To have or to be? To go with the flow or against the grain? Magda Potorska in conversation with Barbara Nowakowska-Drozdek

As Barbara Nowakowska-Drozdek recalls: “In December 1981, I signed a letter of protest against the imposition of martial law in Poland.” The letter, which was initiated by Peter Raina and which was published in “Der Tagesspiegel”, a Berlin-based newspaper, together with our participation in the protests against martial law in Poland, led to the founding of the “Solidarność Berlin-West” working group (“AG-Solidarność”), the first organisation in West Germany that supported the Polish Solidarność movement.

The publication of the letter, which included the private address of Barbara and Wojciech Drozdek as a point of contact, meant that not only the city of Berlin and the press became interested in the couple, but also the police and various intelligence agencies. Since funds donated in support of Poland could only be received by an officially registered legal entity, it became necessary to institutionalise their activities, which until that point had been of a spontaneous nature. The main task of “AG-Solidarność” was to organise and implement voluntary support for those who were being persecuted and who had suffered under the system, particularly the Solidarność functionaries who had been imprisoned and their families. In addition, books and documents from people who had emigrated from Poland were secretly supplied to the underground opposition together with printing equipment, and contacts were cultivated with the media. The working group also provided information to the general public in Germany about the situation in Poland. 

In February 1982, Barbara Nowakowska-Drozdek and Krzysztof Kasprzyk took part in a meeting with German trade unionists and employees of Volkswagen in Wolfsburg, during which they were accompanied by Joachim Trenker, a journalist from the radio broadcaster “Sender Freies Berlin” (SFB) and a reporter for the “Kontraste” magazine. It’s no secret that in contrast to the French trade unions, the unions in Germany tended to be more reserved in their support. It was only several years later, after a deeper, more objective analysis of the facts, that the German labour organisations began to regularly (albeit discretely!) support the Independent Self-Governing Trade Union “Solidarność” (NSZZ Solidarność). In the main, this support took the form of the provision of technical equipment. However, the imposition of martial law in Poland triggered severe protests from the German Trade Union Confederation (Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund; DGB), which in turn led to rapid humanitarian assistance and the founding of the “Solidarität für Polen e. V., DGB” association in Düsseldorf. 

Its political activity aside, the Berlin association adhered to humanistic principles. Barbara Nowakowska-Drozdek and her husband Wojtek studied at the University of Łódź and are both polonists; Krzysztof Kasprzyk, their closest colleague, was originally a geographer and is now a journalist and poet. Among other things, he was the cultural officer of the student movement in the cult Gdańsk club “Żak”. Against this backdrop, the working group published its own magazine, “Przekazy” (“Communications”). It also organised exhibitions in support of Solidarność, including with artists from the GDR, presented works by Andzrej Krauze and put on concerts by Jacek Kaczmarski, a songwriter and Solidarność member, which soon became important events in the cultural calendar of West Berlin. Their activities were grounded in the principle of “working with the base”, which took the form of a Sunday school with classes teaching the Polish language for children and the establishment of a library with publications by Polish emigrants.

The institutionalisation of what had originally been spontaneous, political and yet diverse activities in a tightly structured organisation led to a rigidification of the working group. Not only that, internal conflicts, disagreement when it came to setting priorities and power struggles caused a split within the group. 

“Institutionalisation changed us. We became disillusioned and demotivated”, Barbara Nowakowska-Drozdek explains. “This insight, and my sense of responsibility towards my child, were the reasons why I withdrew from the group as an active member. And although I was elected chairwoman of the working group, I did not take up the role. Instead, my husband became the chairman. I then supported him in his public and conspiratorial work, although as an independent activist, I stepped away from the political scene in Berlin. It was not until 4 June 1989, to mark the first halfway free elections in Poland, that I made an appearance in the Polish Military Mission (Polska Misja Wojskowa) in Berlin as a shop steward of Solidarność.”