Poland: “the police are not the public and the public are not the police”: Transformation from militia to police

Abstract

In the fall of 1989 Poland was the first Eastern European country to free itself from Soviet domination. One of the strongest arms of the communist regime was the Militia, also called the Civic Militia. The main objective of this organization was not strict law enforcement, service, nor emergency response. Despite the initial goal of crime fighting, in reality, the Militia closely cooperated with the Security Bureau and in effect served the role of political police, aiming and targeting political opposition to the communist regime. Presents a study which aimed to analyze the difficult transformation police organizations face in the Eastern European bloc, and the impact of this transformation on the public’s perception of the new police role within the framework of police‐community relations. Owing to the scarcity of information available from the local law enforcement agencies the study largely relied on journalistic sources. Recognizes the limitation of such an analysis and presents the findings and conclusions accordingly.

Citation

Haberfeld, M.R. (1997), "Poland: “the police are not the public and the public are not the police”: Transformation from militia to police", Policing: An International Journal, Vol. 20 No. 4, pp. 641-654. https://doi.org/10.1108/13639519710192878