ABSTRACT
In an attempt to reinstate Solidarity as an openly active and officially recognized public movement that might help overcome Poland's political and economic crisis, Lech Walesa appointed a Provisional Council composed of seven prominent union leaders, all former members of the underground Provisional Coordinating Committee. The Provisional Council was in effect an ad hoc interim body supposed to initiate and supervise Solidarity's transition from clandestine to overt activity. Solidarity leaders claimed that the council was not a new organization but an internal body in a labor union that had been operating in accordance with International Labor Organization Conventions and that it did not require formal approval. The creation of the commission was an attempt to go beyond the strict trade union formula in Solidarity's search for new forms of overt activity. Many opposition activists believed that Solidarity should accept patronage over the diverse social initiatives that had developed autonomously as part of the "underground society".
