An Epochal Shift

For months, Poland's Communist Party had been losing its grip on power. Beset by strikes, debt ridden, repudiated by an overwhelming majority of voters in elections in June, the regime was drained of the ability to govern. After more than 40 years in power, the old order staggered toward its demise. And yet the alternative seemed inconceivable. Never in Europe's postwar history had a Communist government handed authority over to a non-Communist opposition.

Suddenly last week, the inconceivable happened. After a spate of parliamentary maneuvering by the Solidarity trade-union movement, President Wojciech Jaruzelski, who smashed Solidarity in 1981 and interned its leader, Lech Walesa, along with more than 6,000 other members, was forced to turn to his foes to form a government. Jaruzelski asked Tadeusz Mazowiecki, 62, a Solidarity lawyer and journalist, to become the first non-Communist Prime Minister in the Soviet bloc since 1948 and to head up a ruling coalition.

At week's end Walesa and Mazomet in Gdansk to plan their next steps. At the same time, the Central Committee of the Communist Party, officially known as the Polish United Workers' Party, convened in Warsaw to discuss Jaruzelski's move. Poland's official news agency, P.A.P., reported that the President will send the Prime Minister's name to the Sejm, or lower house of parliament, early this week for ratification.

Although Mazowiecki's appointment opened a new chapter in Polish history, the Communists still retained formidable power. Even before Mazowiecki was tapped by the President, Solidarity told the Communists they would continue to hold the key Defense and Interior Ministry -- and perhaps the Foreign Ministry -- portfolios in any new government, and Walesa assured Moscow that Poland would remain a member of the Warsaw Pact. The Communists also retained their monopoly on positions within the bloated bureaucracy.

Nonetheless, last week's seismic developments in Poland reverberated from Moscow to Washington and beyond. The Kremlin said Jaruzelski's decision was Poland's business, but the success -- or failure -- of a government led by a & non-Communist in Warsaw is bound to have an impact on Mikhail Gorbachev's political reforms in the Soviet Union. The West applauded carefully, wary that too hearty a response might be considered meddling that could unbalance the delicate experiment. "We would encourage a non-Communist government in the process of pluralism, of course," said presidential spokesman Marlin Fitzwater. But George Bush "would not want to do anything or say anything to upset the applecart."

In the past, said Adrian Hyde-Price of London's Royal Institute of International Affairs, "the Soviets would have invaded by now." This time, most Western analysts are convinced, Moscow will allow Poland to try a pluralistic approach -- as long as the new, Solidarity-led government honors its pledge not to leave the Warsaw Pact. "As long as Gorbachev is in power, there will be no direct interference," predicted Hartmut Jaeckel, a Polish specialist at the Free University of Berlin.