„Społeczeństwo obywatelskie” w Polsce Ludowej? – przypadek z Wysoczyzny Elbląskiej

Social-Economic Cooperative (SEC) in Nowy Kościół existed a few years after the end of World War II. It was an organization which members had an alternative approach to the reconstruction of the Polish State than the communists. This fact was the direct cause of the rapid elimination of Cooperative. The purpose of this paper is to test hypothesis that the SEC was characterized by features which today is attributed to ‘civil society’. To make it possible,article is divided into two parts. First part outlines the operation of the Cooperative itself. And in the second part, the author is trying to demonstrate which of the features of SEC correspond to those of ‘civil society’.