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Youth activism and participation in the transformation of East European countries from communism to capitalism represent the larger change toward democracy and market reforms in East and Central Europe. An understanding of the change from communism to post-communism from the social viewpoint needs an investigation of the past for the origin of the transformation. Tradition and their own creativity, rather than political impulse, spurred the youth.

The changes which have occurred in Poland since 1989 can be described as a transition in political terms, to relatively free elections, while economic change was imposed above, bringing changes in the country's social structure which are still being felt. Peasants now have to chose between farming for profit or working in the rural service sector. The industrial working class is faced with the break up of plants, and the intelligentsia find their qualifications are little help in finding work. Meanwhile, and urban middle class grounded on commerce is developing. These social changes were not foreseen by the people who set off the political changes, and are in a sense, revolutionary. The deep rootedness of these social changes brings an element of uncertainty, and the outcome of the process is not yet clear.

The article focuses on the amendments in social policy and the steps to be taken in response to the shattered August 1980 economic system in Poland. It states that after the devastation experienced by the country particularly on its economy, demands of August strikers, including increase of wages and shortened working hours, are still unmet. It suggests that the trade union Solidarity should participate in negotiating for the improved social policy.

The story of a boy soldier who loses a leg in the first days of the Warsaw Uprising. His bitterness at being unfit to fight is steeped by his helplessness to prevent the Nazis massacring the wounded in the hospital to which he was brought. His only source of consolation is his nurse Liljanka. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A letter to the editor is presented in response to the article about the regret of Michal Cichy concerning the increasing marginalization of the moderate revolutionists that was published previously.

This article presents information regarding political and economic conditions in Poland. This system of selection of people holding executive and managerial posts worked for years, being accompanied by a general atmosphere of servilism and doctrinairism, and resulted in permanent systemic errors in the government of the country, and in a chronic inability of choosing the proper and realistic ways of its development. People who were usually not tested at lower posts and often proved incapable at the various levels of the political and administrative system were making decisions in the various spheres of life with the consequences which can It is worth noting that in the neighbouring countries, which have the same politico-economic system, economic effects are incomparably better, while many undesirable phenomena, marked by their great intensity in this country, are specifically Polish achievements. The most important examples are the lack of economic balance, collapse of the market and of production processes, the size of the inflation gap, disproportion between. Poland can export and what it must import, and also the sums it has to spend to repay foreign loans.