Hilary Minc – born into a middle-class Jewish family of Oskar Minc and Stefania née Fajersztajn – was a communist politician in Stalinist Poland

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

 and pro-Soviet Marxist economist. Minc joined the Communist Party of Poland

Communist Party of Poland

The Communist Party of Poland is a historical communist party in Poland. It was a result of the fusion of Social Democracy of the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania and the Polish Socialist Party-Left in the Communist Workers Party of Poland .-1918-1921:The KPRP was founded on 16 December 1918 as...

 before World War II

World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

. Between 1944-1956, he was a member of the PWP/PUWP Politburo

Politburo

Politburo , literally "Political Bureau [of the Central Committee]," is the executive committee for a number of communist political parties.-Marxist-Leninist states:...

 of the KCPPR.

Minc was the third in command in Bolesław Bierut's political apparatus following the Soviet takeover. He served as the Minister of Industry, Minister of Industry and Commerce, and deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs during the reign of Stalinism

Stalinism

Stalinism refers to the ideology that Joseph Stalin conceived and implemented in the Soviet Union, and is generally considered a branch of Marxist–Leninist ideology but considered by some historians to be a significant deviation from this philosophy...

 in the People's Republic of Poland

People's Republic of Poland

The People's Republic of Poland was the official name of Poland from 1952 to 1990. Although the Soviet Union took control of the country immediately after the liberation from Nazi Germany in 1944, the name of the state was not changed until eight years later...

 all the way until the Polish October

Polish October

Polish October, also known as October 1956, Polish thaw, or Gomułka's thaw, marked a change in the Polish internal political scene in the second half of 1956...

 revolution of 1956.

Minc was a close associate of the Polish Communist leader Władysław Gomułka in their joint meetings with Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

 at the Kremlin

Kremlin

A kremlin , same root as in kremen is a major fortified central complex found in historic Russian cities. This word is often used to refer to the best-known one, the Moscow Kremlin, or metonymically to the government that is based there...

. Stalin personally assigned Minc first to Industry and then to Transportation ministries of Poland. Minc's wife, Julia, was an Editor-in-Chief of the Polish Press Agency

Polish Press Agency

Polish Press Agency is a Poland's news agency owned by Polska Agencja Prasowa S.A., distributing political, economic, social, and cultural press releases as well as events info and online news, in a similar way to Reuters, Agence France-Presse and AP....

until 1954.