Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 November 2018
During the last three years, extensive academic as well as public discussions of national minorities’ rights have taken place in Poland. Scholars can be roughly divided into a pro-national minorities rights group and an anti-national minorities rights group. Some strive to reconcile these two disparate positions. Similar groups can be found in the Sejm (Polish Parliament) which has been discussing the draft of a law on national minorities since Autumn 1993. This brief article investigates the situation of national minorities in Poland ever since a “specific” policy towards ethnic minorities was carried out in Poland by communist governments (though it focuses primarily on the German minority). It also reviews changes in the official policy of the Polish government, the Sejm, and assesses the prospects for the adoption of a Minorities Law, by discussing the major arguments of those groups proposing national minorities rights and those of its opponents.