Dozens of books have been written--by Solidarity activists, scientists, journalists, novelists, and even poets--and hundreds of speeches have been made about Solidarity, the Polish trade union movement that erupted in 1980. Born out of the strikes of Polish shipyard workers in August 1980, Solidarity posed the most serious and "total," to use William Buckley's expression, challenge to the communist totalitarian rulers of Poland, and its impact was also felt in the Kremlin. Here we had a proletarian movement united with the intellectuals, rejecting the very premise of communist governments, according to which they govern on behalf of the proletariat and for the proletariat. Perhaps because of the total nature of the challenge that Solidarity was and continues to be for communism, even keen observers of Polish developments and themselves are still trying to find out what Solidarity was, what it is, and what it will become--if anything. Those earlier books, articles, and analyses so far have failed to provide a comprehensive answer.
Now comes a book by a man who should know: Lech Walesa, the leader of Solidarity, has just published his autobiographical A Way of Hope. Those looking for sensational historical anecdotes will be disappointed. Those, however, who seek to understand what stood behind Solidarity, what the movement was like, why it would have emerged only in Poland, and why it could be led only by a man like Walesa will undoubtedly find, if not all, then at least some answers.
A view of Solidarity
As if to stress the historical roots and burdens of Solidarity, Walesa precedes his autobiography proper with a short chronology of key events in the history of Poland, from the Polish Constitution of 1791 through the 1945 Yalta agreements that sealed Poland's fate as a Soviet satellite, followed by the successive revolts of 1956, 1968, 1970, 1976, 1980, and ending with the pope's third visit to his homeland in 1987. That short list points to the very heart of the Polish dilemma. The nation, which for centuries because of its geographical location was a natural target for the East--first for imperial Russia and then for the communist Soviet Union--has always considered itself culturally linked with the West. It has seen it self at various points in history as the first defender of the West against the eastern barbarian. Time and again, the Poles would rise and, more often than not, would have to give in to the overpowering forces of their enemies, paying an enormous price in bloodshed and lost lives.
Solidarity, in Lech Walesa's view, was to change this recurring pattern. Thus he writes:
Solidarity is a further sign that a new era is beginning. The burden of the past was weighing us down and forcing us to look for new solutions; it was forcing us to confront problems of impossible complexity. We Poles are exposed to influences from all possible sides and life requires us choose, to verify, to experience for ourselves, and then to assert ourselves and draw from within ourselves the necessary moral strength to effect change. Though we are caught in the vise of a fossilized system, a product of an outdated partition of our planet, in August of 1980 we overthrew an all-powerful political taboo and proclaimed the dawning of a new era.
The Solidarity movement was perhaps the first in Eastern Europe to be
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