By Maria Wilczek
Szymon Hołownia, a journalist and TV presenter, entered politics six months ago in a bid to shake up a political system that for the last 15 years has been dominated by two parties, the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) and centrist Civic Platform (PO), which have swapped power back and forth since 2005.
He stood as an independent candidate in this year’s presidential election. Though failing to make the run-off between the top two, he finished a strong third in the first round, getting 14% of the vote. That put him well ahead of candidates from all of Poland’s political parties other than PiS and PO.
Following that success, Hołownia has announced a new political movement, called “Poland 2050” (Polska 2050). His declared aim is to “break the diseased duopoly” of PiS and PO.
His movement has no programme yet, but Hołownia has presented himself as a moderate and pragmatic conservative: a devout Catholic who strongly believes in the division of church and state and supports same-sex civil partnerships; a proponent of reducing Poland’s reliance on coal and promoting green energy.
The first poll published after Poland 2050’s launch provided Hołownia with a glimmer of hope. It put his movement third in a parliamentary vote with 11.9%, behind PiS on 38% and Civic Coalition (KO, of which PO is the main component) on 23.6%.
Yet Poland’s political history is littered with outsiders who have made dramatic entrances, only to quickly fade away. Two of the most recent examples are rock star Paweł Kukiz – who did even better than Hołownia in the 2015 presidential election, getting 20% of the vote – and economist Ryszard Petru.
Kukiz and his eponymous movement are now a marginal force, while Petru has abandoned politics after seeing his Modern (Nowoczesna) party record declining polling numbers and growing financial difficulties after entering parliament in 2015.
Moreover, Poland’s electoral calendar could work against Hołownia. Whereas Kukiz and Petru formed their movements just months before parliamentary elections in 2015, capitalising on their novelty, Poland 2050 will have to wait until 2023 to stand for parliament (unless snap elections are called earlier). The momentum Hołownia has built this year will have diminished by then.
To assess Hołownia’s prospects, we asked his campaign manager from the recent presidential election and five independent experts for their views.
Michał Kobosko: “there is large demand for a politician who represents a third way”
Michał Kobosko, a former journalist who managed Hołownia’s campaign and heads the Polska Od Nowa (Poland Anew) foundation around which the new movement is based, is, unsurprisingly, optimistic.
“Szymon has shown that there is large and noticeable demand for a politician who represents the third way, outside of PiS and PO,” says Kobosko. “The [new] movement draws on the main theme of Hołownia’s campaign – thinking ahead in terms of the next generation, and not the next electoral term.”
“Szymon is now meeting with his voters and supporters, building the basis for future activities, visiting places that he did not manage to reach during the 20-day [election] campaign,” Kobosko explains.
He envisages the party as an extension of Hołownia’s presidential manifesto: “a green Poland, a supportive [solidarna] Poland and a democratic Poland”.
“A green Poland entails a wide spectrum of issues concerning the climate – energy mix, decarbonisation, renewable sources of energy and a serious discussion about nuclear energy in Poland. A supportive Poland means no marginalisation, a fight against all kinds of social exclusions,” adds Kobosko.
Asked whether Hołownia’s movement is “anti-systemic”, as some commentators have labelled it, he denies the claim. Rather, “it is fighting not against the existence of parties, but against how they function today – out of touch with people’s problems and preoccupied with the struggle between PO and PiS.”
The medium-term aim is to stand in the next local and parliamentary elections, both due in 2023. But Kobosko notes that the movement “will need to prepare for potential earlier elections, if that is the dynamic after this presidential vote”. There have been rumours that the PiS-led government, which has shown signs of internal division recently, could call a snap election.
In terms of organisational structure, the movement has kept all of the campaign’s offices in the capital cities of each province. “These will be meeting places,” he explains, for bringing together activists and volunteers, of whom 15,000 have already enlisted during the campaign, according to Hołownia.
The organisation’s think tank – yet to be launched – will produce reports and organise conferences, and will be led by Katarzyna Pełczyńska-Nałęcz, a former Polish ambassador to Russia.
In terms of funding, Kobosko notes that Hołownia’s campaign budget was entirely based on crowdfunding. “We collected 7.5 million [zloty] – more than 126,000 people contributed,” he says, calling these numbers “unprecedented”.
Milena Drzewiecka: “it will be much harder to build a party around a single name”
“Szymon Hołownia is the engine of the entire movement,” says Milena Drzewiecka, a psychologist and lecturer in political marketing and image formation at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities (SWPS). “But while it makes sense to build a campaign around a single face and a single name, it will be much harder to also build a party around one personality.”
One issue will be attracting media attention. “With the elections over, the party will have to fight for airtime. A social media presence will no longer be sufficient,” Drzewiecka adds.
If Rafał Trzaskowski had won yesterday’s presidential election, that could have made things tougher for the nascent movement. “Trzaskowski has adopted a number of Hołownia’s electoral slogans. If Trzaskowski did indeed become ‘an open candidate’ and lead ‘a non-partisan chancellery’, a number of Hołownia’s voters might lose interest.”
