Jerzy Kochanowski

Black Market in the General Government 1939–1945: Survival Strategy or (Un)Official Economy?

The black market in occupied Poland was such a broad and diverse phenomenon that the author was forced to restrict this research to the General Government, where, unlike areas incorporated directly into the Reich or occupied (from 1939 to 1941) by the USSR, it became a specialised field, often practised professionally. This chapter presents the conditions and reasons for development of the black market, including the exploitation of industry and agriculture by the occupiers, their fiscal policies (including wage freezes) and official rations, which were not enough to ensure physical survival. Polish and German actors on the black market are discussed. The chapter draws on the extensive existing literature, Polish and German archive material, the Polish underground press published during the war, diaries and memoirs.

A ‘Great Change’, or, the Poles’ Unfulfilled Daydream about Having a Car (1956–7)

The political ‘Thaw’ of 1956–7 was in Poland a period of thorough political as well as cultural and social change. While the political liberalisation came to an end rather soon, the team of Wladyslaw Gomulka, the newly-appointed First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party [PZPR], in power since October 1956, cared much for maintaining and reinforcing their pro-social and reformatory image. The leadership team’s assent for a more sophisticated consumption, part of which was owning a car, helped alleviate social tensions. The models were drawn from the West of Europe and from the United States, which for the Polish society were the major points of reference, as well as from the other socialist countries – particularly, East Germany (the GDR) and Czechoslovakia, where the political and societal significance of motorisation had already been appreciated. On the other hand, offering private individuals an opportunity to purchase a car was meant to be a remarkable tool used to draw the ‘hot money’ down from the market, thus preventing inflation. Cars, imported or Polish-made, began being (relatively) freely traded, at very high prices. This did not limit the demand, as acquiescence for private business operations contributed to the growing of the group of affluent people. While this incited the citizens to develop their own strategies of acquiring cars – not infrequently colliding with the law; the authorities began gradually reinstating the rationing. All the same, the number of private cars quickly increased, to 58,600 as of 1958, up from some 24,750 in 1956. Public discussion started around popular low-capacity (small-engine) cars – whether licensed (Renault, Simca, Fiat) or (to be) made in Poland. However, in spite of the raised expectations the authorities decided that it was still too early for a mass motorisation: this was made possible only in the early 1970s.

Foreign Residents in Warsaw, 1945–1956

Although it was not before 1989 that Warsaw gradually became a genuinely multiethnic environment, a group of aliens had inhabited the city in 1945–89. Somewhat paradoxically, the Polish capital city’s foreigner landscape proved to be the most variegated, diverse and vivid in the first post-war decade. The Russians, Germans, Englishmen, Frenchmen, or Italians already residing in Warsaw were joined, as part of post-war voluntary and forced (political-refugee) migration, by nationals of Spain, Greece, Korea, Persia, Yugoslavia, or even Canada. The article shows the ways along which they reached Poland and Warsaw, and the various aspects of everyday life of those aliens: work, assimilation, and political entanglements.

Schleichwege im Sozialismus. Einleitung

Hidden Paths within Socialism. Introduction «Hidden Paths within Socialism» were used by ordinary citizens, especially by tourists and workers from the socialist «brother states». Borders within the socialist bloc were semi-open. The states tried, however, to control and regulate transnational contacts. They foundered time and time again on the «self-assertion» of their own and foreign citizens, who opened up informal areas of freedom. These were based on their wants and withstood the regulating rage. This journal examines the predominantly apolitical, everyday contacts in the GDR, Poland, ČSSR and Hungary between the mid-1950s and 1989.