Economic freedom and freedom of contract safeguard individual freedom and the possibility of self-fulfilment for hundreds of thousands of Polish entrepreneurs, mostly small family businesses which form the basis of national wealth.

Increasingly, the freedom to conduct one's own business is constrained by the institutions introduced into national and international law as an expression of ideologically motivated influence on the market and social life. In many countries, entrepreneurs are faced with a choice between being faithful to their conscience and fulfilling the obligations imposed on them by the law, incurring severe sanctions for being faithful to their convictions and refusing to support phenomena they perceive as objectively evil.

The Ordo Iuris Institute monitors and analyses draft versions of Polish and EU legal acts and examines Polish and international jurisprudence in terms of their impact on the freedom of contract and the ability to conduct business activities in accordance with one's conscience.

Our actions, in which we draw on the experience of other European countries, bring concrete results. In December 2014, the Parliamentary Commission for the EU affairs unanimously adopted the desideratum, prepared by the Ordo Iuris Institute and Centrum im. Adama Smitha (the Adam Smith Centre), calling on the government to withdraw their support for the draft EU directive threatening freedom of conscience and economic freedom. We have also actively and effectively counteracted attempts to push through, on the pretext of developing an anti-discrimination policy, laws restricting economic freedom, freedom of contract and freedom of expression in the media and advertisement.