As democracies around the world face growing polarization, the North American launch of Let’s Agree on Poland: A Case Study of Constitutional Design (Oxford University Press, 2025) offers a timely reflection on institutional renewal. Emerging from an unlikely coalition of 130 Polish thinkers across the ideological spectrum, the project shows that constitutional imagination remains possible even in deeply divided societies. The Polish edition became a national bestseller and was described by Polityka as “the most important book on Polish politics since 1989.”

The English edition broadens this debate, presenting Poland’s constitutional crisis not as an isolated drama but as part of a wider democratic predicament. Moreover, it uses the Polish experience to explore how societies fractured by ideology and identity can still forge durable institutional settlements. Rather than relying solely on adversarial tactics—such as cordons sanitaires or judicial resistance—the project proposes a contractarian logic: institutions designed not for domination but for coexistence.

The event highlights key democratic dilemmas, including the rise of populism, the fragility of judicial independence, and the limits of electoral turnover as a stabilizing mechanism. Comparative insights from the United States further underline the urgency of designing systems resilient to polarization. Ultimately, this debate moves beyond diagnosis. It points toward credible alternatives—frameworks capable of accommodating pluralism and sustaining democracy through difference rather than despite it.