Question by Katatafisch: Which effects did Perestroika and Glasnost have on Poland?
I mean, Gorbatschow installed Perestroika and Glasnost in the UdSSR, but which consequences did that have for Poland?
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Answer by Bobby
In 1982, the Solidarity movement grew and eventually martial law was imposed. Like all the Eastern Bloc satellites Poland was dependent on the Soviet Union for survival and when Gorbachev issued these reforms it marked the beginning of the end. The communist government couldn’t stand on it’s own.
Answer by ammianus
It weakened the power and hold of the Communist Party of Poland.
With Gorbachev in charge in the USSR,there was no longer any guarantee for puppet Communist regimes in Eastern Europe that the Soviet Army was available to deal with serious internal unrest,as had happened in the past in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.
This thus encouraged opposition movements such as Solidarity in their struggle against Communist rule in Poland.
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XXX xxx says
Poland was a central/western European country allied with the USSR, just like the UK with the USA.
USSR’s reforms were seen in Poland as USSR’s weakness. Therefore, the opposition in Poland rose, especially the Solidarity and ROPCiO (the Movement for Defense of Human and Civic Rights).
Since the opposition power grew and the perception of the USSR diminished, the revolutions of 1989 started. Poland was the first country to abandon communism and embrace democracy, quickly followed by other Eastern Bloc (that is to say most of eastern Europe, parts of central Europe, northern Europe and southern Europe) countries in western/central Europe (Hungary, East Germany, Czechoslovakia) and the Balkan region of southern Europe (Bulgaria and Albania). Strong communist parties in the Western Bloc (that is to say parts of western, central, northern and southern Europe): France, the Netherlands and Portugal lost their support.
We can say that these reforms were one of the reasons why the communism in the West started to crumble and fell.
I hope it helps.