Milicja

Milicja is a term used in Polish and other Slavic languages to denote a militia or police force, typically civilian or semi-military. In Poland, the term is most closely associated with the state police during the communist era, when the national police service was known as Milicja Obywatelska (MO).

Milicja Obywatelska existed from the mid-1940s until 1990, operating under the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Its duties included maintaining public order, traffic control, and criminal investigation; it also engaged in political surveillance and the suppression of opposition, contributing to a controversial record in the later years of the Polish People's Republic.

After the fall of communism, reforms prompted by the Round Table talks led to modernization and renaming. In 1990 the Milicja Obywatelska was renamed Policja (Police) and restructured to align with democratic policing standards and Western models; the term milicja gradually fell from official use and today is primarily historical.

In other contexts, militsiya (the Russian form) and related terms referred to internal security or police forces in the former Soviet sphere and in some post-Soviet states. The root milic- appears in several languages, reflecting a broader concept of a citizen militia or state-controlled police. In contemporary Polish usage, milicja is generally obsolete outside historical discussions and is mainly encountered in references to the communist era.