If there is a lack of trust within the Polish public toward the state, then it stems in large part from a history of oppressive foreign or foreign-controlled governments over the course of the last 200 years. Of course, prior to that, the Polish republican tradition generally took a somewhat skeptical view of government and government power, introducing a system of checks and balances that ultimately tipped in favor of the nobility via the Sejm. But recent attitudes are IMO influenced by a kind of habit of viewing government as a foreign intruder dominated by foreign interests (which, frankly, continues to this day in the form of competing German, American, and Russian influence often represented by competing parties). The end of the Cold War did not, of course, lead to the expulsion of the entrenched interests and power networks formed during the years of the Soviet-dominated People's Republic which also contributes to the antipathies Poles have toward government.
The fact that the Court tries not to do something like that is because it is also a political actor searching for stability.
This sounds to me like someone saying that the Queen of England has the power to dissolve parliament - and just doesn't for political concerns. (Those political concerns being that if she ever exercises that power, it'll be removed)
At some point you have to recognize that if you can only use power in ways that don't interfere with another governmental body, that power might not really exist.
> Rulings of the constitutional court have almost no real life consequences. If there is a negative ruling the parliament is given ample time before the unconstitutional law must be replaced. If there is any replacement within that time, the same law, formulated differently, is passed.
To say that the court does have power. But your example is an example of exactly what the OP was saying happens!
>If there is any replacement within that time, the same law, formulated differently, is passed
Which is not accurate. Actually the new laws are substantially different, in the case of the ground tax this is also very obvious.
Some consequential decision that come to my mind (without judging whether these were good or bad decision): - they derived the right to privacy (Informationelle Selbstbestimmung) based on other rights. This is now firmly established in the judicial process. - They struck down the law allowing the government to shoot down hijacked planes (no replacement) - Secret paternity test are illegal and hold no value as evidence - mass deployment of automatic number-plate recognition is illegal - they set the barrier for voting machines so high it's de facto impossible to use them - they've struck down the data mention laws multiple times since 2007. The government keeps trying but to this day there's no law in force - struck down the law requiring a cross in every classroom
And these are just the bigger ones that made the press. There are a huge amount of cases that narrow down and define things like when apartments can be searched, when people can be wiretapped, what are the rights and responsilties of people living in a civil partnerships (before marriage for everyone was enacted), when and when not it's allowed to use the armed forces abroad and what restrictions on the right to assemble are allowed.
The reason you might have this impression are three-fold: - sometimes a law that is unconstitutional can be made constitutional by adding some exceptions. For example a surveillance law might only be unconstitutional because it didn't have adequate measures to protect priests, therapists, lawyers and other professions with certain privileges. The law is then often revised and passes muster. - some ruling a purely procedural. The decision itself is valid but either it didn't come to be in a valid way (e.g. proper parlimentary procedure wasn't maintained) or it exceeded authority (the government acted but it would have to be a law). These are often easily fixed by going through the process again or turning a decree into a law - Lastly, the constitution might just be changed. The Constitutional Court doesn't have any higher authority than the parliament. If the parliament, following proper procedure, changes the constitution a lot of things are possible. This does require a big majority in both parliaments. Note there are some basic principles that can't be changed but they're quite limited.
What? Cases take years or decades to make their way through the court system. You might be thinking of the fact that some laws get an injunction on their enforcement until they are ruled on, but that is not mandatory. More important, they are not struck down, only enjoined. And of course if the legislature changes the law, the case becomes moot by the time it reaches the court (this happens semi-regularly, where the court refuses to rule on the constitutionality of a law that is no longer on the books).
It's implied that we're talking about what happens after it's decided. We obviously can't talk about the action of the court before it's been decided. What matters is what happens after a decision has been made. The grandparent comment gave me the impression that in germany, after a law has been found to be unconstitutional by the courts, it doesn't get struck down. Instead, it gets sent back to the legislature for revision, while remaining valid in the meantime.
>And of course if the legislature changes the law, the case becomes moot by the time it reaches the court (this happens semi-regularly, where the court refuses to rule on the constitutionality of a law that is no longer on the books).
I'm not sure what you're trying to say here. Is this supposed to be a flaw? What purpose does it serve to rule on laws that have already been revoked? To throw some shade on the legislative branch? To punish them somehow? Moreover, is this something that doesn't happen in germany?
Which is strange, since there are people alive today who's relatives were executed in camps by the democratically elected government of Germany. People who think that democratic government is somehow a panacea against tyranny are constantly being proven wrong by history. The modern example is Venezuela and the fact that Maduro's predecessor, Chávez was elected by the majority of the population.
No system is flawless and if shit really hits the fan and somebody makes a coup, who knows what may happen, but the German system is probably the most stable in the world, so I think some amount of trust in it is not misplaced.
And the European, or at least Western European, perspective is that governments are elected and certainly more representative than any large companies that are incentivised only to maximise profit above everything, so having an oligopoly of companies dictating the rules of society is seen as a problem. This is a perspective I largely agree with.
(NB: I'm not saying you should fully trust the government, I certainly don't always do that, but I do trust that the system generally works to keep the government in check.)
I’d be surprised if people trust their governments in Poland, Bulgaria etc.
Government officials have more power to abuse people than companies. At least Germany has an established constitutional court that can still resist the politicians to some degree.
I think the american view is that governments are bad because they can be used to establish tyranny. Every citizen’s right to be judged by their own peers, their right to carry firearms and freedom of speech are the things that allow people to fight against corrupt governments.
This is my view being someone living in Turkey. I am even afraid of posting this comment.
Maybe this generation in Europe trusts their government and thinks that its good. But I bet people having experienced autocratic regimes can never trust their government.