Competing Nationalisms and the Populist Moment in Contemporary Polish Politics

This paper formulates an empirically grounded hypothesis about the recent upsurge of nationalist politics in Central Europe. It takes as its central case the recent developments in electoral politics in Poland. The 2005 Polish parliamentary elections brought nation-oriented political discourses to the center of the domestic public debate, and led, in April 2006, to the formation of a government that included parties that had earlier found themselves isolated and powerless on the extreme-right fringe of the political spectrum. This government coalition was widely seen as emblematic for a more general turn to nationalist politics in the new EU member states in Central Europe. This paper identifies and explores a number of possible explanations for the rise of nationalist political claims in contexts where, as is the case in Poland, it seems that the prime demands associated with nationalism (the creation of a homogenized nation-state on a territory that is believed to be for and of the nation) are fulfilled. The paper argues that traditional explanations of Polish nationalism, which consider this phenomenon to be representative of a culturally ingrained or a spontaneously erupting societal concern for ethnic or cultural homogeneity, need to be qualified. Applying a cognitive perspective on “the nation,” the paper proposes an alternative reading arguing that the recent centrality of nation-oriented political discourses should be seen as linked to the development of particular constellations in party politics and party competition.status: publishe