{"id":766,"date":"2026-04-11T14:57:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T14:57:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/766\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T14:57:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T14:57:11","slug":"what-donald-tusks-return-means-for-poland-democracy-and-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/766\/","title":{"rendered":"What Donald Tusk\u2019s return means for Poland \u2013 Democracy and society"},"content":{"rendered":"

This week,\u00a0Donald Tusk<\/a>\u00a0won a\u00a0vote of confidence<\/a>\u00a0in Poland\u2019s parliament to lead a new government as the country\u2019s new prime minister, following a failed bid by the incumbent, Mateusz Morawiecki, to remain in that role.<\/p>\n

The vote provoked a visibly nervous reaction from the leader of the outgoing populist government, Jaros\u0142aw Kaczy\u0144ski, who stormed up to the rostrum to\u00a0denounce<\/a>\u00a0Tusk, a former prime minister who subsequently served as president of the European Council, as a \u2018German agent<\/a>\u2019. Kaczy\u0144ski\u2019s\u00a0behaviour<\/a>\u00a0since the October election has been all too revealing: the all-powerful national populist leader of the past eight years has lost control\u00a0\u2014 of himself, as well as of the country.<\/p>\n

A determined Poland in the EU<\/p>\n

Kaczy\u0144ski can thank his own hateful policies for his electoral defeat on 15 October (following a record voter turnout of\u00a075 per cent<\/a>). Though his Law and Justice (PiS) party won more seats than any other single party, Tusk has built a broad four-party\u00a0coalition<\/a>\u00a0with a solid parliamentary majority. He is now taking great pains to show his appreciation for his partners, including by\u00a0creating<\/a>\u00a026 ministerial positions in the new government.<\/p>\n

Tusk\u2019s administration will need to show consistency and unity to deal with Poland\u2019s many crises. After years of PiS\u00a0illegally packing<\/a>\u00a0major judicial institutions with political cronies, a top domestic priority is to restore the rule of law. Tusk also\u00a0promises<\/a>\u00a0a \u2018return to Europe\u2019, prompting celebrations across the European media, especially in Germany, a key neighbour with which Kaczy\u0144ski had been picking absurd fights.<\/p>\n

In his\u00a0expos\u00e9, Tusk looked directly at PiS\u2019 parliamentary deputies and made clear that no one in the EU will be able to push him around.<\/p>\n

Paradoxically, the PiS government was generally an easy partner for Germany, since it isolated Poland within the European Union. While Tusk\u2019s victory was\u00a0greeted<\/a>\u00a0with joy in Berlin, German leaders surely know they will be dealing with a serious, seasoned player who will defend Poland\u2019s interests more effectively than PiS ever did.<\/p>\n

In his\u00a0expos\u00e9<\/a>\u00a0(a speech outlining the new government\u2019s plans), Tusk looked directly at PiS\u2019 parliamentary deputies and made clear that no one in the EU will be able to push him around. In doing so, he took the air out of PiS\u2019 aggressive propagandising about him being subordinate to Berlin, and he sent a clear signal to both the German and French governments. He has already announced that he will oppose proposed EU treaty changes designed to remove the unanimity requirement,\u00a0warning<\/a>\u00a0against \u2018naive, sometimes even unbearable Euro-enthusiasm\u2019 behind efforts to \u2018change the character of the EU\u2019.<\/p>\n

A stronger security strategy<\/p>\n

In terms of foreign policy, Tusk says he will focus primarily on maximising support for Ukraine from Poland and other EU and NATO states. He did not mince words: \u2018I cannot listen to politicians who talk about being tired of the situation in Ukraine. They are tired, they say it to the face of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Poland\u2019s task is to loudly and firmly demand that the West fully resolve and help Ukraine in this war.\u2019 There was a clear message here for Hungary\u2019s pro-Kremlin prime minister, Viktor Orb\u00e1n, whom Tusk knows well and once considered a friend.<\/p>\n

Still, Tusk also declared that his government will show \u2018cordial and benevolent assertiveness when it comes to Polish interests\u2019 on the Polish-Ukrainian border, where Polish truckers have set up\u00a0blockades<\/a>\u00a0to prevent their lower-paid Ukrainian counterparts from entering. Tusk says he will offer an immediate solution to this problem, which is destroying the Ukrainian economy.<\/p>\n

On the fraught issue of immigration, Tusk showed during his stint as president of the European Council that he has a strong, principled position on the matter. His policy can be summed up as \u2018Borders First!\u2019. All borders must be secured before a properly functioning migration and asylum system can be established, though the authorities can \u2018protect<\/a>\u00a0the Polish border and be humane at the same time\u2019. His government intends to seal the border but also to end the illegal practice of \u2018push-backs\u2019, which has\u00a0cost the lives<\/a>\u00a0of more than 50 people on the Polish-Belarusian border in recent years.<\/p>\n

During Tusk\u2019s first government,\u00a0Radek Sikorski and Sweden\u2019s then-prime minister,\u00a0Carl Bildt, forged a special relationship. Now, Tusk wants to do the same within NATO.<\/p>\n

The importance of this issue is underscored by the fact that Tusk already has\u00a0plans<\/a>\u00a0to fly to Tallinn and meet with the prime ministers of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. They have many of the same priorities: dealing with the war in Ukraine, securing their borders (all are targets of a Russian and Belarusian hybrid war that includes funnelling immigrants over their borders) and strengthening their cooperation with like-minded governments.<\/p>\n

In his expos\u00e9, Tusk made sure to mention Finland, signalling a stronger focus on NATO\u2019s northern front. During Tusk\u2019s first government,\u00a0Radek Sikorski<\/a>\u00a0(who is returning as head of the Foreign Ministry to rebuild Poland\u2019s ruined diplomacy) and Sweden\u2019s then-prime minister,\u00a0Carl Bildt<\/a>, forged a special relationship. Now, Tusk wants to do the same within NATO. It is a sensible strategy, since he cannot hope for cooperation within the\u00a0Visegr\u00e1d group<\/a>, owing to\u00a0populist spoilers<\/a>\u00a0like Orb\u00e1n and Slovakia\u2019s new prime minister, Robert Fico.<\/p>\n

Poland today is like a ship that needs to be rebuilt while at sea. The situation is not unlike 1989. The biggest difference is that the economy today is in crisis, rather than in ruins. Still, other challenges are just as difficult, if not more so. Back then, Russia (or rather the USSR) was on its knees, whereas now it is waging wars of aggression. There is no Polish politician today who could handle these challenges better than Tusk.<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Project Syndicat<\/a>e<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This week,\u00a0Donald Tusk\u00a0won a\u00a0vote of confidence\u00a0in Poland\u2019s parliament to lead a new government as the country\u2019s new prime…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":767,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[755,676,64,75,754,756,323,753,9,380,368,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-766","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-donald-tusk","8":"tag-change","9":"tag-democracy","10":"tag-donald-tusk","11":"tag-european-union","12":"tag-government","13":"tag-migration","14":"tag-nato","15":"tag-pis","16":"tag-poland","17":"tag-policy","18":"tag-security","19":"tag-ukraine"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=766"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/766\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}