Post-Communist Organized Labor: Lost Amid Economic Reform and Democratization (Research Brief)

The primary purpose of this trip was to gather materials on trade unions in Poland, one of four cases for my book-length project on labor in the region. My chief goal was to contact union offices in several Polish cities and speak with trade union representatives at the national, regional, and enterprise level. I selected four main cities for research: Warsaw, Katowice, Poznan, and Gdansk. In addition to meeting with trade union officials, I also contacted leading Polish academics on trade unions and labor relations (these individuals were primarily in Warsaw). My interviews focused on questions of privatization/economic reform, globalization and the role of foreign capital, and inter-union competition between the main two union confederations in Poland, Solidarity and OPZZ.

Download the pdf at the top of this page for the full brief.

Paul Kubicek, of Oakland University, was a 2002-03 Short-Term Travel Grants fellow.