own. As the election approaches, this creates a serious strategic dilemma. The parties must decide whether to run on a joint list or risk standing separately. The latter option could weaken the parliamentary position of the entire governing camp.
The coalition parties represent different social and ideological constituencies, and their positions are difficult to reconcile on several key elements of the joint government programme. This is particularly evident on reproductive rights. Before the 2023 election, Tusk and his more liberal coalition partners promised to liberalise Poland's abortion laws, but the parliamentary majority has been unable to agree on the most important changes. Resistance from the more conservative Polish People's Party had already blocked broader liberalisation. The issue has therefore become both a social-policy and a credibility problem for the government: voters demanding change are increasingly unwilling to accept the fact that the government has merely kept the issue on the political agenda.
On 20 October, however, parliament passed two bills providing for limited liberalisation. One would narrow the scope of criminal liability for healthcare professionals who assist women in obtaining abortions, while the other would once again allow termination of pregnancy in cases of severe and irreversible foetal abnormalities. Both proposals fall far short of the campaign promise to allow abortion on request during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy. Their prospects are also uncertain, as President Karol Nawrocki has previously made it clear that he does not support liberalising abortion laws. The government does not have the three-fifths parliamentary majority required to override a presidential veto.
The abortion issue has become one of the most important symbols of Poland's deep social divisions, illustrating just how difficult it is to translate political change into institutional and legal reform. Following the parliamentary votes, demonstrations were held in more than twenty cities across the country in October. Some protesters opposed the continued restrictions, while others criticised the government for failing, in their view, to deliver on its promises to restore women's rights. Some activists regard the newly passed bills as little more than pre-election political gestures rather than genuine reform.
The political deadlock is further deepened by the fact that Tusk's government is in conflict not only with its own coalition partners but also with the president elected in 2025. Karol Nawrocki won the presidential election with PiS backing and has since become a key political ally of the opposition right. His veto power allows him to block legislation that would otherwise form an essential part of the government's electoral programme. As a result, judicial reform has run into difficulties alongside the proposed liberalisation of abortion laws. The government promised to restore the judicial system reshaped during the PiS era, but the conflict between the president and the government, together with disputes surrounding the constitutional institutions, has severely limited progress on rule-of-law reforms.
Tusk's coalition remains operational, but the weakening of its smaller partners, social-policy disputes and conflicts with the president are gradually narrowing its room for manoeuvre. Meanwhile, the (far) right has not been pushed out of power: PiS has retained considerable influence through the presidency, while more radical nationalist forces remain competitive players in Polish politics. The next parliamentary election, once again, will be about whether Poland can move beyond the ideological struggle that has dominated its politics since 2015, or whether successive electoral cycles will continue to revolve around dismantling the previous political order, only to rebuild it again.
