"The choice is clear; either Solidarnosc will take cognizance of its trade union function — which the workers (that is those who have to sell their labour power for a wage, whether it is workers or intellectuals, whether they are employed in a factory or a faculty) need — or Solidarnosc will become a museum piece and the workers will find a new tool, better adapted to the defence of their interests.
"The Committee for Inter-Enterprise Coordination (MKK), which comprises 17 Wroclaw enterprises, was formed in August 1990 to reflect on this subject. We share the conviction that Solidarnosc must become an effective representative of the workers in the face of the new market mechanisms, the transformations in the sphere of property, of unemployment, of the privileged position of the former nomenklatura.
The impact of the Balcerowicz programme
"Our trade union must in particular turn its attention to the Balcerowicz programme. This envisages a fall in industrial production of the order of 10-15%, whereas the real fall between January and May of this year was 30%. Consumer prices were 150% higher in April of this year than in last December whereas salaries have fallen by around 43%. Unemployment at the end of September had already reached 926,400.
"If our trade union docs not enter public negotiations with the government around our economic programme, the discussion will take place in the street and Poland will be transformed into a reservoir of cheap labour and a dumping ground for the rest of Europe.
"Inside the regional leadership such a discussion has been lacking. The orientation of the regional leadership has gone counter to the opinion in the workplaces. Wladyslaw Frasyniuk - for whom I feel some sympathy and whom I respect profoundly - has chosen to take on top level responsibilities inside ROAD, an organization which identifies itself with the government and with the programme of Balcerowicz. It does not add up to a personal conflict with Wladyslaw Frasyniuk. It is not a question of ROAD alone. We 9 would have the same situation if the presi-
POLAND dent of the regional trade union became the leader of the Alliance of the Centre [Walesa's party]. I desire only that the problem of the identity of Solidarosc -its place in the new economic and sociopolitical landscape — is settled on the basis of respect for the principles of internal democracy of the trade union, by a discussion around programme, a regional congress and the election of leaders.
"Our region could become the nucleus around which a new identity for Solidarnosc is formed. The tradition of the years 1980-81 and the fact that during the state of emergency we were one of the strongest and best-organized zones, the fact that throughout this period the continuity of the enterprise structures of Solidarosc was preserved in our region — all this could help us today to find new solutions.
"The regional leadership must bring together all the initiatives arising from inside the workplaces. We must renew the practice of 1980-81, that of weekly mectings of the regional leadership with the representatives of the biggest enterprises of the region and of regular meetings of the regional leaders with the trade union commissions and the workers inside the enterprises.
Need for regular internal information
"The union must have a genuine system of internal information. It is scandalous that there has not been in our region a serious trade union bulletin to provide an efficient system of circulating information between all the enterprises of the region.
"With all the esteem that I have for the people employed by the executive of the trade union, I think that they cannot replace the Icadership of the union. The transfer of decision-making from the elected structures towards the executive structures is a sign of bureaucratization and evidence of the grave crisis of Solidarnosc.
"The organization of the work inside the region and of its leadership does not however constitute a goal in itself. It must serve the defence of the interests of the workers. To this end, the regional leadership must establish commissions charged with the analysis of the economic, social and political situation of the workers inside the enterprises, both public and privale.
"The regional leadership must be capable of helping each enterprise, from the point of view of its employees, in the face of the economic changes underway — privatization, bankruptcy of enterprises and unemployment. We must immediately undertake the calculation of the cost of living so as to dispose of our own data on the pauperisation of the society. We must seck to establish contacts with trade unions in the foreign enterprises which 10 install themselves in Poland, so as to know the differences in the costs of labour, the behaviour of these firms towards the workers and the trade unions in other countries and particularly in the third world, so as to judge whether what is taking place is the transfer to our country of ecologically damaging production inadmissible elsewhere.
"If the workers are to be able to respond in the face of the market transformations, they must have access to information. The agencies of the regional leadership charged with these problems must employ the best specialists and dispose of modern data processing means, like banks of computerized data on the changes in the structure of the regional economy, of its ownership, allowing them to monitor job vacancies, unemployment, professional illness, the situation of youth and the old, the ecological situation, and so on. We can count on the help of the western trade unions who sympathize with our activity for the implementation of such a project. Rebuild unity of workers and intellectuals
"This activity will not be possible without the help of specialists or more generally intellectuals. I do not believe that inside Solidarosc a division between workers and intellectuals is possible. We were together in the strikes and in the prisons, in the struggle for a freer and more just world. It is unacceptable that our roads should separate today.
"The regional leadership will certainly obtain the help of the scientific milieux and of intellectuals to organize a Centre of Socio-Professional Research of our trade union.
"The branches are, together with the workplaces, the principal terrain of trade union activity. It is necessary then to do everything so that inside Solidarnosc the diverse representations of the branches can organize themselves and present the tactic they have agreed on throughout the union. But to abandon our current structure in exchange for a vertical branch structure would be contrary to our tenyear old tradition and would put in jeopardy the principal characteristic of Solidarnosc — the defence of the weaker branches by the stronger. The maintenance of our unity will depend on the strength of the union and the role which it will be capable of playing in the future.
"The Womens' Commissions of Solidarnose must play an important role in the activity of the regional leadership. Women are, aside from youth and old people, the most threatened social group today. The Womens' Commissions can dynamise the work of our union and offer it new horizons.
"We must address ourselves to the new generation of workers, apprentices and students, and find a common language with the youth who are absent from our ranks although they were the most active
International Viewpoint #195 • November 26, 1990 in the struggle for the legalization of Solidarnosc during these last years. We must, as often as possible, support the initiatives of the youth, for example in obtaining a cultural centre for the alternative youth movements, or a meeting place for the associations of conscientious objectors.
Confront chauvinism and anti-semitism
"We must inspire ourselves with the ethos of Solidarnosc and the traditional values of our movement to confront chauvinism, anti-semitism and racism. We do not have the right to close our eyes to these phenomena. On this terrain we should seek unity of action with all those who, like us, defend tolerance, including the strictly political organizations.
"We have to develop cooperation with foreign trade union organizations, including direct enterprise links. We must bring our support to the independent trade union movement which is forming in central and eastern Europe and, in particular, establish privileged links with the trade unions of the regions of Germany and Czechoslovakia bordering us, so as to undertake in the future common ecological and economic projects. We must show our trade unionist fraternity towards those who, throughout the whole world, struggle for trade union and political rights. The same fraternity which the world showed towards our struggle after December 13, 1981.
"It adds up only to a minimum pro- am as up oney tat a or the problemthat confront Solidarnosc. I hope that our trade union will find enough strength to renew itself in the new economic and socio-political landscape of our country, that it will forge an identity that will allow it to represent with dignity the interests off the workers. It is with this hope that I take part in the congress of Solidarnosc in Lower Silesia."
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B. CMLAT.
USSR