THE EVOLUTION OF THE APPROACH OF SUBSEQUENT NATIONAL SECURITY STRATEGIES OF THE REPUBLIC OF POLAND TO COUNTERACT TERRORIST THREATS

Abstract

Terrorist threats are a serious problem in ensuring national security and in order to counteract them, documents are being developed which become the basis for the creation of systems ensuring the security of each country. In Poland, such document is the national security strategy of the Republic of Poland. In the recent years, national security strategy has been changed three times. However, in the successive documents setting out the directions for shaping the country’s security systems, the approach to
the issue of terrorist threats was not treated in the same way. As such, author of this publication has undertaken an assessment of the approach of subsequent security strategies to the issue of terrorist threats in the view of changing political, military, economic and health situation
within the country and abroad. The assessment of the directions of changes was carried out on the basis of an analysis of the content of successive national security strategies, legal acts and further literature describing the subject matter of the article. The aforementioned analysis has been undertaken from the moment when Poland
become a part of Schengen area. This is due to the assumption that the abolition of border controls in the Member States allowed the free movement of people, which could become a factor conducive to the conduct of terrorist activity.