Op-Ed: On Poland, Refugee Blackmail, and Cautious Optimism for Liberal Democracy in the EU

Recently arrived Ukrainian refugees organized a protest on Krakow’s Rynek Główny calling for increased EU military support, 11 March, 2022. Photo: Julia Kempton.

Last month, a group of refugees recently arrived from eastern Ukraine gathered beneath the statue of Adam Mickiewicz on Rynek Główny in Krakow’s Old Town to call for peace. A crowd of Poles and tourists gathered, reminded again of the inescapability of the war in Ukraine’s western neighbor, and of the moral imperative to do something about it. For the past decade or so, Poland has leaned dangerously towards the populist far-right under the leadership of the nationalist Prawo i Sprawiedliwość party (PiS). Like Russia’s Vladimir Putin, it has attempted to legislate away the complexities of Polish history – including with what was essentially a gag rule censoring scholars of the Holocaust. Like Hungary’s Viktor Orban, it has employed an anti-migrant and vehemently homophobic sentiment to win votes.

In the fall of 2021, when Belarus’s dictator, angry over sanctions deservedly imposed upon him by the EU, retaliated by abandoning desperate Kurdish and Iraqi migrants in the woods along the Polish border, Poland refused to help them. Women and children froze to death there this past November, because they did not possess Belarusian or Ukrainian passports, because they were fleeing war, repression, or poverty, but not war or repression or poverty in a European country. Poland pushed them back from the border, quite simply, because they were not white. Polish civil society groups and individuals that endeavored to help the migrants were harassed by the police. The European Union, fearing a repeat of the 2015-2016 refugee crisis, made some token protests but largely chose not to intervene. 

On the night of Feb. 24, Russia launched a further invasion of Ukraine. Poland, which shares a border and significant, complicated cultural ties with Ukraine, made a remarkable and sudden reversal in its foreign policy, announcing categorical support for Ukrainian democracy. Poland emerged as one of the most vocal critics of Russia on the world stage. It has taken in hundreds of thousands of refugees from Ukraine – one recent estimate was over two million women and children, entering a country of about 38 million – and collaborated with other E.U. nations and the United States on humanitarian and military policy. (Some Black and South Asian Ukrainians, however, reported experiencing a violent double standard at the Polish borders). 

Amanda Taub at the Times recently made the argument that differential response to refugees is the result not only of racism, but also of Realpolitik, because helping Ukrainians is a way to fight back against Putin, himself a feared boogeyman in Polish politics. Lamis Abdelaaty, of Syracuse University, explained that “Given [the] limitations [of military aid], welcoming Ukrainian refugees allows European countries to really signal which side of the conflict that they’re on.” But if Poland’s outpouring of support for Ukrainians is seen not as an act of human kindness that was unjustly withheld from Middle Eastern refugees on account of their race or religion but instead as a work of self-interest, then a change in the geopolitical situation could see that aid similarly withheld from the Ukrainians.

Poland (and the E.U.) must not view the humane treatment of Ukrainian refugees as an insurance policy or a protest against Putin, because doing so only ensures their short-term prospects, not the long-term support they deserve as human beings fleeing war. But although it is much too soon to say if the outpouring of support from everyday Poles to Ukrainian refugees will signal a major change in Poland’s political culture towards internationalism and empathy, the near-unanimity of support does give some hope that their motivations may be more than just an easily abandoned Realpolitik. If nothing else, increased protections for civil rights organizations and those helping refugees brought about as a result of the war and ensuing refugee crisis will allow these groups to operate more freely to aid other immigrants and refugees in the future.

From the outside perspective, the E.U. now realizes Poland is a bulwark against an even larger refugee crisis. As the New York Times quite succinctly summarized it, “Poland's right-wing populist government has been embraced by both Brussels and Washington as a linchpin of Western solidarity and security.” Like Turkey for Syria or Libya for the Sahel, the E.U. may try to incentivize Poland to keep refugees within its borders, even at the risk of compromising on E.U. positions. In both of those countries, the E.U. equips national governments with funds and resources to manage refugee camps and mitigate so-called “irregular migration,” but abuse is reportedly rampant (Médecins Sans Frontières has called the migration quid-pro-quo with Libya “E.U.-sponsored abuse;” the International Rescue Committee (IRC) considers the E.U.’s payments to Turkey “a stain on the European Union's human rights record.”

The refugee crisis has rescued Poland from its arguably deserved position as a democratic pariah, allowing it to become a darling of the E.U.’s newfound patriotism and optimism. But the E.U. must not ignore the ruling party’s recent history. As it slid further into authoritarianism around 2017, PiS attempted to disbar several judges on the Polish Supreme Court to make it easier for the ruling party to pass laws without oversight. In October of last year, Poland’s constitutional tribunal ruled that the Polish Constitution takes primacy over E.U. legislation and the European Court of Justice. The E.U. threatened to withhold funding to Poland unless it brought itself back in line with the founding principles and general laws of the Union. PiS responded with nationalist saber-rattling and, especially in the lower rings of the party, a suggestion that it might follow the precedent set by the U.K. and leave the E.U. The threats were probably empty, but the disregard for E.U. policies was not.

Lauding Poland’s response to the war in Ukraine need not mean ceding power to the antidemocratic, illiberal impulses of the PiS. Poland should be celebrated for the efforts it’s making today to accept Ukrainian refugees. But the E.U. and the international community have a responsibility to ensure that the PiS’s newly rediscovered focus on human rights and the rule of law extends not just to white Ukrainians but to all those who seek refuge along Poland’s borders.

Posters along Nowy Świat Street in central Warsaw show support for Ukrainian artists, 15 April 2022. Photo: Julia Kempton.