Robert Litwiński
History Notebooks, Issue 147 (4), 2020, pp. 703 - 718
https://doi.org/10.4467/20844069PH.20.038.12492The article discusses an important aspect associated with the functioning of every state, namely, the question of ensuring public security by an effective police institution. The significance of these issues was recognized already in pre-partition Poland. No wonder that during the world conflict of 1914–1918, when the hopes of Poland regaining its independence appeared, there also arose ideas for ensuring public security, peace and order in the reborn state. The first to emerge were citizens’ bodies: underlying their actions was the intention to secure persons and their property after the withdrawal of the Russians from the Kingdom of Poland. The initiatives they took resulted first in the formation of citizens’organizations, which were subsequently taken over by local government authorities. This made it possible to develop a local government model of police organization with a territorially limited range of operation. However, when the issues of public security began to be considered from the angle of administering the territory of the reborn Republic as a whole, the concept that prevailed was that of a centralized state police institution, which was brought into effect after independence was regained.