Right-Wing Duopoly about to End in Poland [interview]
Adrian Zandberg, 2021
In the first round of the presidential election, left-wing candidates collectively garnered around 10% of the vote, in the best performance for the Polish left in over a decade. Magdalena Biejat, Deputy Speaker of the Senate, secured 4.23%. Adrian Zandberg, running a grassroots campaign as an opposition candidate of Together (Polish: Razem), received 4.86%, while Joanna Senyszyn, formerly a member of the post-communist Democratic Left Alliance (SLD), gained 1.09%. Last time the Polish left achieved a comparable result was in the 2010 presidential election, when Grzegorz Napieralski — then SLD candidate and now a member of Civic Platform — obtained 13.68%.
Of the three candidates, all eyes are on Adrian Zandberg, who has been widely recognized by the media and segments of the left as the rising figure of the Polish left. With government approval ratings at a historic low — including for the New Left, which is part of the ruling coalition — many see the Razem’s decision to pursue a path of left-wing opposition as a strategy that could strongly contribute to dismantling the existing duopoly.
Wojciech Albert Łobodziński speaks about this strategy, and about broader prospects for the left in Poland, with Zofia Malisz, Razem’s International Secretary.
How do you assess the results of the recent presidential elections? What do they mean for Together party and the political scene as a whole?
Zofia Malisz: In my view, this marks the beginning of the end for POPiS duopoly (Civic Coalition/Platform vs Law and Justice). The outcome of both rounds represents a major defeat for Donald Tusk’s government — especially in the first round, where Tusk’s coalition partners performed disastrously. We watched a glaring departure from reality in Tusk camp, most notably within Rafał Trzaskowski’s campaign team. They stubbornly repeated strategies from the 2015 and 2020 elections — tactics that had already failed back then. It’s a clear sign that the Civic Coalition has burned out. They’ve run out of ideas and are incapable of offering a compelling new narrative.
It is not just a failure of creativity — it is a swan song. In the second round, the Civic Coalition demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of how to run a presidential campaign in Poland. They put forward a thoroughly unconvincing candidate — a cosmopolitan guy from the capital, someone the average voter saw as inseparably linked to an unpopular government. Tusk, in a last-ditch attempt to save the campaign, stepped in near the end and gave a bizarre television interview, which only made matters worse.
He cited convicted criminals and mythomaniac just to attack Nawrocki.
Exactly. It’s clear that most Poles are fed up with their government’s lack of direction, energy, and qualified staff. In the end, this is what brought the Civic Coalition down.
And how do you assess the strategy of Law and Justice?
They played their cards far more skillfully — especially in the second round. They put forward Nawrocki, a complete unknown man with no political experience and a murky past. But Nawrocki’s campaign team knew full well that these stories from his past would emerge. I believe they calculated it well: he was meant to come across as a bit rough around the edges, a political amateur — a kind of Polish Trump. It worked.
Still, the very fact that the final choice came down to Trzaskowski and Nawrocki is, in itself, a failure of Law and Justice. At the start of the campaign. Nawrocki was completely clueless about foreign policy, was ridiculed for it, and only managed to put himself together after a series of tightly managed briefings. But that doesn’t change the larger picture: the entire campaign had nothing to do with a real debate about Poland’s future.
No programmatic debate at all?
None whatsoever. The political war between Law and Justice and Civic Platform that has dragged on for more than two decades, has drained all substance from Polish politics. There are no policy debates, no new ideas. That’s why Adrian Zandberg entered the first round with a strong and substantial platform — he showed his commitment to offer an alternative . Zandberg and our party demonstrated that the duopoly has no strategic vision for Poland, that none of the domineering parties is capable of real governance.
In your opinion, did young voters play a decisive role in the election’s outcome? Is there potential to build something new from this — a new party system, a new kind of political competition?
Absolutely. That was the core message of Adrian Zandberg’s campaign: we, as a society, can no longer afford to neglect the country just to uphold the stale narrative of the never-ending feud. We have urgent things to do: we need to stop the stealthy privatisation of our public health service, and our state needs to start investing in innovations and people, among other things. That message resonated strongly — especially when contrasted with the other candidates: the hollow Trzaskowski, who has even no meaningful achievements in Warsaw, and Nawrocki, who stumbled through the early stages of the campaign and only barely pulled himself together.
