The polish civil status registration system – the longue durée of the Prussian idea

Abstract

In the article, the author writes about his conception of the longue durée of the civil status registration system in Poland. Its modern history began in 1874 while the Prussian administration established State and secular registry office at the territory of the West Prussia. The basic principles of the civil registration system are its secular state character, the corpus of information gathered about citizens and its connection with the lowest level of local administration. The most surprising and unknown is that they have not been changed by communist and even after 1990 in free Poland until today. The Prussian model of registration has survived two wars and several changes in the political system and statehood as well as the digital revolution. The article is based on legislation, historical and administrative literature and archival holdings. During the research, the author used historical methods, first of all, bibliographic and comparison methods.