Poland: The Protracted Crisis

Hans B. Neumann is a history lecturer at Scarborough College, University
of Toronto.

Adam Bromke, professor of political science at McMaster University, has assembled a book treating developments in the currently troubled country of Poland from the late 1960s to the early 1980s. The book is a compilation of 23 articles spanning the spectrum of Polish politics in both foreign and domestic affairs. Almost all the articles have previously been published elsewhere. Two brief introductions attempt to encompass the included material.

Given the diversity of forums selected by Professor Bromke for his presentations, it is not surprising that the articles display a very uneven quality. Some show academic thoroughness and polish, others verge on the journalistically superficial (for example, chapters 13 and 16). Hence, the book’s format is puzzling; it fails to satisfy either the academic specialist of Poland or the general reader interested in current events. The former would find the journalistic aspects detracting, the latter would be put off by the academic sections.

While the author’s command of the subject matter is beyond question, the book suffers from a lack of thematic unity, a further almost unavoidable consequence of the format. The reader is forced to “hunt and peck” at almost every turn to extract dominant threads from the presented material.

The book represents an interesting effort to mix journalism, current events, history, and political science. It will be of greatest interest to those who want a compendium of Professor Bromke’s most recent work on present-day Poland.