Samstag, 23. Januar 2016

Political change in Poland?

Today Aleksandra Kołeczek is a guest at the sofa and talks about Poland's current political situation. She is a co-spokesperson of the Green Youth in Poland. Aleksandra works and lives in the capital Warsaw. 

Cover of Steffen Möller's book, own editing
SonjasSofa: Dzień dobry. Why did so many people vote for PiS? 
 
Aleksandra Kołeczek: The conservatives from PiS (Law and Justice) won because of the resentment and lack of mobilisation of the society. Many years of domination of the center, neo-liberal party PO (Civic Platform), had made a lot of people disappointed. Their lives were very much different from the vision the ruling government promoted – economic growth did not cause a greater social justice. Nonetheless, it seemed that politicians that were supposed to represent the nation did not seem concerned enough with this. The credibility of the political class was constantly disqualified because

Freitag, 1. Januar 2016

2015 review: Their borders are not my borders

Foto: Emese S.
When looking back at year 2015 we can definately say that it wasn't a boring one. Or let's put it differently: Our world seemed and still seems to descend into total chaos. There's so much happening at the same time: Wars, migration flows, terrorism, climate change and much more. Nobody knows, if 2016 will be better or worse.

But while 2015, taken as a whole, was a really bad year for Europe and a successful one for nationalists, for me personally it was the most European year I've ever had in my life! I've never had so many friends and facebook-contacts whithin the European Union and beyond. Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary, Turkey, Italy, France, Britain, Spain, Belgium, Netherlands, Bosnia and Herzegovina, USA, Ukraine, Iran, Russia, Georgia ... And indeed, I'm still texting with some of these people and I'm still thinking a lot about them. I've never met so many warm-hearted people from different nations than in 2015. I'm really grateful and I wouldn't like to miss this wonderful experience.