Anna Grzymala-Busse

Nota: Este archivo abarca los artículos publicados por el autor desde el 1 de Marzo de 2008. Para fechas anteriores realice una búsqueda entrecomillando su nombre.

Protesters are watched by police in Wroclaw, Poland, on Thursday during a march against the upcoming presidential election. (Bartek Sadowski/Bloomberg News)

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A political crisis is rocking Poland over the presidential elections scheduled for Sunday. Poland is under lockdown to limit infection during the coronavirus pandemic. In-person balloting would violate distancing orders. Opposition candidates for the presidency have been unable to campaign, even as incumbent President Andrzej Duda dominates media coverage. Opinion polls suggested that fewer than one-third of voters planned to vote under these conditions.

Not surprisingly, the opposition called for the elections to be delayed. The government refused.

The solution? The governing Law and Justice party (Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc, or PiS) proposed switching to mail-in postal voting. The party introduced a bill in Parliament on April 6, about a month before the election.…  Seguir leyendo »

On Nov. 10, 1989, East Berliners get help from West Berliners as they climb the Berlin Wall near the Brandenburg Gate. (Jockel Finck/AP)

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The Berlin Wall — both a powerful symbol and a physical barrier that divided the communist East and the democratic West after 1961 — came down 30 years ago this week. Footage of young Germans hammering away at the hated wall dividing communist and Western Europe, then dancing triumphantly at the Brandenburg Gate, were just some of the stirring images of that seemingly miraculous year.

Communism collapsed first in Eastern Europe in 1989-1990 and then in the Soviet Union in 1991.

In short order, the Soviet Union dissolved, as did Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia. Germany reunified. Governments throughout the region held free elections.…  Seguir leyendo »

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The Polish  Law and Justice Party (PiS) government has a new prime minister: Mateusz Morawiecki. In a particularly Polish political twist, the government of Beata Szydło survived a vote of no confidence on the morning of Dec. 7 — only to have Szydło summarily resign later that day.

So what happened, and what does it mean?

Here are five things you need to know.

1. The change in prime minister is mainly symbolic

Mateusz Morawiecki, the new prime minister, is considered the younger, sophisticated and worldly face of the PiS government. Morawiecki was chosen because he appears more credible to the international financial and political community. …  Seguir leyendo »

Demonstrators hold Polish and E.U. flags during a protest outside the parliament building in Warsaw on Dec. 17. (Kacper Pempel/Reuters)

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Poland is gripped by its most severe constitutional crisis since the Communist regime declared martial law in 1981, with protesters — both inside parliament and outside in the freezing streets — accusing the ruling party of threatening democracy.

Law and Justice (PiS), the party in power, has roots in the dissident trade union Solidarity, which helped bring down the Communist regime. But it has this in common with the authoritarian Communist PZPR, which ruled Poland between 1948 and 1989: It occupies an absolute majority of seats in the Sejm, the lower house of the Polish Parliament. Unlike the PZPR, it was elected in free and fair elections.…  Seguir leyendo »