Suchergebnisse

Bilateral relations between Poland and Latin American countries have been largely determined by the history At the time when the countries of that region fought for their independence, Poland did not exist as a sovereign state and was erased from the political map of Europe for many years. Therefore, the establishment of diplomatic or commercial relations with the states of the Latin American region was not possible. However, the countries of Latin America, which in the last century began an intense process of political and economic changes, have rapidly gained recognition in international relations, which as a result influenced their relations with the rest of the world. The active policy towards the Latin American region, conducted, among the others by the European Union, including countries neighbouring Poland, as well as the growing political and economic needs of our country, pose a number of new challenges to the Latin American policy of Poland. The research area of this paper focuses on Poland's foreign policy towards some specified Latin American and Caribbean countries in the post-Cold War period from 1989/1990 to the end of 2016 (regarding also some relevant topics in the first half of 2017). The main part of the work focuses on the analysis of Poland's foreign policy in relation to several Latin American countries: Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Colombia and Venezuela. The choice of the countries was aimed at presenting Poland's relations with the main partners of our country in Latin America. In order to show the whole spectrum of Poland's foreign policy towards some specified Latin American countries, its character was described in a multidimensional manner in four different and complementary dimensions: political, economic, cultural and scientific. The main research objective of this paper has been to present the essence of Poland's foreign policy towards Latin American countries in the post-Cold War period, at a political, economic, cultural and scientific level, taking into account the key aspects of relations from previous years, as well as presenting trends and elements of continuity and change shaping policy of the Third Republic of Poland towards the countries of the Latin American region. The author's aim was to present the main dilemmas and problems of the Latin American policy of Poland, as well as potential areas and reasons for intensifying cooperation on various levels with the countries of the region, in view of the challenges facing Latin American policy of Poland in the second decade of the 21st century.

The author deals with the problem of the role played by foreign nations in the religious life of Israel as the people of Yahwe . He examines the prophetic oracles of the Old Testament where the foreign nations were mentioned in a general way i. e. without their names (about 530 vs.). His conclusions are as follows: The idea that the alien nations were a tool of punishment i the hand of God appeared earlier in the prophetic writings than the idea that the alien nations were an object of Yahwe's salvific care. Punishments and calamities sent by heaven upon sinful nations were a warning or a kind of instruction for Israel that Yahwe was the upright judge of all mankind. The nations, since they witnessed the special care of Yahwe toward the chosen People, exercised a greater or a lesser impact on the implementation of the convenant of Israel. This happened in two ways: negatively (bringing about in Israel feelings of horror, shame or fear of God) and positively (awaking an awarness of the duty to give a good example and to witness for God). In the later prophetic writings the idea emerged that the alien nations were to be gained for Yahwe, but this was more a passive than an active attitude. The prophetic utterences about the nations not mentioned by name were moral and religious admonitions and were not concerned with political affaires. Those admonitions, down the centuries, became more and more eschatological and at the time, they tended to stress the importance of cult.

The author focuses on the analysis of the participatory budgeting issue. He presents the outcomes of its three-year implementation in Warsaw's Ursynów District. He emphasises more the conclusions drawn from practice than from the confrontation of the reality with the assumptions of participatory budgeting. The participatory budget is defined as a process aimed at enabling the community to directly influence the decision to allocate part of the public budget. Within its scope the inhabitants report proposals for projects worth funding. It is a way of including them in the planning of spending public funds that have been given by the authorities at their disposal. The author formulates the thesis that the practice of the participatory budget functioning in Poland is subject to numerous procedural defects. Local governments do not always produce the right patterns for its implementation. They struggle to match these budgets to their realities and often duplicate mistakes. It is a challenge for self-government councils to use their democratic mandate to more actively shape public spending processes.