Attempting to address the topic of this book, as announced in the title, may strike the reader as an excessively bold endeavor. However, we resolved to undertake this topic in view of its gravity for the future of our country, Poland. Irrespective of the wide variety of possible future events, Poland’s fate will remain profoundly and inseparably linked to the situation of Europe as a whole. In this book, therefore, we address many issues that we consider key to Europe’s future. We analyze issues of globalization as confronted with ever-stronger efforts to preserve the sovereignty of nation-states, in the context of the modern nature of the state and mechanisms altering that nature. We attempt to characterize the modernday social structure, accounting for phenomena of such current importance as increasing multicultural diversity and changes in the labor market. We pay close of attention to current economic issues – the role of the state, the infl uence of the development of IT technologies and the signifi cance of transnational corporations. We broadly examine the role of the fi nancial sector, including in the context of the virtual economy.
(Foreword)
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