The reviewed book is, in a way, a continuation of the author's earlier reflections on fascism in the political thought of the Polish interwar far right. This time the aim is to show how the crisis of democracy in the 1930s and the growing popularity of radical nationalism were reflected in the discourse of the left side of the political spectrum of the Polish Second Republic. This is an ambitious undertaking, but the way in which it is carried out proves misguided in many respects.

An unquestionable advantage of this volume is that it brings out the multitude of political initiatives that most often remain in the shadow of major movements and parties of interwar Poland. Therefore, Jarosław Tomasiewicz's work may prove useful as a kind of lexicon of a considerable part of Polish political life in the 1930s. But the value of reconstructing the programs of these often marginal and ephemeral groups lies not only in filling in the blanks. Tracing the meanders of their ideologies and discourses allows also to look at the political field as a fluid configuration of not always consistent paths of Polish politicians franticly searching for an answer to the question of how to arrange the social order. Tomasiewicz juxtaposes various attempts to combine a social program with nationalism and to build a community that would be inclusive and exclusive at the same time (“Poland for the Poles, and equality and brotherhood within it,” 182). His analysis also reveal the prevalence of antisemitism, and makes it clear that Polish political thought was not immune against fascist currents.

Unfortunately, these advantages are accompanied by a considerable set of shortcomings. The book lacks any thesis or research questions and is insufficiently conceptualized: surprisingly, the author fails to engage in a consideration of the meaning of the term “the left.” Its operational definition is thus accomplished by enumeration: the study is divided into three chapters devoted to the ruling Sanacja camp, the people's movement, and left-wing parties, and within each chapter, the concrete organizations are presented. However, some of the author's decisions, such as recognition of the Legion Młodych (The Legion of the Young), despite its leftist tendencies, as the representative of the Sanacja left, are highly questionable. What is also missing is a more general introduction, mapping the Polish political scene of that period and setting these organizations and milieus in the network of relations between each other. As a result, the presentation of the numerous circles that made up the Sanacja camp may be illegible for the less accomplished reader.

The book also lacks the cultural and social context within which the analyzed organizations operated and formulated their programs. Tomasiewicz does not offer any preliminary considerations on the role of fascism as an element of the Zeitgeist and does not attempt to answer the question what it actually meant when one of the cited publicists proclaimed: “We are the people of the fascist era…, but… we are not fascists” (49). Moreover, even for a historian of ideas it should be clear that the socio-political thought of the 1930s simply ought not to be subjected to reflection without referring to the profound experience of the Great Depression. Yet Tomasiewicz mentions it only twice, in passing.

The book does not always work even as a lexicon because it lacks consistency. In some cases it presents, for example, who the leading ideologists of a given milieu were; in others, it does not. The author places one of the pro-government organizations of rural youth in the chapter on the Sanacja camp, while another is placed in the section on the people's movement. The analysis of the thought of the Polish Socialist Party is to a large extent done through the prism of the works of a sole publicist, whose ties with the party—as Tomasiewicz himself admits—were loose. What is worse, the author in no way justifies this choice, creating an impression of randomness. The chapters on people's and socialist movements seem more random and superficial in general anyway.

In conclusion, and taking into consideration the small volume of the reviewed study, it can be said that the book would be a much more coherent proposal if the thematic scope was limited (such as to the Sanacja camp), and the valuable analysis were supported by more synthetic perspectives and developed conceptualization.