Polish Socialist Party

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The Polish Socialist Party (PPS) was founded in Paris in 1892, during the period known as the Great Emigration. In 1893, a faction called the Social Democracy of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania (SDKPiL) split from the PPS. The PPS focused more on nationalism and Polish independence, while the SDKPiL adopted a far-left (Marxist), internationalist stance. In November 1892, key members of the PPS developed a political program that, for its time, was notably progressive. The program called for an independent Republic of Poland founded on democratic principles, direct universal voting rights, equal rights for all citizens regardless of religion or gender, freedom of the press, speech, and assembly, progressive taxation, an eight-hour workday, a minimum wage, equal pay for men and women, a ban on child labor (under age 14), free education, and social support for workers injured on the job.^[5]

After the Revolution of 1905 in the Russian Empire, the party membership drastically increased from several hundred active members to a mass movement of about 60,000 members.^[6] Another split in the party occurred in 1906, with the Revolutionary Faction following Józef Piłsudski, who supported the nationalist and independence ideals, and the Left faction which allied itself with the SDKPiL. However, the Revolutionary Faction became dominant and renamed itself back again to the PPS, while the Left was eclipsed, and in 1918 merged with SDKPiL, forming the Communist Party of Poland. In 1917-1918, the party participated in the Central Council of Ukraine and the Government of Ukraine.

During the Second Polish Republic, the PPS at first supported Józef Piłsudski (himself a former Socialist), including his May Coup, but later moved into the opposition to his authoritarian Sanacja regime by joining the democratic "centrolew" (center-left) opposition movement. Many PPS leaders and members were put on trial by Piłsudski's regime and jailed in the infamous Bereza Kartuska prison.

The party was a member of the Labour and Socialist International between 1923 and 1940.^[7]

The party supported the Polish resistance during World War II as the underground Polish Socialist Party – Freedom, Equality, Independence (Polska Partia Socjalistyczna – Wolność, Równość, Niepodległość). In 1948, it suffered a fatal split, as the Communists applied the salami tactics to dismember any opposition. One faction, which included Edward Osóbka-Morawski, wanted to join forces with the Polish Peasant Party and form a united front against the Communists. Another faction, led by Józef Cyrankiewicz, argued that the Socialists should support the Communists in carrying through a socialist program while opposing the imposition of one-party rule. Pre-war political hostilities continued to influence events, and Stanisław Mikołajczyk, leader of the Peasant Party, would not agree to form a united front with the Socialists.^{[citation needed]} The Communists played on these divisions by dismissing Osóbka-Morawski and making Cyrankiewicz the Prime Minister.

In 1948, Cyrankiewicz's faction of Socialists merged with the Communist Polish Workers' Party (PPR) to form the Polish United Workers' Party (Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza; PZPR), the ruling party in the Polish People's Republic; remnants of the other faction survived on emigration in the Polish government-in-exile and because of that Polish Socialist Party was still active on emigration. Cyrankiewicz's faction isn't really treated as a proper PPS.

A new party sharing the same name, aiming to continue the legacy of the original PPS, was founded in 1987 by left-wing opposition figures like Jan Józef Lipski. However, the modern PPS has remained a marginal force in the political landscape of the Third Republic of Poland, holding representation in the Sejm only from 1993 to 2001, due to the lingering stigma of communism associated with Soviet occupation. In the 2019 Polish parliamentary election, the PPS experienced a resurgence with its leader Wojciech Konieczny being elected to the Senate of Poland as part of The Left.^[8] Subsequently, other members of both the Sejm and Senate joined the PPS, which now has two deputies and two senators.

Its main propaganda outlet was the Robotnik ('The Worker') newspaper. The current party published the Nowy Robotnik ("The New Worker"), a continuation of the original publication, from 2003 to 2006.

On 16 November 2020, the party founded its first foreign branch in the United Kingdom, in the city of Coventry,^[9] home to a British Polish population founded by Polish Army Exiles.^[10]

On 25 June 2022, factions of the party formed an alliance with Social Democracy of Poland, Freedom and Equality, Labour Union and Polish Left to compete in the next Polish parliamentary election. The alliance also included the Feminist Initiative, the Democratic Left Association (SLD), and the Working People's Movement.^[11] In February 2023, after an internal conflict,^[12] PPS, together with the Labour Union, re-joined The Left.^[13]

Historically, the party advocated for a blend of socialism and nationalism,^[14][15] and was generally considered to be a left-wing^{[16][17][page needed]} or a centre-left^{[18][19][page needed]} party on the political spectrum. The party opposed Bolshevism and aligned more with the Mensheviks.^[20] In recent years, the party has identified as a democratic socialist movement, with its parliamentary leader Wojciech Konieczny describing it as a leftist party with a strong emphasis on democracy.^[21] As a modern party, it distanced itself from anti-clericalism, declaring that it does not wish to wage "war against God", accepting the concordat between Poland and the Vatican, along with the position of the Catholic Church in Polish society.^[22]

Presidential

More information Second Polish Republic, Election ...

Second Polish Republic
Election	Candidate	1st round		2nd round
		Votes	%	Votes	%
1922	Ignacy Daszyński	49	9.1 (#5)	1	0.2 (#5)
1926	Supported Józef Piłsudski[note 1]	292	60.2 (#1)
1926	Zygmunt Marek	56	11.6 (#3)	1	0.2 (#3)

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More information Third Polish Republic, Election ...

