The influence of the existence of and the process of the liquidation of the Workers’ Publishing Cooperative “Press – Book – Ruch” on contemporary press system

Abstract

The article points out the problems of the influence of the political transformation in Poland on creating the contemporary press market. It explains the historical importance of the Workers’ Publishing Cooperative “Press – Book – Ruch” (WPC) in the period of the People’s Republic of Poland, which was the biggest press concern across Central and Eastern Europe and was an extremely important element of the political system which had been under the full influence of the Polish United Workers’ Party. It owned most of the press titles on Polish market, so when in 1990 the liquidation of the Collective was started, there were many significant problems of political, financial and social nature. Moreover, in the process of purchasing Polish newspapers and magazines was joined not only by domestic forces but also foreign capital and international investors, which made this privatisation even more difficult and controversial. Main problems were mentioned as well as examples of incompetence of Liquidation Committee or loopholes which caused serious difficulties.

Keywords

• foreign capital
• media
• press market
• transformation
• Workers’ Publishing Cooperative “Press – Book – Ruch