She concludes that Hołownia’s movement “has a shot, thanks to the popularity and political capital amassed during the presidential campaign.” However, she warns, “such capital is very easy to squander”.
Marta Żerkowska-Balas: “in a parliamentary election, he stands an even better chance”
Marta Żerkowska-Balas, a sociologist at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities (SWPS), thinks that there is a place for a party like Hołownia’s, “outside of the current conflict, which reflects the values of many voters”.
She suggests that in a parliamentary election, a challenger party such as this one has a chance at faring better than in the presidential run. “Many people voted strategically for one of the two frontrunners to ensure that there was a run-off,” says Żerkowska-Balas. “Most voters don’t want to waste their vote.”
However, she suggests that the motivations of voters could change in a parliamentary vote. “When the election is not majoritarian, he will stand an even better chance.”
To her, Hołownia’s main strength is his clean political slate. “It’s important that the movement is new, and has until now not been embroiled in any political conflict. It still has the effect of novelty and freshness.”
Rafał Chwedoruk: “he can only establish a new party at the cost of an established one”
“Poland’s political cleavages have ossified in a 2+2+1 party system,” begins associate professor Rafał Chwedoruk, a lecturer in political science at the University of Warsaw.
“That means that there are two large parties, two medium-sized ones, and a stand-in smaller populist party,” he continues, referring to the Polish parliament’s usual make-up of PiS and PO, the agrarian PSL and the Left or the far-right Confederation.
“Anyone who wants to enter the playing field has to do so at the cost of another player,” says Chwedoruk, “Hołownia can only establish his new party at the cost of another existing one.”
Compared to other “outsiders” in Poland’s presidential races in the past two decades, Chwedoruk considers Hołownia to be one of the structurally weaker runners-up. “He does not have much backing,” he explains, contrasting the new movement to Grzegorz Napieralski, a 2010 presidential candidate, with his solid backing from the SLD (Left Democratic Alliance) party, or Kukiz with his firm support base in local authorities, especially in the Lower Silesia and Opole provinces.
Chwedoruk says that Hołownia could easily “continue his political career within one of the larger parties,” noting that there are glaring similarities between his movement and the main centrist opposition, Civic Coalition (KO).
Jacek Wasilewski: “Hołownia doesn’t bring any new ideas to the table”
“The campaign was skilfully crafted, presenting Szymon Hołownia both as a conservative, but also as a candidate who can gain votes from liberals and progressives,” explains Jacek Wasilewski, a lecturer in media studies at the University of Warsaw.
However, he is sceptical of the longevity of a movement built around “rebellion” against the party system. “In the last election, Kukiz received over 20% of the vote,” notes Wasilewski. “The moment when a rebellious figure appears, there is hope that they will be unblemished by politics, with pure intentions.”
Yet “Hołownia does not bring any new political quality to the table, no new ideas around which to build an entire movement,” says Wasilewski.
He notes that Andrzej Olechowski, one of the founders of the Civic Platform, had filled a similar “outsider” role in the 2000 presidential race which he lost to Aleksander Kwaśniewski. “However, he brought professional politicians – including Tusk – on board to create a lasting movement,” says Wasilewski.
“No movement built around a single person has survived in Poland.”
Sergiusz Trzeciak: “the question is, what is he playing for?”
“A common characteristic of independent candidates is that without guaranteed airtime and a sturdy party budget at the outset, they rely on the internet,” says Sergiusz Trzeciak, a strategic communications expert. Hołownia got “off to a great start with his online campaign”.
Trzeciak is, however, more sceptical about where Hołownia goes from here. He sees a number of challenges ahead. “For one, it will be hard to maintain the current campaign dynamics for the next three years,” says Trzeciak. “Second, he lacks the funds. Third, he does not yet have the party structures – local support, candidates who will run with him in the next elections.”
Trzeciak thinks that the movement also has some soul-searching ahead. “Anti-systemic parties which enter the system lose their credibility,” he says, citing Samoobrona (Self-Defence), a left-wing populist party which grew out a union and after a stint in the PiS government in 2005 never regained its electoral support.
“If Hołownia wants to build his own movement, then granting support to another candidate is risky,” says Trzeciak, referring to Hołownia’s endorsement of Trzaskowski for yesterday’s run-off.
“This is politics: support is usually traded for something else. The question here is, what is he playing for,” he says, citing the example of Paweł Rabiej, a founding member of the centrist Modern party, who in 2017 ran against Trzaskowski in Warsaw’s mayoral elections, only to withdraw his candidacy and back Trzaskowski three months later. He is now Trzaskowski’s deputy.
Main image credit: Szymon Hołownia/Facebook
Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She is a regular writer for The Times, The Economist and Al Jazeera English, and has also featured in Foreign Policy, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza.
