>"It’s a particular comparison point for me, as it has a similar (vaguely) recent history to Poland, having regained its independence in 1918, and living in Russia’s shadow most of that time. The difficult, exploitative years under the Russian thumb are usually blamed for most of the mess in Poland right now. Clearly there is another way."
Poland seems to be doing much better than many of the other countries which suffered behind the iron curtain. The comparable countries would seem to be the other former members of the Warsaw Pact: Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, and Romania.
Economically, yes, possibly. I'm rather concerned about the societal growth. Poland is, if anything, growing more intolerant, partisan, narrow-minded, and at times just outright stupid.
For example, the current, still fairly popular government, is alienating literally all allies around, for no apparent reason. Pissing off Americans over a forced sale of a US-owned TV channel, pissing off the EU for a host of petty and ultimately futile little sorties for years now, pissing off Czechs over an, ultimately, minor border conflict to do with a power plant, perpetual beef with Russia. Out of all our neighbours, we're not in conflict only with the Baltic Sea right now, but it's still early in the day.
This has all in fact intensified over the last few months, which see hybrid aggression from Belarus and a Russian army ready to strike at Ukraine, Poland's immediate neighbour. So not a good time to alienate allies and friends.
And worst of all, this seems to be popular. Screw these meddling foreigners. Education is being ripped to shreds for ideological battles. School history is being replaced with "History and Present", where the "Present" is literally recounting how amazing the current government is. Public funds are being raided for political points.
Meanwhile, Finland seems calm and collected. For its 2018 100th anniversary of independence, they built a huge library, and IIRC sent every child a book. Poland founded an enormous museum to its own awesomeness, somewhere in the middle of nowhere (so it can be grand enough), and hasn't finished it still in December 2021.
Poland seems to be doing much better than many of the other countries which suffered behind the iron curtain. The comparable countries would seem to be the other former members of the Warsaw Pact: Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, and Romania.