[3] The parties and political associations belonging to the social-democratic Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) signed the "Local Government '98" (Polish: Samorządy’98) agreement on 16 June 1998, pledging to field joint candidates for municipal, district and provincial councils.

The party leaders believed that the formation of the coalition was necessary because the electoral law that was being prepared clearly favoured the large groupings (i.e. SLD and AWS), and one of the PS's main goals was to oppose the division of the political scene into post-communist and post-Solidarity groupings, and to establish a left-wing alternative for those who did not want to cast their votes for either the AWS or SLD.

It is worth mentioning the then rather exotic AWS-SLD coalition that was concluded in Racibórz, which met with a very critical reception from the AWS leaders and a rather neutral attitude from the PS politicians.

[3] In assessing the outcome of the individual groupings, there was the very good result of the SLD, which, after its defeat in the 1997 parliamentary elections, slowly began to narrow the gap with the Solidarity Electoral Action, dominant on the political scene at the time.

[3] There are two elements which contribute to the assessment of the Social Alliance's success: on the one hand, it became the third political force in the country, and - due to the balance of power in the local governments and councils - an important subject of the coalition negotiations conducted by AWS or SLD; on the other hand, the main beneficiary of the PS's success was the Polish People's Party (PSL), which took over the vast majority of the seats it won.

This was related to the fact that Labour Union's candidates dominated the lists in municipal districts where the Social Alliance did not enjoy particular support.

This is why, despite the announcement that the Social Alliance would be maintained, there were voices in the Labour Union after the elections that were critical of the establishment of cooperation with the Polish People's Party.

[3] Apart from the PSL, the radical agrarian Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland also greatly benefited from its participation in PS, giving it nationwide recognition and allowing it to emerge as the third largest party in the 2001 Polish parliamentary election.