THE LEGAL NOTION OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL PRINCIPLE OF BUSINESS ACTIVITY FREEDOM

The purpose of this article is to analyse the constitutional principle of business activity freedom. It should be emphasised that the Author refers to the conceptions elaborated by the Polish theory of law. It is therefore a comparison of the constitutional regulations with the precise terminology. The Republic of Poland shall guarantee the freedom of business activity. Some restrictions of this freedom may be imposed only by means of statute or when the public interest is threatened. The former constitutional binding norm „regardless of the type of ownership” has been abrogated. Consequently, according to the Constitutional Tribunal ascertainment, the freedom should be related to private enterprises, not to public ones (i.e. owned by the state or local governments). The constitutional principle is analysed through 4 issues: 1) the ways of understanding the principle in the course of the Constitutional Committee’s work (1993 - 1997), 2) the question of how to relate and interpret the principle within another principle - the so-called social market economy, 3) the essence of legal constitutional regulations, 4) some decisions of the Constitutional Tribunal which influence and determine the legislation