Third Polish Republic
Election	Candidate	1st round		2nd round
		Votes	%	Votes	%
1995	Supported Tadeusz Zieliński	631,432	3.5 (#6)
2000	Piotr Ikonowicz	38,672	0.2 (#10)
2005	Supported Daniel Podrzycki[note 2]
2020	Supported Robert Biedroń	432,129	2.2 (#6)
2025	Supported Magdalena Biejat	829,361	4.23 (#7)

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Sejm

More information Election, Votes ...

Election	Votes	%	Seats	+/–	Government
1919	515,062	9.2 (#4)	35 / 394	New	Coalition (1919)
					Opposition (1919-1920)
					Coalition (1920-1921)
					Opposition (1921-1922)
1922	906,537	10.3 (#5)	41 / 444	6	Opposition (1922-1925)
					Coalition (1925-1926)
					Opposition (1926)
					Coalition (1926-1928)
1928	1,482,097	13.0 (#2)	64 / 444	23	Opposition
1930	1,965,864	17.3 (#2)	23 / 444	41	Opposition
	As part of the Centrolew coalition, that won 79 seats in total.
1935	Boycotted		0 / 206	23	Extra-parliamentary
1938	Boycotted		0 / 208	0	Extra-parliamentary
1947	9,003,682	26.13 (#1)	116 / 444	116	Coalition
	As part of the Democratic Bloc coalition, which won 394 seats in total.[note 3]
1991	230,975	2.1 (#13)	0 / 460	116	Extra-parliamentary
	As part of the Labour Solidarity coalition, that won 4 seats in total.
1993	2,815,169	20.4 (#1)	4 / 460	4	Coalition
	As part of the Democratic Left Alliance coalition, which won 171 seats in total.
1997	3,551,224	27.1 (#2)	3 / 460	1	Opposition
	As part of the Democratic Left Alliance coalition, which won 164 seats in total.
2001	13,459	0.1 (#11)	0 / 460	3	Extra-parliamentary
2005	91,266	0.8 (#11)	0 / 460	0	Extra-parliamentary
	As part of the Polish Labour Party committee, that won no seats.
2007	160,476	1.0 (#7)	0 / 460	0	Extra-parliamentary
	As part of the Polish Labour Party committee, that won no seats.
2011	1,184,303	8.2 (#5)	0 / 460	0	Extra-parliamentary
	As part of the Democratic Left Alliance coalition, which won 27 seats in total.
2015	1,147,102	7.6 (#5)	0 / 460	0	Extra-parliamentary
	As part of the United Left coalition, which won no seats.
2019	2,319,946	12.6 (#3)	0 / 460	0	Extra-parliamentary
	As part of The Left coalition, which won 49 seats in total.
2023	1,859,018	8.6 (#4)	0 / 460	0	Extra-parliamentary
	As part of The Left coalition, which won 26 seats in total.

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Senate

More information Election, Votes ...

Election	Votes	%	Seats	+/–
1922	468,147	8.4 (#5)	7 / 111	n/a
1928	715,556	11.2 (#3)	10 / 111	3
1930	As part of Centrolew coalition, that won 13 seats in total.
1935	Boycotted
1938	Boycotted
1993	4,993,061	35.7 (#1)	1 / 100	1
	As part of the Democratic Left Alliance coalition, which won 37 seats in total.
1997	6,091,721	45.7 (#2)	3 / 100	2
	As part of the Democratic Left Alliance coalition, which won 28 seats in total.
2001	131,987	0.5 (#11)	0 / 100	3
2019	415,745	2.3 (#4)	1 / 100	1
	As part of The Left coalition, which won 2 seats in total.

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European Parliament

More information Election, Votes ...

Election	Votes	%	Seats	+/–	EP Group
2004	48,667	0.80 (#12)	0 / 54	New	–
	As part of the KPEiR-PLD coalition, that won no seats.
2009	1,331	0.02 (#12)	0 / 50	0	–
2014	Did not contest		0 / 50	0	–
2019	Did not contest		0 / 50	0	–
2024	741,071	6.30 (#5)	0 / 50	0	–
	As part of The Left coalition, that won 3 seats in total.

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Presidents and heads of state

• Józef Piłsudski (former member at time in office)
• Stanisław Wojciechowski (former member)
• Ignacy Mościcki (former member)

Presidents-in-exile

• Stanisław Ostrowski
• Franciszek Trąbalski

Prime ministers

• Ignacy Daszyński
• Jędrzej Moraczewski
• Janusz Jędrzejewicz (former member)
• Walery Sławek (former member)
• Edward Osóbka-Morawski (later became a communist)
• Józef Cyrankiewicz (later became a communist)

Prime ministers-in-exile

• Tomasz Arciszewski
• Tadeusz Tomaszewski
• Antoni Pająk
• Alfred Urbański

Other figures

• Norbert Barlicki
• Józef Biniszkiewicz
• Adam Ciołkosz
• Lidia Ciołkosz [pl]
• Jerzy Czeszejko-Sochacki (later became a communist)
• Piotr Ikonowicz
• Wojciech Konieczny
• Jan Kwapiński
• Herman Lieberman
• Jan Józef Lipski
• Bolesław Limanowski
• Stanisław Mendelson
• Stanisław Dubois
• Jan Mulak [pl]
• Mieczysław Niedziałkowski
• Antoni Pajdak [pl]
• Feliks Perl [pl]
• Zofia Praussowa
• Kazimierz Pużak
• Kazimierz Sosnkowski
• Czesław Świrski [pl]
• Jan Stańczyk
• Leon Wasilewski
• Aleksandra Zagórska
• Iza Zielińska

• List of Polish Socialist Party politicians
• Central Rada
• List of anti-capitalist and communist parties with national parliamentary representation