POLISH FAMILIARIZATION COURSE

INTRODUCTION TO

REPUBLIC OF POLAND

                                                                                Flag and National Emblem of Poland

                                                                                                             Map of Poland

THE REPUBLIC OF POLAND

The Republic of Poland (Polish: Rzeczpospolita Polska), is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine and Belarus to the east; and the Baltic Sea, Lithuania and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north. It also shares a maritime border with Denmark and Sweden. The total area of Poland is 120,728 sq mi making it the 69th largest country in the world. 

Poland is sub-divided into 16 administrative regions known as voivodeships (województwa, singular - województwo): Wielkopolskie, Kujawsko-Pomorskie, Małopolskie, Łódzkie, Dolnośląskie, Lubelskie, Lubuskie, Mazowieckie, Opolskie, Podlaskie, Śląskie, Podkarpackie, Świętokrzyskie, Warmińsko-Mazurskie, Zachodniopomorskie.

GEOGRAPHY

The Polish landscape consists almost entirely of the lowlands of the Northern European Plain, at an average height of 173 meters. The Sudetes and the Carpathian Mountains (including the Tatra mountains, where one also finds Poland’s highest point, Rysy, at 2,499 m.) form the southern border. 

Several large rivers cross the plains: the Vistula (Wisła), Oder (Odra), Warta, and Bug rivers.  Poland also contains over 9,300 lakes, predominately in the north of the country.  Masuria forms the largest and most visited lake district in Poland. One quarter of Poland is forested. Most trees are evergreens. Most of the country’s original forest has been removed to create farms.

                      Tatra Mountains

CLIMATE

Poland enjoys a temperate climate, with cold, cloudy, moderately severe winters and mild summers with frequent showers and thunderstorms. The climate is influenced by oceanic air currents from the west and cold air from Scandinavia and Russia. In winter time the average temperatures drops below freezing point. Summer temperatures are generally moderate – an average July temperature is in 70 F. The temperature in Poland is given in Celsius. 

     Vistula River

POPULATION

The population of Poland is about 38 million. Formerly Poland played was a host to many languages, cultures and religious. However, after the World War II, Poland is the most homogenous country in Europe. Today 97 percent of its populations are Poles with small majority groups of Germans, Ukrainians, Byelorussians, Slovaks, Jews and Lithuanians. Poles are faithful followers of the Roman Catholic Church with 75 percent of population counting as practicing Catholics. The rest of the population consists mainly of Eastern Orthodox and Protestant religious minorities. Karol Wojtyła known as John Paul II was the first pope of Polish origin. The majority of Polish people live in cities with the largest being Warsaw, Łódź, Kraków, Wrocław, Poznań, Gdańsk and Szczecin.

           Warsaw - the Old Town

HISTORY

Poland began to form into a recognizable unitary and territorial entity around the middle of the tenth century under the Piast dynasty. Poland's first historically documented ruler, Mieszko I, was baptized in 966, adopting Catholic Christianity as the nation's new official religion, to which the bulk of the population converted in the course of the next centuries. In the twelfth century, Poland fragmented into several smaller states, which were later ravaged by the Mongol armies of the Golden Horde. In 1320, Władysław I became the King of a reunified Poland. His son, Casimir III, is remembered as one of the greatest Polish kings.

Poland was also a centre of migration of peoples and the Jewish community began to settle and flourish in Poland during this era. The Black Death which affected most parts of Europe from 1347 to 1351 did not reach Poland.

In the mid-seventeenth century, a Swedish invasion and Cossack's Chmielnicki Uprising ravaged the country and marked the end of the golden age. In 1807 Napoleon recreated a Polish state, the Duchy of Warsaw, but after the Napoleonic wars, Poland was again divided in 1815 by the victorious Allies at the Congress of Vienna.

Shortly after the surrender of Germany in November 1918, Poland regained its independence as the Second Polish Republic. It reaffirmed its independence after a series of military conflicts, the most notable being the Polish-Soviet War (1919-1921) when Poland inflicted a crushing defeat on the Red Army.

The 1926 May Coup of Józef Piłsudski turned the reins of the Second Polish Republic over to the Sanacja movement. It lasted until the start of World War II in 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded on September 1 and the Soviet Union followed on September 17. Of all the countries involved in the war, Poland lost the highest percentage of its citizens: over six million perished, half of them Polish Jews. Poland made the fourth-largest troop contribution to the Allied war effort.  At the war's conclusion, Poland's borders were shifted westwards, pushing the eastern border to the Curzon line. Meanwhile, the western border was moved to the Oder-Neisse line. The new Poland emerged 20% smaller by 29,900 sq mi. The shift forced the migration of millions of people, most of whom were Poles, Germans, Ukrainians, and Jews.

The Soviet Union instituted a new Communist government in Poland similar to much of the rest of the Eastern Bloc. Military alignment within the Warsaw Pact throughout the Cold War was also part of this change. In 1948, a turn towards Stalinism signaled the beginning of a new period of totalitarian rule. The People's Republic of Poland (Polska Rzeczpospolita Ludowa) was officially proclaimed in 1952.

Labor turmoil in 1980 led to the formation of the independent trade union "Solidarity" ("Solidarność"), which over time became a political force. It eroded the dominance of the Communist Party and by 1989 had triumphed in parliamentary elections. Lech Wałęsa, a Solidarity candidate, eventually won the presidency in 1990. The Solidarity movement heralded the collapse of communism across Eastern Europe.

