Social Movements and Pact Making in Eastern European Transitions to Democracy: the Case of Poland

This study is looking for an answer to the question of the role of social movements in pact making. Since pacted transitions from nondemocratic to democratic regimes tend to be the most successful ones in terms of bringing about democracy, it is important to focus on the pact making process of democratization. By taking the path dependency of the democratization process into account, I have tried to show in this study that there are different paths to democracy among which pact making is the most viable one for democracy. By focusing on the transition process itself, I have indicated that the strategic interactions of regime and opposition actors made pact making possible. I have argued that social movements could stand as an opposition during the transition process and, in this way, became the credible negotiating partners of the pact making. Thus, in contrast to a thesis in the transitions literature that the social movements prevent pact making, this study shows that social movements can contribute to the pact making process. Through this study, I attempted to bring social movements as one of the actors of the pact making. I have indicated that social movements contributed to the transition process either through pushing the process toward pact negotiations or through being the partners of the pact making. Poland case approved the fact that social movements can be very effective during the pact making process. Consequently, this study has shown that the scope of pact making should be enlarged so as to include opposition social movements.