Warsaw occupied a paradoxical and central position in the dialectics of the communist period (1945–1989). Rebuilt from the ashes of 1944, the capital emerged simultaneously as the administrative center of the regime—and thus the locus of the most sophisticated security apparatuses—and as the “primary laboratory” of organized political opposition.

It was in this city that a fundamental strategic alliance crystallized, bridging historical divides: the union between the leftist intelligentsia and the Catholic Church to confront totalitarianism. Its sociopolitical density turned it into a constant battlefield where confrontation with the State was direct and often brutal, hosting numerous opposition organizations, including those linked to the exile community.

The Genesis of Social Self-Defense: KOR

Resistance in the capital underwent a crucial paradigm shift in 1976. Following the violent pacification of workers’ protests in Radom and Ursus, a group of Warsaw intellectuals—notably Jacek Kuroń, Jan Józef Lipski, and Adam Michnik—founded the Workers’ Defense Committee (KOR).

Breaking with the tradition of secret conspiracies, KOR adopted a strategy of “openness,” publishing the names, addresses, and telephone numbers of its members to challenge the State’s legitimacy and attract international attention, thereby complicating police repression. Their objective was not the seizure of power, but the reconstitution of civil society through “practical solidarity”: providing legal, medical, and financial aid to the families of repressed workers. KOR’s structure in Warsaw functioned as a center for social intelligence, gathering information on human rights abuses to disseminate via underground bulletins.

The Nervous Heart of Solidarność

This infrastructure laid the ethical and organizational foundations for the birth of the Solidarność (Solidarity) trade union in 1980. Although symbolically founded at the Gdańsk Shipyard, Warsaw functioned as its nerve center for coordination, communication, and political pressure on the government. The city demonstrated its capacity for mass mobilization, acting as an engine of popular protest where workers openly defied the government.

The Battle for the Word: NOWA and the Second Circuit

Warsaw was the epicenter of the drugi obieg (second circuit) of clandestine publications. The scale of publishing production transformed reading and editing into acts of political resistance. The publishing house NOWA (Niezależna Oficyna Wydawnicza), founded in 1977 by Mirosław Chojecki, operated as the largest underground publishing house in the Eastern Bloc, employing nearly industrial logistics to evade the secret police.

• Logistics: Paper, strictly rationed by the State, was stolen from state printing presses or bought on the black market. Production was decentralized across dozens of private apartments to prevent the Służba Bezpieczeństwa (SB) raids from dismantling the entire network.

• Content: Hundreds of banned titles were published, from Orwell (1984, Animal Farm) and Günter Grass to censored Polish sociology (such as Tadeusz Konwicki’s A Minor Apocalypse). These texts circulated even in factories, educating labor leaders and breaking the state’s information monopoly.

• Distribution: Warsaw served as a logistical node for distributing literature smuggled from the West—sometimes with the complicity of foreign intelligence agencies—and for disseminating publications from other Polish cities.

Education as Resistance: The Flying University

Faced with historical falsification in official institutions, the opposition reactivated the tradition of the Flying University, formalized in 1978 as the Society for Educational Courses (TKN), with the backing of intellectuals like Władysław Bartoszewski and Tadeusz Mazowiecki. Lectures were held in private apartments, addressing the “blank spots” (białe plamy) of official history: the Katyn massacre, the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, and socialist economic reality.

Despite harassment by “goon squads” (bojówki) organized by the SB to destroy furniture and beat attendees, these spaces consolidated as bastions of intellectual freedom. The University of Warsaw was also a space of constant tension, exemplified by the 1968 protests.

Innovation and Culture: Radio Solidarność and the Artistic Front

During martial law (1981–1983), Zbigniew Romaszewski’s team created Radio Solidarność. Using clandestine FM transmitters, they broadcast bulletins that the population acknowledged by blinking their house lights in unison, demoralizing the authorities attempting to locate them. In parallel, a “home theater” movement flourished in private apartments following the suppression of professional theater, and jazz consolidated its status as a metaphor for freedom through underground concerts.

Warsaw housed the heart of the repressive apparatus: the Ministry of Interior (MSW) and the Służba Bezpieczeństwa (SB). From there, national surveillance was coordinated, maintaining detailed files on dissidents. Repression included electronic surveillance, raids, and lethal violence, such as the massacre of workers at the Mokotów market in 1956 and the militarization during the state of siege in 1981. Despite this, the Catholic Church in Warsaw maintained its influence as a pillar of morality.