The category of small towns is progressively polarized under the impact of metropolitan development. There is a growing diversification of such places with regard to functions performed and the overall position in settlement systems at regional and national levels. Aside from the division line which separates these towns that are located within, from those situated beyond the commuting range of large urban centres, this is increasingly related to local, territorial capital held. In general, however, the flattening of urban hierarchy and the decreasing importance of hierarchical linkages affect in particular the role of local service centres, especially in sparsely settled peripheral areas. Concerning the future, three alternative development paths are discussed in the article against the relevant conceptual background. These refer to the cyclical nature of urbanization processes, assume an extrapolation of trends observed or, alternatively, consider a containment of metropolization phenomena. With respect to policy related questions, changes in small town networks in peri-urban zones are identified as a specific, sensitive issue.

This article deals with the new Polish legislation of 9 November 2000 concerning Maritime Safety. This legislation harmonizes in detail the basic issues in what can be broadly understood as Maritime Safety. The author of this study has frequently drawn attention to the inadequacies of regulations up to now in the area of maritime safety. He has emphasized the need for legislation on maritime safety. This legislation regulates the issue ofmaritime safety in the following: ship building, and fixed machinery and equipment on board ships (articles 6-16); the qualifications and composition of the crew (articles 17-25); safety in navigation (articles 26-39); and saving life at sea (article 40-50). The legislation is of a framework kind, and the emergence of rational legal system of safety at sea depends on the addition of many executive legal instruments to the legislation. A characteristic feature of the legislation is that the requirements relating to maritime safety are based on international standards. Thus numerous regulations within the legislation refer to well-known international conventions in the area ofmaritime safety, for example, to the SOLAS, LL, CSC, COLREG, SAR, and other conventions. The legislation also contains a range of regulations relating to supervision of safety at sea, and to sanctions for non-observance of requirements relating to maritime safety. The author discusses the new legislation in its entirety, emphasizing its strong and weak points.

The article asks the questions:
– How far can the authorities interfere with freedom of speech/freedom of scientific research? By what means and how can one effectively defend oneself against direct and indirect interference and manipulation?
– Can it be punished if someone considers the results of research to violate his or her personal rights (an open catalog: e.g. good name, cult of the deceased, or even “the right to national identity and pride”)? Is it then possible to demand withdrawal/correction of the scientist's findings or compensation?
Today, threats to the freedom of scientific research are made not so much by censoring science as by threatening the autonomy of universities; controlling the conditions of doing science (its dissemination); discouraging certain topics; self-censorship caused by a chilling effect. This is dangerous in flawed democracies, where no attention is paid to pluralism in the exercise of freedom and to ensuring some minimum protection of minority interests and proclaimed views. And at the same time in poor countries, where little resources are allocated to science, which induces the phenomenon of “chasing away from the bowl” and “rewarding with a better bowl”. Money allocated to science is a very effective means of both promoting and eliminating views. The existence of this phenomenon increases the perceived threat to freedom, even without explicitly encroaching on it (the chilling effect). Freedom of speech, freedom of scientific research are exposed to a specific threat conducted on attacks and an attempt to limit or even eliminate them – paradoxically – in the name of allegedly threatened pluralism of ideas and views. In this situation, the attackers use the idea of protecting individual freedom for expansive purposes. Not in the name of freedom of expression of one's own axiology, but in the name of forbidding this expression to others.