Od decentralizacji do centralizmu demokratycznego – od samorządu II Rzeczypospolitej do systemu rad narodowych w Polsce Ludowej
From Decentralization to Democratic Centralization – From Self-government of the Second Polish Republic to the System of National Councils in the People’s Republic of Poland

Summary/Abstract: The formation of the internal structures of a local government began once Poland regained independence. The local government in the Second Polish Republic became an essential element of the reactivated Polish sovereignty and of the local authorities created at that time. At the same time, it underwent significant changes: from the rule of the broad self-government based on the principle of decentralization, to the self-government subjected to the process of centralization and functioning in an authoritarian state. The culmination of these events resulted in the consolidation act of 1933. The functioning of the self-government structures of the Second Polish Republic was interrupted by World War II. After the war, Poland was in the sphere of Soviet influence and took over Soviet system solutions. Initially reactivated local government was finally replaced in 1950 by the system of national councils to express a democratic centralism and simultaneously a guarantee of ensuring the communist party power monopoly. The aim of this article is to show the changes in the functioning of local government – from its establishment in the Second Polish Republic to its “transformation” into a system of councils and then consolidation of this system in People’s Poland. The study was based on normative legal acts which made up the legal basis for the functioning of local government in the period of the Second Polish Republic and People’s Republic of Poland, as well as on the source literature on this subject. The historical and legal method was the main research method used when writing this article. It consisted in the research and critical evaluation of archival sources and legal phenomena. Moreover, it was used to study the old (non-binding) law regulating the local government system in the period of the Second Polish Republic and People’s Poland.

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