After the peaceful changes in 1989 the first free elections after the World War II were held in 1990. Poland joined NATO alliance in 1999 and the European Union on 1 May 2004.

POLITICS

Poland is a liberal democracy, with a President as a Head of State, whose current constitution dates from 1997. The government structure centers on the Council of Ministers, led by a prime minister. The president appoints the cabinet according to the proposals of the prime minister, typically from the majority coalition in the bicameral judicial lower house (the Sejm). The president is electing by popular vote every five years. The judicial branch plays a minor role in decision making. Their major institutions include the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Tribunal.

ECONOMY

             Since the fall of communism, Poland has steadfastly pursued a policy of liberalizing the economy and today stands as one of the most successful and open examples of the transition from communism to a market economy. 

The privatization of small and medium state owned companies and a liberal law on establishing new firms have allowed for the rapid development of an aggressive private sector, but without any development of consumer rights organizations. Poland is a member of both IMF and the World Bank. The World Bank has been the key source of external support, strengthening the developmental potential of the country. Although the Polish economy is currently undergoing an economic boom there are many challenges ahead. The most notable task on the horizon is the preparation of the economy to allow the Poland to meet the strict economic criteria for entry into the European Single Currency. Poland might be ready to join the Eurosystem within the next decade

AGRICULTURE AND INDUSTRY

Before World War II Poland was an agriculture country. Presently, 49 percent of the land is cultivated with rye, wheat, oats, barley, potatoes, and sugar beets. About 13 percent of land is a pastureland. Dairy cattle, sheep and pigs are among major livestock.  Small farmers hold much of the land and communist’s attempts in past to turn farms into cooperative farms always fell. About 27 percent of the country’s labor force works in agriculture. Poland has a large agricultural sector of private farms that can be a leading producer of food in the European Union. 

In industry, priority is given to the production of iron, steal chemicals and electricity. Poland ranks fourth in the world in coal production and exports. Also, about 80 percent of electric power production comes from coal. The chemical industry is significant.  Sulfuric acid, salts, and fertilizer are major products. The Polish engineering industry produces a variety of items including ships, transport equipment, agricultural machinery and machine tools. The leading products for export are locomotives, freight wagons, automobiles, trucks, tractors, and ships. A large factory in Warsaw produces Polish Fiat automobiles. Textile production is a traditional branch of Polish industry, and linen and cotton textiles are exported.

TRANSPORTATION

            By Western European standards, Poland has a relatively poor infrastructure of expressways/highways. The Government has undertaken a program to improve the standard of a number of significant national highways by 2013. There are a total of 9,283,000 registered passenger automobiles, as well as 1,762,000 registered trucks and buses (2000).

            Poland is served by an extensive network of railways. In most cities the main railway station located near a city's center and is well connected to the local transportation system. The only high speed rail line in central-eastern Europe, Centralna Magistrala Kolejowa (Central Railway Route, length 221km), links Warsaw with Kraków and Katowice. Trains on the CMK achieve speeds of up to 160km/h. 

Poland has 8 major airports, a total of 122 airports and airfields, as well as 3 heliports.  The total length of navigable rivers and canals is 3,812km. The merchant marine of Poland consists of 114 ships, with additional 100 ships being registered outside country.  Poland’s principal ports and harbors are Gdańsk, Gdynia, Kołobrzeg, Szczecin,

Swinoujście, Ustka, Warszawa, and Wrocław. 

PEOPLE AND CULTURE

            Polish culture has a rich thousand-year history influenced by both West and East. Today, these influences are evident in Polish architecture, folklore, and art. Poland is the birthplace of many world famous people, including Pope John Paul II, Marie Curie, Kazimierz Pułaski, Tadeusz Kościuszko, Nicolaus Copernicus, and others.

Major contributions to the world haves been in literature and music. World recognized writers include Henryk Sienkiewicz for his novel Quo Vadis (1896) and the Nobel Prize winner for literature in 1980 Czesław Miłosz. Poland’s greatest composers were: Fryderyk Chopin, Henryk Wieniawski, Witold Lutosławski and Krzysztof Penderecki. World-famous musicians are: Ignacy Paderewski, Artur Rubinstein.

In the sciences, Marie Curie won two Nobel Prizes: one for Physics in 1903, and one for Chemistry in 1911. She was a pioneer in the studies of radium and polonium, and was instrumental in the understanding of radio-activity. The research, she did with her husband (Pierre Currie), led to the understanding of the atom as being an entity that could be split to release enormous energy. Nicolaus Copernicus is said to be the founder of modern astronomy. Tadeusz Kościuszko is best known as the designer and builder of West Point. Kościuszko also gained initial fame for his strategy at the battles of Ticonderoga and Saratoga.

Lech Wałęsa was one of the founders and a head of Solidarity Labor Union that led to a peaceful overthrow of communist government of general Jaruzelski. In October 1983, Wałęsa received Nobel Prize and was elected President of the Republic of Poland in 1990.

Mikołaj Kopernik	Tadeusz Kościuszko	Fryderyk Chopin	Maria Skłodowska-Curie	Karol Wojtyła - John Paul II