In 2023, after 8 years of populist right-wing rule in Poland, which alongside Hungary made the country a European forerunner of anti-democratic and illiberal backlash, the hardline conservative PiS cabinet was replaced by a liberal, pro-European coalition. Riding on a wave of mass civic mobilisations around democracy, abortion, and LGBTQ rights, the new government came to power by promising a democratic renewal and progressive policies. As one of the European dailies announced “Poland was smiling again”. Popular democracy indexes such as V-Dem were also quick to register this change and signalled a reverse of the previous backlash. Based on their formal criteria Poland no longer classifies as backsliding and instead, is now placed among other democratising countries.
Yet, while formally, and in popular international perception Polish democracy has come out of an authoritarian crisis, the empirical data coming from social movements, which brought the long-awaited electoral change, challenge this story. A draconian abortion law remains in place, sexual minorities are still unprotected, and a murderous and racist regime on the Polish-Belarussian border has been expanded by Tusk’s cabinet. To better understand these developments and critically reflect on “backlash” and “the populist nightmare is over” discourse, in our presentation we turn to experiences and perspectives of feminist activists.
We analyse individual and group interviews with 40 social movement actors engaged in either abortion activism or pro-migrant support at the Polish-Belarussian border. We zoom in, particularly on their experiences of change and continuity between the PiS government in years 2015-2023 and Tusk’s rule since the last Parliamentary elections. Based on our findings, we argue that the categories of “backlash” and “backsliding” conceal a much more complex reality, in which racist and sexist regimes, together with a crisis of democratic legitimacy can extend well beyond periods labelled as such, and become a permanent, violent status quo.
