Upcoming Oxford symposium on the Polish constitutional crisis in Polish press

The Programme for the Foundations of Law and Constitutional Government at the Law Faculty is organising a high-profile symposium on the Polish constitutional crisis, to be held on 9 May 2017. The symposium is already attracting interest from Polish media. Mikołaj Barczentewicz, a DPhil candidate in Law and one of the organisers, published an op-ed explaining the idea of the symposium in a major Polish daily ‘Dziennik Gazeta Prawna’.

 

"Among the confirmed speakers we have Polish lawyers representing very diverse perspectives on the events around the Polish Constitutional Tribunal," Barczentewicz wrote. The symposium will feature Professor Lech Morawski, elected to the Constitutional Tribunal by the current Polish Parliament, as well as some of the outspoken critics of the actions of the current Polish government. Actions that include the procedure by which Professor Morawski was elected to the Tribunal.

 

Stating the goal of the symposium, Barczentewicz wrote: "Having regard to how heated the Polish public debate is on the topic, we propose a conversation on a different level. Our goal is not to defend or to attack the current Polish government. The idea of the conference stemmed from a significant interest in the Polish situation and a desire to understand it beyond the content of newspaper headlines. Our ambition is to provide time and space for a measured, deep, but not less critical, discussion about the events around the Polish Constitutional Tribunal."