The report refers to the years 2004-2009, during which Poland became active as a full-fledged EU member. In order to lend proper context to the subject at hand, authors of individual chapters nevertheless frequently refer to the pre-accession period, when accession negotiations were carried out and changes were introduced into Polish law, preparing it for the forthcoming accession. Works on the report were completed in February 2009. It follows that not all statistical data was available for the most recent events and processes concerning the fifth year of Poland's membership in the EU. In early 2009, it was difficult to foresee the developments in many areas of Poland's European policy, e.g. those ensuing from the advancing economic crisis. The report is composed of three parts relating to particular dimensions of the membership - the economic, social and political dimensions. An introductory chapter precedes each set of analyses for every dimension and is meant to serveas a synthesis of the findin