The Seeds of Triumph: Church and State in Gomulka's Poland

By Hannah Diskin

The Roman Catholic Church has played a unique role in the history of Poland in the twentieth century: the people and the Church drew closer and closer together during Nazi rule, the Stalinist period and the somewhat milder, though strongly anti-religious and repressive Gomulka regime (1956-1970). The power struggle between the Church and the communist government did in fact play a role in shaping world politics, the Polish Church having been the force behind the opposition movement in Poland. Against this background, a Polish pope appeared and made a major contribution to the collapse of communism.

The Seeds of Triumph, the most comprehensive recent book on the opposition of Church and State in post-war Poland, compares the characteristics and consequences of this relationship during three different periods: the first and second periods of Gomulka's rule, and the Stalinist era between the two Gomulka periods. It examines the balance of power, studying to what degree the Church and other factors in the political environment influenced governmental policy-making. The author disproves the common stereotype, held at the time, that domestic conditions played only a marginal role. In examining the regime's policies, she covers the legal background, the general policy characteristics, the specific policies implemented during the period, and the role of the individual actors, most notably the pivotal role of the two main protagonists, Cardinal Wyszynski and Wladislaw Gomulka.

In her landmark study, Diskin makes a significant contribution to the study of authoritarian systems and greatly enhances our understanding of the centrality of the Church in recent Polish history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Central European University Press
• Release date: Sep 1, 2001
• ISBN: 9789633864708

Hannah Diskin

Hanna Diskin has been involved in teaching and research at the Department of Political Science, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem; the Institute of Soviet & East European Studies and the Centre for Research on Canadian-Russian Relations, Carleton University, Ottawa; as well as several other institutions. Since the late 1970s she has focused on the opposition movement in Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia. She is currently specializing in European integration in the post-1989 period.

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