Przymusowe wywłaszczenia w dobie budowy Nowej Huty
Compulsory expropriations during the construction of Nowa Huta

Summary/Abstract: The article is essentially about the issue of compulsory expropriations that affected the residents of some four thousand farms in the area of Mogiła and Pleszów near Kraków in connection with the first phase of the construction of the town of Nowa Huta and the industrial conglomerate in the period 1949-1955. The key theses advanced in the article include inter alia one that argues that the communist authorities’ legislative preparation was inappropriate for conducting mass expropriations in the era of progressive industrialisation. Furthermore, the article contains a thesis claiming that the people’s authorities expropriated mainly small and medium-sized farms rather than large estates owned by rich landowners, in contrast to the claims made by the propaganda of the time. Finally, there is a thesis regarding the lack of suitable tangible compensation from the state to the owners of farms that were subject to compulsory expropriation during the PRL era. In terms of sources, the article is primarily based on published memories of residents of the farms that were compulsorily expropriated in connection with the construction of Nowa Huta. The article is also based on publications of yearly records documenting the area and period in question. Analysis of the material could not fail to include the propaganda literature of the time. Finally, publications from the field of sociology are particularly important when discussing this issue. The core structure of the paper is based on the chronological and topic-related methodology. The article consists of an introduction, discussion and summary. In the several paragraphs of the main part of the text, the author embraced key issues related to the discussed subject field while the summary contains conclusions that answer the research questions and theses put forward in the introduction.

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