Mieczysław Rakowski

Who was Mieczysław Rakowski?

Mieczysław Rakowski was a Polish communist politician, historian and journalist. He served as an officer in the Polish People's Army from 1945 to 1949. He began his political career in 1946 as a member of the Polish Workers' Party, and from 1948 to 1990 he was a member of the communist Polish United Workers' Party, serving on its Central Committee from 1975 to 1990.

He received a doctorate in history from Warsaw's Institute for Social Sciences in 1956. Rakowski served as the second-to-last communist Prime Minister of Poland from September 1988 to August 1989. He was the last First Secretary of the PZPR from July 1989 to January 1990. However, he was not, unlike his predecessors, the de facto leader of the country; the PZPR had given up its monopoly of power in early 1989.

Rakowski was also known as one of the founders and, from 1958 to 1982, first deputy and then chief editor of the weekly newspaper Polityka, one of the most influential newspapers at the time. Today some people still remember him as a journalist and editor rather than a politician.