142 LUDfor buying food from the Polish peasantry, thus eliminating the German or
Jewish middleman. The stimulus given to the awakening national consciousness
is obvious. The Prussian example was followed in Austria in the 1890s by the
proliferation of the so-called Kasy Stefczyka or 'Stefczyk's Tills' - mutual credit
societies organized on lines pioneered by F. Stefczyk (1861-1924) - and in
Russia, with less success, by attempts after 1905 to found co-operative food
stores. In the inter-war period, the co-operative movement, encouraged by the
law of 192.0, blossomed mightily. The Co-operative Union, Spotem (Together),
and its various successors opened branches in every region of the Republic, and
was supported by every national minority. According to the figures for 1937, a
total of 12,860 co-operatives represented 7,812 Polish, 3,516 Ukrainian and
Byelorussian, 773 Jewish, and 759 German organizations: analysed by type, they
counted 5,517 credit societies, 2,973 agricultural-food, 1,804 food consumer
societies, and 1,498 dairies. Total membership topped three million. As shown
by repeated attempts to bring it under central political control - in 1938 by the
Sanacja regime, in 1939 by the Nazi and Soviet occupation authorities, and in
1948 by the People's Democracy - the co-operative movement represented a
strong and independent feature of Polish social and economic life. Significantly
enough Edward Abramowski (1868-1918), the leading theorist of Polish co-
operativism and one of the pioneers of social psychology, advocated the concept
of ethical anarchy, where the free will of autonomous social groups was given
precedence over the claims of the sovereign state.^8
The Polskie Stronnictwo Ludowe (The Polish Peasants' or People's Party,
PSL) was founded in Rzeszow in July 1895, in prospect of the forthcoming
Galician elections, by a group of politicians who had long been active in peas-
ant circles. Jakub Bojko (1857-1943), Jan Stapiriski (1867-1946), the long-
serving editor of Przyjaciel Ludu (The People's Friend), Boleslaw Wyslouch
(1855-1937) and their associates, quickly rose to prominence both in Galicia
and in Vienna. In the course of the next two decades they launched a party
which was to remain a major factor in Polish politics for fifty years. For many
reasons, however, they failed to mobilize the peasantry into a unified political
force. Their influence in Prussia, and in Russia where a separate PSL
'Wyzwolenie' operated from 1915, was limited. Persistent differences over
social priorities and political tactics, over attitudes to the landowners, the
clergy, the national minorities, and the government of the day, led to constant
schisms. The right-wing VSh-Piast under Wincenty Witos (1874-1945) parted
company from Stapinski's radical VSL-Lewica (Left) as early as 1914. Further
fragmentation occurred in 1926 with the secession of Dqbski's Stronnictwo
Chlopskie (Peasant Movement). Brief appearances in Witos's coalition govern-
ments in 1920-1, 1923, and 1926, did no more to enhance the PSL's influence
than did participation in the 'Centre-Left' Opposition in 1929, or the formation
of the federated Stronnictwo Ludowe in 1931. The massive revival of the move-
ment in 1944-7 served only to arouse the hostility of the USSR and the commu-
nists, who effectively organized its suppression.^9