Gdańsk Agreement in the context of Strike action

Jarosław Aleksander Kaczyński (born 18 June 1949) is a Polish politician. He co-founded the Law and Justice (PiS) party in 2001 with his twin brother, Lech Kaczyński, and has served as its leader since 2003. He served as Prime Minister of Poland from 2006 to 2007, and has twice held the post of Deputy Prime Minister of Poland, first from 2020 to 2022, and a second time from June to November 2023. He is considered to have been the eminence grise of Poland, when PiS formed the government in 2005–2007 and again in 2015–2023, with direct political influence over the prime ministers Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, Beata Szydło and Mateusz Morawiecki.

Jaroslaw Kaczyński as a student took part in protest during the March 1968 political crisis. Subsequently, he became involved in the anti-communist opposition as a collaborator of KOR and KSS KOR. He took part in the protests in August 1980 when he was arrested, then joined the Solidarity movement. In 1982 he became a member of the Polish Helsinki Committee. He took part in the 1988 strikes.

Lech Wałęsa (/vəˈwɛnsə/; Polish: [ˈlɛx vaˈwɛ̃sa] ; born 29 September 1943) is a Polish statesman, dissident and Nobel Peace Prize laureate who served as the president of Poland between 1990 and 1995. After winning the 1990 election, Wałęsa became the first democratically elected president of Poland since 1926 and the first-ever Polish president elected by popular vote. An electrician by trade, Wałęsa became the leader of the opposition Solidarity movement and led a successful pro-democratic effort, which in 1989 ended Communist rule in Poland and ushered in the end of the Cold War.

While working at the Lenin Shipyard (now Gdańsk Shipyard), Wałęsa, an electrician, became a trade-union activist, for which he was persecuted by the government, placed under surveillance, fired in 1976 and arrested several times. In August 1980, he was instrumental in political negotiations that led to the ground-breaking Gdańsk Agreement between striking workers and the government. He co-founded the Solidarity trade-union, whose membership rose to over ten million.

54°22′23.956″N 18°39′39.358″E / 54.37332111°N 18.66093278°E / 54.37332111; 18.66093278

Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee (or Inter-Factory Strike Committee, Polish: Międzyzakładowy Komitet Strajkowy, MKS) was an action strike committee formed in Gdańsk Shipyard, People's Republic of Poland on 16 August 1980. It was led by Lech Wałęsa and others and is famous for issuing the 21 demands of MKS on 17 August, that eventually led to the Gdańsk Agreement and creation of Solidarity.

The 21 demands of the Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee (Polish: 21 postulatów MKS) was a list of demands issued on 17 August 1980 by the Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee in Poland.

The first demand was the right to create independent trade unions. Other demands called the government to respect the constitutional rights and freedoms, dismantling the privileges for Polish United Workers' Party members, and taking actions to improve the economic conditions of Polish citizens. The demands eventually led to the Gdańsk Agreement and creation of Solidarity.

Martial law in Poland (Polish: Stan wojenny w Polsce) existed between 13 December 1981 and 22 July 1983. The government of the Polish People's Republic drastically restricted everyday life by introducing martial law and a military junta in an attempt to counter political opposition, in particular the Solidarity movement.

Since the late 1970s, Poland had been in a deep economic recession. Edward Gierek, First Secretary of the Polish United Workers' Party (PZPR), had obtained a series of large loans from foreign creditors to achieve better economic output. This instead resulted in a domestic crisis. Essential goods were heavily rationed, which acted as a stimulus to establishing the first anticommunist trade union in the Eastern Bloc, known as Solidarity (Polish: Solidarnośćcode: pol promoted to code: pl ), in 1980. Gierek, who permitted the trade union to appear per the Gdańsk Agreement, was dismissed from his post less than a month later and confined to house arrest. Following countless strikes and demonstrations by employees of chief industrial regions, Poland was heading towards bankruptcy. The new First Secretary, General Wojciech Jaruzelski, was determined to end the demonstrations by force if necessary.