Topic: Rising Nationalism and Political Extremism
Country: Poland
Delegate Name: Annika Santos
School: Forest Hills Central High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Poland position papers GLIMUN 2018 committees
Nationalism is defined as loyalty and devotion to a nation. Extremism is defined as the advocacy of extreme measures or views. These are two very different words; people must make the distinction between these two definitions as they should not be confused with one another. A country may have nationalistic views without provoking extremism and harm on other countries. Extremism, on the other hand, has been the cause of many major wars. Of course, extremism can be seen as the largest cause of World War II with Hitler having extreme ideas of the superiority of a certain people. This resulted in the death of millions of people. In the past decade, there has been a noticeable, growing amount of nationalist movements. With the knowledge that nationalism can come to a point of reaching extremism, we must respond to these events. Poland recognizes the dangers of these ideas. However, we also must take into account the possibility that nationalism can be used positively. Recently, with the new Polish government, Poland has been put into a nationalistic category. This categorizing has been done negatively and resulted in the xenophobia of other nations; people should not be concerned. We, like many other nations, are just celebrating our independence and pride in our nation. In our most recent Independence Day march, there were multiple extremist groups—some burned an EU flag chanting “down with the European Union”. These people are a terrible representation of the Polish people and Poland recognizes that they are only a minority. As for extremist views outside of our nation, Poland is working hard to combat terrorism with Algeria in Syria, Libya, and Mali. Poland understands the fears of extremism and its dangerous effects. We are willing to work with other countries to counter the effects of extremism while reminding all countries that nationalism can be used positively; we can still build a democratic and peaceful society through national dialogue. Also, Poland recommends supporting “ local communities in order to strengthen resilience against violent extremist agendas” as stated by our UN ambassador, Minister Wronecka. It is the duty of the UN to keep a peaceful society throughout the world and to prevent the extremist ideas before they begin.
