Search

Poland's major post-Communist party, the SLD, was an electorally successful legacy party during the 1990's. An analysis of Polish National Election Studies data and data from a separate study of new firm creation in Poland indicates their success was built on two important and related factors. One is the growth of new firms, which stimulated the growth of a centrist constituency who voted for parties supporting economic reforms. Second, the SLD adapted to this constituency by themselves becoming more economically liberal, as documented by Grzymala-Busse (2002). A conditional logit model of voter choice in the 1997 and 2001 elections relates votes to the distance between voters' preferences on economic policies and the positions of the competing parties. From this analysis we estimate that if the SLD had remained an ideological non-reformist party as did the KSCM in the Czech Republic and the CPRF in Russia it would have been a far weaker party as measured by vote and seat shares. Without the new firm creation, an ideological SLD cum KSCM could have been electorally successful as was the CPRF. The paper concludes by contrasting the the Polish, Czech and Russian post-Communist parties and extending the implications of the results to other developing and industrial economies faced with the need for structural change.

Data from a longitudinal study of Polish workers interviewed in 1988, 1993 and 1998 are used to test propositions about the connections between employment, attitude, and voting changes during the transition to a market economy. The results show that changes in attitudes about the reforms are associated with changes in voting, with those coming to favor reforms and their consequences voting for liberal parties, and vice versa for those coming to oppose the reforms and/or their consequences. Individuals making a successful transition and residents in areas with more employment in new firms are more likely to switch their attitudes to favor the reforms and vice versa for those who lose their jobs or who live in areas without new firms.

The mathematical model of a generating gear grinding process is presented in the paper. Detailed analysis of the creation of the tooth profile resulted in evaluation of the shape of a material layer being removed in a particular generating stroke of a grinding wheel and consequently in calculation of grinding forces, power density distribution on a wheel/workpiece interface and in calculation of temperature distribution in gear tooth during grinding. This in turn may be utilised to predict such surface integrity parameters as residual stress, microhardness distribution, burns or cracks. Some experimental results, which confirm the model, are also presented in the paper.

This study investigated the effects of N-nitro-L-arginine and haemoglobin on responses of aortic rings (10 g resting tension) from 2-week streptozotocin-diabetic and control rats. N-Nitro-L-arginine (0.1 mM) or haemoglobin (10 microM) potentiated constrictor responses of aortae from both groups of rats to 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) or noradrenaline. They also overcame the tachyphylaxis which occurred on the second exposure to 5-HT. Following constriction of aortae with 5-HT or noradrenaline, acetylcholine produced concentration-dependent relaxation. At concentrations of acetylcholine of 0.1 microM to 0.1 mM for 5-HT-constricted rings, and 0.1 microM for noradrenaline-constricted rings, the specific component of relaxation attributable to acetylcholine was significantly less for aortae from diabetic rats than for those from controls. For aortae from both groups, N-nitro-L-arginine (or haemoglobin) inhibited relaxation in the presence of acetylcholine (noradrenaline or 5-HT-constricted rings), and N-nitro-L-arginine (or N-nitro-L-arginine with haemoglobin) partially inhibited spontaneous relaxation of 5-HT-constricted rings. These results suggest that NO may play a role in tachyphylaxis to 5-HT, and that acetylcholine-induced output of endothelium-derived relaxing factor/nitric oxide (EDRF/NO) (or responsiveness to EDRF/NO) may be reduced in noradrenaline- and 5-HT-constricted aortic rings from 2-week diabetic rats.

Poland is changing. . . Today the country of the Polads is totally free and the road to democracy seems likely to be short. But the situation is different when it comes to the economy. Partitioned as it then was, it lost in the 19th century that initial period of industrialization when the infrastructure was being created for modern economies and modern societies. The efforts of millions of Poles in the interwar period or since the Second World War have not made up for this lost time. At the same time Utopian and ultimately an absurd central system of planning and management forced on Poland by its great neighbour, led to waste on a gigantic scale waste of people and things, of thought and the effects of work. The present ineffective structure of the economy is a result of this: the dominance of mining and the industries engaged in the first phases of processing, a high degree of public ownership, concentration and monopolization. Starting in 1970, successive governments have declared their intention of making changes in this structure. None have done so, and events have even moved in the opposite direction. The absence of reforms, or the introduction of very cautious changes only, has strengthened this ineffective structure and has resulted in periodic economic crises and related socio-political upheavals. It was only the creation of the social movement of “solidarity” in 1980-1981 which opened the way to more radical changes in politics, and in the system for managingthe national economy. The economic reforms started in 1981 and the changes in the system for managing the national economy created a firmer basis for the transformation which was to take place in the political situation and in economic reform. The political breakthrough occurred in June 1989, and the reform of the Polish economy has been under way since January 1990. Today it is still difficult to evaluate all its effects, but it is possible to state with certainty that Poland is still a long way from becoming a modern society of the 21st century, and the time required to achieve this will surely exceed that spent on toasting the beginning of the new century in champagne. Since the second half of the 1960s research has been undertaken on the problems of management in the economy, the national administration and business enterprises. Looking back it can be said that a good deal of research has been achieved, with many publications of good methodological quality and yielding interesting results. We have taken the opportunity here to present some of the research which has been conducted over the last 2 or 3 years. The selection of articles has had a specific basis: we have

Two dimensions of the “Polish turnaround” are important to the intensification of the process of adapting to the European economy and culture. The essence of the first is to change “incompetence into competence” in all fields of political, economic and social activity. The second concerns the necessity for creative government influence on management. steering it towards the “future structure”. These two dimensions are both related to the problem of “producing new managers”. In this article, the background and the possible future outlines of a new system are described.