In this text, the authors present an overview of the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights and Polish courts – including the Constitutional Tribunal as well as ordinary and administrative courts – concerning freedom of assembly. The review covers the legal framework under both the initial, highly liberal statute adopted during the democratic transition in 1990 and the more extensive regulation introduced in 2015, together with its 2016 amendment concerning cyclical assemblies. The authors conduct a selective review, focusing on the constitutional and administrative dimensions of the law on assembly. In particular, they examine issues such as the definition of an assembly, notification requirements, grounds for prohibition, and conflicts between assembly law and other areas of administrative law, including the Public Roads Act and regulations enacted during the COVID-19 pandemic. The analysis demonstrates the key role that courts have played in shaping the proper interpretation of this fundamental civil liberty.
Bień-Kacała et al. (Mon,) studied this question.