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The Fifth Annual Ion Ratiu Democracy Lecture

Adam Michnik, a political activist and retired member of Poland's first democratic parliament, was presented the 2009 Ion Ratiu Democracy Award on December 3 at the Woodrow Wilson Center. At the event, Michnik delivered year's Ion Ratiu Democracy Lecture: Democracy: Traps and Question Marks.

Adam Michnik, a political activist and retired member of Poland's first democratic parliament, will be presented the 2009 Ion Ratiu Democracy Award on Thursday, December 3, and will deliver the 2009 Ion Ratiu Democracy Lecture at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C. He will be introduced by Zbigniew Brzezinski, former National Security Adviser to President Jimmy Carter, 1977-1981.

Thursday, December 3, 2009, 4 p.m. - 6 p.m.
6th floor Flom Auditorium
Woodrow Wilson Center
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Visit the event page for more details, and to view the live webcast at the time of the event.

Michnik is the editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza, Poland's largest daily newspaper. He was a founding member of the Komitet Obrony Robotnikow (Committee for the Defense of Workers) in 1976 and a prominent activist during the Solidarity movement in the 1980s. He participated in the Round Table Talks of 1989, and was later elected to Poland's first non-communist parliament, where he served from 1989-1991. Michnik is the author of several books, including Letters from Prison and Other Essays (1987); The Church and the Left (1993); and Letters from Freedom: Post Cold War Realities and Perspectives (1998).

The purpose of the Ion Ratiu Democracy Lecture is to bring visibility and international recognition to the ideas and accomplishments of individuals around the world who are working on behalf of democracy. The event expresses the deep commitment to democracy of the late Ion Ratiu through his contributions as a Romanian politician as well as his interest in democratic change worldwide. The Ion Ratiu Democracy Lecture aims to replicate for campaigning democrats today, whether in exile from repressive regimes or representative of today's emerging democracies, the life-changing experience in Washington, D.C., of the Romanian democrat, Ion Ratiu, in the 1970s and 1980s.

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