ABSTRACT
Short periods of stability in post-war Poland indicated that even simply the chance of prosperity, if generally considered to be rational, may lead to people giving mental approval to the political system. The Montesquieu-derived conception of the Rule of Law meant that the protection of all by the law is incompatible with the present-day exclusion of the “underclass” by the bureaucracy in power. Equally, government and law need to guarantee the minimum conditions of material life for individuals that make this participation worthwhile and that give them a serious stake in the various communities with which they may associate. The rule of law is linked with Polish democracy and its fate, and so major threats to the rule of law amount to threats to Polish democracy in general. Professor A. Zielinski remarked that the inefficiency of the machinery of justice is a great obstacle to establishing the State of Law in Poland.