If you look at the breakdown of the electorate, it’s the votersunder 30 who are most likely to break with this entrenched polarization. The younger the voter, the weaker the attachment to the worn-out narrative: the battle between good and evil, democracy versus the dark ages, or conversely, between the real patriots and the “traitors”.
But can something lasting really be built on this youthful energy, which often seems fussy?
It’s not a simple equation. Older generations are deeply rooted in the political rituals of the duopoly. For many, it’s no longer just a political choice. It is an emotional, tribal allegiance. At Christmas dinners, at wedding parties, conversations between Law and Justice supportera and Civic Platform voters frequently ends in a confrontation. Yes, this is a division that goes through families and ruins friendships.
Yet something seems to be shifting. You could already feel it during the second round — as if a narrative dam had burst. Even among liberals, critical voices began to emerge. Not in the mainstream media, which still favours the Coalition, but increasingly on social media — and more audibly with each day.
A well-known liberal pundit, Jacek Żakowski suggested that Tusk should step down – and this happened before the second round. Tusk had long been untouchable — practically sanctified in liberal circles. Now, even in those same circles, there’s a growing sense that Tusk’s project is nearing its end.
Later, we saw Michał Kamiński, a conservative politician, Tusk’s coalition partner in a TV interview. When asked point-blank whether he wants Tusk to step down, he answered: “Yes, I do. I don’t want him as prime minister.”
It felt like a moment of catharsis — not just a personal reckoning, but a symbolic closing of a chapter. Political commentators, media personalities, intellectuals — they’re beginning to turn away from Tusk. These are no longer scattered voices on the margins.
At the same time, a counterexample: Minister of Foreign Affairs, Radosław Sikorski defending Tusk, comparing him to Pope John Paul II…
Exactly. In an interview on Channel Zero (Kanał Zero), Sikorski once again attempted to glorify Tusk — calling him the greatest Pole since John Paul II, solely because… he held the post of President of the European Council. That says a lot. On one side, you have those clinging desperately to the old narrative; on the other, figures who are now openly challenging it. It’s a clear turning point. The political immunity Tusk has long enjoyed within liberal circles is beginning to unravel.
Similar signals are coming from people aligned with Szymon Hołownia, the leader of another coalition partner, Poland 2050. Joanna Mucha, for instance, openly mocked the KO campaign — and who can blame her? The campaign was hollow, the messaging weak, and the platform embarrassingly shallow.
Looking specifically from the perspective of my field — science policy — what they proposed looked like something scribbled together by an intern in five minutes on their knee. Three vague general issues, no strategy, no real solutions. And this was their official policy platform!
It reveals something deeper: after years of the political war against Law and Justice, the Civic Coalition has completely run out of both personnel and ideas. Their “programme” is pure PR — empty slogans, vain promises, and obvious electoral gimmicks that everyone sees right through.
Tusk has always good at declaring. Not at delivering the declarations.
Of course! Take an event earlier this year: meetings with scientists who had won prestigious ERC grants. A full-blown media production was staged — elegant halls, a conference at the stock exchange, the Prime Minister delivering lofty speeches about a “breakthrough year,” about science and innovation as pillars of a new state strategy. Warsaw’s scientific elite was thrilled.
And then? Nothing. No decisions, no reforms, no funding. Just glossy images and smoke and mirrors. That’s what this government stands for. And against that backdrop, what Adrian Zandberg is doing — and what we, as the Together party, are proposing — really stands out. We’re here not for PR. We’re offering specific, measurable change: in the health service, in tax and industrial policy and so on.
We used to be the de facto think tank of the Left coalition, as long as we remained in a common parliamentary club with the New Left, a social-liberal party which has chosen to join Tusk’s government in 2023. Unlike Tusk, we don’t claim to have “drawers full of ready bills” that, however, never see the light of day — we do have proposals.
Zandberg has long been talking about strategic transformations — like shifting toward an innovation-driven economy, modelled more on the example of South Korea than on the outdated cheap-labour paradigm, which has so far been implemented everywhere in the post-communist Central, Eastern and South-Eastern European countries. We have precise proposals to develop a Polish nuclear programme, for reorienting the entire economic system. But above all, we have a coherent vision for the state. That’s something that cannot be faked.
Speaking about consistency and vision… where would you position the far right Confederation party?
That’s where it gets interesting. Confederation, a clearly far-right and libertarian option, is gaining substantial support — and that needs to be taken seriously.
