An outline of legal and constitututional developments in Poland under the rule of the Law and Justice Party, which include the threat of EU sanctions over reforms to the judiciary and the recently announced and highly controversial Holocaust bill

Report of the Stefan Batory Foundation Legal Expert Group on the impact of the judiciary reform in Poland in 2015-2018

“The two years that passed since November 2015 have brought the highest number of challenges and threats to human rights and freedoms in the entire post-1989 period”, reads today’s statement of the Helsinki Committee in Poland.

How is it that suddenly, out of nowhere, Poland, the precocious child of transformation, seems to be returning to the culture of mono-power?

A dramatic change occurred in Polish constitutional politics in 2015: a combined presidential and
parliamentary victory of the populist Law and Justice party [PiS] began a series of deep political and
legal changes which turned the constitutional order on its head in many respects.
In this paper, I provide a detailed account of how comprehensive and momentous the legal changes
are, in particular going so far as to dismantle institutional checks on the government (including
paralysis the Constitution al Tribunal, and then conversion of it into an active supporter of the government) and
to erode a number of individual and political rights, such as the right to assembly and privacy.

Clearly, the Commission has decided that in view of the crisis of the Rule of Law, only the political pressure of other Member States under the procedure based on Article 7 TEU has the capacity to provide a feasible solution.

Last month, the new Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki pushed two bills through parliament that gave his government and his party increased control over Poland’s courts. Just before the laws were signed by Polish President Andrzej Duda on Dec. 20, Morawiecki chose to address the American people and defend this decision in the pages of the Washington Examiner.

Expressing opinions opposing the authorities draws repressions. Supporting the authorities ensures impunity. Inequality of treatment becomes a fact

The President doesn’t open the constitutional debate, he narrows it. Women who took the Black Protest to the streets, protesters against the assault on courts – that was the debate

Rule of law in Poland. State of play in October 2017. Analysis by judge Dariusz Mazur and judge Waldemar Żurek.