Editing Democratic Party – demokraci.pl (section)

===Characteristics===
The core of the Democratic Party is made up by the members of the Freedom Union (''Unia Wolności'', UW), which had so far been the most important Christian democratic group in the Polish political landscape. Since its inception in 1994, the UW had to cope with internal frictions between various factions: liberals (such as [[Leszek Balcerowicz]]), those proposing a more [[economic liberalism|liberal economic]] agenda in a more [[conservatism|conservative]], bourgeois guise (such as [[Donald Tusk]]), more progressive [[Social democracy|social democrats]] such as [[Jacek Kuron|Jacek Kuroń]], and intellectual former [[civil rights]] activists such as [[Bronisław Geremek]] or [[Tadeusz Mazowiecki]], who also has a strong background in liberal [[Roman Catholic Church|Catholicism]] and leans towards [[Christian democracy]].

In 2001, these frictions – combined with the prospect of a devastating defeat in the upcoming [[2001 Polish parliamentary election|election]] – led to an exodus of conservative and [[liberal conservatism|liberal conservative]] members around Tusk who joined former members of the UW's senior coalition partner, the conservative [[Solidarity Electoral Action]], to form the new party [[Civic Platform]].