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This article presents the main goals and the programme of ‘The Society of the Second Republic of Poland: An attempt at a new synthetic approach’, a research project pursued in the Institute of History, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw. A conference discussing the ways in which national and ethnic factors informed the interwar Polish society, held most recently (in 2012) as part of the project, is discussed in some detail. The article introduces the papers first delivered at the conference and now published in the present issue of Acta Poloniae Historica.