Their appeal is built on several layers. First, they channel a very raw, powerful sense of rebellion — deep anti-system anger. The kind of fury that leads people to vote particularly for someone like Grzegorz Braun, who openly presents himself as antisemite, who used to be a member of the far-right Confederation till last year. This year, he created an even more extremist political grouping. You can explain this phenomenon basing it on any programme. It’s build out of a desire to tear everything down.
But Confederation offers something else, too: consistency. Stability. People sense that. Even if they don’t know the programme in detail, they can feel that Confederation has stuck to the same message for years. This means they are serious. They don’t shift their whole narrative every two weeks — and in today’s Polish political landscape, that alone creates a sense of authenticity.
Does this mean consistency is enough, even without a real programme?
It’s not that the programme doesn’t matter at all. But when someone like Sławomir Mentzen consistently articulates certain views, that consistency builds credibility — even if, as Zandberg pointed out during the debate, many of those views are internally contradictory or outright populist. Zandberg completely disarmed him there by citing his own words about cutting pensions privileges from 2023, exposing Mentzen as a politician who had forgotten his own programme, just another player in the same political game — the game of “why not promise everything.”
That public exchange showed that Mentzen isn’t an outsider — he is a byproduct of the very same political logic of our system.
Yet Confederation continues to grow. Why?
They are methodical. They’ve spent years building recognition — through consistent media appearances, grassroots meetings, and a disciplined communication strategy. They travel, they talk, they forge the message, they repeat their lines. It works. Even when their arguments are simplistic, people sense a kind of steadiness there.
I haven’t analysed their full programme in detail, but my impression is that their messaging doesn’t feel like it was crafted in a PR lab based on focus group data — at least not as blatantly as in the case of the Civic Coalition or Law and Justice. That alone gives them an aura of authenticity — and in today’s climate, authenticity resonates. Razem is concentrating on challenging their set of solutions, which are in our view very harmful, they are focused on dismantling the Polish state in all its dimensions – our goal is to make it stronger, more socially-oriented and more democratic.
However, being heard in Polish politics requires funds. For parliamentary elections campaign, every party need people, logistics, banners, leaflets. Progressive alternatives cannot expect high state funding, nor big money from private donors. If you want to challenge Confederation, you need a solution to this.
Even though 10,000 new members have joined Razem in recent months, the budget remains our biggest problem. In a presidential race, you can rally around one candidate. If that candidate is already known, the financial entry barrier isn’t as steep. But parliamentary elections are a whole different scale. That said, our candidate has created a lot of grassroots enthusiasm — his campaign raised a lot of funds from ordinary people, and we continue receiving donations. This is our way — people’s support rather than funding connections to real estate developers, which is how our liberal opponents work.
In fact, Zandberg has been saying it openly: the parliamentary campaign has already begun. And we feel it. We’re striking while the iron’s hot. I think this is the moment we’ve been preparing for since 2015, when Razem was founded. Even then, we predicted that an eventual second Tusk term would end in disillusionment, with him growing detached from reality and pushing further anti-social reforms. And that out of that disillusionment, something new could emerge.
Back then, Law and Justice, through Beata Szydło’s candidacy, seized that space, offering a moderate social turn. And we, first opposing the right, then staying out of the polarization altogether, endured.
History is coming full circle?
Exactly. We’re back at the starting point. But this time, we are better prepared — organizationally, in terms of personnel, and also in terms of programme. Our members of parliament have known the political system inside and out. We have the structures, the tools, and the experience. What we don’t have is money. A public subsidy — even just a few million zlotys a year — makes an enormous difference. Crossing the 3% threshold already opens doors. Above 5%, you’re talking about real power.
Adrian Zandberg’s presidential campaign cost around 700–800 thousand PLN. Now compare that with Trzaskowski’s campaign — backed by the giants of Polish business. We started from an estimated support of 1.5% — and ended up with a result five times better, with a campaign budget twenty times smaller. That’s the power of consistency, ideology, and genuine commitment.
And your most valuable resource?
People. They are our core strength — their belief in a new beginning, their energy, their determination. Like us, they’re done with the sterile, bitter feuds that have defined Polish politics for the past two decades. We all want more than that — we want real change.
Subscribe to Cross-border Talks’ YouTube channel! Follow the project’s Facebook and Twitter page! And here are the podcast’s Telegram channel and its Substack newsletter!
Like our work? Donate to Cross-Border Talks or buy us a coffee!
About The Author
