We have been travelling throughout Poland by practice the day after the nation’s sensational parliamentary elections in autumn 2023. When information of the outcomes got here by, passengers in our compartment fell into one another’s arms, rejoicing as if an amazing weight had been lifted from their shoulders. Onerous because it was to consider after eight years, the nationwide populists of the Legislation and Justice social gathering had been ousted from energy on a report turnout of 75% of voters. We felt the potential of democracy to vary issues for the higher as a bodily sensation.
Lower than two years have handed however this enthusiasm has disappeared with out hint. The Legislation and Justice-backed candidate Karol Nawrocki gained the presidential election run off in June with 50.89% of the vote, securing the admiration of Donald Trump within the course of. Days earlier than Nawrocki’s swearing in on Wednesday [6 August] a brand new ballot recommended that just about half of voters would love the prime minister, Donald Tusk out. The ruling coalition is wobbling. Tusk’s liberal democratic authorities might turn into nothing greater than an intermezzo, a pause between rightwing populist governments.
After greater than a decade of residing, in a world sense, with the brand new wave of populism, we will see a sample of missed alternatives of which Poland is only one instance. In international locations dominated by new populists, voters typically come to really feel disappointment and anger. In recent times, liberal candidates, carried by a tide of opposition, have ousted the populists: earlier than Tusk managed it in Poland there was Joe Biden within the US, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil and Zuzana Čaputová in Slovakia. The victories of those politicians appeared briefly like beacons of hope for the post-cold struggle liberal democratic consensus.
However rebuilding after populists vacate workplace can resemble a every day wrestle within the political mud. A victorious election marketing campaign just isn’t the identical as a definitive victory. The struggle towards populists is a everlasting one, and a world one, amplified by digital media.
Put up-populist rule is all of the tougher as a result of populist governments depart behind a authorized minefield. In Poland, numerous authorized choices and acts in drive have been supposed to undermine liberal democratic establishments. Dismantling them constitutionally and restoring the rule of regulation takes time and power. It additionally requires wanting again to the previous reasonably than specializing in the longer term as the brand new authorities addresses its predecessors’ errors. In Poland and Brazil, this has stifled any ambitions to supply an thrilling roadmap for the years forward. Inevitably, any preliminary euphoria is shortly adopted by public frustration and the rise of one other problem from the rightwing populists.
For the reason that anti-communist Solidarity motion within the Eighties, Poland has been a vital laboratory within the battle for democracy. After returning to energy in 2023, Tusk confronted a dilemma: ought to he fully distance himself from his predecessors’ agenda or flirt with their legacy? Tusk selected the second possibility. He maintained the populists’ programme of direct monetary assist for households with youngsters. He continued with the development of a mega transport hub, a flagship mission for the earlier authorities that he had beforehand attacked as wasteful. It’s particularly putting that he has did not liberalise Poland’s abortion legal guidelines, which have been tightened by the populists. Echoing the nationalists’ rhetoric about migration and defence of nationwide borders has led to Poland reimposing checks at its borders with EU neighbours Germany and Lithuania, regardless of all three international locations being within the Schengen space.
Letting the nationwide populists set the political tone for him is driving Tusk’s failure. The defeat of his presidential candidate, Rafał Trzaskowski was adopted by a collapse of assist within the polls. The absence of an inspiring imaginative and prescient, or perhaps a sense of what Tusk stands for, is painful to witness.
If parliamentary elections have been held in the present day, Poland’s rightwing populists could be emphatically returned to energy, in all probability with an much more radical nationalist programme. Overseas, Tusk could also be admired as a staunch defender of democracy. At dwelling, he has develop into probably the most unpopular politicians within the nation.
Name it the Gorbachev syndrome: beloved internationally, however reviled domestically. Tusk’s scores stoop might be blamed on an entire set of unfulfilled guarantees, poor messaging and a poor presidential marketing campaign. He’s additionally affected by the worldwide tendency to reject institution politicians. To many Polish voters, particularly youthful ones, Tusk, who has been energetic in Polish politics for greater than 25 years and was prime minister from 2007 to 2014, looks as if a part of a drained previous elite whose time has come to step apart.
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Safeguarding democracy requires one thing liberal democrats have up to now lacked: an imaginative conception of what the longer term ought to appear to be. Right here, Tusk and Lula disappoint, simply as Čaputová and Biden did earlier than them. The message is missing, however the medium is difficult too. To this point, rightwing populists are successful on the battleground of new and social media.
It’s not the one instance, however the Polish case clearly demonstrates the folly of preventing elections purely on the defensive. It’s too little and too slim. Liberal ambitions should prolong additional than stopping populists from coming to energy or eradicating them from it.
Elections should be understood as an opportunity to rebuild democracy, and to take action in tune with the brand new media setting. With out a forward-thinking method, the liberal intermezzo will stay simply that: a quick interval between acts in an extended populist play. Democrats should study this lesson – contending with populism means not solely confronting the previous, but in addition providing a compelling imaginative and prescient for the longer term.
