Robotnik : A Short History of the Struggle for Worker Self Management and Free Trade Unions in Poland

Tracing the Polish labour movement over four decades, from the early strikes in Lodz to the success of the Gdansk shipyard strikes, this study of solidarity stresse that the events of the 1980s had their origins as far back as 1944.

Stefanic places the crushing of solidarity and the declaration of Martial Law in December 1981 within the framework of Polish history.

A postscript brings the story up to the summer of 1989 and the arrival of Tadeusz Mazowiecki as the country's first non-communist Prime Minister since 1939.