Polish People's Party

The Polish People's Party (Polish: Polskie Stronnictwo Ludowe, abbreviated to PSL (traditionally translated as Polish Peasants' Party), is a centrist, agrarian, and Christian democratic political party in Poland. It currently has 31 members of the Sejm, one member of the Senate, and three Members of the European Parliament. It is the junior partner in a coalition with Civic Platform.

The party was formed in 1990. Originally a left-wing party, the PSL formed a coalition with the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) after winning 132 seats in the Sejm at the 1993 election, with PSL leader Waldemar Pawlak as Prime Minister until 1995. The party fell to 27 at the next election, and moved towards the centre at the end of the 1990s. In 2001, the party re-entered a coalition with the SLD, but withdrew in 2003. After the 2007 election, the PSL entered a coalition with the centre-right Civic Platform.

The party's name traces its tradition to an agrarian party in Austro-Hungarian-controlled Galician Poland, which sent MPs to the parliament in Vienna.

Read more about Polish People's Party:  Ideology, Leadership

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