The atmosphere in Warsaw last autumn was one of euphoria following the victory of the liberal coalition parties on October 15. Michal Grzebowski, a Sociology and Political Science student, voted to evict Law and Justice (PiS) after eight years of ultra-conservative drift. Along with women, the new generations were key to Donald Tusk’s return as head of Government. This spring week, sitting with four other young people in a bar in the capital, Grzebowski’s first idea when evoking those elections six months later is disappointment.
Tusk’s center-right Civic Coalition (KO) arrived with 100 promises for the first 100 days of Government. Among the commitments were recovering democracy, the rule of law and a place in Europe. Also, return rights and freedoms such as abortion. New Left (Nowa Lewica), the center-left minority party of the Executive, offered a similar menu, somewhat more socially progressive. Meanwhile, Third Way, formed by the conservative agrarian party PSL and the Christian Democrat Polska 2050, led by a former television presenter with presidential aspirations, Szymon Holownia, promised another way of doing politics.
The 2023 legislative elections confirmed the trend of the 2020 presidential elections and represented a youth earthquake with 70.9% participation. Radoslaw Marzecki, a youth expert at the Institute of Sociology of the University of Krakow recalls that abstention reached 61.4% for young people aged 18 to 29 years compared to 48% overall according to Ipsos exit polls. The data is comparable to previous regional elections but has been interpreted as a warning to the new Government – which Tusk took into account when he considered demobilization “worrying,” especially that it affected young people who are disappointed in KO’s delay on processing legislation until last week after regional elections as feminist activist Marta Lempart criticizes that “the Government has not complied with abortion or LGTBI rights because of Christian fundamentalist partners.”
In Warsaw it is not unusual to see displays
