Cenzura w Polsce 1944-1960. Organizacja - kadry - metody pracy

The censorship institution was established in Poland during World War II. Offi ces responsible for the control of the media were created by offi cers of the Soviet control apparatus – Glawlit, with the support of the NKVD and, to a lesser extent, of the local communists, in all Central and Eastern European countries that were in the Soviet sphere of infl uence and in areas annexed by the Union Soviet. The Polish communists played a small role against the Soviet military and so-called advisers from Moscow in the process of creating the censorship apparatus. The most important decisions were made by the employees of Glawlit, the commands of which were considered by the Polish Workers’ Party (PWP) leadership as orders. Press publications in the West, describing the scale of Soviet crimes before 1939 and during World War II were one of the reasons for the creation of civil censorship in Poland, in addition to the existing war censorship. Stalin wanted to minimize information on the extermination of people living in the Eastern Borderlands of the Second Polish Republic, deporting hundreds of thousands of people to the USSR, the Katyn massacre and the Soviet terror, especially on the eve of the Yalta conference. The Central Press Control Offi ce, established on January 19, 1945, was almost entirely dominated by members of the PWP (80% of the staff). The fi rst censors were elected from among the offi cers of the Ministry of Public Security (MPS), the more so that until mid-November 1945 the offi ce was subordinate to the Ministry of Public Security. The employees of the MPS, and therefore censors, came from social advancement. 85% of the staff had primary or incomplete basic education and only 1% had higher education. Censorship was a tool of the party during propaganda campaigns aiming at various environments. The censors participated in a propaganda campaign directed against members and authorities of the PWP and were responsible for the liquidation (acquisition) of the peasant press, including the most popular PWP periodical – “Gazeta Ludowa”. The censors cooperated with the Security Offi ce (SO)/Security Service (SS) in the area of intimidation of PWP press journalists and contributed – by providing a lot of valuable information – to a series of arrests among the editorial staff. The PWP press was harassed by the state authorities (the apparatus of repression and censorship) in various ways, beginning with the removal of most articles and information materials (from 25% to even 75% of the total) as well as journalists were beaten and arrested. The censors participated in trials as court experts and their expert opinions were repeatedly cited in the indictments. They sometimes were the basis for the verdict. This type of their activity is the least-recognized aspect of the functioning of the control apparatus. The censors analysed books, magazines and leafl ets provided to them by the offi cers of the Security Offi ce/Security Service, less frequently by the Civic Militia, obtained during the revision of private apartments, churches and editorial offi ces, extracted from parcels and letters and travellers’ luggage crossing the border or provided by secret collaborators. The censors from the Main Offi ce and local offi ces closely cooperated with the MPS. The employees of the SO suspended or initiated media campaigns and infl uenced on the work of journalists thanks to information obtained from the censors or secret collaborators employed, inter alia, in the editorial offi ces. The information on journalists undertaking “obscene” themes, in particular those related to Soviet crimes, was collected by the heads of local censorship units and provided to the offi cers of the Security Offi ces. The censors intimidated journalists of the Catholic press by creating an atmosphere of uncertainty and fears for their own lives. The consequence of cooperation of the censors from the SO was repression aimed mainly at Catholic priests, nuns, members of the editorial offi ces of opposition writings and religious groups. The censors from the Main Offi ce for the Control of the Press, Publications, and Public Performances (MOCPPPP) participated in the works of the Evaluation Committee of Discontinued Publications, which functioned in the years 1954–1956, as the opinion-giving body of the President of the Central Offi ce of Graphic Industry Publishing and Bookselling for the withdrawal of books publications and distribution. The activities of the committee were closely related to the current propaganda needs of the party, and the lists of destroyed books illustrate how the history was falsifi ed then. The committee withdrew books published mainly in the years 1945–1951, which due to the change in the political course of the CPSU and thus the PUWP, became politically obsolete, i.e. harmful in terms of propaganda. Although, during the thaw, the censorship policy towards the domestic media was slightly liberalised, it remained restrictive in relation to foreign books and periodicals. The contents of the packages were meticulously analysed, and the objectionable publications were secretly confi scated, without informing the recipient. The packaged provided to the Customs Offi ces were controlled by customs offi cers and confi scated publications were provided to the offi cers of the Security Service or directly to the MOCPPPP and ROCPPPP. The publications provided to the censors were analysed by the employees of the Independent Foreign Language Department of the MOCPPPP, who decided whether the press and books would reach to the recipient or be destroyed. “Kultura” and books of the Literary Institute confi scated by censorship were practically inaccessible to the average reader in the 1950s. During the thaw, the situation did not improve, the monthly magazine reached to a very narrow group of readers. At the order of the most important people in the state, it was impossible to distribute “Kultura”, which was perceived as a threat in the internal dimension and inspiration for a potential opposition. The possession and sharing of the monthly magazine by the library were of interest to the Security Service. The most important libraries in the country were visited by the offi cers of the SS, who controlled the books of access, declarations of use and reversals. The publishing houses of the Literary Institute were located in closed parts of selected libraries, the so-called prohibition sections. In the Library of the University of Warsaw, the keys to the warehouse and the premises with the catalogues of registered prints were kept in a handy cash register under the director’s control and were made available only at his orders. The Main Offi ce for the Control of the Press, Publications, and Public Performances existed until 1990. Although, during this period, the organizational structure, management, staff and in 1981 the name of the offi ce changed, the mechanism of action remained unchanged.