Pobierz plik - Grundtvig

1. The creation of a civic society is one of the
most important conditions for the successful
completion of the political transformation in
Poland commenced in 1989. This necessitates
changes in the citizens’ mentality, where integration
of social groups and their willingness
to participate in public life play pivotal role
in the process. That willingness pertains also
to political activity, which is frequently confused
with activities for the benefit of a specific
political party. On the other hand, public
administration needs to open up to citizens’
initiatives in an actual rather than declarative
way. We need to admit that the principle of
subsidiarity deemed fundamental in Europe
from the point of view of state organisation,
means that these initiatives or organisations
should be treated as rightful participants of
public life. This holds true also for implementing
public tasks. According to the principle of
subsidiarity, public authorities are not obliged
to tackle all tasks but rather to ensure streamlined
(i.e. rational and appropriate) implementation
thereof, by defining fundamental
criteria and monitoring tasks in a reliable way.
This role does not involve bureaucracy accompanying
public tasks, while many public institutions
tend to adopt this interpretation.
2. Senior citizens are among the most dispersed
social groups. Integrating them for representation
on the local, regional and then national
level may occur only when special instruments
are applied to ensure effectiveness. Most of
all, a network of centres to integrate senior
citizens into their environments needs to be
established. Identifying such locations and
adopting the right type of activities is of great
importance. The formula of unique publicprivate
partnership devised by TPNK and WBP
and transformed into S@S has proven to be
the right model and is shown to be effective. It
may be even regarded a model solution. Public
libraries seem to fulfil the most important
relevant criteria: they are public institutions
and they are naturally visited by members of
local communities. On top of that, they can
usually offer senior citizens facilities for their
activities while on a regional level they build
up networks of cooperation. On the other
hand, a civic organisation of international
nature (TPNK), whose members are experts
in various fields, is a strong content-related
partner facilitating attendance of European
initiatives.
3. Poland has been affected by changes related
to the family model. The traditional template
of the multi-generation family sharing a
house, with nearly constant contact between
the generations, is disappearing and is being
replaced by other models. Successive generations
living separately, with sporadic contact
and independent senior citizens is becoming
commonplace. Such circumstances pose a
threat of isolation, imposing a sense of social
‘redundancy’ often accompanied by solitude.
This is the reality in Poland, calling for the establishment
of social mechanisms which will
serve to minimise or eliminate the threats
of usually psychological rather than factual
background. Most frequently, the senior citizens‘
decision to ‘withdraw’ from social life
has no rational grounds; senior citizens have
the potential to fully participate in social life.
4. The new system solutions related to state
management and operations were adopted
in 1989 and further modified over the years.
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