In fresh days mainstream media and public opinion have been surviving reports of drone raids. Meanwhile, there is simply a dispute in the background that could have far more serious political consequences. We are talking about a conflict that broke out between Law and Justice and the Confederation, and in practice between Jarosław Kaczyński and Sławomir Mentzen.
Marcin Palade
Although the most attention is given to current pushes and sharp words mentioned by leaders, it is worth asking about the long-term effects. This is peculiarly crucial in the context of building the majority after the next parliamentary elections, which, if held on time, will come in the fall of 2027.
To realize the current situation, you gotta go back to the past. The full period of the 3rd Republic of Poland, i.e. since 1989, was marked by constant competition on the right. Leaders with ambition never lacked, but – figuratively speaking – there were many Napoleons, and the army always turned out to be besides small.
Effect? The right hand could seldom translate its aspirations into permanent power. Apart from the short and stormy episode of Jan Olszewski's government from 1991 to 1992, the only major success was the government of the Election Action Solidarity from 1997 to 2001, and in coalition with the Union of Freedom.
For the first 15 or even 20 years the right hand appeared at the helm of power only occasionally – never for long, never alone.
The situation did not change until 2015. At that time, the Law and Justice won parliamentary elections and for the first time in the past of the 3rd Republic gained a stand-alone majority.
From then on, however, the arrangement of forces on the right began to complicate slowly. A Confederacy appeared, which attracted any of the younger electorate, disappointed in both the Civic Platform and the PiS.
Today's dispute between Kaczyński and Mentzen is not just an exchange of individual attacks. It is primarily a question of the form of the future right in Poland and whether these groups will be able to cooperate at all after the 2027 election.
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History teaches that the divisions and ambitions of the leaders have repeatedly prevented the right from continuing to rule. Will it be different this time?
The answer will gotta wait. But 1 thing is certain: conflict on the right is not an episode, but a process that can form the political scene until the 2027 elections.
Why? due to the fact that already then there was a dispute about the direction in which Poland should follow. And it wasn't just about the classical division: the independency right versus the post-communist left or liberal environments. The key competition was within the right hand.
In the following years, the political scene was substantially rebuilt. The division of “post-communist” and “post-communist” Poland has disappeared. The conflict between solidarity and liberal Poland took its place.
Since 2001, Jarosław Kaczyński and his political environment began playing the function of the main force of solidarity Poland – first the Agreement of the Centre, then the Law and Justice.
The real breakthrough came after 2015. Then the Law and Justice gained absolute dominance on the right hand – 1 that created in the heads of many politicians of this organization the belief that there is only a wall to the right of the Law and Justice, and no crucial political environment exists.
Meanwhile, past has changed. After the 2015 election, initiatives began to form, which in 2019 entered the Sejm as a Confederate – for the first time breaking the monopoly of the Law and Justice on the right.
If we look at the actions of the Law and Justice against any competition on the right, which appeared after 2015, there is clearly 1 strategy: suction, demolition and disorganization. All to preserve the monopoly.
This way of reasoning found its confirmation in the 2023 election campaign. Just remind Friday just before election silence – 2 days before the vote on 15 October. Since this morning, the frontal attack on the Confederate has been on the Polish tv strips.
Jarosław Kaczyński believed in his advisors and analysts from Nowogrodzka that an aggressive attack against the Confederacy would weaken her adequate that the PiS would take over any of her constituents. This was an additional 2–4 percent points, which would have been adequate for the 3rd consecutively independent majority.
The effect was reversed. The Confederacy has indeed lost support – already falling in the last 2 months of the run – but the main beneficiary was not Law and Justice, but the 3rd Road (the coalition of PSL and Poland 2050 Simon Holownia). That's where quite a few erstwhile Confederate voters went.
As a result, the 3rd Road gained more than 14 percent support, introduced more than 60 MPs to the Sejm and played a key function in securing Donald Tusk's parliamentary majority. Paradoxically, alternatively of stopping Tusk's return to power, the PiS strategy helped him gain that power.
This rivalry besides continued after the 2023 election. The situation calmed somewhat during the presidential run of 2024. Since late autumn it was already known that the Confederacy would be represented by Sławomir Mentzen, while the PiS candidate was Karol Nawrocki. At that time, a kind of non-aggression pact worked – both formations understood that besides fierce competition could weaken the right hand in the second round, where the main opponent was to be the favourite of the liberal-left camp, Rafał Trzaskowski.
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Such a rational approach had a measurable effect. Mentzen scored 15 percent, Grzegorz Braun over 6 percent, and a large part of their disciplined electorate in the second circular voted for Karol Nawrocki. This gave him triumph and election to the office of president of Poland.
The triumph of this PiS read as a signal that it had a real chance to redominate on the right. However, post-election enthusiasm rapidly turned into a political attack on the Confederacy. The "honey month" lasted only a fewer weeks – immediately afterwards a regular exchange of blows began between Jarosław Kaczyński and Sławomir Mentzen, as well as the politicians of both formations.
The PiS accused the Confederacy of being ready to settle after the election, The Confederacy responded with accusations of attempted weakening and marginalisation. The culmination of this tension was the alleged “Polish Declaration” by Jarosław Kaczyński – a paper containing 10 points under which Mentzen was to sign. There was no sign of what Kaczyński treated as an excuse to re-frontal impact on the Confederacy and its leader.
The aim of this strategy was clear: to repeat the 2023 manoeuvre, which is to take over part of the Confederate electorate. The problem is that the erstwhile effort resulted in a fiasco – and yet helped Donald Tusk win the parliamentary majority.
The PiS's strategy towards the Confederacy is inactive based on the same scheme: to maximise the weakness of the rival and to regain his constituents. The problem is that a akin effort in 2023 failed – the weakening of the Confederacy did not bring PiS additional mandates, and any electorate departed towards the 3rd Way.
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Today the situation looks even more hard for Jarosław Kaczyński. The Confederacy grew from 7% to unchangeable 14-15% in polls, while the PiS fell from 35% to about 30%. Much of the hard right-wing voters moved to the Confederate, and any to the Crown of Gregory Braun – and it is hard to believe that they are willing to return. In fact, PiS may recover at most 0.5–1 percent point.
There is besides an expanding conflict between the Law and the Confederation. This exchange of blows not only hinders cooperation in the future, but even destroys the remaining assurance between the 2 environments.
The paradox is that if there were a post-election PiS–Confederation coalition, they would have had a lot more than 231 seats together, a majority in the Sejm. But it takes 2 to tango.
