The aim of this article is to refer Polybius’s political theory, included in Book VI of The Histories, to the history of the rise of the Roman Republic. This theme must have been particularly significant for Polybius. For him, Rome was the most perfect example of a mixed government system, and the aim of describing its history was to show the development of this perfect system. The article presents the mutual relation of theory and history, starting with the period of kingship, up to the emergence of the democratic element, i.e. the moment when Rome acquired the mixed system of government. Both the political and social contexts of the changes are outlined. The analysis suggests that Polybius related his political theory to the history of the state he admired, thus providing the theory with actual foundations. Reconstructing his analysis makes it possible to see the history of Rome in a different light, and to ponder the system itself and its decline, even though the main objective of both Polybius and this article is to present its development.

The article addresses the issue of the changing administration in Scotland in the period of the Wars of Scottish Independence (1296–1328). The period was marked by the conflict between Scotland and England over the dominance on the Scottish land. As the corpus of texts illustrates, English officers used the methods of exploitation and humiliation to impose their jurisdiction on Scottish administration

The article focuses on some regulations of the Polish-Magdeburg Law and the proceedings related to municipal elections in Knyszyn (a royal town in the Podlaskie Voivodeship) from 16th to the beginning of 18th century. The first, theoretical part of the article, describing pertinent rules of that law, is based on books written by the 16th-century Polish lawyers Bartholomaeus Groicki and Paulus Szczerbic. Its second part analyses some documents from the municipal records in order to explain the practice of elections in this town. Unfortunately, the number of available sources is limited, as we only have the royal privilege from 1568 A.D. and some information about the elections from 1625, 1643 and 1706. The article tries to find the answer to the following questions: the attitude of the inhabitants of that town toward the municipal offices and its representatives, the circle of persons exercising power and its stability, the infl uence of external factors on the appointment of officials. Summing up, the author points to some changes in the electoral procedure and to the multilateral interest in the results of the election.

The paper analyses the legal construction of the shares of Polish public companies in the 18th century. The analysis relied on the statutes and documents referring to the shares. The Woolen Products Manufacturing Company founded in 1766 should be considered the first Polish public company. Before 1795, i.e. before the Third Partition of the country and the subsequent lost of independence, there had been established as many as seven companies of that type. The surviving projects of statutes show that there were plans for founding several other companies. The period in which the first Polish companies functioned was short and most of them were dissolved within a few years after they had been founded. This was partly due to the difficulties in collecting the capital fund. The preserved source materials allow for an analysis of the legal nature and function performed by the shares in the construction

The process of restoration of the Kingdom of Poland was started by the Act of 5th November 1916, issued by the governments of Germany and Austria-Hungary (after pushing out the Russian army from Polish territory and establishing the Regency Council). The foundations of Polish state administration were laid by the Regency Council through establishing Polish governments with Prime Ministers. The competencies of the government were delineated by the Act of 3rd January 1918 “about the temporary organization of the head authorities in the Kingdom of Poland”. The act differentiated the executive power into the Prime Minister, the Council of Ministry and the Ministers themselves. The scope of Prime Minister’s duties was defined the Patent of 12th September 1917 and the act of 03th January 1918. Neither of the documents made it clear, however, what authority, and according to what procedure, should appoint the Prime Minister. The new government was approved by the Regency Council only as requested by the already appointed Prime Minister. For sure it highlighted the independency of the “Ministers’ President” from the rest of the government, whose work he supervised. During the time of the Regency Council five cabinets were established, including two provisional governments. Evaluating the cabinets, it should be highlighted that the cabinet of Jan Kucharzewski was the one which actively sought practical experience in managing the Council of Ministry, which later was used by their successors. Their other big achievement was preparation of a lot of projects of legal acts necessary for the development of the new Polish State. The cabinet of Jan Steczkowski continued this process, but after establishing the Council of State in June 1918 (whose role was overestimated) it slowed down in its work of overtaking the successive parts of country administration, and instead started establishing diplomatic offices, which turned out nothing but a faint attempt to show the illusory independency of the Kingdom of Poland. The cabinet of Józef Świeżyński struggled to demonstrate the independency of the Polish government in front of the German and Austrian governments, trying even to distance itself from the Regency Council. It is worth emphasizing the intense work of the provisional governments on taking over the state issues by Polish political subjects. Even though the possibilities of the first cabinets were very limited, they did establish the beginnings of Polish regular state administration and in this way educated the regular state administration officers for the future Polish State.

In 2012 Paweł Borecki and Czesław Janik published book titled (in English translation): “Churches and other philosophical organizations about new Polish constitution. Selection of documents from 1988 – 1997”. This review concerns formal, methodological aspects of above mentioned work, its contents and importance for development of scientific research in the field of opinions of Churches and other philosophical organizations on new Polish constitution and their impact on its final text. In the reviewer’s opinion discussed book made a significant contribution to this research and it is of good editorial quality.