Interviews with Andrzej Gwiazda and Joanna Duda-Gwiazda

JOANNA DUDA-GWIAZDA: What I believe is that there is not a single method, there is not a single path, a path toward freedom, toward prosperity, toward independence, whenever that is the case, for countries that have different situations. So it is hard to say what, for instance, North Koreans could be doing. But I think that an absolute basis is that people should abandon the fear of a mutual conversation [talking to one another]. That they should disseminate all possible information, they should be building societal communication, as the learned phrase goes, you know, at the very basic level.

Because, when we reflected on what the core difference was between, say, Poland and the Soviet Union, then the difference was that in the Soviet Union, if someone was sent to a labor camp, then his family would disown him [meaning their fear of state repression led them to disown an imprisoned family member]. On the other hand, with Poland, they were never able to achieve that mindset. The Poles would always tell jokes amongst themselves, and this is a basic way to push back against, so to speak, this – this oppression. You cannot even start on your way without this.

ANDRZEJ GWIAZDA: For my part, I would like to add one important thing: that if [your] totalitarian system collapses, do not sink into euphoria: now we have toppled the system, because the toppling of a totalitarian system is only the beginning of a difficult path of building a new system. And so if I were to give advice, then the system [you are building] should be designed for the country for which it is being made.

Andrzej Gwiazda, born in 1935 in Pinczow, Poland, and his wife, Joanna Duda-Gwiazda, born in 1939 in Krzemieniec, Poland, were prominent anticommunist opposition leaders in the 1970s and 1980s.

Andrzej studied electronics at Gdansk University of Technology and graduated in 1966. Joanna Duda graduated from the Gdansk University of Technology in 1963 with a degree in engineering and shipbuilding.

After marrying in 1961, Andrzej and Joanna became more active in opposition movements. Andrzej participated in the student protests against the Polish government in 1968; he also took part in the December 1970 demonstrations that were sparked by sudden increases in food prices. In 1976, the Gwiazdas wrote a letter to the Polish Parliament expressing their support for the Workers’ Defense Committee, an anticommunist underground civil society organization in the 1970s, formed to provide assistance to laborers and others persecuted by the government. Soon after, the Gwiazdas were officially banned from leaving Poland and were placed under surveillance.

In 1978, Andrzej helped to found the Free Trade Unions of the Coast and began publishing and delivering its bulletin, Worker of the Coast. Joanna worked as the bulletin’s editor. Andrzej was a member of the Presiding Committee of the Strike at Gdansk’s Lenin Shipyard in August 1980, a workers strike that attracted nationwide, popular support and forced the communists to the negotiating table. Joanna also participated in the Lenin Shipyard strike and, along with her husband, co-authored the 21 demands issued by the Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee to the communist authorities advocating for the establishment of an independent trade union and other workers’ rights. The government accepted these demands in what became known as the Gdansk Agreement.

In 1980, Andrzej became the Vice President of the Founding Committee of Solidarity, and served as the Vice President of Solidarity, the first independent labor union in the communist world that transformed into a nationwide freedom movement. Joanna was a member of the Regional Board of Solidarity in Gdansk until December 1981, when the Gwiazdas were imprisoned after the government declared martial law in an effort to crackdown on political opposition. Joanna was released in July 1982 and Andrzej was held in prison until May 1985.

While the Gwiazdas opposed the Round Table Talks that led to semi-free elections in 1989, believing that Solidarity shouldn’t meet the demands of a weakening Communist Party, they remained active in their opposition to communism until its collapse. They have since retired to Gdansk.